YOUR correspondent Raymond Jacobs (July 10) may like to know that according to legend, ''Gessler'' was the name of the Austrian bailiff who ordered William Tell to shoot the apple off his son's head with a crossbow - hence the ''Tell'' tale governor.

K Kerr,

31 Auchinlea Drive, Cleland. July 11.

AS any schoolboy of the 1950s might tell you, the two best TV programmes of that era had something in common. These were The Lone Ranger which had part of the William Tell overture as its theme music, and The Adventures of William Tell. The latter featured, as the ''baddy'', a governor of Tell's area of Switzerland who was named Gressler, hence the clue.

Apparently, the definition of an intellectual is one who can listen to the theme of the William Tell overture without envisaging ''The Man in the Mask''. Rules me out.

Bob Stobie,

30 Millersneuk Avenue, Lenzie. July 11.

I'M sure Raymond Jacobs (July 10) knows that the Austrian governor in the Swiss patriotic story of William Tell is called Gessler. It is very tyrannous of The Herald's crosswordsmith to invent a Gressler just to fit his grid. This linguistic aggression is almost imperious in its estuarine imprecision.

Tim Cox,

34 Dunbar Road, North Berwick.

July 10.