The tyrant, Hermann Gessler, made Tell the victim of a savage jest. He could have his freedom if he shot an apple from the head of his son Walter. If he missed or refused, he would be executed.
Outside the village of Altdorf, Tell faced his son. One deadly bolt lay on his crossbow. Another jutted from his belt. He fired—and the apple split in two. Why, asked Gessler, had he taken the second bolt from his quiver?
"It was for your heart if the first had harmed so much as a hair of my son's head," replied Tell. Gessler yelled to his soldiers, "Take him to the castle." Tell was bundled into a boat with Gessler, and his guards took him across Lake Uri to Gessler's grim fortress.
On the way a storm blew up. The guards freed Tell so that he could guide them to shore. He did—then leaped out and pushed the boat back into the lake.
Gessler's men were swept to their deaths, but the tyrant himself struggled back to shore. Tell was waiting with his second bolt. He fired— and Switzerland was free of the Austrian yoke.
William Tell's story was first told in the Swiss chronicles of Aegidius Tschudi, a 16th-century writer, about 200 years after Tell was: supposed to have lived. But there is no contemporary evidence that Tell or Gessler existed;
It seems that Tschudi's account is a embellishment of an 11th-century legend, for stories of expert archers occur all over northern Europe. Tschudi only added details—and made Tell the Swiss folklore hero he is todav.
