“I never heard that any one insisted on this being the original building,” said Herr H----. “It is probably an improvement on it; but it was not the fashion in those times--for people were not then incredulous--to put up tablets recording changes and renovations, as nowadays at Kaltbad and Klösterle, for instance. But speaking dispassionately, Mr. George, it seems to me quite impossible that the introduction of any legend from Denmark or elsewhere could have taken such strong hold of a people like these mountaineers without some solid foundation, especially here, where every inhabitant is known to the other, and the same families have lived on in the same spots for centuries. Why is it not just as likely that the same sort of event should have occurred in more than one place? And as to its not being mentioned in the local documents, that is not conclusive either; for we all know how careless in these respects were the men of the middle ages, above all in a rude mountain canton of this kind. Transmission by word of mouth and by religious celebrations is much more in character with those times. I go heart and hand with your own Buckle, who places so much reliance on local traditions. The main argument used against the truth of the story is, you know, that it was first related in detail by an old chronicler called Ægidius Tschudi, a couple of hundred years after the event. But I see nothing singular in that; for most probably he merely committed to writing, with all the freshness of simplicity, the story which, for the previous two hundred years, had been in the hearts and on the lips of the peasants of this region. No invention of any writer could have founded chapels or have become ingrained in the hearts of the locality itself in the manner this story has done. It was never doubted until the end of the last century, when a Prof. Freudenberger, of Bern, wrote a pamphlet entitled _William Tell: a Danish Fable_.” “Yes,” broke in little Emily, latest translator of Schiller, and who had been listening attentively to our discussion, “and the people of the forest cantons were so indignant that the authorities of Uri had the pamphlet burned by the common hangman, and then they solemnly proclaimed its author an outlaw.” “I told you, Mr. George, that you were on dangerous ground here,” said Herr H----, laughing. “I must make him kiss this earth before he leaves,” said Mrs. C----, “as I read lately of a mother making her little son do when passing here early in this century, regarding it as a spot sacred to liberty. She little thought a sceptic like you would so soon follow.” “Well! I am _almost_ converted,” he answered, smiling, “but I wish Miss Emily would tell us the story of Tell’s jumping on shore here,” trying to draw out the enthusiastic little prodigy.