Nearly in the centre of Switzerland, around the Lake of Luzern, were the Forest Cantons of Schwyz, Uri, and Unterwalden; defended on the north by the stormy waves of the lake, on the south by inaccessible peaks and glaciers, on the side of Germany by precipices and unbroken forests, and the Rigi in the midst. This district was inhabited by a shepherd race; the elevated and barren site of their habitations had secured them from the cruel caprices of the petty tyrants who ruled over the lower valleys, and they governed themselves under the forms of a republic. Rudolph of Hapsburg, the father of the founder of the House of Austria, a distinguished soldier and leader of the Zurich troops, the son of an Alsatian landgrave, had his castle near the confluence of the Reuss and Aar, and in 1257 was voluntarily chosen by the people as their governor. Sixteen years later he ascended the imperial throne of the Roman Empire of Germany; for eighteen years he kept the throne, and, remembering that he was by birth a native of Switzerland, he protected his countrymen from oppression, and was esteemed for his humanity, prudence, and valor. He gave firm assurance that he would treat them as worthy sons of the Empire, with inalienable independence; and to that assurance he remained true till his death, which happened in 1291. His son, Albert, who had been made Duke of Austria, ascended the throne. He was grasping and eager to make territorial acquisitions. He desired to be first Duke of Helvetia, and proposed to these Forest Cantons that they should sever their relationship, as a province of the German Empire, and become a member of his Dukedom. Though Emperor of Germany, he was Duke of Austria, and his ambition was to aggrandize the Austrian House. The peasants rejected his proposition. Jealous of this remnant of independence, which the snows and rocks had left to the peasants of upper Helvetia, he undertook to subjugate them. Failing to seduce them by diplomacy or pretended kindness, he sent _landvogts_, or governors, to reside in their midst; these governors bore the title of Imperial Bailiffs. Instead of sending, as was usual, some noblemen for imperial governors, whose functions were only those of high judges in capital crimes, he sent two dependants of his family, men whose dispositions were as hostile and cruel as their orders. Their mission was to goad and persecute the people into some act of rebellion, that might be used as a pretext for reducing them to the level of common slavery. There were two of these bailiffs, Berenger and Gessler, the former stationed at Sarnen, the latter at Altdorf; they were unbounded in their tyrannies, using their powers wantonly, with all the stings of insolent authority. Gessler was the most cruel; he pillaged private property, imprisoned husbands, carried off the wives, and dishonored the daughters. It was now the beginning of the fourteenth century, and the country was in a degraded and miserable condition.