Are all resolved in favor of delay?

[The majority raise their hands.]

STAUFFACHER (counting them).

Twenty to twelve is the majority.

FUeRST.

If on the appointed day the castles fall,
From mountain on to mountain we shall speed
The fiery signal:  in the capital
Of every Canton quickly rouse the Landsturm.[55]
Then, when these tyrants see our martial front,
Believe me, they will never make so bold
As risk the conflict, but will gladly take
Safe conduct forth beyond our boundaries.

STAUFF.

Not so with Gessler.  He will make a stand. 
Surrounded with his dread array of horse,
Blood will be shed before he quits the field,
And even expell’d he’d still be terrible. 
’Tis hard, nay, dangerous, to spare his life.

BAUM.

Place me where’er a life is to be lost;
I owe my life to Tell, and cheerfully
Will pledge it for my country.  I have clear’d. 
My honor, and my heart is now at rest.

REDING.

Counsel will come with circumstance.  Be patient! 
Something must still be to the moment left. 
Yet, while by night we hold our Diet here,
The morning, see, has on the mountain tops
Kindled her glowing beacon.  Let us part,
Ere the broad sun surprise us.

FUeRST.

Do not fear. 
The night wanes slowly from these vales of ours.

[All have involuntarily taken off their caps, and contemplate the breaking of day, absorbed in silence.]

ROeSSEL.

By this fair light which greeteth us, before
Those other nations, that, beneath us far,
In noisome cities pent, draw painful breath,
Swear we the oath of our confederacy! 
A band of brothers true we swear to be,
Never to part in danger or in death!

[They repeat his words with three fingers raised.]

We swear we will be free, as were our sires,
And sooner die than live in slavery!

[All repeat as before.]

We swear, to put our trust in God Most High,
And not to quail before the might of man!

[All repeat as before, and embrace one another.]

STAUFF.

Now every man pursue his several way
Back to his friends, his kindred, and his home. 
Let the herd winter up his flock, and gain
In secret friends for this great league of ours! 
What for a time must be endured, endure,
And let the reckoning of the tyrants grow,
Till the great day arrive when they shall pay
The general and particular debt at once. 
Let every man control his own just rage,
And nurse his vengeance for the public wrongs: 
For he whom selfish interests now engage
Defrauds the general weal of what to it belongs.

[As they are going off in profound silence, in three different directions, the orchestra plays a solemn air.  The empty scene remains open for some time, showing the rays of the sun rising over the Glaciers.]