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A UTHOR: 
 
 VIEUSSEUX, ANDRE 
 
 TITLE: 
 
 THE HISTORY OF 
 SWITZERLAND ... 
 
 PLACE: 
 
 LONDON 
 
 DA TE: 
 
 1846 
 
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 LIBRARY 
 
 m 
 
 
 
Xp^ Jhcrt, 
 
 /S^f, 
 
THE 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
COMMITTEE. 
 
 CAa.Vman.-The Right Hon. LORD BROUGHAM. F.R.S., Member of the National 
 
 Institute of France. 
 
 rice-Chairman—J OHy WOOD, Esq. 
 
 Treasurer.-M'ILLIAM TOOKE, Esq., F.R.S. 
 
 A. Ainger, Esq. "" 
 
 n'.AIIen,E8q.,F.R.and R.A.S. 
 
 Capt. Beaufort. R.N.,F.R. 
 and R..\.S., Hjdrographerto 
 the Artmiraltv. 
 
 G. Birkbeck, M.D. t, 
 
 G. Burrows, M.D. 
 
 Peter Stafford Carey,Esq.,A.M. 
 
 John Conolly, M.D. 
 
 William Coulson, Esq. 
 
 R. D. Craig, Esq. 
 
 J. F. Davis, Esq., F.R.S. 
 
 H. T. Delabeche, Esq., F.R.S. 
 
 The Rt. Hon. Lord Denman. 
 
 Samuel Duckworth, Esq. 
 
 The Right Rev. the Bishop of 
 
 Durham, D.D. 
 SirH.EUis.Prin. Lib.Brit.Mus. 
 T.F. Ellis, Esq.,A.M.,F.R.A.S. 
 John Elliotson, M.D., F.R.S. 
 George Evans, Esq., M.P. 
 Thomas Falconer. Esq. 
 I. L. Goldsmid, Esq., F.R. and 
 R.A.S. 
 
 Fras. Henrv Goldsmid, Fgq. 
 B. Gompertz, Esq., F.R. and 
 
 K. A.S. 
 J. 1". Graveg, Esq. , A.M.,F.R.S. 
 G. B. (ireenough, Esq., F.R., 
 
 and I..S. 
 M. D. Hill, Esq. 
 Rowland Hill, Esq., F.R.A.S. 
 The Right Hon. Sir J.C. Hob- 
 house. Bart., M.P. 
 T. Hodskin. M.D. 
 David jardine, Esq., A.M. 
 Henry B. Ker, Esq. 
 Thos. Hewitt Kev, Esq., A.M. 
 Sir Chas. Lemon, Bart., M.P. 
 George C.Lewis, Esq., A.M. 
 Thomas Henry Lister, Esq. 
 James Loch, Esq.,.Ar.P.,F.G.S. 
 George Loni?, Esq., A.M. 
 H. Maiden. Esq., A.M. 
 A. T. .Malkin, Esq , A.M. 
 James Manning, E.sq. 
 R. I. Murchison, Esq. F.R.S . 
 F.G.S. 
 
 The Right Hon. Lord Nugent. 
 
 W. S. O'Brien, Esq., M pT 
 
 The Right Hon. Sir H Pamell, 
 Bt.,M.P 
 
 Richard Quain, Esq. 
 
 Dr. Roget.Sec. R.S., F.R.A.S. 
 
 Edw. Romilly, Esq., A.M. ' 
 
 R. W. Rothman, E»q., A.M. 
 
 Rt. Hon. Lord J. Russell, M.P. 
 
 SirM. A. Shee.P.R.A., F.R.S. 
 
 The Right Hon. Earl Spencer. 
 
 Sir G. Staunton, Bart., M.P 
 I John Taylor, Esq., F.R.S. 
 ' Dr. A. T. Thomson, F.L.S. 
 
 Thomas Vardon, Esq. 
 
 James Walker, Esq., F R.S. 
 Pr. Inst. Civ. Eng. 
 
 H. Way mouth, Esq. 
 
 J. Whishaw, Esq.A.M, F.R.S. 
 
 Thos. Webster. Esq. 
 
 The Hon. J. Wrottesley, A.M.. 
 
 F.R.A.S. 
 J. A. Yates,Esq.,M.P. 
 
 Alton, Stafordahire—Rev. J. P. 
 
 Jones, 
 .(fngfejea— Rev. E. Williams. 
 Rev. W. Johnson. 
 Mr. Miller. 
 Afhburton—J. F. Kingston, Esq. 
 
 Barnstaole BancVaft, Esq. 
 
 William Gribble. Esq.. 
 Belfast — Dr. Drummond. 
 Birmingham — .1. Corrie, Esq., 
 F. R.S., Chairman. 
 Paul M. James, Esq., Treat. 
 Bridport—Ja». Williams, Esq. 
 Uristol—J. N. Sanders, Esq., 
 F.G.S., Cliairman. 
 J. Remolds, Esq., Treaa. 
 J. B. l:stlin, E«q., F.L.S.,See. 
 Calcutta— J nmes Young, Esq. 
 
 C. H. Cameron, Esq. 
 Cambridge Rev. James Bow- 
 stead, M.\. 
 Rev. Prof. Henslow, M.A., 
 
 F.L.S. H G.S. 
 Rev. Leonard Jenvns, M.A.. 
 F.L.S. ■ ' 
 
 Rev. John F.odge, M.A. 
 Rev. Prof Sedgii-ick, M.A.. 
 F.R.S. & G.i5. 
 Canterburij— John Brent, Esq., 
 Alderman. 
 William Masters, Esq. 
 Can<on— \Vm. Jardine, Esq., 
 President. ^ 
 
 Robt. Inglis, Esq., Treas. 
 Rev. C. Briderman, ) 
 Rev. C. Gutziaff, }Sees. 
 
 J. R. Morrison, Esq., I 
 Cardigan— Ri:y. J. Blackwell, 
 M.A. [F.H.S.E. 
 
 CaWiv'e— Thomas Barnes,M.D., 
 Carnarvon— R. A. Poole, Esq. 
 
 William Roberts, Esq. 
 CA*«fcr — Henrv Potts. EJsq. 
 Chichester— J oUn Forbes, M.D 
 F R S 
 C. C. bendr, Esq. 
 Cockermnuth — Rev. J. Whit- 
 ridge. 
 Cor/«— lohn Crawford, Esq. 
 
 Mr. Plato Petrides. 
 Co-}entry AnluirGregory.Esq 
 DenbiiXh- John MadocVs, Esq. 
 
 Thomas E»ans. Esq. 
 Derhif -Josep'.i Strutt, Esq. 
 
 Edward Strutt, Esq., M.P 
 Dtvonport and Stonehonse— 
 , John Cole, Esq^ 
 Norman, ^q 
 
 LOCAL COMMITTEES. 
 
 Lt.-Col. C 
 F.R.S. 
 
 Hamilton Smith, 
 
 Dublm—T. Drummond, Esq., 
 R.E., F.R.A.S. ^ 
 
 Edinburgh Sir C. Bell. 
 
 I F.R.S.L. and E. 
 
 ; E»ruria— Jos. Wedgwood, Esq. 
 
 I Exeter— J. TvrreM. Esq. 
 
 I John Milford. Esq. (Coaver.) 
 
 , Glamorgnnshire—Dr. .Malkin, 
 
 I Cowbridge. 
 
 W. Williams, Esq, Aber- 
 pergwm. 
 G/a«goMj_K. Pinlav, Esq. 
 Professor Mvlne.' 
 Alexander McG rigor, Esq. 
 James Coupcr, Esq. 
 A. J. D. D'Orsey.ksq. 
 G'iernse,/-F.C. Lukis, Esq. 
 Hm//— J.C. Parker, Esq. 
 Leamington Spa— Dr. Loudon, 
 
 M.D. 
 Leedj—J. Marshall, Esq. ' 
 Le,ce3—.h W. Woollgar, Esq. 
 Liverpool ImcuI Asmriatinn — 
 W. W. Currie, Esq., Chair- 
 man, 
 3. Mulleneux, Esq., Trco*. 
 Rev. Dr. Shepherd. 
 Maidenhead— R. Goolden, Esq., 
 
 -VajWsfon.?— Clement T. Smyth, 
 
 Esq. 
 
 John Case, Esq. 
 
 Mnlmesbury—B. C. Thomas, 
 Ksq. 
 
 Manchester Local Assoeialinn— 
 G.W'.Wnoii, Esq., C/iaji77ian. 
 Sir Benj. Hevwood, Treas. 
 T. W. Winstanlev, Esq., Hon. 
 
 See. 
 SirG. Philips, Bart., M.P. 
 Benj. Gott, Esq. 
 itfa,</iam— Rev. George Wad- 
 
 dington, M..A. 
 Mtrthyr Tydvil-J. J. Guest, 
 Esq., M.P. 
 
 j Minehinhamplon John G. 
 
 [ Ball, Esq. 
 
 Monmouth— J. H. Moggrid-'e 
 Esq. o3""=e, 
 
 AVa//i— John Rowland, Esq. 
 Neiceastle—Rev. W.Turner 
 T. Sopwith, Esq.. P.G.S.' 
 Neicport, Isle of JVight—Ahr. 
 Clarke, Esq. 
 T. Cooke, Jun., F..sq. 
 R. G. Kirkpatrick, Esq. 
 Keipport PagneU — J. Millar, 
 Esq. 
 
 K^ewfown, Monlgomerythire—— 
 W. Pugh, Esq "^ 
 
 THOMAS COATES, E^., Secretary, 59. Lincoln'-inn Fields 
 
 iVbrirwrn— Richard Bacon, Esp, 
 
 Wm. Forster, Esq. 
 Orsett, Essex — Dr. Corbett, 
 
 M.D. 
 Oxford— Dr. D.iubeny, F.R.S., 
 Prof. ofChem. 
 Rev. Prof. Powell. 
 Rev. John Jordan, B.A. 
 Pesth, Hungary — 
 Count Szechenyi. 
 
 Plymouth H. Woollcombe, 
 
 Esq., F.A.S., Ch. 
 Snow Harris, E.sq., F.R.S. 
 E. Moore, M.D.. F.L.S., Sec. 
 G. Wightwick, Esq. 
 Presleign— Dr. A. W. Davies, 
 
 ^I.D. 
 fi«>on— Rev. H. P. Hamilton. 
 M.A., F.R.S. and G.S. 
 Rev. P. Evvart, ^LA. 
 Ruthen—lie\. the Warden of. 
 
 Humphreys Jones, Esq. 
 Rydf, Isle of H'ig/it— Sir Rd. 
 
 Simeon, Bart. 
 Salisbury- Rev. J. Barfitt. 
 Slieffield-J. H . A brahams, Esq . 
 Slie,)ton Mallet- 
 
 G. F. Burroughs, Esq. 
 Shreyrshury—R. A. Slaney, Esq. 
 M.P. ' • 
 
 South Petlierton- 
 
 J. Niclioletts, Esq. 
 St. Asaph — Rev. Geo. Strong. 
 Stockport -II. Marsland, Esq., 
 rr««ajiMrer. 
 Henry Coppock, Esq. Sec. 
 I Sydnry, A'rtr South Hales— 
 I Willi.im M. Manning, Esq. 
 Chairman of (Juar. Ses. 
 Tavistock— ]\e\ . W. Evans. 
 
 John Rundle, Esq. 
 rn<ro-H. Scw.-jl Stokes, Esq 
 TuHhridge HeUs-Dr. Yeals, 
 
 Utloxeter — Robert Blurlon. 
 
 Esq. 
 Virginia — Professor Tucker 
 IVorfester—DT. Hastings, M D 
 C. H. Hebb, Esq. = ' •"• 
 
 WVej-Aani— Thomas Edgworth. 
 Esq. 
 
 J. E. Bowman, Esq.. F.L.S., 
 
 Trensurer. 
 Major Uilliam Llovd. 
 Yarmouth-C. E. humbold 
 Esq. 
 Dawson Turner, Esq. 
 I'ur*— Rev. J. Kenrick, M.A. 
 
 fg's"''"' ^"'■' ''•""*'•• 
 
 V 
 
 THE 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND, 
 
 FROM THE FIRST 
 
 IRRUPTION OF THE NORTHERN TRIBES 
 TO THE PRESENT TIME. 
 
 INCLUDING 
 
 THE WAKS OF INDEPENDENCE, THE CONFEDERATIONS OF THE CANTONS, 
 
 THE REFORMATION BY ZUINGLIUS, 
 STRUGGLES DURING THE FRENCH REVOLUTION, ETC. 
 
 Compilcti from t^e fiei^t ^ut^onticiS, 
 
 INCLUDING 
 
 MULLER, MEYER, FRANSCINI, AND KASTHOFER. 
 
 BY 
 
 ^*' 
 
 A. VIEUSSEUX, 
 
 Author of various rrorks imblished by the Society for the Proniotlon of Useful Knorvledge. 
 
 WITH A LARGE COLOURED MAP. 
 
 LONDON: 
 HENRY G. BOHN, YORK STREET, COVENT GARDEN. 
 
 MDCCCXLVI. 
 
f -* 
 
 o 
 
 
 THE AUTHOR'S PREFACE. 
 
 Switzerland has long been a favourite country for travellers, 
 who so thilhcr to admire the natural beauties of the land and its 
 impressive scenery : but Switzerland has otlier claims to 
 attention besides its mountains and its lakes, its waterfalls 
 and glaciers. The reflecting observer finds another and perhaps 
 a greater charm in its poUtical independence, and the personal 
 freedom and security enjoyed within its boundaries. Many 
 a traveller, retracing his steps from the glowing regions of 
 the south, having feasted his eyes on the splendour of classic 
 lands, and enjoyed the luxuries and gaieties of Italy, has 
 experienced, wliilst descending the Swiss side of the Alps, and 
 beholding the dark pine forests that protect the peaceful valley 
 below, an involuntary emotion of content and satisfaction, recall- 
 in «t to his mind Goldsmith's well known lines — 
 
 u 
 
 My soul turn from them, turn we to survey'* 
 ***** 
 
 Of late years Switzerland has acquired an additional claim to 
 notice. The changes which have taken place since 1830 in the 
 political institutions of most cantons afford ample matter for 
 observation and serious reflection. Switzerland may be consi- 
 dered now as an epitome of civilized Europe : all the parties, the 
 theories, the expectations, the pretensions, which agitate larger 
 states, are seen here, as it were, in miniature. Most of the 
 Swiss cantons are now, for the first time, engaged in trying the 
 experiment of combining perfect political equality witli order 
 and good government. To those who either promote or oppose 
 
 Q O 9 '7 t 
 
VI 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 such an experiment in other countries, it may be useful to 
 watch the working of the new Swiss constitutions in the various 
 ca!itons ; for it must be borne in mind that each canton is an inde- 
 pendent state, and that there is no general Swiss Government, 
 properly speaking. The sittings of the Legislative Councils are 
 now held wilh open doors, as well as those of the Federal Diet, 
 and reports of the debates are published by the press. 
 
 The present is a political History of Switzerland, in which, 
 however, the social and intellectual condition of the people at 
 various epochs has been taken into account, as far as the limits of 
 the work would allow. In a country like Switzerland, consisting 
 in a great measure of free municipal towns and districts, even before 
 the assertion of independence by the three Forest Cantons in 1308, 
 a history of its political events is necessarily also a history of the 
 people. 
 
 The principal authorities for the History of Switzerland are 
 quoted in the body of the work : those who may wish to inquire 
 deeper into particulars will find an ample list of historical, geo- 
 giaphical, and statistical works under the head of each respective 
 canton, in EbeFs ^' iManuel du Voyageur en Suisse," vol. i. sec. 18. 
 Among contemporary writers, Meyer of Knonau, Franscini of the 
 canton Ticino, and Kasthofer of Bern, deserve to be particularly 
 mentioned. 
 
 1 sincerely wish that this work may prove interesting and 
 H.structive to tlie English reader, and may induce him to'ltudy 
 Switzerland as a country remarkable among the states of modern 
 Europe for its moral as well as for its physical peculiarities. 
 
 A. VlEUSSEUX. 
 
 Kentish Tofwn, January^ 1840. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Author's Preface • • • • • 
 Geographical and Statistical Sketcli of Switzerland 
 Statistical Tables of the Twenty-two Cantons 
 
 • V 
 
 • ix 
 . xix 
 
 Page 
 
 \ I 
 
 FIRST perio;d. 
 
 The History of Helvetia, from the First Irruption of the Northern Tribes to 
 the Reign of Rudolph of Habsburg, at the close of the Thirteenth Cen- 
 tury • ...•••••••• 
 
 SECOND PERIOD. 
 
 FOURTEENTH CENTURY. 
 
 From the First Alliance of the Three Forest Cantons to the Termination of the 
 War of Swiss Independence, and the Establishment of the Confederation 
 of the Eight Old Cantons'. • . • •• • • .39 
 
 THIRD PERIOD. 
 
 FIFTEENTH CENTURY. 
 
 From the Emancipation of Appenzell and of the Grisons, to the End of the 
 Suabian War, and the Estabhshment of the Confederation of the Thirteen 
 Cantons and their Allies • •••80 
 
 FOURTH PERIOD. 
 
 SIXTEENTH CENTURY. 
 
 The Reformation in Switzerland, from the First Opposition made by Zwingli 
 to the Sale of Indulgences in 1518, until the Final Establishment of the 
 Reformed Religion at Bern, Zurich, Basle, Schaffhausen, Geneva, and 
 Neuchatel, and in part of Glaris, Appenzell, and the Grisons . . .117 
 
Vlll 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 FIFTH PERIOD, 
 
 From the Beginning of the Seventeenth Century till the Epoch of 
 Revolution . . 
 
 Page 
 the French 
 
 • 159 
 
 SIXTH PERIOD. 
 
 » 
 
 r,on, .he F„„ch Invasion of. 798, and .he consequen. D«soIu.lon of .he 01,1 
 He ve..c Confederation „f Thir.een Can.on,. ,o the Ne„ Org.ni.a.ion of 
 ^nueriand as a Federal S.a.e. con,i,.ing of T„en.y.„v„ Cantons, in 
 
 215 
 
 1814 . 
 
 SEVENTH PERIOD. 
 
 "'" fnThe'^^^^^^^^^ '' T '' ''' '-'-' ^'^-^^ -''^^' ^-e ta.en 
 
 I'lace ,n the Constitutions of most of the Cantons in 1830-8 . 
 
 . 267 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 I. The Gugler's Song, composed at Bern iu 1376 
 
 II. The Dialects of the Orisons • . . ' 
 HI. Bernese Profession of Faith a. d. lo^s' 
 
 IV. Abstract of the Helvetic Confession of Faith, 15G6 
 
 Chronological Index . 
 
 . 303 
 . 305 
 . 309 
 . 311 
 
 322 
 
 Alphabetical Lndi;x 
 
 . 339 
 
 GEOGRArmCAL 
 
 AND 
 
 STATISTICAL SKETCH OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 Switzerland lies between 45° 50' and 41° 40' north lat., and 6° and 
 10° 30' east long. Its greatest length from east to west is about 210 
 miles, and its greatest width about 130 miles; its area is estimated at 
 about 2,000 French square leagues.* Switzerland forms part of the 
 liigh land of central Europe : it rises above the plains of Lombardy on 
 the south, and the plains of Dijon or Burgundy on the west ; on the 
 east it is connected by the Alps with the high land of Tyrol and Bavaria, 
 and on the north it adjoins the plateau or elevated plain of Suabia, from 
 which it is separated only by the bed of the Rhine. It is bovmded by 
 mountains on the west, south, and east, but is open to the north on 
 the side of Germany. The lower parts of Switzerland are generally 
 more than 1,200 feet above the level of the sea, and nearly 1»000 feet 
 higher than the plains of Lombardy ; but the greater i)art of tlie surface 
 is much higher. 
 
 The surface of Switzerland presents three distinct regions: 1. the 
 Alps; 2. the Jura; 3. the plateau or table land which lies between 
 these two mountain systems. 
 
 The Alps enter Switzerland from Savoy on the south-west, from whence 
 their main ridge, known by the name of the Pennine Alps, stretches 
 in an easterly direction, forming the boundary between Switzerland and 
 Italy, and dividing the basin of the Upper Rhone on the north from that 
 of the Po on the south. Some of the highest sunmiits of the Alps are 
 in this part of the chain : Mont Velan, which is the highest peak of 
 the group of the St. Bernard, is 11,000 feet high; the IMattcrhoni is 
 14,800, and Mont Rosa 15,150 feet above the sea. On reaching the 
 sources of the Rhone, the Alps form a massive and lofty group, which 
 is generally designated by the name of the St. Gotthard, and which may 
 be considered as the centre of the Alpine system of Switzerland. This 
 mass occupies a length of more thfxn twenty miles of direct distance 
 
 * The length of the French or Swiss league is iu the proportion of twenty-five 
 to one degree of latitiu'.e. ' 
 

 X HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 from east to west, from the sources of the Rhine to those of the Rhone, 
 and about the same distance from north to south, from Am Stas:, in the 
 canton of Uri, to Airolo, in the Val Levantina. The principal summits 
 of tliis mountain mass, the Gallenstock, Fieudo, Badus, Crispalt, &c., 
 are from 9,000 to 12,000 feet in height, and seventeen valleys, eight 
 glaciers, and several small lakes are contained in the recesses of this 
 Alpine region. Four offsets detach themselves from the mass of the 
 St. Gotriiard ; one to the west, which constitutes the Bernese Alps, 
 and divides the basin of the Rhone from that of the Rhine ; one to the 
 north-east, which forms the Alps of Glarus and the northern Orisons ; 
 another to the south-east, which forms the southern boundary of the 
 Orisons or Rhsetian Alps, on the side of Italy ; and lastly, the south- 
 west branch, which connects the St. Ootthard with the Pennine Alps 
 already mentioned. Between these offsets there are four large valleys : 
 the valley of the Rhone, running westward towards the lake of Geneva; 
 the valley of the Reuss, sloping northward to the lake of the four can- 
 tons; that of the Upper Rhine, running to the north-east; and that of 
 the Ticino, which runs southward towards the plains of Lombardy. 
 
 To the east- north-east of the group of the St. Ootthard is the country 
 of the Orisons, the ancient Rhsetia, now forming part of Switzerland, 
 the \A hule surface of which is studded with elevated ridges and peaks. 
 The surface of this Alpine region is furrowed by sixty deep valleys, and 
 the sides of the mountains are covered with glaciers, from which the 
 various branches of the Rhine are fed. This mountain region, with the 
 adjacent cantons of Glarus, and part of St. Gall and Appenzell, consti- 
 tute Eastern Switzerland, which lies entirely within the Alps. 
 
 If we draw a line on the map from the eastern extremity of the lake of 
 Geneva, in a north-east direction, to the eastern extremity of the lake of 
 Constance, and make the line describe a slight curve to the northward 
 about the middle of its course, so as to pass north of the lakes of Thun, 
 Waldsfatten, and Wallenstatt, we shall find that the whole Alpine region 
 of Switzerland is to the south-east of this line ; the country to the north 
 and west of it constitutes the plateau or table land of Switzerland. 
 
 The Jura mountains occupy the western part of Switzerland. The 
 chain of the Jura touches the country near the western extremity of the 
 lake of Geneva ; it runs in a north-east direction along the boundary 
 between France and the canton de Vaud, which is partly covered by 
 some of its ridges, and it then enters the canton of Neuchatel, which it 
 almost entirely covers, as well as the north-west part of Bern and the 
 greater part of Soleure and Basle, and the north-west part of Aargau. 
 The vale of the Rhine divides the Jura from the mountains of the 
 Schwarzwald or Black Forest, which are a continuation of the same 
 chain. The lakes of Neuchatel and Bienne, and the valley of the lower 
 Aar from the confluence of the Thiele to the junction of the Aar with 
 the Rhine, mark the eastern boundary of the Jura region of Switzerland. 
 
 GEOGRAPHY AND STATISTICS. 
 
 XI 
 
 The Jura consists of several parallel ridges, of which the most eastern is 
 generally the highest. It rises abruptly from the plain of Switzerland, 
 but has a gradual slope on the French side. The valleys formed by the 
 Jura are longitudinal, narrow, and short ; some of them very elevated 
 and cold. In proportion to its height, the region of the Jura is colder 
 than that of the Alps, though the Jura does not attain above one-third 
 of the elevation of the high Alps. Its principal summits in Switzerland, 
 the D61e, Mont Tendre, and Chasseral, are from 5,500 to 5,300 feet 
 high. The Jura forms a broad limestone mass, extending like a rampart 
 along the whole western side of Switzerland, with the highest part 
 swelling here and there into rounded summits. 
 
 East of the Jura region, and north of that occupied by the Alps, the 
 intermediate country constitutes the plateau or table land of Switzerland, 
 which is the finest and most productive part of the whole : it occupies 
 about one-half of its surface, stretching along the whole breadth of the 
 country from south-west to north-east, and includes the cantons of Vaud 
 and Freyburg, the greater part of Bern, nearly the whole of Luzern and 
 Aargau, the whole of Zurich, Zug, Thurgau, and part of St. Gall. 
 Schaffhausen, which lies north of the Rhine, forms part of the table land 
 of Suabia. The table land of Switzerland slopes from south to north, 
 from the foot of the Alps to the Rhine and the lake of Constance. Its 
 climate is variable ; the spring is subject to cold winds and late frosts, 
 the summers are very hot. The vine thrives in most districts. The 
 surface of the table land is furrowed by numerous valleys, which gene- 
 rally run from south-east to north-west ; the principal of these valleys 
 are the following : 1 . The valley of the Sarine or Saane, a river which 
 rises in the Alps, on the borders of the Valais, crosses the canton of Frey- 
 burg from south to north, and enters the Aar below Bern. 2. The valley 
 of the Aar, from the point where that river issues out of the Alpine region, 
 through the lake of Thun, flowing in a north-west course through the 
 finest part of the canton of Bern, until it turns to the north-east near the 
 borders of Soleure, after which it skirts the base of the Jura region. 3. 
 The valley of the Gross Emmen, which river rises in the Alps near the 
 lake of Brienz, and flowing north-west drains the fine districts of the 
 Emmenthal and Burgdorf, in the eastern part of the canton of Bern, and 
 then enters the Aar below Soleure. 4. The valley of the Reuss, a large 
 river which comes from the St. Ootthard, and after flowing through the 
 Alpine district of Uri, enters the lake of the four cantons, out of which 
 it issues at Luzern, where it enters the table land of Switzerland ; it then 
 flows north, through part of Luzern, Zurich, and Aargau, and enters the 
 Aar near Windisch, the ancient Vindonissa. . 5. The Limmat, a rapid 
 stream, which rises in the Alps of Glarus, where it is called the Lintb, 
 enters the lake of Wallenstadt, from which it issues at Wesen, and then 
 enters the plateau or plain land of Switzerland. After marking the 
 limits between Schwyz and St. Gall, it enters the lake of Zurich at its 
 
 'III 
 
XII 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZKRLANl). 
 
 n 
 
 GEOORAIIIY AND STATISTICS. 
 
 Xlll 
 
 eastern extremity, and issues out of it at the opposite or north-west 
 end by the town of Ziirich. It then Hows north-west through part of 
 that canton and afterwards of Argau, and enters the Aar below the con- 
 fluence of the Reuss. 6. The Thur, which rises in the mountains of the 
 High Toggenburg, in the canton of St. Gall, flows north through a great 
 part of that canton, and then, turning to the west, enters Thurgau, which 
 take& its name from the river; and after crossing this canton from east to 
 west, flows through the northern part of the canton of Zurich, and enters 
 the Rhine below Rheinau. 
 
 Various ranges of hills follow the cours'e of these streams : they are 
 generally wooded and rounded at the summit ; few of them exceed the 
 height of 1,500 feet above the surface of the plain. The elevation of 
 the plain itself varies from 1,800 to 1,200 feet above the sea. The 
 banks of the Sarine at Freyburg are 1,700 feet, those of the Aar at Bern 
 are 1,600, those of the Reuss at Luzern are 1,400, and those of the 
 Limmat at Ziirich are 1,300 feet above the sea. 
 
 Nearly four-fifths of Switzerland belong to the basin of the Rhine, of 
 which river the Aar is a main branch. Tiie Yalais, the southern part 
 of Vaud, and the small canton of Geneva, are in the basin of the Rhone, 
 the waters of which flow to the west and south-west. The ridsre called 
 Jorat, which runs from east to west through the southern part of Frey- 
 burg and of Vaud, separates the waters which flow northward to the 
 Rhine from those which flow southward into the Rhone, or rather its 
 reservoir, the Leman lake. The canton Ticino, being on the south side 
 of the Alps, belongs entirely to the basin of the Po, of which the Ticino 
 is an affluent. Several valleys of the Grisons, Calanca, Misocco, Bre- 
 gaglia, and Poschiavo, being likewise on the south side of the Alps, 
 belong to the same system, and their waters flow southward into the 
 Ticino and Adda. The great valley of Engadin, which is in the south- 
 east part of the Grisons country, between two lofty ridges of the Rhjetian 
 Alps, is drahied by the Inn, which is an affluent of the Danube. The 
 Inn rises on the East slope of Mount Maloya, at the bifurcation of the 
 southern chain of the Rhcetian Alps, one offset of which runs north-west 
 to the sources of the Albula find the Landquart, which are affluents of 
 the Rhine, and the other branches off" to the eastward, along the northern 
 border of Valtellina, which is an Italian valley, drained by the Adda, 
 an affluent of the Po. Between these two ridges the Inn flows for sixty 
 miles in a north-north east direction, after which it enters the Tyrol by 
 the defile of Finstermunz. 
 
 The small valley called Miinstcrthal, east of Engadin, which forms 
 part of the territory of Switzerland, is drained by tlie Rom, an affluent 
 of the Etsch or Adige, which flows through LoweT Tyrol and the Vene- 
 tian territories into the Adriatic. 
 
 The Rhine, the chief river of Switzerland, is formed by numerous 
 streams which rise in the Alps of the Grisons and receive the waters of 
 
 all the glaciers of that lofty reigion. The two principal branches, which 
 by their confluence form the Rhine, are called Vorder Rhein, or Fore 
 Rhine, and Hinter (rear) Rhine, The Vorder Rhine rises in the lake 
 Toma, 7,000 feet above the sea, and receives the drainings of the glaciers 
 of Badus, Cornera, Crispalt, and others : it flows for about fifty miles 
 in a north-east direction through a deep valley, receiving numerous 
 streams from the south, the Medelser or Mittel Rhine, the Glenner, the 
 Savienbach, and others. Near Disentis, fifteen miles from its source, 
 the banks of the river are about 3,500 feet above the sea ; at Reicheneau, 
 thirty miles further, they are only 1,900 feet above the same level. Near 
 Reichenau the confluence of the Vorder Rhine and Hinter Rhine takes 
 place. The Hinter Rhine has its source in the glacier of Rheinwald, 
 in the valley of the same name, about 6,000 feet above the sea; flowing 
 north-east, it skirts the northern base of Mounts Bernardin and Splugen, 
 over which are two fine roads into Italy : it then turns to the north through 
 the valley of Schams, passes along a deep defile, known by the name of 
 Viamala, receives the Albula from the eastward, coming from the valley 
 of Davos, and then passing through the valley of Domlcschg, joins the 
 Vord.r Rhine. Below Reichenau, the united stream turns nearlv due 
 north, receives the Plessur, or river of Coirc, and further down the 
 Landquart, coming from the line valley of Pilitigau, after which it leaves 
 the Grisons country near Luzicnsteig; from thence to its entiance into 
 the lake of Constance, a distance* of about thirty-five miles, it forms the 
 boundary between Switzerland and the Austrian province of Vorarlberg, 
 receiving on its left bank tlic Tamina, from the canton of St. Gall, and 
 on its right bank the 111, from the Austrian territory. 
 
 Tlie lake of Constance, or Boden See, is about forty-five miles long 
 from east-south-east to west-north-west, at which latter extremity it forms 
 a deep and narrow gulf called Bodmer See and also Ueberlinger See, 
 which stretches into the territory of the grand duchy of Baden. Through- 
 out its eastern half the lake is about ten miles wide, and its greatest 
 depth is 1,800 feet. One or two steam-boats run upon the lake of Con- 
 stance. The Rhine flows out of it at the town of Constance, a mile 
 below which it forms another lake, called Untersee and also Zeller See, 
 which is about thirteen miles long, and five miles in its greatest width. 
 A fine island, called Reichenau, rises in the midst of this lower lake. 
 
 The Rhine issues from the Untersee at the town of Stein, which is, at 
 its western extremity, 1,280 feet above the sea : it then flows in a general 
 west direction, but by a tortuous course, as far as Basle, forming the 
 . natural boundary of Switzerland on the north side for a direct distance 
 of about seventy miles. The canton of Schaff'hausen, however, lies 
 entirely on the right or German baidv of the Rhine, as well as a small 
 part of Basle. In its course from Stein to Basle, the Rhine forms the 
 cascade of Lauffen below Schaff'hausen, about 70 feet high, and further 
 down the "rapids of Lauffenburg. By means of the Thur, the Aar, and 
 
XIV 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAVD. 
 
 !l 
 
 lowest elevation in all Switzerland h.,.' '^' '''' ""'^'^^ *« *e 
 
 lit r.r ^-^ ^'^ ^-- -tt;: "Sir ijis 
 
 ex.renii,yoftheValais,a LheiS of = C "^"L"' ""' *^ "°«h-easter„ 
 the drainingsof the la ge glaetth , h I K^f "'°'' ^"^ ^^«- ^'^««'>es 
 the Furca, and descend! rapWIv t! n '''^':'='r'" '••« Gallenstock and 
 inasouth-westdirecti„„a?lr usmT • ^™™ -''«"=« it proceeds 
 miles, through a large valley between the'fi J' ' '''!?'' "^ ^^^^nty-five 
 the Lepontian and Pennine Alp on , tu A aTl '' "" *' ■"''''^' ^""^ 
 of nunierous glaciers from botlf rang s am.''''"'!' *' '''"^'"'■"«« 
 abruptly to the north-west and rl, ^a^'gny, the Rhone turns 
 
 into the Leman lake. tI dire" 5,":" "/'"^' ~ to its entrance 
 is about twenty.five miles At St m' '""" Mart.gny to the lake 
 the Rhone makes its wavthroLh a^"""''' f." ""'"'' '''''>'' ^^^^'m, 
 Morcle, (9,000 feet higM a ^1, 7'"^'" ""''"''^ "'^ ««"t de 
 the Dent de Midi, (lojoo feet . „! '"" ^'^^ "" "^ ^'^e, and 
 
 the other: here the val ev of the U„ie Rr"'''''"" "'""^ ^"'"y ^^'P^ «n 
 
 The lake of Geneva." cal d !lT lakeT """'"''' ^"'^^• 
 reservoir of the Rhone! spreads n It r^^' "'"' '^ "'^ ^'^«' 
 Switzerland and Savoy, its northern n '^ "'"='"' ^-^tween . 
 
 a- of about fifty-fou/ miles in t "th and"^' '""' '''™'"' ^ 
 about forty-six. Its breadth is .bo ,t f ? ""^ '°""'«™ ^ank of 
 
 becomes very narrow toward Genet U '' '"" "" "'^'''"«' 1^"' it 
 Pr.ncipal of which are the Dranse from ^''17' ''""■"' ''^^'"»«' «■'« 
 Vevayse and Venoge from the SwL il^Vf '^^ "' ^^^y' =""1 the 
 lake IS about 1,000 feet ueir tho V '"= ^'''^'''^^t depth of :the 
 
 places it vari^ fro^ 5oT I^^'LT!' TT '^ ^^"'^ '^ "^^^^^ 
 proaching Geneva. The surface of thTll'l ,"""""' ^'^^ °» ap- 
 but in summer it rises seven or eLh 1 '' ''''" ^''' "^ove the sea. 
 snows in the Alps. The Leman ifknow' tT^ '? "'' "'"'"« "^ 'he 
 twice, in A.I,. 762 and 805 Th'Tb ''''''" '^^^^ 
 
 enters the lake by two mouths at it soufh Z' "T"^ ''"""^ "'^ Calais, 
 of the river are there very muddv Tt """"' ""-^ "'e waters 
 at the south-west extremhy of the' 1 k wf ""' °J " "«'"' "' ««»eva, 
 clear, and of a deep blue t nge. B Iw G '"' " "'" ^^P*"^ '"y 
 consideral,le Alpine stream whL con ^ r ? " ''''''''' '^e Arve. a 
 and the waters of which are mudd a t"" *' """^y "^ Chamou;v. 
 Rhone for a considerable dLaTceafte'i'" T """ ^^"'' "^°- "^ the 
 the Swiss territory near Cha ^ tht , X "T?' ^'' ^'^""^ ^"''^ 
 after which it turns to the southward ^ °' "'' """"" "^ Geneva. 
 
 between the Jura on one ^ZlZ:nX:Z^r'\'. ""'"^^ ''^^'^ 
 
 . an onset of the Savoy Alps on the other. 
 
 GKOGRAPIIY AND STATISTICS. 
 
 XV 
 
 Switzerland is a country of lakes : besides the two great lakes of Con- 
 stance and Geneva, the other principal lakes are the Waldstatter See, 
 called also the lake of the four cantons, because it lies between the cantons 
 of Uri, Schwyz, Unterwalden, and Luzern. Its form is very irregular, 
 somewhat in the shape of a cross, the lower part of which has been 
 twisted or broken. The Reuss coming from St. Gotthard enters it at its 
 southern extremity. The whole length of the lake is about twenty-six 
 miles ; the southern part of it, called lake of Uri. a sheet of deep water 
 eight miles long, and between one and two miles broad, runs from south 
 to north between two ranges of mountains, almost perpendicular, which 
 give it a character of gloomy grandeur ; it communicates by a narrow 
 strait with the middle basin which spreads between the cantons of 
 Schwyz and Unterwalden, in a direction from east, to west, and is about 
 nine miles in length, and fibout two miles wide ; another narrow channel 
 between two jutting capes leads from the middle basin into the western 
 basin, called the lake of Luzern, which is the widest and finest 
 of the three, and is nine miles in length from east-south-east to west- 
 north-west. It throws out two arms or gulfs, that of Kussnacht to the 
 north-east, and that of Stanzstadt or Alpnach to the south-west. The 
 town of Luzern lies at its western extremity, where the Reuss issues out 
 of the lake,' and the neighbouring banks are formed by verdant hills 
 studded with cottages, whilst the square mass of the Rigi rises opposite. 
 and the broken dark peaks of Mount Pilate are seen frowning on the 
 other side. The country around the Waldstatter See is the classical 
 ground of Switzerland, and is full of recollections of the heroic age of its 
 independence. The level of the lake is about 1,400 feet above the sea, 
 and its depth is in some places more than 1,000 feet. The lake seldom 
 freezes ; it is subject to violent gusts of wind from the mountains, which 
 render navigation dangerous. A steam-boat plies between Luzern and 
 Fluellen, the port of Altorf. 
 
 The lake of Ziirich, formed bv the Limmat, is twentv-four miles lonsr 
 from south-east to north-west, and from one mile to two miles wide. 
 Its greatest depth is about 600 feet^ and its level is about 1,300 feet 
 above the sea. The banks of this lake, well cultivated and studded with 
 villages and detached houses, are amongst the finest and most cheerful 
 regions of Switzerland. The bridge of Rapperswyl, which is tlirown 
 across the lake, divides it into two unequal parts, the smaller or eastern 
 part stretching between the cantons of Schwyz and St. Gall, whilst the 
 larger part lies almost entirely in the canton of Zurich. The small but 
 pretty island of Uffnau rises in the lake not far from Rapperswyl ; it is 
 known as the place of retirement and death of Ulrich von Hiitten, a 
 soldier and an author, who lived about the time of the reformation. 
 A steam-boat plies on the lake of Zurich, between Zurich and Rap- 
 perswyl. 
 "^^ The lake of Wallenstatt, or Wallensee, to the south-east of the lake of 
 
XVI 
 
 I 
 
 HISTORY OP SniTZKRLAND. 
 
 Ziiricl, which is also formed by the Linth or I.immat, lies in the Alpine 
 
 than 1,400 feet above the sea, its depth from 400 to 500 feet, its length 
 f cm east to west .s eleven miles, and its breadth about one n ile. This 
 heet ot water hes deeply embedded between two lofty ridges of mom - 
 tarns; those on the north rise almost perpendicularl/ above the 7Z 
 A steam-boat runs on this lake also. 
 
 The lakes of Brienz and Thun, both formed bv the Aar, lie in the 
 midst of the Bernese Alps, and are the most elevated of the large lakes 
 of Sw. zer and. The lake of Thun is more than 1,900 feet Z'Z 
 
 Ind fhl : ^ V- '""^ '''"*-*''^' '" north-west, between two 
 
 and thiee mdes wule, and Us greatest depth is about 800 feet. Besides 
 
 ece v the^ ' ' T "^'P'"' ^'^«="n.-hieh before its confluence 
 
 recenes the S.mmen, another considerable stream, which gives its name 
 
 In ^'""Tf '"'.' » «"^ ^''"<=y ">«« than thirty miles in length, ricHn 
 
 lake of Than, which is much visited by tourists from Bern. The lake 
 of Bnenz ,s smaller, and a few feet higher than the lake of Thun Ikh 
 vhich It comniunicates by the Aar. It receives from the south Uie ll 
 chine, coming from the Alpine valley of Lauterbruuuen, celebrated fos 
 numerous and fine waterfalls, and for the fine view of he JungfVau o e 
 of he b,gli summits of the Bernese Alps. Another stream, criled al o 
 Lutscune comes from the valley of Grindelwald, which is al o much 
 VIS, ed by travellers for its fine glaciers, some of the largest in SwUzer 
 land, r.nd which spread at the foot of that enormous mass of Alps wld 
 x-nder the names of Schreekhorn, Wetterhorn, and !• ni^ r al „ 
 IB grouped on the borders of the cantons of B»n and VaS The' 
 two Lutschinen unite before entering the lake of Brienz ' 
 
 The lake of Neuchatel is the largest in Switzerland, after those of Con 
 stance and Gene^., being twenty-five miles in length from outlwe^t "o" 
 north-east, and about five miles broad throughout ^ne-half of it S " 
 The other or southern half decreases in width more and more as i a ' 
 proaches. the town of Yverdon, which is at its south-west ex" em tv an 
 ^vhere the lake is hardly two miles broad. Its level is abou S et 
 above the sea and its greatest depth about 350 feet. The river Orbe 
 coming from the valleys of the Jura, enters it at Yverdon and issues from t' 
 a the opposite or north-east extremity, under the name of Zihl or ThTl 
 t also receives the Broye, which is the outlet of the lake of Morat ami 
 
 WtheelevatedVnortariL?^^^^^^^^^^ 
 
 spread at its uorth-ea.t extremity between it and the c ntrous Takes 
 o. Morat and Bienne. which apparently at one time formed wT t onlv 
 one basm. and even now in seasons of extraordinary floods, wit I 
 
 GEOGRAPHY AND STATISTICS. 
 
 xvu 
 
 case in 1816. the three lakes join their water togerte. ^J^J^^ 
 the lakeofNeuchaterbelongstothe nver system "^ *™;' ^^^^^ 
 divided from that of the lake of Geneva by the ndge of the J^"*, a ^ ^ 
 rlfofl^d which stretches from westto ff^^^^^^^^^^Z:^ 
 and Freyburg from the Jura to thebanks °f f "^'^.^"'"ti^'S ou the 
 some of the offsets of the Bernese Alps. A steam-boat pl.es y 
 
 lake of Neuchatel. France, which 
 
 The countries bordering on Switzerla,.d are --^ ''^^ ^ „^,, 
 bounds it along the whole of its western f^ont er f«™ th Jl^ ^^^ ^^^.^ 
 
 Basle to the Rhone below Geneva J'^^^'^i;. .-o^ds from France 
 already said, runs along the whole line TheFmcpa^ ^^^^^ 
 
 to Switzerland are :-the high road from Pans to Basle^ V^^^^^ 
 
 through Langres. Vesoul, Befort, ''"^^^^"'^^g^^tTlroIds lead from 
 from Befort to Porentrui in the canton of Bern Several m 
 he French department d„ Doubsinto Ae ^^f ^° Neu<=ha^, o 
 Martau to the Locle. and another f^m P-;;:^-^^^ th^^^^^^^ ^^ 
 From Pontarlier another road leads Jy /-^^y;^ ^tj ^,,e. which, on 
 
 ot G.,«v^ ta the Kh..« » "•™"°";3 of the l«l« *• '>»""''■'' 
 
 „,,.„>,. s.«, '"■ Ji;:;\i;,4" : Ifof .1.. Alp., ..« ..,«- 
 
 line runs in a south-east direction diuub Bernard, from 
 
 rates Savoy from the Valais as far as the S™"P « ''^^^^- ^^r^.jj.idge 
 whence the frontier between the two countries run alon^^ ^S^ 
 
 of the Pennine and Lepontiau flP^-far'is the nor* west ^^^ 
 
 Lago Maggiore. The P^-P^} .^f/ ^^^^ J ^Jj^'^Cambery, and 
 Sardinian territories «e : the high road from Gene> .^^ ^^^ 
 
 ?:^:tr;^-^eir^s?£^i^^^^ 
 
 over the high Alps from the Valais uito Piedmont. ^^^^ ^^ 
 
 The frontier of ^-^^J^^'^^ry ^^^^^^^^^ naturally de- 
 
 the Lago Maggiore, and runs m ^ J^y ^ ^.^^^^ ,, 
 
 fined line along the southern and ««; «"^°f /^^^J ^^ ,f «« Rhstian 
 far as Mount Giori, f^"" -^^^"'^V^JtwS Ui«ce of Valtelliua. 
 Alps, which divides the G"-- f"™ *^^^^^^^^ Bernardino, and 
 
 Z StXi^^^^ -- ^^^- V"^' '-'' 
 
xviii 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 the Grisons into Valtellina "^ ™°""*'''" P^^^ lead from 
 
 alolg^tltorre^^^^^^^^^^ ^»nd Switzerland 
 
 of the Rh^tian A,p L" " SrTV^'^ " '^'''''^ '^^ '«fty ^dge. 
 «teig. This line of mZtt : ^''^ '" '''' ^'''"^ "«"' Luzien- 
 
 which rises in the 0^2" and „"' 'T^ ""' "^^ ^»"^y "^ *e Inn, 
 
 of Finstermunz. Th hi'gh road^f '"'V'" '''■"' ''>' *^ »"-- defile 
 Luziensteig and Feldkirl T »/Tt ^°"' '" ^""^1''"^^ P««^es by 
 boundary between aSL and sT> ''}'TT''^ '^e Rhine marks thi 
 stance. The broad eClof thtfv"'* '°™" '" *^ ^^'''^ «f Cou- 
 Wngdoms of Bavaria and wl^^K "t^T""' Switzerland from the 
 northembank. The h: bo I 'I^^^^^^^^^^^^ 
 
 t.on between Bavaria and Switzerland " a }v "^''f ^^P^^'of '^omm.nuca- 
 the starting point from the W^^rgl rr t ' ^'^<^^'^'>^^'''^^" ^-- 
 
 -S:,:t'yrdXttnis^^^^^^^^^^ 
 
 said making the bounda v li^ etl . \ ^l'*'"' ** '^'''"^ "^ ^^^^^^^y 
 intervenes, which lies ou m: or^h ""■' ""^ '^*"'°" of Schaffl.ausen 
 The two principal ro ads wEh enter 5! TTK l'""^ "' Switzerland. 
 Schaffhausen and Basle. Steam if ?""'' ^'""^ *^ ""«'' P»ss by 
 far as Basle, thus affording Jr^^ nternn "1'/"";""''' *^ «' '^ - 
 water from England by Rotte:d:m tS .al "' '=°'"'""---' "y 
 
 The following statistical tables of th^ l! 
 comidete this sketch of the gellt fT"' ''r°"' "■■" ""«"''^'' '« 
 population are taken from the hu^t^S; f ''T""'""^- ^'"= "«» "'"' 
 G%-;,;.-,«. .fe /, Suisse 2 X Zo 1 '^ '^'''''''''' ''^^''""naire 
 Esquisse dela Terre, suivie delaoJ. -^"'"T^' ^^^^' andGuinand, 
 ^«39. winch is t.sed in the^t^^^rrnlf de^lT' ''' "^"^^ 
 
 
 (j 
 
 / 
 
 \\ 
 
 ) 
 
 I 
 
 (I 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 FIRST PERIOD. 
 
 THE HISTORY OF HELVETIA, FROM THE FIRST IRRUPTION OF THE 
 NORTHERN TRIBES TO THE REIGN OF RUDOLPH OF HABSBURG, AT THE 
 CLOSE OF THE THIRTEENTH CENTURY. 
 
 In the fourth century of the Christian era, the provinces of Helvetia and 
 Rhaetia were integral parts of the Roman Empire, in the enjoyment of a 
 considerable degree of civilization and prosperity. Flourishing Roman 
 Colonies, such as Vindonissa, Augusta Rauracorum, Aventicuni, Novio- 
 dunnm, Octodurum,Vitodurum, the Thermae Helveticae (modern Baden), 
 and others were scattered about the country ; military roads across 
 the xMps secured a prompt communication with Italy, to which Helvetia 
 was an essential rampart on the side of warlike Germany*. The de- 
 scendants of the ancient Helvetians no longer formed a separate or dis- 
 tinct people ; in the course of three centuries they had been blended 
 with or confounded amongst their concpierors, whose manners and lan- 
 guage they had adopted ; and when at last the Roman eagles were scared 
 away by a new race of invaders, the people of Helvetia, both of Roman 
 and aboriginal descent, were either exterminated, or reduced to slavery 
 luider the general appellation of Romans^ then become a word of con- 
 tumely, which the invading northern tribes applied indiscriminately to 
 the inhabitants of the countries they conquered. The very name of Helve- 
 tians then disappeared, and all traces of their origin were obliterated. 
 
 The Burgimdians, a tribe of the Wendes from the farthest end of 
 Germany, near the shores of the Baltic Sea, appeared on the Rhine in the 
 latter part of the fourth century, under the reign of Valentinian I. In the 
 spirit of that weak and perfidious policy which characterized the councils of 
 the Empire in its decline, the Burgundians were at first encouraged in their 
 advance by the Roman commanders, with a view to check the irruptions 
 of the formidable Alemanni, another race of barbarians, who threatened 
 the power of Rome in the same quarter, and with whom the Burgundians 
 were then at war ; but Valentinian, after defeating the Alemanni in a 
 great battle, having no longer need of the assistance of the Burgundians, 
 
 *Plautin Heivetia anliquay Bern, 1756. 
 
2 
 
 niSTORT OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period 1, 
 
 opposed the>r further progress, and obliged them to retreat again into 
 the wi ds of Germany. They reappeared, however, at the beginning of 
 the fo lowing century, led by their chief Gunthahar, and having crossed 
 the Rhine, they entered the province called Germania Superior, now 
 l^orraine and Alsace. Constantius, who commanded in that quarter for the 
 tmperor Honorius, assigned them lands on their promising to defend the 
 frontier of the Rhine against other tribes. They lived for a time in 
 peace and good understanding with the native Gauls; their leader 
 Uunthahar, or Gundicarius, became a convert to Christianitv, and was 
 baptized, with most of his men, by a Roman Bishop about the year 417 
 according to the historian Orosius. The Burgundians, who Appear to 
 have been a race less rude and ferocious than many of their northern 
 brethren were originally shepherds, and brought with them large Iierds 
 ot cattle, but they soon learnt agriculture from the Gauls. Meantime 
 the Franks another German tribe, having crossed the lower Rhine 
 settled m Belgic Gaul, ^tius, the Roman general, uneasy at the 
 neighbourhood of the two warlike races, closed with his troops round the 
 Burgundian settlement, and brought that people to a forced understand- 
 ng that they should remove farther south, and occupy the lands between 
 the Jura and the Alps, namely, western Helvetia, with the country of the 
 Allobroges. The Burgundians accepted the offer, and they found rich 
 pasture for tlieir cattle in the fine valleys where they were settled. They 
 promised on their part to defend the passes leading to Italv, and they 
 
 azel";: iS'^r *'' H"-''' --=- ScythiL horde; led on bj 
 Ez 1 or Attila, "the scourge of God," swept, like a hurricane, over 
 western Europe. The Burgundians opposed their advance, but were 
 defeated and their chief was killed in battle, about tlie year ^50 The 
 Huns however a people of hunters, passed on. destroying all human 
 habitations and carrying away the people into captivity, leaving behind 
 a long and dismal track of devastation, until ^tius assisted by the 
 Franks and other German settlers in Gaul, utterly routed them in a 
 memorable battle fought in the Catalanni campi, or plains of Chai ns 
 The Burgundians, weakened by their defeat, formed an alliance with 
 the Visigoths a powerful Scandinavian race who had settled in Southern 
 Gaul, and who were msti^mental in repelling a second invasion of the 
 barbarous Huns; and they adopted Gundioch, a Visigoth chief for 
 their kmg Tlie Roman power in the west was now crumbing and 
 province after province was dismembered from the Empire. The'Bur- 
 gundians availed themselves of this opportunity to extend their dominion 
 ac OSS the Jura into Gaul, along the banks of the Saone and the Rhone 
 and over that fine country which has ever since borne their nle 
 The inhabitants of Gaul, weakened by misfortunes and deserted by Ze" 
 opposed no resistance, and. submitted to share their lands with \uT^ 
 come s Every Roman proprietor, and the Gauls were included in the 
 appellation, was obliged to give to a Burgundian two-thirds of his lands 
 
 PERIOD I.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 one-third of his slaves*, and one- half of his forests and huildings. Th 
 king's share was the best and the largest, it constituted his sole revenue, 
 taxes being then, and for a long time after, unknown to the free German 
 tribes. The king, or chief, was chosen by the people to lead them in 
 war ; his authority in time of peace was extremely limited : it consisted 
 chiefly in summoning the gemeine or general assemblies of all the free 
 men, and in executing the resolutions there passed. When, however, 
 the German races became settled in the regions of the west, partly 
 by conquest and partly by a forced consent, extorted from the weak 
 emperors, the latter invested the principal chieftains with the rank of 
 patricians or vicarii, delegating to them their authority over the Roman 
 citizens who remained in the countries thus dismembered from the 
 Empire, and by this measure of policy they continued to retain for 
 some time longer a shadow of nominal authority in the western world. 
 Over the Roman population, therefore, the power of the barbarian 
 kings was much more extended and absolute than over their own free 
 countrymenf. 
 
 After the final settlement of the Burgundians in the regions of eastern 
 Gaul and of Helvetia, something like a regular system of society can be 
 traced among them. The ranks were the same as among other German 
 tribes, optimates, or nobles, mcdiocres, or common freemen, leudes^ or 
 freedmen who could be tenants but not freeholders, and lastly culoni, or 
 serfs bound to the soil. The kiag's serfs, however, as the kingly au- 
 thority became extended, were equal to freedmen. The property of a 
 Burgundian was divided at his death among all his children. There 
 were lands called allemeind, or common property. The business of the 
 freemen was war, and the cultivation of their fields in time of peace; all 
 other handicraft or trade was exercised by slaves. 
 
 Gundioch left four sons, Hilperic, to whom he gave Geneva and the 
 country around ; Godegisel, who had Besan^on ; Gundobald, who took 
 Lyons as his portion ; and Godemar, who had Vienne on the Rhone. The 
 Burgundians, however, still remained united as one nation. Gundobald, 
 the most enterprising of the four brothers, was raised, through the in- 
 terest of his relative Count Ricimer, a Suevian chief in the service of 
 the empire, who exercised a paramount influence at Rome, to the rank 
 of patrician by Olibrius, one of the many short-lived occupants of the 
 tottering throne of the west. After the deaths of Olibrius, and of Rici- 
 
 * Slavery having been long established all over the Roman world, continued in 
 practice after the spreading of Christianity. The slaves were individuals who had 
 been taken prisoners in war., and their descendants. They were publicly sold in the 
 markets. After the invasion of the northern tribes, we find two sorts of slaves, those 
 who belonged to the Romans and other inhabitants of the Empire, and the captives 
 made by the new conquerors. The latter were better treated than the former. By 
 degrees they became coloni, or serfs attached to their masters' estates. 
 
 f Chlodowig or Clovis king of the Franks, was invested by the emperor Anasta- 
 sius with the decoration of the purple, and the titles of patrician, consul, and even 
 Augustus. Theodoric was likewise ackowledged by Zeno as king of Italy, after the 
 extinction of the western empire. 
 
 b2 
 
* HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. [PERIOD I. 
 
 mer, Gundobald, who was at Rome with an auxiliary Burgundian force, 
 bestowed the imperial purple on Glycerins, an obscure soldier, in the 
 year 412. The empire was now no longer called Roman but Italian, 
 imperium Italicum, and crowned puppets were set up and put down by 
 Ricimer, Gundobald, Odoacer, and other chiefs of the barbarian merce- 
 naries, or confederates, as they were styled, to whom the defence and 
 safety of Italy and of Rome were entrusted, and who were in fact the 
 sovereigns of the country, although they did not take the title of Em- 
 peror, which, by ancient law or usage, no one but a Roman citizen could 
 assume. Odoacer was the first barbarian who ruled alone as jmtriciaJi 
 of Italy, after the forced abdication of Romulus Augustus, (strange co- 
 incidence of names !) last Emperor of the West, a. d. 476. A decree 
 of the Roman Senate at that time abolished the imperial dignity. 
 
 Gundobald having returned to his principality of Lyons, aspired to 
 the undivided sovereignty of the whole Burgundian kingdom; and made 
 war on his brothers Hilperic and Godemar, and defeated them. Hu- 
 manity to the vanquished was no feature of the barbarian character. 
 Hili)eric and his two sons were beheaded at Geneva, and his wife thrown 
 into the Rhone. Godemar, besieged in the tower of Vienne, perished 
 amidst the flames in the year 48G. Thus Gundobald remained i)ossessor 
 of all his father's dominions, with the exception of Bcsancon, where his 
 brother Godegisel maintained himself. The unfortunate' Hilperic had 
 left two daughters, Sedeleuba, who devoted herself to a life of religious 
 seclusion, and Clotilda, who was demanded in marria«ce by Clovis*, the 
 powerful king of the Franks. With much rcluctance^Gundobald com- 
 plied with Clovis's demand, and sent him his niece, who afterwards ex- 
 erted so much influence over the destinies of her husband and of France 
 Gundobald restored the walls of Gebena or Geneva, and under his reign 
 the first huts were built on the hills now occupied by the city of Lau- 
 sanne, the old Lausanium of ihe Romans having been destroyed, as 
 well as most of the Roman colonies in Helvetia. The countrv, in fact 
 had become a wilderness, but pious hermits came and built their cells 
 and sanctuaries in many a solitary district, and revived agriculture in 
 the Helvetian valleys. They were called Sandi, which meant religious 
 and virtuous men. Gundobald was favourablv disposed towards his 
 Roman subjects, and he seems to have intended to place them on an 
 equal footing with the Burgundians. This was attributed by the nobles 
 to his ambitious views, and a diet of the lords ecclesiastical and lay, and 
 of the freemen of Burgundy, was convoked at Geneva about the'year 
 500 at which Gundobald's enactments were abrogated, and soon afterwards 
 a collection and revisal of the Burgundian laws were efi^ected at Ambi- 
 aracum, and signed by thirty-six lords or counts* of the kingdom. The 
 old custom of compounding for murder by means of a sum of money, 
 
 PERIOD l.j 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 was abolished among the Burgundians sooner than among the Franks. 
 In the early stages of barbarian society, in their native wilds and forests 
 of Germany, men were more afraid of fine than of death, for property 
 was scanty and difficult of acquirement, whilst life they were accus- 
 tomed to risk frequently in battle. But as the tribes became settled in 
 more favoured regions, and as they became possessed of permanent pro- 
 perty, they grew less fond of war, the boon of life was better appreciated, 
 feelings altered, and tlie laws were altered accordingly. We also find 
 the ban or outlawry pronounced by the Burgundian laws against a free- 
 man who killed a slave, a crime formerly overlooked by the laws. A 
 woman who forsook her husband was suffocated in a marsh. Divorce 
 was allowed in case of adultery, of attempts at poisoning, and of witch- 
 craft. If a slave had connexion with a free woman, they were both put 
 to death. If a free man violated a girl and could not pay the heavy fine 
 prescribed by the law, he was at the mercy of her parents, who might muti- 
 late him. He who refused hospitality to a stranger was fined, if a free 
 man, and flogged, if a slave. 
 
 Gundobald married his son Sigismund to the daughter of Theodoric, 
 the powerful king of the Goths and of Italy, the most illustrious and en- 
 liijhtened chief in those barbarous time?, ihe friend of Boetius and of 
 Cassiodorus, who recalled learning and the arts to the devastated regions 
 of the South. Gundobald himself esteemed the learned, and he em- 
 ployed the Roman patrician Syagrius in improving the rude dialect of 
 the Burgundians, of which Gundobald felt ashamed. In fact, the kings 
 and chiefs of the northern tribes now settled in the West, were no longer 
 the uninstructed barbarians their fathers were when they issued out of 
 the forests of Germany. In their necessary intercourse with the Romans 
 they had adopted the Latin language, which became of common use 
 among the Franks and the Burgundians, and by its corruption and ad- 
 mixture vith the northern idioms gave birth to the romance dialects. 
 Their conversion to Christianity mainly contributed to the change, as 
 Latin w^as the language of the church. They chose, likewise, their 
 councillors and ambassadors among their Roman subjects, who acquired 
 thereby considerable influence. 
 
 In 514, Gundobald, feeling himself old and weak, called together a 
 Diet at his residence of Quadruvium, near Geneva, where his son Si- 
 gismund was proclaimed his successor as king of the Burgundians, with 
 the usual ceremony of being raised on a shield. Gundobald died shortly 
 afterwards in the 50th year of his reign. Sigismund received the pa- 
 trician dignity from Anastasius, Emperor of Constantinople ; for, after 
 the extinction of the Western Empire, the Eastern Emperors had re- 
 tained a nominal authority over the former Roman provinces in the 
 West in their quality of successors of the Caesars. Although Gundobald 
 was of the Arian commvmion, his son Sigismund had embraced the 
 
6 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. [pERIOD I. 
 
 Catholic Faith *, and soon after his accession to the throne he received 
 letters from the Pope or Bishop of Rome, urging him to convoke the 
 assembly of the Bishops of Burgundy, which had been neglected during 
 his father's reign. The council being assembled, a series of regulations 
 were adopted for the discipline of the clergy. The clerici who infringed 
 these statutes were to be judged by their own order, and the plurality of 
 voices ; the monks by the assembly of their l)rethren presided over by 
 the Abbot, and the secular priests by their Bishops. But if the offence 
 was against the general laws of the country, any one might be the ac- 
 cuser, and the culprit was obliged to answer the charge before the secu- 
 lar judges. Capital offences by clergymen were punished by imprison- 
 ment for life. It was decreed that no candidate should be ordained 
 deacon or presbyter who had married a widow, or a second wife. No 
 young clergyman was allowed access to a nun without the consent of her 
 parei:ts. Clergymen in general were forbidden to visit women at im- 
 proper hours f. Hunting, and other sports were also declared to be 
 improper for men of their sacred profession. The clergy already pos- 
 sessed property by means of donations or legacies, but their lands were 
 scattered, and not united into lordships as at a later period. The monks 
 tilled the ground and exercised charity towards the poor and the stranger. 
 Whilst Western Helvetia, which comprised the region between the 
 Jura, the Leman lake, (the Lake of Geneva,) and the river Aar, was 
 thus recovering from former devastation under the more settled sway of 
 the Burgundian monarchs, the northern and eastern parts of the country 
 were in the possession of the Alemanni, a ferocious nomadic people, 
 who had been among the first invaders of the Roman empire. Although 
 successively repelled by Aurelian, Julian, and Valentinian, they at last 
 (about the middle of the fifth century), spread along the Rhine from 
 Cologne to the Rhetian Alps. In their repeated irruptions they com- 
 pletel}^ devastated the valleys of Helvetia, destroying the towns and vil- 
 lages, reducing the country to a wilderness, and the inhabitants to a 
 state of bondage. Hunting being their chief means of subsistence, they 
 acknowledged no division of lands among them, nor did they live in 
 towns, but encamped in the fields. Thus, by degrees, vast marshes and 
 forests spread over the north-eastern parts of Helvetia, and encumbered 
 the banks, now so fertile, of the lakes of Zurich, and of Constance. 
 The Helvetia of the Alemanni was divided from that of the Burgundians 
 by a desert tract between the river Reuss and the Aar. But those Ale- 
 
 * The Catholic or Nicene creeJ obtained the prevalence in the west towards the 
 end of the sixth century by the conversion of the Visi<^oths of Spain, and of the 
 Lombards in Italy. The Franks had become Catholics at their first conversion, and 
 their connexion with the Burgundians influenced, probably, the adoption of Catho- 
 licism by the latter. 
 
 \ Horts preeteriiis, meridianis vel vesjyertlnis. Chastity had ever been in honour 
 amonj^ the German nations, even in their pagan state, different in this from the 
 Huns, and other Scythian tribes, amongst whom polygamy was established. 
 
 PERIOD I.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 manni who had settled lower down on the Rhine came to hostilities with 
 their neighbours the Franks, and a desperate battle ensued between the 
 two people in the plains of Tolbiacum, near Cologne, in the year 496. 
 It was on this occasion that Clovis, king of the Franks, made a vow 
 that should he be victorious, he would embrace Christianity, the faith of 
 his wife Clotilda. This being understood by the Christian Gauls who 
 were in his army, gave them a fresh impulse, and victory decided fot 
 Clovis. The Alemanni were totally defeated, and Clovis fulfilled his 
 Vow by causing himself and his Franks to be baptized ; but it was not 
 until after several years that he succeeded in subjugating the whole 
 nation of the Alemanni, which he effected in great measure by exter- 
 minating the refractory. The Helvetia of the Alemanni thus passed 
 into the hands of the kings of the Franks, who appointed dukes to 
 govern the country. 
 
 The mountainous province of Rhaetia, which extended from the lake 
 of Wallenstadt to the foot of the St. Gothard, and eastward along the 
 lofty chain of Alps that border the valleys of the Adda and of the Inn, 
 was then considered as belonging to Italy, and it followed the fortunes 
 of the latter country. After being overrun by various tribes, it fell into 
 the hands of the Ostrogoths, whose king, Theodoric, ruled over Italy. 
 Under his reign, as it has been already remarked, order and security were 
 enforced. He appointed Servatus, duke of Rhsetia. 
 
 Sigismund*s wife, a daughter of Theodoric, having died, the Burgun- 
 dian king married a woman of inferior condition, at whose instigation 
 he afterwards put his own son to death. Theodoric declared war against 
 him, to avenge the death of his grandson, and Clotilda, Sigismund's 
 cousin, who had never forgiven the murder of her father by Gundobald, 
 instigated her own sons, who, after Clovis* death, had divided between 
 them" the kingdom of the Franks, to join in the attack on Sigismund. 
 The Burgundians were defeated, and Sigismund having given up the 
 command to his brother Gondemar, took refuge in the convent of St. 
 Maurice in the Valais ; but he was taken thence by the Franks, and 
 brought to Orleans, where he was put to a cruel death, with his wife 
 and her two sons, by order of Clodomir, son of Clovis. Theodoric's 
 generals, in the meantime, had taken possession of the southern part of 
 the Burgundian dominions. Gondemar, however, continued to struggle 
 for eight years against his enemies ; having made peace with the Ostro- 
 goths, and left them in possession of the chain of the Helvetian Alps, 
 he turned his whole strength against the Franks, and defeated and killed 
 Clodomir in battle. The body of that prince being taken to the im- 
 placable Clotilda, she urged the Franks to ravage the territories of Gon- 
 demar, where they committed the most atrocious cruelties. At last, in 
 534, Gondemar was defeated in battle and disappeared, leaving it in 
 doubt whether he had fallen among the slain, or had escaped to wander 
 
s 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period I. 
 
 into other lands. With him ended the first kingdom of Burgundy, one 
 hundred and twenty-eight years after that people had first crossed the 
 Rhine. Soon afterwards the Ostrogothian kingdom in Italy also fell to 
 pieces, owing to dissensions among the successors of the great Theo- 
 doric ; and Dietbert, or Theodebert, king of Austrasia, and grandson of 
 Clovis, took possession of all the dominions of the Ostrogoths in Hel- 
 vetia and Rhaetia, and in southern Gaul. To this acquisition Dietbert 
 had a double claim ; first, by a cession made to him by Vitiges, king of 
 the Ostrogoths ; and, afterwards, by a formal acknowledgment of the 
 emperor Justinian, who confirmed the cession in the year 536. " This," 
 observes an old French historian, " was a new title to the Franks for 
 the dominion of Gaul. From that epoch the Franks became masters of 
 Marseilles, Aries, and the shores of the Mediterranean." 
 
 All Helvetia was now under the rule of the Franks ; but the distinc- 
 tion continued between its three principal provinces, which were under 
 separate local governments, namely, Burgundian Helvetia, or transju- 
 rane Burgundy, the Helvetia of the Alemanni, and Rhectia. A 
 distmction which may still be traced in the manners, language, and 
 even the appearance of the inhabitants ; the Burgundian part cor- 
 responding, in great measure, to that which is now called French 
 Switzerland, whikt the Germui cantons occupy the country formerly 
 that of the Alemanni. The Burgundians, however, on submitting to 
 the Franks, after Gondemar's defeat, entered into a treaty with their 
 conquerors, by which it wa? stipulated that *' the kings of the Franks 
 should also bear the title of kings of Burgundy, and as such should be 
 entitled to all the services formerly paid to the house of Gundioch, the 
 nation, and each individual of it, at the same time retaining all their 
 rights and privileges, their laws and properties; and also that the Bur- 
 gundian troops should not be scattered in separate bodies among other 
 mdiiia." Thus the Burgundians remained a distinct nation, differing 
 in this from the Alemanni, who had not obtained such favourable con- 
 ditions from the Franks, but were ruled as a conquered people A 
 duke was appointed to the government of lower Burgundy, and a patri- 
 cian to that of the high lands of the Jura and the Alps. Another duke 
 ruled over the Alemanni, and a president over Rhaitia. The authority • 
 of the Frankish kings was not tamely acknowledged in the mountain 
 districts, and the optimates, as well as the people, submitted with reluct- 
 ance to a foreign yoke. Eager to escape from thraldom, whole bands of 
 them severally left their homes to serve as mercenaries in foreign lands 
 Ten thousand Burgundians at one time crossed over to Italy and joined 
 the camp of the Ostrogoths, who were besieging Milan, which city beincr 
 taken m 538, all the male inhabitants, including infants, were butchered'' 
 the clergy were slaughtered at the foot of the altars, and the women led 
 into captivity by the Burgundians. This dreadful massacre was in 
 
 PERIOD I.] HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 9 
 
 great measure the result of the fanatical hatred between the Arians and 
 the Catholics. Another army, of seventy thousand Alemanni and Franks 
 united, left Helvetia to make an incursion into Italy, about ;the year 555. 
 They overran and pillaged that country to its southernmost extremity ; but 
 being met on their return through the plains of Campania by Narses, 
 the general of Justinian, they were defeated and utterly destroyed. 
 When we read of the frequent incursions of the barbarians into 
 Italy, during several successive centuries, we must not imagine that 
 every irruption was made by a new people or horde come directly from 
 Germany, Scandinavia, or Scythia. In most cases, nations long set- 
 tled in haul, Helvetia, and Noricum, sent forth marauding parties, 
 composed of men weary of inaction and thirsting for plunder, to try 
 their fortunes in the fair regions of Italy, a country, the weakness of 
 which had become as proverbial as its fertility. 
 
 Under the turbulent dynasty of the Merovingian kings, the vast em- 
 pire of the Franks was sometimes divided between three or four Sove- 
 reigns, one of whom resided at Metz, another at Paris, and a third at 
 Orleans, and at other times was reunited under one head, as was 
 the case under Clotarius I. During these partitions, the Helvetia 
 of the Alemanni was in gciieiul dependent on the kingdom of INIetz, 
 and Burgundy of the kingdom of Orleans. Gontram, son of Clotarius, 
 king of Orleans and of Burgundy, strove to check the power of the 
 nobles in the latter country, by dividing it into several governments ; 
 and thus formed western Helvetia into two provinces, one of the 
 Alps, and the other between the Jura and the river Aar. Landed 
 property was then, however, the foundation of all power ; the whole 
 nation formed the army ; the system of paying troops out of taxes levied 
 in the sovereign's name, did not exist among the Germanic tribes : 
 indeed, some of the Merovingian kings, such as Chilperic I., king of 
 Soissons, who began to levy taxes on estates and slaves, were resisted in 
 the attempt. The nobles of Burgundy, alarmed at Gontram's innova- 
 tions, availed themselves of one of the frequent wars between the various 
 princes of the Franks, in order to extort greater immunities for them- 
 selves. This they effected in 587, when the grants made, at various 
 times, by the king to his Jideles and to the church, which had been 
 till then held only during pleasure, were declared to be for life, and soon 
 afterwards hereditary. Seven and twenty years before this period the 
 nobles had been satisfied with an enactment which declared thirty years' 
 possessions to constitute 3 title to the property. This was the origin 
 of fiefs, or feudal property, the holders of which were bound to do 
 homage and to perform certain services for it, differing in this, from 
 allodial property which was derived from the allotments made to all 
 freemen after the conquest, and which was wholly independent and 
 hereditary. Under the reigns of Gontram and of his nephew Childebert, 
 laws for the security of property were promulgated in the assemblj 
 
10 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period I. 
 
 of the notables which was held in the month of March in every 
 year. The country was divided into districts called centenm or hun- 
 dreds, because originally consisting of a hundred families of freemen 
 the heads of which were answerable for the robberies and other offences 
 committed m their district, unless they brought the offenders to 
 justice. The cenlenarii or justices of the hundreds, as well as the 
 magistrates of whole districts or provinces having no armed force at 
 their command, depended on the assistance of all the freemen for the 
 execution of the laws. Doubtful cases were decided by an appeal to 
 what was called " tlie judgment of God," being in other words the 
 ordeal of fire or water, or single combat. The bishops, styled " the 
 fathers of the people, " formed jointly with the dukes and counts, the 
 council of the state. The counts had the administration of justice over 
 large districts, and the dukes that of whole provinces, appeals could be 
 made from them to the bishops who examined and verited the sentences 
 The laws were few and mostly prohibitive, rather than injunctive, 
 iheft was pumslied with death on the evidence of five impartial wit- 
 nesses. The Sunday was strictly observed, and if dancers or ju-elers 
 exhibited on that day, one hundred stripes were their punishment 
 
 Childebert died in 596, and was succeeded in Burgundy by his son 
 Jhierri who was a minor, under the regency of his grandmother Brune- 
 Jiaut, a clever but intriguing and mischievous woman. She bestowed 
 upon Protadius a Roman, and governor of the province of Scodingen 
 which extended as far as tlie Aar in Helvetia, the dignity of maior 
 domus major of the palace, an office which became afterwards more 
 powerful than that of the king himself. Protadius endeavoured to 
 depress the nobles, but was not supported in his attempts by the people 
 Our ancestors," says the historian MuUer, "mistrusted all such policy* 
 which they considered as something like that of a wolf strangling the doss 
 of a fold, and pretending that he did it for the purpose of delivering the 
 sheep fi-om the importunate watching and barking of their guardians " 
 Protaduis summoned the freemen to take up arms agaiifst Dietbert 
 king of Austrasia : the nobles, when assembled in the field at the head 
 of their retainers, felt their strength, and one of them, Welf, a Burgundian 
 loid,decIared "that they did not look upon Dietbert a a danger's 
 enemy,that the people would not make war against him, inasmuch a 
 their principal foe inhabited the palace of their own kings." Tha 
 day Protadius was killed in an affray; Brunehaut avenged his death 
 by another crime, the murder of Welf. She then bestowed the pro 
 vmees of Scodingen, Wadt and Uechtland, which included all westTn 
 or Burgundian Helvetia, on her grand-daughter Theodelinda. Tl errf 
 soon after died, and his cousin Clotarius II., king of Soissons unS 
 under his sceptre the whole dominions of the Franks : a.o. ^IT^^^. 
 haut fearing the punishment due to her numerous misdeeds, flid to he 
 grand-daughter's castle of Orbe in Helvetia, but the Burgunin nobl 
 
 PERIOD I.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 11 
 
 geized her and gave her over to Clotarius who sentenced her to a cruel 
 death. She was the widow of Siegbert king of Austrasia, and her hatred 
 against another wicked woman, Fredegonda, wife of Chilperic king of 
 Soissons, was the cause of continual wars and atrocious crimes for 
 nearly half a century. , 
 
 Clotarius II. having sworn to maintain the laws and liberties of the 
 Burgundians was acknowledged by them as king, but the real power 
 remained in the hands of Warnachar, major domus of Burgundy, whom 
 Clotarius confirmed in his situation for life. He did the same by the 
 major of the palace of his other kingdoms of Austrasia and Neustria, 
 and by so doing he stimulated still further the ambition of those officers 
 who soon contrived to make their dignity hereditary in their families. 
 Alethgcus patrician or governor of the Valais and of the higher Alps, 
 a descendant of the old stock of Gundioch, aspired to the throne of 
 Burgundy. The bishop of Sion undertook to persuade the beautiful 
 wife of Clotarius to forsake her husband, who, he predicted in his pre- 
 tended knowledge of astrology, would not live to the end of that year, 
 and to unite her fortunes to those of Alethseus, who was to re-establish 
 the old independent kingdom of the Burgundians. The queen, how- 
 ever, would not be persuaded, but revealed the plot to her husband. 
 Alethscus was beheaded, and the bishop of Sion rigorously confined to 
 
 his diocese. 
 
 In 615, Clotarius convoked a general assembly of the lords, proceres, 
 and leuctcs, and of the bishops of the kingdom of France and Burgundy, 
 in his good city of Paris, in order to effect the reform of abuses. This 
 was styled the Fifth Council of Paris. Seventy-nine bishops were pre- 
 sent. These assemblies being composed of churchmen and laymen for 
 the object of legislating for both orders, united the aitributes of synods 
 and of parliaments: their decrees were called capitularies, and had the 
 force of law over the whole nation. Clotarius had also ambulatory par- 
 liaments, or courts which judged of local matters, and were called ^;/n- 
 cita, whence the word plaids, pleadings. In the above Council of Paris 
 it was ordained that the bishops, being elected by the clergy and the 
 people, should be consecrated at the request of the king by the arch- 
 bishop, attended by his suffragans. Bishops were not to be superseded 
 or replaced, except when unable to perform their functions. In both 
 civil and criminal matters the clergy were to be tried and judged 
 according to law, ecclesiastical judges being present in the court; m 
 questions between clerical and lay parties, the court was to be 
 composed of both orders in equal numbers ; the vows of nuns were 
 declared irrevocable, and death was awarded to the seducer; freed- 
 men were placed under the protection of the clergy ; the taxes which 
 Protadius and others had exacted were abolished, certain articles alone 
 paid fixed duties according to old statutes; offices were to be filled 
 by natives only. Not even a slave was to be condemned without 
 
12 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period I. 
 
 PERIOD I.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 13 
 
 being heard .n h.s defence: public officers were to assume no power 
 beyond that g.veu them by the laws ; Jews could bring no action against 
 Chnstmns, and the latter were forbidden to participate in usurious 
 
 ■ tZd t"'' S'T"'-'""'f ^' '■''™" "^'"Ss were to be faithfully maiu- 
 tan ed. Two great pnnc.ples were established by these enactments : first, 
 hat a freeman could be judged by his peers only; and, secondly, tha 
 the magistrate or judge of a district must be a native and an inhabitant 
 of the same, acquamted with the habits and wants of the people, and 
 sharing their common sympathies. This was the first foundation of a 
 municipal administration. The two great orders in the state, the nobles 
 and the dignitaries of the church, both powerful and both independent 
 of the king, became checks on each other, and from their mutual vi'^i- 
 lance some sort of protection to the people was derived. 
 
 Under Dagobert, successor to Clotarius II., whose memory has been 
 handed down to us by tradition with the flattering appellation of tc hon 
 lioi Dajoberl, France and Burgundy enjoyed tranquillity and prosperity 
 commerce revived, merchants from France traded as far as Constand^ 
 nople and Saxon traders resorted to the fairs of St. Denis. The spoils 
 of Italy, into which both Franks and Burgundians had made repS 
 ncursions generally carrying back with them an ample bootv, Tved 
 
 accounts of the wealth and magnificence of those times. Dagobert it il 
 said, had a throne of solid gold made by El„i, or Eligius, a skilful to k 
 man, who was subsequently king's treasurer, and \ishop of Noyo„ • 
 and after his death, was numbered by the church of Rome among i.^ 
 
 We have seen that the Helvetia of the Alemanni was governed by a 
 duke, dependent on the Frank kingdom of Austrasia, or Metz. That 
 part of the country, however, was still considerably behind Burgundiai. 
 Helvetia in the progress of civilization. The Alemanni continue 
 their rude, pagan state till the seventh century. Unlike the Burgundkns 
 or Franks, they had not, after their conquest made any re^uW dSZ 
 o lands with the old inhabitants, but considered the' h le as he^" 
 property and the tenants as their coloni or bondsmen, to whom was 
 ntrusted what little cultivation remained in the country, on Zdi L. 
 of their paying rent in kind to their new masters. But bvTr he 
 greater part of the land had become a wilderness in whirb ll „ 1/ 
 grazed their flocks, or hunted the beasts of thXs '" Thtat^rZ 
 Alemanni, different in this from those of the Bur-^undians mal. n 
 mention of the subject, or Roman race ; they speak n of tiiemse ve" 
 
 coveted under Childebert 11.. ^r::VZl£ ^^Z^^l^^ . 
 
 ?hTtti;;:Mhe I^ -re reduced to something like consistenc" 
 nation of the Alemanni was classed into optimates ; medii. or 
 
 middle estate ; Uheiii, or freedmcn ; salaried servants ; and lastly, 
 slaves. The latter cultivated one half of the land for their masters, 
 and the other for themselves : woi-king for the former three days in 
 the week (as is the case to this day with the serfs in Poland and 
 parts of Russia) ; and paying, besides, to their masters a determinate 
 quantity of fowls, eggs, pigs, bread and beer. Once a fortnight, on 
 the Saturday, the freemen of each district assembled under the presi- 
 dency of the count or governor to administer justice, and to settle 
 other local matters; and on the 1st of March every year, a general 
 assembly of the province was held. Their laws were as simple as 
 their manner of living ; they aimed rather at repressing the abuse of 
 physical force, than the devices of craftiness; the latter being little 
 known amongst them. Manslaughter was punished by heavy fine ; 
 no man was allowed to enter armed into another man's dwelling ; a 
 woman who was assaulted by a man, obtained double damages, as 
 she could not so well defend herself; the owner of a- dog that had 
 bitten a man to death, paid half the fine of manslaughter. Death was 
 seldom inflicted, except against robbers and conspirators. 
 
 Towards the beginning of the seventh century, Columbanus, an Irish 
 monk, the founder of the sanctuary at lona, with his brethren Gall, 
 Magnoald, and others, passed into France, where these pious men 
 taught both religion and agriculture ; they were, however, persecuted 
 by Brunehaut, and were driven away from their convent at Lutzel, or 
 Luxeuil, by her grandson Thierri, whom Columbanus had reproved for 
 the guilt of incest. Dietbert, king of Austrasia, Thierry's brother, per- 
 mitted the persecuted monks to preach the gospel among the Alemanni 
 of Helvetia. At the place where Schaffhausen now stands, there was 
 then a hamlet, called still by the Roman name of Ascaph\ where 
 boats used to land their goods and passengers, above the fall of the 
 Rhine. Further on there was a castle, Castrum Turegum, on the spot 
 now occupied by Zurich : a few more villages were scattered at long 
 intervals about the country. Christianity had already penetrated into 
 those regions, especially among the aboriginal or subject population ; 
 but as the missionaries advanced to the interior as far as Tuggen or 
 Tuggenburg, near the lake of Wallenstadt, they found the inhabitants 
 of that district still deeply plunged in heathen superstitions. To tlie 
 exhortations of Columbanus, who preached to them " Jesus redeemer of 
 the sins of man," the people of Tuggen replied that the gods of their 
 fathers had till then bestowed fertility on their fields by means of 
 showers in the spring, and of genial heat in the summer ; and that as 
 long as they continued thus propitious, the people could not think of 
 forsaking them, and they went on sacrificing to their gods. Colum- 
 banus and his friend Gall, excited with indignant zeal, set fire to the 
 temple, broke the image of Wodan to pieces, and threw the offerings 
 into the lake. The inhabitants complained to their governors, and the 
 
 J ■» 
 
 ika- 
 
14 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period I, 
 
 monks were sent away; Gall with Magnoald, proceeded first to Arbon. 
 on the lake since called of Constance, and thence to a delightful, though 
 deserted valley, near the river Sitter, where they built a cell, planted an 
 orchard, and tilled the ground which the count of Arbon gave them 
 Ihjs was the origin of the famous abbey of St. Gall*. Colurabanu. 
 with another rnonk, passed into Rhsetia, where they founded the con- 
 vent of Disentis, in the high valley of the Rhine, about the year 614 
 The convent of Seckingen, in the Frickthal, was founded by Fridolin' 
 another missionary, who likewise built a chapel consecrated to St' 
 Hilarius, m a remote valley of the Alps, near the source of the Linth' 
 M'hich sanctuary afterwards gave its name to the Canton of Glarus a 
 corruption of Hilarius. The Romans formerly had a station near the 
 entrance of this valley, on the borders of RhiEtia, and on the banks of 
 the ake since called of Wallenstadt, from the German words trehche- 
 stadt, Italian town." Several villages near the lake, on the spots 
 where the legionaries were quartered, have retained the Roman names 
 of terzen, quarlen, quinten. Kuprecht, another cenobite, founded a 
 church and chapter of canons near the castle of Zurichium, in the 
 midst of a solitary forest. Another monk raised the abbey of St Leo- 
 degar where Luzern now is; the latter name being probably derived 
 fiom the Latin lucerna, a light house having existed there for the guidance 
 of boatmen on the stormy Waldstatter lake. In the neighbourhood of 
 these and otiier sanctuaries, houses were built, and hamlets grew bv 
 degrees into towns. It was only there, or in the vicinity of some noble- 
 man s castle or tower, that any traces of agriculture and industrv were 
 to be seen. The thin, scattered population were poor, having few 
 wants or wishes. In Burgundian Helvetia, the shores of the Leman 
 lake afforded a somewhat more cheerful prospect ; Geneva was alreadv 
 a town; Lausanne, Vicus Urba, now Orbe, Everdunu.n, were rising 
 again from their ruins. In the Valais. the abbey of St. Maurice had 
 been raised near the ancient Octodurum. Monks were the first re- 
 
 Switzlrknd """'"" ""* ''°'"*'"' '"'^"'"^ '" "'' '^'''^'"^ ^""«>-^ "f 
 After the death of Dagobert, a.d. C38, the kings of the Merovingian 
 dynasty became weak and insignificant : the mayors of the palace who 
 were also commanders of the militia, kept them in abject tutor'ship. 
 These rois faineans, do-„othi„g-kings," as they have been called, were 
 content with the luxijr.es of their mansion and gardens, wliile the major 
 domus managed all the affairs of state, or led the nation to war A 
 cession of degenerate, obscure princes passed over the stage. Some 
 were murdered, others were immured in convents, whilst other pnpnets 
 were taken from the royal stock to fill the sinecure office. This state 
 
 teen written by th'e first Switch or frilhronki'' '"'^ ' "' ""^^'"^ '" '"'^« 
 
 PERIOD I.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 15 
 
 of things contiDiied for about a century. Pepin d'lleerstal, major 
 domus to Thierri III., was succeeded in his office by his natural son 
 Charles Martel in 715. The great qualities of Charles recommended 
 him to the people at a time when the Saracens from Spain had pene- 
 trated as far as Burgundy, and threatened the very existence of the 
 monarchy of the Franks; and Charles Martel defeated them in a 
 memorable battle near Poitiers, and thus effectually stopped the advance 
 of Islamism in Western Europe. On the other side, hordes of Huns 
 advanced again from the east, as far as Rhaetia, but were defeated near 
 the convent of Disentis by the hardy mountaineers of that region. The 
 Frankish dukes of Helvetia, refusing to countenance the usurpation of 
 Charles Martel and of his son Pepin, revolted, and were defeated by 
 Pepin, who took the title of king of France. The ducal dignity was 
 abolished throughout Helvetia, counts were entrusted with the adminis- 
 tration of the various provinces, subject to the inspection of the missi 
 camerce or councillors of the royal chamber; and the government 
 ssumed for a time a more monarchical form. 
 
 From the death of Dagobert till the dissolution of the Merovingian 
 dynasty, history is extremely obscure ; there is hardly a chronicler of 
 those times worthy of being consulted. We are better acquainted 
 with the remote epoch of the first kingdom of Burgundy and the strug- 
 gles of its nobles against the encroachments of absolute power, than 
 with the times immediately preceding the elevation of Charlemagne. 
 Under the long and successful reign of that monarch, who revived in 
 his person the empire of the west, the regions of Helvetia shared, in 
 common with the rest of his vast dominions, the advantages of his 
 orderly and vigorous administration. Christianity had become the 
 religion of all Helvetia, and its mild influence softened the manners of 
 both the rulers and their subjects. The art of agriculture kept pace 
 with domestic and social improvement. Common lands were divided 
 among new settlers, and enclosed ; overgrown forests were cut down, 
 the waters restrained by dykes, and morasses restored to cultivation. 
 The vine was planted ou the hills near the lake Leman, and on the 
 banks of the lake of Zurich. In every manor there was a house or tower 
 built of stones, belonging to the lord ; the rooms of which were warmed 
 with stoves. The huts of the labourers, and the stables for the cattle, 
 stood round the residence, as well as the orchard and gardens ; beyond 
 these were the corn-fields which were cultivated by the serfs. Other 
 parts of the lord's property were scattered about the district, and culti- 
 vated by free servants or tenants. Every village or burgh had its hof 
 or court of justice presided over by the mayor, who was appointed by 
 the lord. The whole district or canton, however, assembled on particular 
 occasions in the open air, when the freemen formed a ring, the elders 
 having the precedence ; the count opened the business, and every one de- 
 
16 
 
 BISTORT OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period t. 
 
 livered his opinion, according to rank and age ; the judges then entered 
 the ring and pronounced the verdict, which was binding both on free- 
 men and serfs. 
 
 The dignity of count which was ut first for life, became hereditary 
 with the connivance of the crown, under the weak successors of Cliarle- 
 magne, and thus all power was concentrated in the hands of a few fami- 
 lies. The most powerful lord in the Thurgau. a i.rovince between the 
 lakes of Zurich and of Constance, was the count of Kvburo-, whose 
 castle «-as not far from the Zurich lake. The count of Rapperschwvl 
 was lord of the march *; behind his possessions avast, impervious forest 
 extended for many miles, as far as the lake of Uri, and the Alps of St 
 Oothard The counts of Lcnzburg held vast estates in the Aareau • 
 they had also built castles, abbeys, and villages, in the central valleys as 
 far as the lake of Zug. The lands around Zurich were partly held of 
 the great church and nunnerv-, and partly under the government of the 
 emperor himself, whose lieutenant resided in the castle, exercised high 
 jurisdiction, received appeals from subaltern judges, administered the 
 lands of the imperial chamber, and superintended the roads and water, 
 the weights and coinage. Almost every fresh cultivator of the soil 
 placed himself and his property, for the sake of securitv, under the pro- 
 tection of some lord or monastery, to whom he paid "a fee. Hence a 
 new source of the relation of lords and vassals t; and one which 
 operated powerfully to extend the system of feudality. " The dukes 
 or governors of provinces," .ays the French historians, "the counts 
 or governors of towns, and the subaltern officers of the kin-r, havino 
 rendered their offices hereditary, usurped both lands and judicial 
 jurisdiction, they made themselves proprietors of the districts of 
 winch hey were before only magistrates, they became .„...«/„/ the 
 crown lands and received the fees from the tenants who. from bein! 
 subject to the crown, became vassals of their respective lords 'iZy 
 filled up the benefices which had been vacated, they judged appeals 
 from the justices of the hundreds, they exacted services of LT'ro 
 visions and money : for the royal authority was substituted a ba^n a 
 right m the various provinces. The whole kingdom," savs M zen 
 
 T tV' \r'' '''• ^'"'^"'""S i'^^'f "t -ill and not- as a m n- 
 archy. The nobles were the great vassals of the .crown; they hTd 
 
 * March gcrmanice 3^/r^, meant oriduallv a distrit tliP ;nT,.K-i * p , 
 vent together in a body to war, and kej t i^m/ZLTLu^r Is f^"^f ^ °^ ^'^'''^' 
 
 nty in time of peace. Bv de.'rees as thp rmmf ? i ^ • ' *^'*'"" "eternal secu- 
 
 duties. The Mark of Rapperschw3l L Tm now art if thp C ^'T^ Z^' *''^ ^>"« 
 lord or governor of a march district\.as siyled mark ^raf ^ m^^^^^^ "^ ^''^"^'*^- ^^^ 
 
 iBus.u, vassi, or hassa/,, were at first the e^ants"of Jp?.. t V 'f ^T'* 
 or serfs; they could l.ave'hi.n acco ding to the U'v of the Vl'l •^>'* '^""'"^ 
 for havmg their lives threatened, bein/depivel of tw ^'^"^ ^" ^^""^ <^^«" : 
 agamst the chastity of their wives or daucrhrrllwlf I • ^'"^^^^^ ^«' attempts 
 a puuishuieut considered onl/fit for shv^ ' ^''"^ '^'""'^ ^^*^ ^ '''^K 
 
 PERIOD I.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 n 
 
 under them their provincial vassals, who had by subinfeodations subor- 
 dinate vassals themselves. The vassals of the lords were obliged in cer- 
 tain cases to follow them to war, even against the king." 
 
 Freemen, however, in general preferred placing themselves under the 
 protection of the church. They gave up their property to the Holy 
 Virgin, or other patron saint of a convent or abbey, and received it 
 back as a fief, paying a quit-rent. The monasteries were under royal 
 protection, and respected both by the lords and by the people. Their 
 tenants and dependants enjoyed under their pacific rule much greater 
 security than those of a turbulent and warlike count. The principal 
 towns of modern Switzerland owe their origin to the church. The 
 abbey of Einsiedlen was built on the site of a cell where Meinrad, son 
 of Berthold, count of HohenzoUern, had lived as a hermit, and 
 was murdered by robbers. The abbey of Beromunster was founded in 
 850 by Beron coimt of Aargau. The convent of St. Maurice in the 
 Valais had an extensive jurisdiction in the adjoining country. The 
 bishop of Sion was also count or governor of the Valais. The bishop 
 of Lausanne's diocese extended over Burgundian Helvetia, and that 
 of the bishop of Constance embraced the country of the Alemanni. 
 The bishop of Coire had spiritual authority over Rhajtia. The influ- 
 ence of the bishops in temporal matters rose very higli under Charle- 
 magne's successors : even kings submitted to their decisions and bore 
 their reproofs with patience. AVhen the monarch had to propose a law, 
 he first submitted it to discussion in his council, after which his chancellor 
 communicated it to the archbishops and counts, and these again to the 
 bishops, the abbots, and the centum graves, or justices of the hundred; 
 the project of law was read before them and submitted to their approval 
 before it received the king's sanction : lex consensu iwpuli Jit et con- 
 stitulione regis. Laws were seldom general, but were adapted to the 
 manners and localities of each province of the empire. The centum 
 graves were judges in their districts, but could not deprive any one of 
 his property or life. The counts held the provincial assizes at the head 
 of twelve scabini or notables, called also boni homines, and by the 
 Spaniards afterwards ricos hombres, who were chosen by the people. 
 The advocate (vogt) of the abbot or bishop attended the assizes. 
 Murder, arson, robbery, rape, and other capital charges, were judged by 
 the scabini : they also decided matters between the vassal and his lord ; 
 even the king's domestics and serfs, Jiscales servi et ingenui, were subject 
 to their jurisdiction. 
 
 In the month of May, a missus camerce, or king's commissioner, went 
 his circuit, and was received by the bishops, abbots, counts, viscounts, 
 (vicecomites, who had the government of towns,) centum graves, advo- 
 cati, and vicedomini of the abbesses, and by a deputation of boni homines, 
 and of the vassals or tenants of the king, who assembled to receive him. 
 He inquired of all present whether the officers did their duty, and he 
 
18 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period I. 
 
 degraded the scabini who had been guilty of injustice. Young men come of 
 age took the oath of allegiance at his hayds. Those vassals who ne- 
 glected to pay homage had their houses occupied by the commissioner 
 or count, or some of his suite, who lived there at the expense of the 
 owner. There were asylums against the violence of power, but not 
 against the authority of tribunals. 
 
 Monks were at first subject to the bishops of their diocese, who had 
 the inspection of their property, and appointed their superiors. By 
 degrees the abbots became independent of the bishops, as the counts had 
 become independent of the dukes. Some convents, as that of St. Gall, 
 redeemed themselves by a sum of money from the episcopal authority ; 
 others were emancipated by the emperors, whose policy was favourable 
 to a subdivision of power; whilst the vast increase of property and po- 
 pulation rendered the authority of one man no longer equal to the ex- 
 tent of his jurisdiction. 
 
 Such were the institutions of the empire of the Franks under Charle- 
 magne and his immediate successors. In the division of his empire 
 among the latter, the Helvetia of the Alemanni, which we shall call 
 henceforth German Helvetia, fell to the share of Louis of Bavaria, 
 called ako Louis the Germanic, and afterwards continued attached to 
 that part of the German empire called the Duchy of Suabia. Burgun- 
 dian Helvetia was dependent sometimes on the kingdom of Italy,\nd 
 sometimes on France, until after the death of Louis le Begue, in 879, 
 when the monarchy fell into confusion : the Normans in the north and 
 the Saracens in the south invaded France; the nobles, among whom 
 Louis had parcelled the royal domains, considered themselves inde- 
 pendent, and the royal and imi)erial crowns were disputed between 
 Louis UL and Carloman. The States of Burgundy amidst this anarchy 
 assembled at Mantaille, near Vienne ; six archbishops and seventeen 
 bishops, with the chief lay lords, determined to give up the imbecile de- 
 scendants of Charlemagne, and to choose a king for themselves, according 
 to the ancient rights of Burgundy. They invited Boson, count of Vienne 
 and governor of Provence, a nobleman valiant, generous, and of plausible 
 address, who had married Hermangard, a daughter of the emperor Louis 
 IL Boson accepted the kingly office, under the condition that for three 
 days prayers should be said in all the churches, in order to see whether 
 his election was approved of by heaven, and whether anv protests should 
 be made against it. The three days having expired/ Aurelian, arch- 
 bishop of Lyons, crowned Boson king of Aries and of Burgundy This 
 was in 879, three centuries and a half after the extinction of the first 
 kingdom of Burgundy, and its union with the crown of the Franks*. 
 
 Louis in. and Carloman made war upon Boson, whom they "con- 
 sidered as a usurper, but the two brothers having died soon after. 
 Charles le Gros, emperor and king of France, a. d. 884, made peace 
 
 * See page 8. 
 
 PERIOD I.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 19 
 
 with Boson, and invested him with the crown, on the plea that Bur- 
 gundy was originally a patriciate of the empire. For this reason the 
 emperors of Germany, successors of Charles le Gros, considered them- 
 selves as suzerains of the kingdom of Burgundy. Charles le Gros, being 
 deposed, died in 888, and Arnoul, natural son of Carloman, and grand- 
 son of Louis of Germany, was elected emperor ; at his death in 898, his 
 infant son Louis IV. succeeded him, and he also dying in 915, Conrad 
 I. duke of Franconia was proclaimed, by which means the imperial 
 dignity went out of the house of Charlemagne, and of France, and 
 became elective among the Germans, and such it has continued until the 
 renunciation of Francis II. of Austria, at the peace of Prcsburg in 
 1806, when the dignity of Emperor of Germany was finally abolished. 
 
 Boson, at his death, left his son Louis, a minor, under the 
 guardianship of Hermangard; but during the minority the kingdom 
 raised by Boson was parcelled into three. Rudolph count of western 
 Helvetia, son of Conrad count of Paris, and related to the Carlovingian 
 dynasty, aimed at the throne. He assembled at St. Maurice, in the 
 Valais, several lords and bishops, who crowned him as king Rudolph 
 I. of Upper Burgundy. He was acknowledged in western Helvetia, 
 and in the country west of the Jura, as far as the river Saone. At the 
 same time Richard, brother of Boson, count of lower Burgundy beyond 
 the Saone, made himself also independent of the kingdom of Aries, and 
 became the head of the first dynasty of the dukes of Burgundy. Louis, 
 son of Boson, continued to reign at Aries. And thus the Burgundian 
 nation was permanently divided. Each division assumed a different 
 character, was swayed by different interests, and lost its nationality ; 
 and, although the greater part of the former Burgundian territories were 
 finally reunited several centuries afterwards by being merged into the 
 kingdom of France, yet one division of them, namely, Transjurane Bur- 
 gundy, consisting of Helvetia and Savoy, has remained separated and 
 estranged from the remainder. 
 
 Rudolph, after sustaining a war against the emperor Arnoul, who 
 cp.me into Helvetia with an army of Germans, was induced to repair to 
 Regensburg, (Ratisbonne,) where a general diet was held, in which the 
 affairs of France and Burgundy were regulated. Upper or Little Bur- 
 gundy was acknowledged as an independent kingdom, a. d. 890. Ru- 
 dolj)h, after reigning 24 years, was succeeded by his son Rudolph IL 
 
 Meantime German Helvetia, ever since the abolition of the ducal 
 dignity by Pepin, was governed by missi ca?nerce, who resided in Suabia. 
 Two brothers, Erchanger and Berthold, who were intrusted with this 
 office, became jealous of Solomon, bishop of Constance and abbot of St. 
 Gall, and lord of several other convents and domains, a man of noble 
 family, superior learning, and high accomplishments. He had been a 
 favourite of Arnoul and of Louis IV., the last emperor of the Carlovingian 
 race, who ranted him lands from the imperial domains. After sundry 
 
 c2 
 
20 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period I. 
 
 vexatious charges, from which the prelate came out triumphant, the two 
 brothers took Solomon prisoner, but the bishop's reputation stood so 
 high that the country rose in his favour; he was released, and the two 
 commissioners, being arraigned for sacrilege before a court of Suabian 
 nobles, were condemned to death and executed. Burkard, count of 
 Ihurgau, was the principal instigator of this severe sentence. Soon 
 after, Burkard himself, was made, by the emperor Conrad, with the con- 
 sent of the nobles of the province, duke of Alemannia, called also by 
 some of Suabia, which government included German Helvetia. Burkard 
 quarrelled with Rudolph II. of Burgundy about the frontier district of 
 Aargau; but peace was re-established between them, and Rudolph 
 married Burkard's daughter. The river Reuss seems to have marked 
 the limits between the two states. Rudolph was then called into Italy 
 by a party of lords of that country, who were dissatisfied with their kinc^ 
 Berengarms, and a battle was fought at Firenzuola, near the river Ticino"^ 
 in which the Burgundians were victorious. Bcrengarius escaped, but 
 was afterwards treacherously murdered at Verona. Hugo count of 
 Provence, who had expelled Boson's grandson from his little kindom of 
 Aries, started as rival to Rudolph for the crown of Italy. Rudolph called 
 to his assistance Burkard, his father-in-law: the old warrior came, but 
 being over-confident in his contempt for his Italian enemies, he was 
 killed near Milan. Rudolph then returned to his own dominions 
 which the emperer Henry I. enlarged by part of German Helvetia, de- 
 tached from the dukedom of Alemannia ; and for this Rudolph did 
 homage to the empire. Hugo of Provence died soon afterwards, and the 
 Burgundians of both parties were finally expelled from Italy. It ap- 
 pears that the Italians had conceived great aversion to the whole nation 
 on account of their excessive eating and drinkin-, and because the Bur- 
 gundian voices sounded too rude for Italian ears ! The Bur-undians 
 had also the reputation of being thick-headed and dull; they are stvled 
 by some writers the Boeotians of those times, a reputation which their 
 descendants in some parts of western Switzerland have retained in a 
 certain measure, to this day, under the gentler appellation of bonhommie 
 Muller remarks that the Burgundian convents produced no eminent 
 
 man Helved' '"^ ^''"' '^'""' "^ ^'' ^'"' ^^^'^' "'^^ ""'^''^ ^^^er- 
 
 After the death of Rudolph II., in 937, Otho I., emperor of Germany 
 came into Burgundy and took away Conrad, Rudolph's son, who was 
 stdl a minor, in order to have him brought up under his own eves 
 Meantime Bertha, Rudolph's widow, governed the kingdom. Conrad 
 having become of age, was restored by Otho to his dominions • the 
 emperor married Conrad's sister, Adelaide Queen of Italy. In Conrad'! 
 reign another irruption took place of the Hungri or Madjars, called by 
 fiome lurci, who had some years before overrun Italy and Rhitia • thev 
 afterwards penetrated into western Helvetia. This fearful scourc^e wal 
 
 PERIOD I.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 21 
 
 the occasion of the town being first surrounded by walls and ditches, 
 that they might afford protection to the inhabitants as well as to the 
 country people. At the same time the emperors, and especially Henry 
 I., bestowed privileges and franchises on the burghers of towns, and thus 
 created municipal bodies independent of the nobility. This was a step 
 most important in its consequences, which will be adverted to more 
 fully hereafter. 
 
 Conrad defeated the Madjars, as well as some bands of Saracens*, 
 who had found their way to the valleys of the Jura, by opposing the 
 barbarians to each other, and deluding each party with the expectation 
 of his assistance against the other. While the wandering hostile hordes 
 were fast engaged in combat, Conrad fell upon both and destroyed them. 
 After this he reigned long and in peace. Under him Helvetia con- 
 tinued to improve ; agriculture and human habitations spread around. 
 The Oechtland, a region extending from the lakes of Neuchatel and 
 Bienne to the Aar, was still, however, covered with marshes and forests. 
 Part of it belonged to the royal domain, and part to the counts of 
 Wechtingen, who had also the castle of Novocastrum (Neuchatel), from 
 which their descendants afterwards took their title. This family also 
 bestowed extensive lands at the foot of the Jura mountains, in the 
 country of the Rauraci, on the bishopric of Basel. The emperors, on 
 their side, granted to the same see mines of silver in the Brisgau, and 
 hunting-tracts of land along the Rhine. Such was the origin of the 
 dominions of the bishops of Basle, which in after-times became an in- 
 dependent state allied to Switzerland. 
 
 Gontram count of Alsace, a nobleman of high descent and con- 
 nexions, having opposed the power of the emperor Otho, was deprived 
 of his tenures, and found himself reduced to his patrimonial estate in 
 Helvetia, near the ruins of Vindonissa. Conrad, king of Burgundy, 
 deprived him also of his priory of Moutiers Graiidval, and of the district 
 of Erguel, which had been bestowed on his family by Rudolph II. On 
 this occasion it was decided, in a public assembly of the nobles and 
 clergy, that " a royal and free priory could not be bestowed on lay- 
 menf." Gontram, thus humbled in his fortunes, retired to Wolen, in 
 Aargau, near the Reuss. There he still enjoyed much consideration 
 
 * There is much obscurity in the old accounts of these Saracen predatory bands. 
 It ought to be observed that it was then a common misnomer to call the Saracens 
 Poffnns, and this error has prevailed among Italian writers of a much later age ; on 
 the other hand, the Hungarians have been mistaken sometimes for Saracens. Kk- 
 kehard notices this : Qui Ungros Jgarenos putant, longa via errant. Real Saracens, 
 however, had settled themselves at Fressiento, among the maritime Alps, from which 
 they made incursions into the valleys of Piedmont and even of Savoy. 
 
 f The practice of granting priories and abbacies in commendam to bishops and 
 also to laymen was then in full vigour. The grantee enjoyed the principal part of 
 the revenues, leaving a pittance for the maintenance of the monks, over whom he 
 appointed a substitute. The emperor Louis 11. gave, in 860, the monastry of Santa 
 Julia, of Brescia, to his daughter Gisla, with the faculty of administering and en- 
 joying its revenues for life. 
 
22 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period I. 
 
 PERIOD I.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLANf>. 
 
 23 
 
 among his tenants and neighbours, and several freeholders placed them- 
 selves and their properties, according to the custom of the times, under 
 his protection, by paying him a small fee, or quit-rent. When Gon- 
 tram's fields ^vere to be tilled, or the harvest was to be reaped, they 
 assisted him also of their own good will. But by degrees Gontram 
 exacted these services as a duty, and he also imposed, of his own will, a 
 contribution of poultry. The country-people carried their complaints to 
 the king, who happened to be then at the convent of St. Urs (Soleure) 
 but they could not approach him through the nobles by whom he was 
 surrounded, and who already looked down upon simple freemen as ple- 
 beians. From that moment the count and his son Lancelin grew bolder 
 in their exactions : Lancelin dealt by the free peasants of Muri, a neigh- 
 bouring district, as his fiithcr had done by those of Wolen ; new duties 
 were imposed on them, and the vassals or tenants were treated as if they 
 were serfs. Those who did not quietly submit to the rapacity of the 
 count and of his son were deprived of their fields and cottages. This 
 was towards the end of the reign of Conrad, a weak and indolent prince. 
 Under him, and still more under his son Rudolph III., the nobles knew 
 no check to their caprice. Count Lancelin, after his father's death, 
 resided at the castle of Altenburg, near the Aar. When he was on his 
 death-bed, about the year 990, those whom he had oppressed at Muri, 
 among whom were two nuns, came to him to reclaim their property. Rad- 
 bod Lancelin's son, drove them away with scorn ; he afterwards built a 
 castle at Man for his residence. Radbod married Idda, the dau-hter of 
 duke Frcdenc of Lotharingia*, or Lorraine, and niece to Hugh Capet the 
 founder of the tiiird dynasty of French kings. Radbod aave Muri as a 
 dowry to his wife, who shuddered with horror when she^ heard on the 
 spot the tales of the injustice and cruelty which her father-in-law and 
 her husband nad been guilty of against the poor inhabitants, in order to 
 extort their property from them. But the victims were by this time 
 
 Sil of ^7 T"^"'"? "' ^''''^^'' ^''''''' ^^^^^' ^y '^'' -^^-'^ of the 
 bishop of Strasburg, thought of making some reparation, according, to 
 
 Tl.l7 ^"l 'T"' '^ '^"'^"^^^ ^ ^^"^'^"^ '' ^^-i' - the raising of 
 which four hundred men were employed. . The abbey of Muri became 
 
 r di wuh donations, and flourished in learning, and it has continued to 
 
 our da>s one of the most considerable in Switzerland. Radbod about 
 
 the year 1020 built another castle on a steep hill, called Wulpeisber<. 
 
 ^hich rises above the Aar, near the site of ancient Yindonissa. This 
 
 castle was called Ilabsburg, from habs, terra aviaficaf, being built on 
 
 an estate or patrimony hereditary in the family. From that time the 
 
 counts of Altenburg took the title of counts of Habsburg. The 
 
 r^:^^:^:::^^^ «^ ^^- -- -, ana who .as 
 
 Millei''o'piZnf ''" '^""^"^ "*"^ ' ^^"'^^ ^^-'--^- «^« Ducange. The above is 
 
 Castle was small, being proportionate to the size of the estate ; it was, 
 however, strong by its position and well fortified. Werner, bishop of 
 Strasburg, and Radbod's relative, who had advanced some money for the 
 construction, having come to see the new residence, was mortified at its 
 diminutive proportions. Radbod, who had employed the money in 
 securing the friendship of the neighbouring freeholders, who swore an 
 inviolable attachment to his family, collected a number of them in the 
 night, and, when the bishop rose next morning and saw this multitude 
 in arms, he appeared uneasy ; but Radbod said to him, " With your 
 money I have raised these living walls ; valiant and faithful men like 
 these are the safest of all castles." Such were the humble beginnings 
 of the house of Habsburg, which has risen since to so high a degree of 
 power and greatness ; but of its fortunes, and the influence it exercised 
 over the destinies of Switzerland, there will be ample occasion to speak 
 in the sequel of this history. 
 
 The abbot of Muri gave the peasants who came to settle on its do- 
 mains a hut, a plough, a cart and four oxen, a sow and two young pigs, 
 a cock and two hens, a scythe and axe, and seeds of hemp, millet, oats, 
 beans, peas, and turnips. Their services were likewise defined : each 
 settler was obliged to labour in spring and autumn four acres of the 
 abbey lands, to act as letter-carriers and messengers for the monks as 
 far as the Aar and the Reuss, to fetch wine from Brisgau and Alsace, to 
 lodge guests of the abbey three times a-year, and to watch one night, for 
 a glass of beer and half a loaf. The contributions they had to furnish 
 in cloth, cattle, and other produce, were also determined. 
 
 The town of Zurich had become the depot of an extensive commerce 
 between Italy and Germany, by the road which crosses Mount Septimer 
 in Rhsetia and the valley of Misox, and over Mount Cenere into Lom- 
 bardy. As early as the tenth century we find Zurich styled civitas et 
 colonia impei^atorum. This was at the time when Henry L ordered the 
 towns to be surrounded by walls and ditches, in order to defend them 
 against the frequent irruptions of the Hungarians. He appointed at 
 the same time markgrafs, marchiones, on the neglected frontiers ; whilst 
 at the head of his Germans he defeated the Hungarians, and checked 
 their fearful advance upon vvestern Europe. To the towns and ancient 
 Roman colonies which still existed he gave charters ; he ordered that 
 the ninth part of the armed men of the Banlieue should live within the 
 walls, and that one third of the harvests should be kept therein. He 
 gave them other privileges; he was, in short, the founder of the 
 bourgeoisie, or third estate. By degrees the artisans in the towns ex- 
 celled those of the country, for in the latter the same family did all kinds 
 of work themselves ; they spun, wove, &c. ; whilst in the towns the 
 division of labour was first practised, and every workman followed a par- 
 ticular branch of trade, which he continued all his life. At last the 
 peasants confined themselves to the works of the field, and came to the 
 
24 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period I. 
 
 towns to purchase other things they wanted, with the surplus of their 
 produce. The exchange between town and country became thus regular, 
 and days were fixed for markets and fairs. Agriculture and handicraft, 
 being thus mutually encouraged, soon afforded a surplus for speculation 
 and extended commerce with foreign countries. The emperors established 
 at Zurich tribunals and consulships for the Lombards and other nations 
 who traded on that road. Innkeepers, tradespeople, artisans, packers, 
 custom-house officers, and others, crowded into the town. Zurich be- 
 came the capital of all Thurgau, or northern Helvetia. 
 
 The abbot of St. Gall established a market at Roschach near the limits 
 between Helvetia and Rheetia. Athelstan, king of England, sent an em- 
 bassy to St. Gall, and concluded an alliance with the abbey by means of 
 bishop Keonwald. The abbey was then at the height of its splendour; 
 its friendship was sought by lords and sovereigns. Singing, versification' 
 and calligraphy, were particularly attended to in its school, and its re- 
 putation in music has been maintained till latter days. Ekkard, who 
 died m 996, was one of the most learned men the abbey produced. He 
 was a great favourite with Hedwige, duchess of Suabia, a lady versed 
 in classical literature. After her death the emperor Henry II. bestowed 
 her abbey of Hohenwiel and Stein on the bishop of Bamberg. He 
 granted to the serfs of the bishop and of the abbot the right of marrying 
 and living together in families, for before that, as in the former ages of 
 Rome, that degraded race had not the rights of connubia, but lived pro- 
 miscuously hke the animals of the field. This was the first great step 
 towards emancipation. Seven other abbeys of Thurgau, among which 
 were the chapter of Zurich, St. Gall, Einsiedlen, Scckingen, andReich- 
 enau, granted to their serfs the connubial rights, as well as the right of 
 inheriting property ; but others refused to follow the example. With 
 regard to forced services or corvees, they were few and definite, and 
 might be redeemed at a small cost, the price of a day's labour being very 
 low. "^ 
 
 The nobles, seeing their vassals thriving and rich, attempted to in- 
 crease the fees and dues which the latter paid ; but the freemen of 
 Thurgau opposed their pretensions, and this was the first time in the 
 history of modern Helvetia that we find the people employing force 
 against the abuse of power. The commons of Thurgau marched'' under 
 the orders of Henry of Stein ; some of the lower nobility, milites sim- 
 plices, distinguished from domini servitiales, joined the popular side; 
 they were worsted, but their resistance proved an effectual warnino' to 
 the high nobility. Several abbeys, among others Einsiedlen, took part 
 with the nobles, by whom they had been enriched, against the people, 
 *• not reflecting," as Muller observes, " that a single irreligious prince 
 could strip them in one day of all their wealth." 
 
 The canton of Glarus was inhabited by serfs of the abbey of Seck- 
 ingen, by strangers who farmed lands of the abbey, and a few freeholders. 
 
 PERIOD I.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND, 
 
 23 
 
 Twelve noble families were bound to military service for the abbey, 34 
 more paid a small fee. The mayor appointed by the abbey elected the 
 judges, from whose sentences the appeal lay to the lady abbess, who was 
 looked upon as a mother by the people. Capital punishment could be 
 inflicted only by the emperor, to whom 200 livres were paid every year 
 at Martinmas. The tenants paid fixed rents in proportion to the produce 
 of their lands. The judicial fines, called fredim, also went to the abbey, 
 and this was a great source of seignorial revenue. The mayorship of 
 Glarus remained for 300 years in the family of Tschudi, one of the 
 most ancient in Switzerland, which has since given seventeen landam- 
 mans to their canton, produced many warriors, and the oldest historian 
 of the Helvetic confederacy. Some say the Tschudis were originally de- 
 scended from a Scythian slave freed by the emperor Louis IV., who 
 publicly took a denier from his hand as the price of his emancipation. 
 The serfs of the sovereign were considered nearly as equal to freemen. 
 
 Conrad having died after a reign of 57 years, the states of the king- 
 dom of Upper Burgundy assembled at Lausanne, and chose his son 
 Rudolph III., A.D. 993. He was a weak and capricious prince; and, 
 having deprived a noble of his patrimony, the nobility assembled, gave 
 him battle, and defeated him. His aunt the empress Adelaide, daughter 
 of queen Bertha, and widow of Otho the Great, was the means of saving 
 him through the respect which her virtues inspired. But Rudolph did not 
 regain the confidence of his subjects ; and, his estates being badly ad- 
 ministered, he became poor and distressed. Having no male issue he 
 looked for support to the Emperor Henry II., whom he declared his 
 heir in 1010, sending him the spear and the ring of St. Maurice, which 
 were the insignia of investiture. Eudes count of Champagne, nephew 
 to Rudolph ; the count of Poitiers, a relative of the king of Aries ; and the 
 count of Besan^on, opposed this cession, which was contrary to the ancient 
 usage of electing their own kings, which the Burgundians claimed as 
 their right. Rudolph fled to Strasburg with Hermangard his wife, in 
 1016, and finally gave up Burgundy to the emperor. The Burgundians 
 refused obedience. Henry marched troops into Helvetia under the 
 command of Werner bishop of Strasburg, and Radbod of Habsburg. 
 The kingdom of Upper Burgundy was composed of heterogeneous races; 
 it was divided between Germans and Burgundians, between German and 
 Romance languages. The Aargau, the Oberland, and other districts, 
 were essentially Germans, and therefore sympathized with their country- 
 men of the empire ; whilst the Waadt, since called the Pays de Vaud, 
 Geneva, and Neuchatel, were connected with Burgundian France. 
 This distinction, with its attendant differences of language, character, 
 and sympathies, has perpetuated itself to this day. Werner crossed the 
 Oechtland, and met the Burgundians, commanded, by the count of 
 Poitiers, near the lake Leman. The Burgundians were defeated and 
 obliged to swear fidelity to the emperor. Henry, however, died without 
 
26 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period I. 
 
 heirs, and before his cousin Rudolph, in the vear lOOd r a^ . 
 of Francouia, called the Salic, was elected emre'^^^^^^ n ^^^' 
 
 people, called into the country bv th. n '^''"*'' !''"' "^«y ^"e a free 
 
 digenous Gauls to a ZT'^l^XTZ'Zt TT. '' ''' '"• 
 chosen their own kinir, Af„ • „ *'"" "'^y ^""^ ever since 
 
 1-vins died in 032 Conr.d X;""' ''"'°''''' "'- ^'^■^'^ ^^-''-. 
 sion of Helvetia or U„rr R , u ''"'""''"' '■^™""'«' '" P««^es- 
 
 Her«e„garrR:Ilph.?:d!rTSf ^'"f T''''' *« '■"■-«« "^ 
 and of a multitude of Bur"u„dian Lrds , '""'" "' ^'''""^""''' 
 after all the ancient form^nf " , ^- t\f ''"' """"''^^ "' ^^'^^a. 
 
 the second kLgTon of Burld ^b" 5 '"" "'""'''• '^'"'^ ^"''^'^ 
 and Kudol,. 1^^^ 
 
 b:t;:in1orc:rd^i:nfr:r:ft^er" 'f ^ ^^-^^^ 
 
 Soleure, a town which wa, ZTl !k • Durgundian nobility at 
 
 chapter of St Urs and tt R^ '^'"^ ""''" the protection of the 
 Henry for thei^W *""' *''«/"^S""'l'an nobles chose Conrad's son 
 
 >y lor tneir knig. Henceforth the historv of all H«i„^t- i 
 closely connected with that of the German empire '™'"'' 
 
 of the Burgundians, and Kh.tia ^S w s itTsredT' t' 
 pendency of Northern TfoKr tt i i.- . consiaerea as a de- 
 
 c.n,.d,-,,,. „",'',:':, "a ","'; :: •■ ■• "■*; "■« »' •>" «» 
 
 the priests. He also forbade them to recle itf"^ "f^"'l '"^^"^^ 
 from laymen-a result of HenrTlV J i i ^' """^ preferments 
 
 livings. He also was th: fet ^o mai t Wmirthr^T!, ^^"^"^ 
 to dethrone the emperors, and release tlT^l^Ti^^^^^^^ 
 fidelity. The council held at Rome in 10^- '"J^.^^^ *rora then- oath of 
 
 the corruptions of churchmen a^^'LveS '' ''''''' 
 
 the same time to establish fha ""^""^^'^y f the emperors, went at 
 
 me to establish the supremacy of the popes above every 
 * See page 18, towards the end. 
 
 PERIOD I.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 21 
 
 Other power. The pope denied to the emperor the right of investiture 
 to bishoprics and abbacies. Henry boldly resisted the pretensions of 
 Rome, and in a diet held at Worms, to which many German bishops 
 and abbots repaired, Gregory VH. was declared to be a usurper of the 
 tiara, and was anathematized. Gregory in his turn excommunicated 
 Henry, and released his subjects from their oaths of fidelity. It is a 
 remarkable fact, which shows the confusion of ideas in those times, that 
 while councils of churchmen pretended to interfere in temporal affairs 
 of state, diets of laymen assumed a right to dictate in matters of church 
 discipline. Thus an extravagant and unjust assumption of one party 
 provokes another as absurd and outrageous from the opposite quarter. 
 
 Helvetia was distracted, as well as Germany, by the effects of the schism. 
 Buikard, bishop of Lausanne, who was married, uxorem legitimam habuit, 
 says the *' Chartularium" of Lausanne, the bishop of Sion, chancellor 
 of Burgundy, Otho bishop of Constance, and the bishop of Basle, were 
 on the emperor's side. The bishop of Lausanne sold eleven farms be- 
 longing to his see, and armed his serfs in favour of his sovereign. Henry 
 bishop of Coire, was for the pope, although Rhsetia in general stood by 
 the emperor, and this induced Welf, or Guelph, duke of Bavaria, to 
 ravage the fine valley of Engadina with fire and sword. Berthold of 
 Zaringen, a Suabian nobleman, who had been deprived by Henry of the 
 duchy of Carinthia, and Rudolph of Rhinfeld, duke of Suabia, whose 
 ambition aspired to the empire, reconciled their private feuds, and, taking 
 up arms against the emperor, were followed by the counts of Kyburg, and 
 by the town of Zurich. The emperor's party prevailed in western or 
 Burgundian Helvetia; Rudolph's in the German part of the country. 
 The emperor, wishing to reward the fidelity of the bishop of Constance, 
 gave him the administration of all the fiefs which Rudolph possessed in 
 Roman or Burgundian Helvetia. The warlike bishop soon afterwards 
 died in battle with arms in his hands. Berthold of Carinthia, on his 
 side, ravaged the possessions of the bishop of Basle. He also, in con- 
 cert with Guelph, duke of Bavaria, attacked Ulrich, abbot of St. Gall, 
 who had taken the emperor's part. The abbot, being hard pressed, 
 pledged the ornaments of the church to carry on the war ; but at last, 
 seeing the calamities that fell upon his vassals, he abandoned his 
 convent, and concealed himself for two years ; and the monks, in imi- 
 tation of their abbot's example, dispersed among the Alps. After 
 the defeat of Rudolph by the emperor, the abbot of St. Gall reappeared 
 and resumed his jurisdiction. Excommunicated by the pope, sur- 
 rounded by powerful enemies, yet strong in the attachment of his vassals, 
 he governed his abbey, together with its vast possessions in the moun- 
 tains of Appenzell*, for fortj'-six years, from 1071 to 1117, and never 
 forsook the cause of the emperor or sued for peace. On the other hand, 
 he was never the first to commence fresh hostilities, nor sought, like 
 
 * Jbfen Zell, *• the abbot's cell," from which is derived the name of the cantoa. 
 
28 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period I, 
 
 PERIOD I.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAKD. 
 
 29 
 
 olht S.'"' '" """' ''^ ''''^y " '"^ ^'"""y -* the property of 
 
 After the death of Rudolph, who was killed at the decisive battle nf 
 
 Mersburg m 1080. the duchy of Suabia, or Alemanniar^rcon ested 
 
 the dT f r-"""°" "' ^'""'^••'' -'"' ''«'' -"-d a daughter of 
 the duke of Zanngen, and Frederic of Hohenstauffen, son.i„.Ia^v to the 
 emperor Henry Berthold died in ,090, and left all his posJe i „ 
 and clauns to his brother-in-law Berthold of Zaringen, to whom the 
 lords of Suabia, assembled at Ulm swore fiHpIif^ onH 
 bv Guelf H.,1,. nf R. • "''"'"•/^^o'^e hdehty, and were supported 
 Dy uuelf, duke of Bavaria, whose dominions extended as far as Hnn 
 gary. ButBerthold of Zaringen. weary of the difficulties aniaTan"iL" 
 of the long-protracted struggle, made a voluntary sacrifice of h s riXts 
 he repaired to Maynz. where a general diet of ^he empire was aim' 
 bled and there surrendered his claims to the ducal dig'nity In fav r^f 
 
 Berthold the office of imperial kastfogt, or warden over the town chan 
 tera„d district of Zurich, thus detaching that part of Helvetia f";™ h'e 
 duchy of Suabia properly so called. From this epoch the beneficen! 
 
 etrr a^^^Lt-r " '"-- ""- -' ^ - «^--" 
 
 Henry v.. successor to Henry IV., having died in 1125, Lotharius 
 duke of Saxony was elected in his place. Renaud. count of BulX 
 refused homage to the new emperor, alleging that, by the extinction of 
 Conrad's Ime m Henry V.. last emperor of the house of Francon f the 
 crown of Burgundy had become vacant, and the people were Tt'ortd 
 to their right of choosing a king in a new familv. Havin.^ absen ed 
 umsel, from the general diet held at Spire, he wa/put to the 'ban of t' 
 empire, and Lothanus appointed Conrad of Zaringen, son of Berthold 
 landgraf and imperial rector of Burgundy, with oilers to carry on the' 
 war agamst Renaud. Conrad crossed the Aar, at the head of a power! 
 ful host defeated Renaud, and took him prisoner. Renaud havil 
 appeared before the diet, and made his submission, was allowed to re' 
 tain the government of the country west of the Jura* but lost his iuris- 
 diction in Helvetia, which was henceforth governed by the dukes of 
 Zanngen. After Lotharius' death, Conrad of Hohenstauffen was elected 
 emperor, to the exclusion of Henry " the proud," duke of Bavaria ani 
 of Saxony. The duke of Zaringen, having espoused the cause of the 
 alter, was attacked by Frederic, Conrad's nephew, and constrained 
 to do homage to the emperor, who graciously confirmed him in his 
 jurisdiction. * 
 
 Conrad died in 1152 and his nephew Frederic, called Barbarossa 
 from the colour of his beard, was proclaimed emperor. He married 
 Beatrice, daughter of Renaud, and heiress of Tranche Comtt?. The new 
 
 of L^'rcl^jS&io^^^^^^ ""''"'''*^ '' ^^"^^ ^^^^-^ ^*« ^°-t was independent 
 
 monarch wisely confirmed, and even enlarged, the jurisdiction of Berthold 
 IV., duke of Ziiringen, by appointing him imperial vofjt or warden to the 
 three bishoprics of Lausanne, Geneva, and Sion. A long contest, how- 
 ever, ensued with Landri, bishop of Lausanne, who appointed another 
 warden, and appealed, at the same time, to the pope. At last the duke 
 of Zaringen was acknowledged by the bishop in 1178. The see of 
 Lausanne was then rich and powerful ; its farms extended along the 
 shores of the lake, and towers were built to protect them. The city of 
 Lausanne itself was fortified. The chapter ccmstituted a court of jus- 
 tice in all matters concerning the vassals and serfs of the canons. The 
 duke of Zaringen, either through policy or interest, gave up his avouerie 
 or wardenship of the see of Geneva to Aymon, count of Genevois who 
 held a considerable tract of country on both sides of the lake. The 
 bishop opposed the count's jurisdiction in the city and castles of his see. 
 At last the emperor was appealed to, and acknowledged the bishop as 
 prince of Geneva, under the immediate authority of the empire. Geneva 
 thus became an imperial town. 
 
 The bishopric of Sion, after remaining for a time under the jurisdic- 
 tion of the counts of Savoy, with the consent of the dukes of Zaringen 
 obtained in 1189, the same privilege as that of Geneva, of being placed' 
 under the immediate jurisdiction of the empire. The lands of the 
 Wallis or Valais (vallis Agerana) were cleared and brought into cultiva- 
 tion, as far as the sources of the Rhone, by noblemen and freemen 
 from Burgundy. These settlers met in their advance over the Grimsel 
 Alps, on the side of the Ober-hasli, with other pioneers from the country 
 of Zurich, who had pushed their settlements as far as the Engelbero- and 
 Mount Brunig. The barons of Thurn, who had emigrated from Dauphiny 
 and resided at Gestelenburg in the Upper Valais, were the most powerful 
 lords of that district : they held themselves independent of the bishop of 
 Sion, and even interfered with the exercise of his jurisdiction, which ex- 
 tended not only to chattels, but to lands and to oflfences ; the bishops had 
 also the command of the militia, and the collection of the fees and duties 
 both annual and extraordinary. In a convention of the assembled 
 lords of the Valais is found the foUovving passage which is characteristic 
 of the times : " Whereas the Baron de Thurn has caused travellers who 
 have refused to pay the tolls and duties exacted by his collectors, to be 
 assassinated on the high roads, the bishop of Sion shall give in future an 
 escort to passengers for their security." 
 
 In the towns which enjoyed imperial charters the elective principle 
 prevailed, and the hereditary prerogative of the dukes and counts was 
 very limited. Geneva, having rejected the jurisdiction of the counts of 
 Genevois, placed itself under that of its own bishops, who were elected 
 by the clergy and people, and whose authority rested mainly on the good 
 will of the burgesses. At Zurich, too, where the duke of Zaringen was 
 imperial govenor over the regii Jiiscalini or free vassals of the empire, 
 
30 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND 
 
 [period I, 
 
 PERIOD I.] 
 
 BISTORT OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 31 
 
 including the religious houses in the city, the burgesses had the right of 
 appointing their own avoyers to watch any encroachment on the part of 
 the governor. The canons of the Gross Mnnslcr, or great church, 
 elected their own provost. The abbess of the Fraumunsler, or nunnery, 
 appointed her avoyer to judge of causes merely civil. Criminal cas^s 
 were brought before the governor and decided by eight burgesses and 
 four knights or councillors, elected for four months. Judgment was 
 wise ml ,?'""''''"^' *" '"'"'" '''^^''"'' <»"" precedents sanctioned by 
 
 dukes of Zanngen had more substantial power; they held great part of 
 
 ectors" tI" i^T" 'T""' ^"^* ^"^•^^^'1 *e rest as imperial 
 
 rectors They presided at the provincial diets, or. seated under an 
 ancient oak near the high road, they gave judgment in capital cases and 
 on appeals. They had the command of the armed force, furnished escort 
 
 travellers, received tolls and fines, granted the investiture of fiefs 
 and tenures coined money, and had the right of cutting timber in the 
 
 orests That part of the country called the Oechtland, which answers to 
 the central parts of the present cantons of Bern, and Frevbur- had fewer 
 
 oS "oM t;'" f T ""'■' -' ™^^"^- ^"^ ^"•'aSi' 'It 
 
 chiefly old settlers, hereditary proprietors of moderate estates, whose 
 a^.cest«rs had explored and cleared the wilderness. The couilts of 
 Gruyere in the south, and those of Neucliatel to the west, were t e no!t 
 po«xr ul lords in the neighbourhood. Berthold IV. of Z rin^en i 17s 
 built the town of Freyburg (free iorcr.) on a steep hill above "hT v ! 
 Saane.as a stronghold and place of security for the freemen and others of 
 he surrounding country against their more powerful neighbours. Whils 
 building the wall., the colonists were obliged to hire mercenary soldi 
 •n order to protect themselves and their works. A numS inferior' 
 noblemen inscribed their names among the burgesses of the new town 
 bu from the first they made a distinction between themselvesld rtei; 
 
 t';::g\^;:;'e"f; t;r''^ T^ 
 
 ra;k"r:Se";;^:nr,XT^^^^^^ 
 
 Tiortnnr'P in/i +u« • i i • ^ -i icvuurg sooii rosc into im- 
 
 portance and the neighbounng country .as cultivated with remarkable 
 care. The lords and peasants for three leagues around joined tlie rising 
 comn.unity; town and country formed but one socie v, adn t'st cd 
 by an avoyer elected every year by all the burghers; ' In the fame 
 
 fronl the other Si! a t A"s " ^^Jo^^ nei,.hbl,urhood, apar 
 
 centurios and a half, FreybuW halr^fW^ . '^' ^''^*- ^^^^''' ^^^^- ^'^P^^ of six 
 
 spirit of its first founde'4 as^the ml/ "^ T '''"• *''""' ^^'^ characteristic 
 versity of lang„a..P, ori^-rliaHni. inT 1 ^"'*"'''^*'e f '*>' i« Switzerland. 1 he di- 
 settlefs, has alio bl^en r^aintS to tit l""^ ^'^^^'^^ ^^ Btngtmdian and Germa, 
 and the other German ^'"^ ^ *^"' day,-one part of the town speaking French 
 
 manner Berthold IV. enclosed the towns of Moudon and Berthoud (the 
 latter of which took his own name) and other places, all of which were 
 under his own protection and paid him dues. 
 
 The love of peace, order, and security, contributed to people the 
 towns. There municipal freedom existed : the lawsuits of citizens 
 were brought before twelve councillors chosen from among themselves *, 
 and presided over by an avoyer, (scheltheiss,) wlio was elected for one 
 year. As hereditary governors, the dukes of Zaringen received a cen- 
 sus on every house, and a duty on goods, as well as tolls on the roads 
 and bridges : they also inherited one-third of the property of any person 
 dying, provided no heirs had been declared within one year after the 
 death. No citizen could be summoned before the judges of any other 
 court than his own, and no foreign witnesses could he brought against 
 him. None of the duke's servants could be witnesses against a bur- 
 gess. In doubtful cases it was not the duke who decided, but either 
 appeal of battle was resorted to, or the case was carried before the court 
 of Cologne, whose jurisprudence had been the model of the laws given 
 to the towns by the dukes of Zaringen. After the death of a citizen 
 his estate went to his widow. Orphans were under the protection of 
 the town, who appointed guardians. The councillors and burgesses 
 fixed the price of bread, wine, and meat. Any inhabitant of a town 
 was at liberty to leave it when he chose. Many serfs sought an asylum 
 in the towns, and, if not claimed within the year by their lord, xoho was 
 obliged to prove their condition by seven witnesses from among his 
 relatives, they were considered free. In urgent cases which con- 
 cerned the whole community, the burgesses taxed themselves. If re- 
 quested to accompany the duke, as an escort, or for other purposes, 
 they had the option of going no farther than a distance from which they 
 could return at night and sleep in their houses. Their houses were, in 
 fact, the security the duke had for their fidelity. 
 
 The love of liberty nourished by the inhabitants of the towns was 
 circumscribed to themselves ; their sympathy embraced only their im- 
 mediate neighbours. Whatever was out of the pale of the community 
 was either openly hostile or suspected. 
 
 Berthold IV. died in 1185, and his son Berthold V. succeeded hii.i, and 
 followed his steps. The house of Zaringen pursued a regular system in 
 promoting the building of towiis, which thus formed an important addition 
 to its own possession, whilst they resisted their turbulent and ambitious 
 neighbours. The great lords of the Alps and of Burgundy, jealous of the 
 increasing influence and power of the duke of Zaringen, rose against 
 
 * The word pares, peers, did not mean in Ililvetia persons of the same profession 
 trade, or condition, in which case professional jealousy or ignorance niij^ht defeat 
 the ends of justice, but persons enjoying the same rights and privileges which were 
 alike to all freemen of towns. 
 
32 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period I, 
 
 him but were defeated in 1190, between Payerne and Avenches, and 
 next year m the valley of Grindelwald. Berthold, faithful to his lieee 
 lonl the emperor, ^vas looking out for a spot at an equal distance from 
 either of his enemies, and in tlic centre of the Oechtland, on which to build 
 a more important town than any yet raised by his predecessors ; and 
 this town he intended as a defence to the lands belonging to the empire 
 against the encroachments of the feudal noblemen, who, availing them- 
 selves of the absence of their sovereign, had usurped the rights of the 
 crow-D. He fixed on a steep peninsula, formed by a curve of the foam- 
 ing Aar, having a forest at the back, and a vast extent of meadow-land 
 in front. He directed Cuno of Bubenberg to enclose this spot in 1 1 91 
 ihe first enclosure was afterwards enlarged at different epochs The 
 new city was called Bern, some say from bilr, "a bear," Berthold 
 havmg kdled one of those animals while hunting near this spot; others 
 from a Celtic word, signifying a place where justice is administered 
 A number of noblemen, among others D'Erlach, of an ancient Bur^in- 
 dian family, the lord of Egerden, and that of Muhlern, and many more 
 ivhose names have since become extinct, went to reside in the new citv 
 built houses and even whole streets. Bern was placed under the direct 
 protection of the empire, a free, imperial town, and no family, however 
 noble, exercised any dominion over it, or in it. It was from its birth a 
 commonwealth of free, independent gentlemen. An avoyer, assisted bv 
 two councils, one of twelve, and another of fifty, had the administration 
 of public aftairs. The secondary nobles of the neighbourhood sought 
 Its alliance against the oppression of the counts, and served under its 
 banner. The city took up their private quarrels, and by so doin^ and 
 by the constant use of arms in an age when the sword was tlie .reat 
 public law. It extended its jurisdicti.m, and became powerful and re- 
 spected. The emperor Henry VI., in 1198, wrote a letter to the citv 
 placing the convent of Interlaken under its protection, and Frederic II* 
 afterwards bestowed on it considerable privileges in the Golden Bull' 
 dated Frankfort, May, 1218. The regulations contained in the latter 
 document have served as the foundation of the civil laws of Bern till the 
 present time. Several substantial burgher families from Zuricli and 
 Friburg in Brisgau, came to settle at Bern, and brought with them the 
 arts of industry. A number of artisans also resorted thither 
 
 Berthold V. had by his wise and just conduct acquired such a renu- 
 tation all over the empire, that at the death of Henry VI in 1 1 98 
 several states of Germany offered him the imperial crown: but he de' 
 clmed the dangerous gift, and preferred his humbler, but still splendid 
 jurisdisdiction, over his native land, in the midst of his hereditary dos 
 sessions, where he lived for twenty years longer, respected by all for- 
 midable to the great whom he kept effectually in check, and cherished 
 bv the towns whose freedom he had established and supported. By his 
 
 PERIOD I.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 33 
 
 death the office of rector of Burgundy ceased, and all Helvetia became 
 again annexed to tlie German Empire. 
 
 There were, besides Zuricli and Bern, tliree other imperial towns in Hel- 
 vetia ; these were Solcurc, Busle, and Scliaffhausen. The town of Soleure, 
 Solothurn in German, which adjoined the chapter of St. Urs, had obtained 
 already, under Rudolph, last king of Burgundy, the right of electing its 
 own magistrates, which was confirmed by the emperors ; in whose hands 
 the J us gladiU and the appointment of the avoyer remained. These last 
 rights of supremacy were mortgaged by Henry VII. to the counts of 
 Bucheck, who held an important office under the chapter of St. Urs, 
 and who ultimately ceded them to the town itself. The neighbourhood 
 of Soleure and Bern, and their common interests, made them close 
 allies, and the rights of bourgeoisie, or the freedom of both, were en- 
 joyed in common by the burghers of each. 
 
 The city of Basel, galllce Basle, was at first under the jurisdiction of 
 the bishops, and afterwards of the emperors. The burghers were divided 
 into classes according to their respective trades, as was the case in 
 Zurich and most free cities at that time. All was corporation, a circle 
 within a circle, every trade had its privileges, its laws, its magistrate or 
 provost, its banner, and its guard. *^ There was this difference," says 
 Muller, " between these republics and that of infant Rome, that in the 
 latter the agricultural part of the population, whose habits were warlike, 
 had the ascendency, whilst most of the republics of Helvetia in the 
 middle ages were essentially commercial, inclined to peace, and free 
 from ambition, at least beyond the precincts of their respective districts." 
 Bern was, perhaps, the principal exception to this rule, its jiopulation 
 consisting chiefly of free nobles and landholders, and not of traders. 
 At Basle four knights and eight notables, chosen among old burgher 
 families, and twelve deputies, elected by the trades, formed the sovereign 
 council, which was renewed every year; the bishop confirmed the ap- 
 pointment of the burgomaster. Basle became early, next to Zurich, the 
 most wealthy and flourishing city in Helvetia. 
 
 Schafihausen, a mere hamlet of boatmen, grew by degrees into a town, 
 at first under the jurisdiction of the wealthy neighbouring abbey of" All 
 Saints," of which it afterwards freed itself, and was admitted to the rank 
 and privileges of a free imperial town. Bienne or Biel was also at one 
 time an imperial town, the counts of Neuchatel being its avoyers, but it 
 lost its independence afterwards, and fell under the domination of the 
 bishops of Basle. 
 
 The house of Savov had conslderablv extended its possessions in 
 southern Helvetia. Humbert " of the white hands," couijt of Maurienne, 
 the founder of his dynasty, had received from the emperor Conrad II. 
 the Chablais, or the southern coast of the Leman, with the lower Valais, 
 the country round the northern shore as far as Vevai, and the Provincia 
 Equeslris, which extended along the other, or western side of the lake, 
 
u 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period I. 
 
 from Geneva to Rolle. The name of pagus cqucstm was taken from 
 Noviodunum. now Nyon, which is marked in the Roman itineraries as 
 Colon^a equeslris. The emperor Philip, in 1207, gave Thomas, count 
 ot bavoy, the castle of Moudon and all its appurtenances; Frederic II. 
 passmg through Turin in 1238, and being well received by Amadeus IV 
 recognised him as duke of Chablais. The counts of Gmyere paid 
 homage to the more powerful counts of Savoy, and the bishops of Lau- 
 sanne gave them several towns and castles of their dependence, and even 
 one half of the revenues and rights of Lausanne itself; thus the counts 
 ot bavoy by degrees became possessed of the greater part of the barony 
 of Vaud, as far as Morat and Yverdun. 
 
 The counts of Neuchatel were also great feudatories of the empire. 
 They were possessed of the counties of Neuchatel, Valengin, and Nidau ; 
 the Nugerol, or country round the lake of Bienne ; and the castle of 
 Aarbcrg. 
 
 In northern Helvetia the counts of Toggenhurg were possessed of the 
 provinces of that name, as well as of Uznach, and of several districts in 
 Khoetia. The counts of Werdenberg lield the Kheinthal and the county 
 of Sargans. There were besides numerous other counts, though not so 
 powerful as the above, both in Helvetia and in Rhtetia, all of whom had 
 a great number of sub-feudataries. The old chronicles enumerate fifty 
 counts, one hundred and fifty barons, and more than a thousand noble 
 tamilies, scattered all over the countrv. 
 
 The house of Kyburg, one of the most powerful in all Helvetia, had, 
 besides its own possessions in Thurgau, acquired by marriage the exten- 
 sive domains of the extinct house of Leuzburg, in Aargau, and the countrv 
 01 Zug. Ulnch of Kyburg married Anne, sister to Bcrthold V., last duke 
 of Zaringen. By the death of the latter without issue in 121S the 
 %.-l."Ie rich inheritance of the house of Zaringen fell into the house 
 of Kyburg, including the counties of Thun, of Berthoud, the town 
 of Freyburg, and the landgraviate of Burgundy. Ulrich and Aunc left 
 two sons and a daughter; Hedwige, the latter, married Albert, count of 
 Habsburg, by whom she had Rudolph, afterwards emperor, and head of 
 
 lOfil^fH , "'?'u ^^ *" """'"S^- »"'• ">« -'^^^q-"' death, in 
 1264, of Hedwige's brother, Hartmann of Kyburg, called "the old " 
 
 ^tee estates were left to his nephew Rudolph, the paramount greatne'ss 
 
 of the house of Habsburg was established in Helvetia. That house was 
 
 possessed already of part of Aargau, and of the wardenship of Bipp 
 
 Falkenstem, Bechburg. Olten, and Soleure. Rudolph of Habsb irJ 
 
 now inherited the bulk of the united patrimonies of the houses of Lenz! 
 
 burg, Kjd)urg. and Zaringen, in which splendid inheritance were included 
 
 rtie greater part of Thurgau, Zurichgau, Oechtland, Zug, the towns of 
 
 ^ursee, Sempach, and Winterthur, the counties of Baden and Lenzburg 
 
 m Aargau, the wardenship of the convent of Seckingen and Claris, and 
 
 the Lasdgraviate of Burgundy, from Thun to Aarwangen. Rudolph 
 
 PERIOD I.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 35 
 
 also acquired, in 1274, from his cousin Eberhard of Habsburg, the town 
 of Freyburg, which formed part of the Zaringen inheritance. Rudolph's 
 possessions spread, therefore, over a great part of Helvetia, from the 
 lake of Neuchatel to that of Constance, and from the banks of the Rhine 
 to the foot of the Alps. 
 
 While the great vassals cf the German empire were thus extending 
 and consolidating their power in Helvetia, the authority of the distant 
 emperors became merely nominal. In fact, the empire itself was at this 
 period distracted by contested elections, and consequent wars, both in 
 Germany and Italy. After the untimely death of Henry VI , son of 
 Barbarossa, in 1198, the imperial crown was contested between his 
 brother Philip, duke of Suabia, Frederic, king of Sicily, the infant son of 
 Henry, and the Guelph Otho, son of Henry the Lion, duke of Bavaria, 
 and the foe of the Hohenstaufen family. Innocent III., one of the 
 most able, rigid, and imperious pontiffs that ever sat in the papal chair, 
 and who asserted the right of raising and deposing princes at his plea- 
 sure, pronounced first in favour of Otho, then acknowledged Philip, 
 whom he had before excommunicated, and after Philip's murder by 
 Wittelsbach, he excommunicated his former protege Otho, and sanc- 
 tioned, in 1212j the choice of young Frederic of Sicily, the only remain- 
 ing male offspring of Barbarossa. Frederic, who was but seventeen 
 years of age, though already a husband and a father, accepted, contrary 
 to the advice of his Sicilian councillors, and of his queen, Constance of 
 Aragon, the perilous offer: he proceeded first to Rome, where he had 
 an interview with Innocent; and thence, through many dangers and 
 narrow escapes from the partizans of Otho in Lombardy, he reached, at 
 last, the mountains of Helvetia. The bishop of Coire and the abbot of 
 St. Gall received him as their sovereign. Thence he hastened, with only 
 sixty followers, to Constance, where he arrived just in time to fix the 
 wavering minds of the bishop and the burghers. The abbot of St. Gall 
 exerted himself strenuously in his behalf Otho, Frederic's rival, was 
 close at hand with his troops; his cooks and quarter-masters were 
 already in the town. But the gates were suddenly closed against him, 
 and Otho was obliged to retire. " Had Frederic been three hours 
 later," says Raumer, in his history of the Hohenstaufens, *' he might 
 never have worn the imperial crown." As it was, Frederic's success 
 was from that moment progressive, though slow, until at length, in 
 1215, he was universally acknowledged as emperor and crowned king of 
 the Romans. His reign was stormy, and distracted by his quarrels with 
 the popes, and with the Lombard cities. Frederic died in 1250, and 
 was succeeded by his son Conrad, who died suddenly four years after- 
 wards. William, count of Holland, who was elected next, though not 
 universally acknowledged, having died also in 1256, a long interregnum 
 followed, during which the imperial crown was contested by Richard, 
 earl of Cornwall, and Alfonso of Castile, who had each their partizans, 
 
 d2 
 
36 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period r. 
 
 PERIOD I.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 31 
 
 At last, m 1273, Rudolph of Ilabsburg was, by universal conseut, 
 elected emperor, and the archbishop of Cologne proclaimed on the occa- 
 sion, that Rudolph was " wise, just, and beloved of God and man." We 
 will now take a short view of the character of this remarkable prince, 
 and of his conduct towards Helvetia, his native country, the cradle, and' 
 for a long time the main support of the extraordinary fortunes of his family. 
 Rudolph, after leading a wild and irregular life in his vouth, had 
 since fully retrieved his character. He was active and bmve, very 
 ski ful in state affairs, and although certainly ambitious, yet equitable 
 and just. There was in his disposition a strong element of native 
 honesty, and his firmness was free from obstinacy. He was in general 
 a favourite with the towns, who, amidst the troubles of the inlerreg- 
 nnm, had felt thankful for tlie countenance and protection of so 
 powerful a chief Zurich had chosen him to command its militia 
 on being threatened by his neighbour Ulrich, baron of Regensberg. Ru- 
 dolph defeated the baron, and obliged him to seek the forgiveness of the 
 citizens. He was not, however, on such friendly terms with the people 
 of Basle. The misunderstanding originated in some disputes he had 
 with the bishop of that city, and an affray which occurred soon after 
 widened the rupture, During the carnival of 1273, a number of kni-hts 
 and other young noblemen, the friends and dependents of Rudolph 
 repaired to Basle to enjoy the festivities of that merrv season. Some of 
 them behaved rudely to the burghersMadies,the husbands and f.thers of 
 whom rose against the insolent intruders and killed several of them 
 Ihe count of Habsburg, on receiving the dismal news, collected troops' 
 and marched against the city. While he was besieging the place the 
 news arrived of his election to the imperial throne. On hearing this. 
 the citizens of Basle came out of their walls with every mark of respect 
 towards the new emperor, and invited him to enter their city with his 
 troops. The past was easily forgotton ; Rudolph assured the citizens of 
 ±Jasle of his friendship, and they swore allegiance to him. It was a 
 time of wonder and rejoicing in Helvetia: the magistrates of the town, 
 the nobles, great and small, all repaired to Brougg in Aargau to conc^ra- 
 tulate the emperor. Their countryman, the valiant Rudolph, had been 
 raised to the first throne of Europe. Rudolph, on his part, notwith- 
 standing his elevation, the multifarious cares it brouaht on him, and the 
 distance to which it removed him from his country,\etained to the end 
 of his life an affectionate regard for his brethren, the people of his native 
 valleys. He granted Zurich a solemn pledge that that city should never 
 be alienated from the empire. This was an important privilege in those 
 times, when the emperors often gave away to the nobles, for pecuniary or 
 other considerations, lands and towns belonging to the empire, as if thev 
 had been their private domain, by which means the inhabitants lost their 
 immunities and privileges. He secured to Zurich, Schaffhausen, and 
 Soleure, the right of having their judges and avoyers taken from ai^ong 
 
 themselves, and of being governed by their own municipal laws ; and he 
 bestowed on another town, Luzern, similar franchises. These he also 
 extended to Bienne, Aarau, Winterthur, Laupen, Diesenhoffen, and 
 other secondary places ; he moreover protected Lausanne and Freyburg 
 against the encroachments of the counts of Savoy, asserting in that part 
 of the country the imperial authority, under which he restored to their 
 liberties all those who had been free before. He raised the bishop of 
 Lausanne and the abbot of Einsidlen to the rank of princes of the em- 
 pire. He was liberal, but just and impartial, as well toward the towns 
 as towards the nobles. On their part the towns, and the country at 
 large, showed their sense of gratitude to him by abundant supplies of 
 men and money, in the exigencies in which he was often placed. The 
 city of Bern formed, unfortunately for both parties, the only exception 
 to this good understanding. That city had acquired great importance 
 in western Helvetia; it stood constantly in arms against the neighbour- 
 ing nobles ; its fidelity to the empire having excited numerous enemies, 
 it was compelled, during the interregnum, to place itself under the pro- 
 tection of Philip, count of Savoy, and to make alliances with Soleure, 
 Freyburg, and other towns. The river Aar separated Bern from the 
 domains of the count of Kyburg, for a branch of that family still sub- 
 sisted in the person of Hartman the young, nephew of Hedwige, Ru- 
 dolph's mother. This Hartman dying, left a daughter, Anne, who 
 married Eberhard, of Habsburg-Lauffenburg, cousin to Rudolph, and thus 
 was formed the branch of Habsburg-Kyburg, which]continued to figure in 
 the subsequent history of the country. They were lords of Kyburg, of 
 Thun and Berthoud. Disputes, which were then of frequent occurrence 
 among neighbours, brought the count of Kyburg to besiege Bern, but 
 his attempt was vain. Rudolph himself, in 1288, threatened the city, 
 under pretence of protecting the Jews^ whom the Bernese had driven 
 away, but he retired without accomplishing any thing. The same year 
 the Bernese defeated the baron of Weissenburg, lord of the lower Sim- 
 menthof, took his castle of Wimmis, and destroyed that of Jagdberg, 
 taking the knight of Blankenburg prisoner, who was afterwards received 
 as a citizen of Bern. The following year Albert, son of Rudolph, known 
 by the name of Albert of Austria *, endeavoured to take Bern by sur- 
 prise, but being discovered, he was himself attacked by the citizens, 
 and after a severe engagement, in which many of the burghers fell, 
 though their banner was saved by a desperate efibrt of valour, Albert, 
 struck with regard for the bravery of the Bernese, made peace with them 
 on the sole condition that they should pay for a daily mass in the church 
 of Wettingen, (a celebrated monastery near Baden in Aargau, on the 
 
 Ottoki 
 
 the Bamberg ...»~, . 
 
 taken it iu 127G fron^pttakar, bestowed it ou his sou Albert. 
 
 / 
 
33 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period I. 
 
 
 banks of the Limmat, which subsists to this day,) for the soul of count 
 Louis de Homberg, who had been killed in the combat. 
 
 The authorities for this part are:-I. Histoire de la Confidkratiori 
 Helvelique, par A. L. De Watteiille, 2 vols. Bern, 1754. This is a 
 very valuable compilation, made from a series of MSS., bei^innin^ with 
 Jiistinger who wrote his chronicle in 1420, and includi;? Wagner, 
 Tschachtlan, Schilling, Anshelm, and Stettler. Watteville refers to his 
 ai|^honties at the bottom of every page. An abridgement of Stettler's 
 Chronicle has been printed: Annales oder Grundliche Bcschreilmnn 
 
 t'.. ' ''' '''''^ ^^'^'"'^ ^^ ^^^""''^ Helvetia, fol Bern,1627. XL 
 ^gidius Tschudi of Glarus, Chronicon Hchelicum oder Grundliche 
 Beschreibuncj der to uM in den Heiligcn mmischcn Reich als 
 hesonders in Liner Lohlicher Eydgenoss-schaft nnd angrdnt.enden 
 Orten vorgelofen merkiciirdigsten Begegnussen, edited by J. L. Iselin, 
 2 vols. fol. Basel, 1734. Tschudi wrote about the middle of the 16th 
 century; he drew his materials from numerous MSS. documents, 
 
 TddSt "ifr"*' ''''^""'" °'^"^^^"' ^^^- --^^ ^^--t the 
 in n07 t' 1/\^. ^^^^t-T^ and whose chronicle was printed at Basle 
 in 1507. Tschudi has also taken from the MS. chronicle of Schodeler 
 who wrote in the 15th century. JH. John ^luller, Geschichte der 
 Schueuenschen Lidgenossenschaft, 5 vols. IVIiiller's work is well 
 known as the best history of Switzerland. He has carefully ex- 
 amined all the old chroniclers, documents, and traditions, and he 
 frequently refers to his authorities in the course of his work. A new 
 and spirited French translation of Muller is now in the course of pub- 
 lication ://.,/o.r. ./. la Confideration Suisse, par Jean de uhler 
 
 IttTL ""''"^^^^^^^^^^ ^ '- '' ^^^^^•"^-'- '-^--^^ ^^^' /'^/w: "; 
 
 conUnuee jj^sc^^c^a nos jours, par Charles Monnard et Loins Vulliemin 
 Pans and Geneva, 1837-8. Three or four volumes have as yet aimeared 
 and the notes by the editors are copious and very valuable ^^ ' 
 
 SECOND PERIOD. 
 
 FOURTEENTH CENTURY. 
 
 FROM THE FIRST ALLIANCE OF THE THREE FOREST-CANTONS, TO THE 
 TERMINATION OF THE WAR OF SW^ISS INDErENUENCE, AND THE ESTA- 
 BLISHMENT OF THE CONFEDERATION OF THE EIGHT OLD CANTONS. 
 
 Behind the great central lakes* of Helvetia, on the other side of the 
 Finsterwald, or gloomy forest, and at the foot of the highest ridges of 
 the Alps, among marshes, and rocks, and glaciers, tribes of scattered 
 shepherds had, from the early times of the Roman conquest, found 
 a land of refuge from the successive invaders of the rest of Helvetia. 
 According to tradition these people were the last remnant of the 
 Cimbri, who escaped the terrible defeat of their nation by the Romans. 
 The Cimbri, it is known, were joined by some of the Helvetian 
 tribes on their march to the south. In our own days philologists have 
 traced in many words of the rude German dialects, spoken in the central 
 cantons of Switzerland, a Swedish or Danish etymology ; the appearance 
 also of the race which inhabits some of these mountain districts is pecu- 
 liar, and differs from that of the people of the other valleys around them. 
 However this may be, the inhabitants of that secluded region, whether 
 of original Helvetian, or of Scandinavian descent, remained unknown to 
 the world for ages after the fall of the Roman power. No Alemanni, 
 Burgundians, or Franks went to settle in that labyrinth of Alps, among 
 wilds almost inaccessible, where no castle or steeple was to be seen on the 
 hills nor town in the valleys. The cattle of the shepherds roamed in safety 
 over the innumerable recesses of the Alpine chain, concealed from the eyes 
 of the straggling bands of barbarians who might venture into these solitudes, 
 and who, concluding that the country was uninhabited and unproductive, 
 soon left it again for lands of better promise. The zeal of hermits and 
 monks, however, proved more persevering than that of conquerors ; the 
 pious Meinrad, the cenobite of Einsiedlen, and several of his brethren, 
 converted the rude shepherds to Christianity. For a long time after 
 this the inhabitants of the three districts or cantons called Schwytz, 
 Uri, and Unterwaldcn, formed but one society, having only one common 
 church in the valley of Muotta, which belonged to the people of Schwytz, 
 and choosing their magistrates from among their elders. As the popu- 
 lation increased, everv canton would have its own church, its own 
 landamman or chief magistrate, and its council and tribunal. Thus 
 
 * The lake of the Waldsfdtten, also called Lake of the Four Cantons, as^ it 
 washes the shores of Schwytz, Uri, Unterwaldeu, and Luzeru, 
 
 I 
 
40 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZEKLAND. 
 
 [period ii. 
 
 Schwytz, Un, and Unterwaklen became three distinct communities. 
 yet remmni,.- m close alliance as men of the same stock, and havin? the 
 same interests. The form of their government was that of v.ure and 
 sim,>le democracy, suited to the habits of a pastoral race ; all the native 
 mliabitants who had reached the age of manhood assembled once a 
 >ear m tlie church or in a field, to discuss and settle among themselves 
 the lew dcbutcable questions that miglit arise in so primitive a common- 
 wealm, and to elect their magistrates. It is not clearly known at what 
 period they began to acknowledge the supremacy of the emperors of 
 uermany, by whose subjects and vassals they were surrounded, and 
 whose name and sanction they probably considered as a security against 
 the annoyances and pretensions of their neighbours. There were in 
 these mountainous regions, many vast tracts of desert land, many a vale 
 unexplored and uninhabited. The emperors had given some of the<^e 
 tmappropriated grounds to nobles or to convents. The free peasants 
 who came to cultivate these lands paid a quit rent to the proprietors, 
 inc counts of Lenzburg and those of Rappersehwvl, and the abbeys of 
 ^unch, Beromunster, and Engelberg held several of these loulships. 
 W the most wealthy and powerful monastery in the country was that 
 of Emsiedlen, m the canton of Schwytz. The abbot claimed the right of 
 
 m /""l' f "'''"" ^"™""'«"S mountains, in consequence 
 Of an old grant n.ade by an emperor to the monasterv of all the unculti- 
 v,ed lands ni the country. The emperor did not know at the time 
 vv hat he was g.vmg away. The shepherds of Schwytz, strangers to all the 
 afluns of the polu.cal worll, ignorant of the nature' of grant^ and feudal 
 
 graze on their own meadows, which had belonged to their families for 
 several generations. They disputed the abbot's claim, which was 
 referred to the emperor Henry V., who decided in favour of the abbot 
 The shepherds of Schwytz felt indignant at this ; they concluded that the 
 
 rr^ .f •'"'''"■°' "■''' °^"° "^^ *° 'h^""' ''"d t'^'t thev mi.ht as 
 w do without It. Being joined by their brethren of Uri ami Unter 
 w iden, they drove away the monks and their cattle from their meadow 
 The emperor put them to the ban of the empire, and they were To Jxl 
 communicated by the bishop of Constance, who interdicted 1 ries^ 
 from administering the sacrament, and forbade the ringing, of the chTrc 
 
 the people of Schwytz were not so easily intimidated, they insisted on 
 their priests performing the church service as before and drov awai 
 
 ply notwithstanding the interdict, the grass grew on their fields as 
 uxuriantly as before, and the shepherds sent !as usual the produce o 
 heir dames to the markets of Luzern and Zurich. Thus things wen 
 
 on for years, during which the emperor had probably for Jten tT. 
 
 people of Schwytz and their quarrel with the 'abbot. 'BSeVree 
 
 PERIOD II.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 ^1 
 
 cantons, foreseeing that troubled times might come again upon them, 
 entered into a solemn alliance with each other, and they afterwards re- 
 newed it from time to time. 
 
 y^he three Waldstdlten^ or forest-cantons, as they were designated, from 
 the numerous and thick woods which covered great part of the country, 
 had not acknowledged the delegated authority of any of the imperial 
 governors in Helvetia until 1209, when Otho IV., on his way to Italy, 
 induced them to accept the count of Hahsburg for their landvogt or 
 bailiff, the latter swearing at the same time to maintain their privileges 
 and franchises. But the count having probably disregarded his oath, 
 the people of the forest-cantons appealed to Henry VII., king of the 
 Romans and son of Frederic II., to be freed from their governor, and 
 that prince acquiesced in their demand, and confirmed their liberties, as 
 did also Frederic II. bv a written charter, in return for the services of a 
 gallant band of their youths wlio had accompanied that emperor in his 
 foreign wars. The expressions of the diploma are remarkably explicit ; 
 the people of Schwytz, Uri, and Unterwalden are acknowledged as/re^- 
 vicn " who owe no allegiance but to the emperor, by whom they are re- 
 ceived with open arms, having submitted of their own free will to the em- 
 pire, fromwliich tliey shall not at any future time be detached or alienated*." 
 During the turbulent period of the interregnum which followed the 
 extinction of the imperial line of the Hohenstaufcns, the forest-cantons 
 thought proper to place themselves under the powerful ])rotection of 
 Rudolph of Hahsburg, acknowledging him as their Icuidvogt. Rudolpli 
 was faithful to liis engagements, and when elected emperor he confirmed 
 the perpetual right of the Waldstatten to hold solely and directly of the 
 empire. But Rudolph had sons w^hom he wished to leave independent 
 and powerful ; one of them he had made duke of Suabia, for another lie 
 had in view the restoration of the kingdom of Burgundy, and a third, 
 Albert, who was already duke of Austria, was importunate in urging 
 his father to extend and consolidate his hereditary dominions in Helvetia. 
 Albert is described by contemporary writers as a man of abilities, but 
 rapacious, ambitious, and unprincipled, who scrupled not to usurp the 
 castles and domains even of his relations for his own aggrandizement ; 
 he had, moreover, by his consort, Elizabeth of Carinthia, a numerous 
 offspring, for whom he was anxious to provide. He aimed at forming an 
 hereditary dukedom of all Helvetia, and for this purpose he suggested to 
 his father to purchase the domains of the abbeys, to induce the lords to 
 sell him their fiefs, or at least to do homage to him as duke of Austria, 
 by which means the free towns and independent commonwealths, 
 finding themselves enclosed within his dominions, would at last be 
 obliged to surrender also their rights. How far Rudolph entered into 
 
 * Guilliman de rebus Heh'-ticis. The Waldstatten, from their very orij^in, were 
 differeuJly situated from the other peoi)le of Helvetia ; they had never been con- 
 quered or made subjects of. 
 
42 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period 11. 
 
 these views of his unprincipled son is not known; he, however, in 1291, 
 purchased of the abbot of Murbach the town of Luzern, and the rights 
 of the abbey over several villages within the country of Schwytz, givin-^ 
 the abbot in exchange some districts in Alsace, besides two thousand 
 marks of s.lv-er The news of this acquisition on their immediate fron- 
 tiers alarmed the Waklstatten. In the same year, however, Rudolph 
 died while on a journey to Spire, in the seventy-fourth vear of his age, 
 and the nmeteenth year of his reign. The imperial crown was contested 
 by his sons Albert and Adolphus of Nassau. The latter had the majority 
 of votes; but Albert maintained the struggle by arms, and Helvetia, as 
 well as Germany, was divided on the question. The Waldstatten, see- 
 ing the storm gathering around them, renewed in 1291, their alliance, 
 solemnly engaging themselves by oath mutually to defend each other, 
 and their families and properties, against all aggressions from without. 
 From this alliance they took the name of Eidgenossen, « bound by coni- 
 
 jr \l,T 7ftT'\ °" "^' '''^'' '"'^^ •''« '"^hop of Constance, 
 the abbot of St. Gall, the town of Zurich, and the count of Savoy formed 
 
 a so an a hance among themselves, in order to oppose the ambitious 
 
 V e vs of All^ert. The latter, in revenge, overran and ravaged the lands 
 
 of the bishop. At length, in a great battle fought in 1298, Adolphus 
 
 of Nassau lost h,s crown with his life, and Albert of Austria took „"! 
 
 d puted possession of the imperial throne. He soon turned his whole 
 
 attention to what he considered his refractory subjects of Helvetia. 
 
 rnn ;""'°"'r "" g°^""">™'^ of that country consisted at that 
 epoch of lour c asses : l.t. Towns, Lands, and Lordships belongii,. to 
 the house of Habsburg or Austria, whose representative Albert wa " 
 his elder brother R.ululph, duke of Suabia, having died, leavh g 1 s IT 
 John of Habsburg, a minor under the guardianship of Albert 2nd 
 
 t^iupire. ciru, j^jee Imperial Towns- 4th nnrl inef n^u #-. 
 TniSre^ ^.I^VTI— - ^^'^ were'ltoJ^.y^I^Sri 
 
 fa?:he%i;i ; ttra.: etrvrrit'^^^™^- -^t ^"^"■^•■' '^ 
 
 policy of Albert'to enlarge 1"^ mire ^sT m^fal HelS'' t'l'^ 
 patrimony or fief of Austrli H„ « . ! ""i" make all Helvetia the 
 
 {he free town of Befn wWd, bo.lf Tf '"' !T' '" ''''' '">"'' 
 once before attached ii;!, and ntl,'" r' "T""" ''''' "'^^"''y 
 number of lords ielous of H,. expedition he was joined by a 
 
 at the bold ^^\^z^'zs^r:^^''£" -1 °^-^' '• 
 
 hy the militia of Freyburg, which town h d iirio,4 7"' f ° "'"'"' 
 come under the dominion of the hou«e of Aus rfa T,' n' '"' ''""' 
 the command of oup nf th.- i I Austria. The Bernese, under 
 
 jointly witiilh^: zi^^e^tz^:;;'t "' ^:!'''' "•^"' 
 
 nerbuhl was obstinate. «n,l 1.1 i I , ' ' ''''= ="'"'«" "' Don- 
 
 Bernese, and tee—Vn^ " '"'' victory declared for the 
 , tlie emperor was obliged to retire with great loss. The 
 
 PERIOD II.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 43 
 
 vengeance of Bern now fell upon the vassals of Albert, whose castles 
 almost encircled the town ; many of these were taken and razed to the 
 ground; several of the nobles, among others the baron of Weissenburg, 
 lord of Simmenthal, in order to save their property, acknowledged them- 
 selves vassals of Bern, by which the territory of that republic was 
 considerably extended, Count Otho of Strasburg soon after gave up to 
 the Bernese the town of Laupen and its territory, which he held of the 
 empire. 
 
 Albert, foiled before Bern, turned against Zurich, and encamped 
 with his host before the town, under the pretext that the inhabitants 
 had insulted his subjects of Wintcrthur. He then proposed to the 
 abbess and chapter, and to the burghers, to acknowledge his dominion. 
 The people of Zurich having made their preparations of defence, in 
 which even women and children vied with the men, sent him word that 
 they were ready to acknowledge and receive him as their sovereign 
 emperor, if he, on his side, confirmed their liberties and privileges. 
 Albert, doubting of the success of a siege, accepted the conditions and 
 made jieace with Zurich. The whole weight of his wrath was next to 
 fall on the confederates of the Waldstatten. These had roused his 
 anger by taking, during the contest for the empire, the part of Adolphus 
 of Nassau, Albert's rival, who was lawfully elected ernperor, and who 
 on his part had confirmed their privileges. After the death of Adolphus 
 and Albert's final recognition trs emperor, the confederates sent a depu- 
 tation to Strasburg to beg the confirmation of their ancient franchises, 
 whicli his father Rudolpli, of glorious memory, had solemnly acknow- 
 ledged. Albert gave them an evasive answer, saying he had to propose 
 to them a change in their situation. Two years afterwards, in 1300, 
 he sent to the AValdstiitten two of his councillors, the Baron Liechten- 
 berg, and the Baron Ochsenstein, to represent to them that it would 
 be for their interest to become subjects of the duke of Austria, by 
 whose possessions they were surrounded, and that he had himself in 
 their country sundry jurisdictions which he and his father had purchased 
 from the clergy and lay proprietors. He promised to adopt them as 
 faithful children of his imperial family, to give them possessions 
 and wealth, and to create knights among them. The answer of the 
 three cantons was brief. They stated respectfully, but firmly, that 
 " they were satisfied with their present condition under the immediate 
 protection of the German empire, that they flattered themselves that the 
 emperor would acknowledge their hereditary privileges, as they on their 
 side were ready to fulfil all engagements to which they were bound." 
 
 This answer served only to increase Albert's wrath. He employed 
 his vassals and other dependants in the neighbourhood of the 
 AValdstatten to gain some of the higher families of those valleys, espe- 
 cially the free nobles whose ancestors had come to reside among them, 
 and had been among the first to clear the wilderness. This they were 
 
44 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period II. 
 
 to do by descanting on the advantages that would accrue to them and 
 their estates if all the countries of that part of Helvetia which traded 
 together should become united under one master. But he made no 
 converts, and the baron of Attinghausen, landamman, or first magistrate, 
 of Un, repaired m 1301, to the imperial court, again to solicit the con- 
 firmafon of the privileges of the three cantons, and to demand a reichs. 
 vogt 0, imperial governor, to be sent to them. This request was made 
 for the purpose of preventing Albert from sending them his own Austrian 
 ba. Ms, and from detaching the Waldstatten from the empire and 
 making them part of the appanage of his own family. Albert's answer 
 was, that as they had refused his advantageous offers, he should not 
 use any greater complaisance towards them; that they had no occasion 
 for an impend governor, and had only to address themselves either to 
 his own baihff at Luzern, or the other at Rottenburg." The mcanin. 
 of this answer was well understood by the AValdstatten ; he referred 
 them to his bailiffs, that -the latter, by administering they«. gladii, or 
 supreme justice m their country, in the name of the duke of Austria 
 might thus acquire a prescriptive right for that house. On the subse- 
 quent remonstrances of the Waldstatten, Albert promised at last to send 
 them imperial bailiffs, which he did in 1304, enjoining the people to 
 obey them and respect their orders as theyl^uld his own, under pain of 
 being deprived of their liberties. ^ 
 
 Albert appointed to this office two noblemen of a haughty, harsh and 
 overbearing character; and he, probably, gave them inslruc io s wl" 
 aggravated the natural bent of their dispositions. One of these wa 
 Hermann Gessler of Brunegg, and the other Beringar of Landenber. 
 They estabm themselves permanently in the couutrv. cont ry fo 
 the custom of former imperial bailiffs ; the first at Altorf," he princip 
 village Un and the latter at Sarnen, in the UnterwaWr X 
 castles which they occupied and fortified, were garrisoned by Austri ^ 
 troops. Albert had lately acquired another castle called RotzberJ in 
 the country of Unterwalden; and there he sent another nUeX 
 name of Wolfenschiessen, of the same temper as the two bl Ss T 
 careerofinjust.ce and vexation which these worthy delegates of Alber 
 pursued, was such, that the chroniclers of the time find foexpetion 
 efficiently strung to cliaracterize it. Thev openlv viola . 1 H ^i u 
 of the country; they arrested the inhabitLfs upon he J" , „ 
 grounds, and sent them to Luzern or Zug, where Zy were t ild W 2 
 ministers of the duke of Austria; they increased the I po tTa„d'to! 
 lue to the empire; they levied arbitrary fines, and exacted pyment in 
 the most merciless manner; and they insulted on all occasions the simile 
 
 slffSr f J'-' '"''•""""" "™P^'^'"" "f '"e coun ry. We™ 
 Stauffacher of Steinen, m the canton of Schwvtz had h„lli hJu 
 new and commodious house Gessler riding ^ '/ . '"mself a 
 loudly. "Is it to he. >w.rnr?i. ^^^^^"' "<l"ig past It one day, exclaimed 
 y, is It to be borne, that vde peasants should be possessed of such 
 
 PERIOD II ] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 45 
 
 fine mansions ?** In Unterwalden, Arnold of Melchthal was fined for a 
 slight offence, and a handsome team of oxen was taken from his plough 
 by a servant of Landenberg, who told Arnold that " peasants ought to 
 draw the plough themselves." The young man struck the fidlow, 
 broke two of his fingers, and then ran to the mountains. The bailiff 
 Landenberg, revenged himself on old ^lelchthal, the innocent father of 
 Arnold, by searing his eyes. The yovuig lord of Wolfenschiess, the 
 friend of Landenberg, went one day to the house of Conrad of Baum- 
 garten, while the latter was out in the fields, and insisted that Conrad's 
 wife should prepare a bath for him, making her, at the same time, in- 
 decent proposals. The wife sent word to her husband, who, returning 
 hastily, killed AVolfenschiess in the bath. The inferior dependants and 
 partizans of the bailifis imitated the conduct of their masters. The 
 governor of the castle of Schwanau, in the lake of Lowerz, having 
 attempted to violate a young woman of Artb, who belonged to one of 
 the principal families of the country, was murdered by her brothers. As 
 there was no chance of obtaining justice, the country people became 
 desperate, and every one sought redress with his own hands. General 
 confusion and disorder spread over the land. It was evident that 
 Albert's intention was to drive the people either to rebellion, that he 
 might have a pretence for annexing them to his dominions, or to the 
 voluntarv sacrifice of their liberties, in order to be relieved from their 
 bailiffs. Indeed the latter alternative was suggested to them by the 
 emperor's ministers, by way of advice, in answer to their reiterated re- 
 monstrances. On the other side, the Waldstatten were anxious to avoid 
 open revolt, which might give the emperor a pretext for effecting that 
 which they well knew to be his main object. But Albert's bailiffs, by 
 carrying their oppression too far, hastened the crisis. Their outrageous 
 conduct was a theme of secret though frequent comi)laints among the 
 people. The women, less restrained by prudence, were loud in their 
 denunciations of the tvrants, and ur^ed their husbands to throw off the 
 Yoke. Werner Stauffacher of Schwvtz, who has been mentioned above, 
 had, in the course of 1307, interviews with AValtcr Furst of Uri, and 
 Arnold Melchthal of Unterwalden. These three men, deploring the 
 miseries of their common country, agreed to sound their respective 
 neighbours, and ascertain whether the people would risk their lives for 
 the recovery of their ancient liberties. They agreed to meet again and 
 report to each other the result of their inquiries ; and they fixed upon a 
 solitary spot called Riitli, on a steep promontory, jutting into the lake, 
 opposite the village of Brunnen, as a central point between the three 
 cantons. 
 
 An incident occurred in the meantime, which, althougli unconnected 
 with the conspiracy, had the effect of strengthening the purpose of the 
 patriots. The bailiff Gessler, suspecting that a spirit of resistance lurked 
 among the people, and wishing to find out the most determined spirits, 
 
46 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period II. 
 
 PERIOD II.] 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 41 
 
 > 
 
 that he might get rid of them, resorted to a most singular contrivance of 
 despotic caprice. He caused a high pole to be raised in the market- 
 place of Altorf, on the top of which his hat, or, what is more probable, 
 tlie ducal cap of Austria, was perched ; issuing at the same time an 
 order, that every passer by should uncover his liead before the hat, in 
 token of respect for its master. Wil helm Tell , of Burglen near Altorf, 
 son-m-law to Walter Furst, was the first who disobeyed the order He 
 w^s immediately taken before Gessler. This was a new species of 
 oflence, and the punishment the bailiff awarded was equally new. Tell 
 was known to be an excellent marksman at his bow ; he had only one 
 son, yet a boy, and Gessler sentenced the father to take his stand at a 
 considerable distance, and shoot at an apple placed on the head of the 
 child. Should he miss his aim, he was to sutler death. The inhuman 
 sentence was carried into immediate execution : the bov was blindfolded 
 and an apple tied over his head. Gessler was presen't on the occasion, 
 le 1 took Ins bow and /«„ arrows in his quiver, and set about his fearful 
 task. With a firm hand he let fly the arrow, and hit-not the boy's 
 head, as the tyrant expected, but the apple. The spectators shouted 
 applause. Tell was overcome by his feelings; and, in his jov at his 
 boy s escape, he unguardedly answered the questions of the tyrant, who 
 asked him for what purpose he had taken a second arrow in his quiver 
 as he could shoot but once? " That was reserved for thee, had the 
 first hit my son." This rash but irresistible burst of feelin. nearlv 
 proved fata to Tell. Gessler, rendered doubly suspicious of this maii'I 
 courage and skill, was determined not to leave him at large: and he 
 eagerly caught at the threat thus imprudently expressed. Tell was 
 pinioned, and thrown into Gessler's boat, which was ready to carry him 
 to the castle of Kussnacht, at the other extremity of tife lake. The 
 wind was contrary, but Gessler, impatient to carry off his prisoner, and 
 fearing an outbreak of the indignant people, gave the signal fbr depa tu« 
 The southernmost branch of the lake of the Waldstiitten, which ex- 
 tends into the canton of Uri, consists of a long and narrow piece of water 
 of very great depth stretching from north to south, between two rige 
 s S' • r ";; ''"''' P-P-'dicuIar rocks. The wind when pi ngi'" 
 suddenly from the mountains above, causes a dangerous surge There 
 hard y a landing place along either coast, and the boat wlfch should 
 attempt m a storm to near the shore, would be dn,l,.-l f 
 .he cliffs. Gessler's boat had not '^^^^ ^^::j::Z^'Z 
 strenuous exertions of his rowers, before it became nnmanageaWeVhe 
 
 let them unfetter Tell, who was lying at the bottom of the boat and 
 was known as an experienced boatman, and one well acoinint.! ' ! 
 every nook of the shore, they might vet be saved Thl ""''"'""*«' 7"'' 
 -sent. Tell, taking the rudder^ land Z d IuCr'"""'V 
 abr^pt sides Of the Axenberg, where a n^t flat ilf'^Sl ^^ 
 
 into the water. As the boats neared it, Tell, seizing his bow, sprang on 
 the narrow ledge, pushing at the same time the boat with his foot back 
 into the roaring waters. In the confusion, Gessler's boatmen missed 
 the landing place, and were obliged to beat out against the waves. The 
 storm, however, abated its fury, and Gessler was safely landed on the 
 coast, from whence he took a path across the country to reach his castle 
 of Kussnacht. Tell, who foresaw where he would land, if land he did, 
 and the direction he must follow, was waiting in ambush for him in a 
 cave ; and as Gessler passed, Tell shot him through the heart*. This 
 happened towards the end of 1307. 
 
 Tell was driven to this last extremity by the absolute necessity of de- 
 stroying his implacable enemy, or being himself destroyed and his 
 family ruined. As soon as the deed was done, he went to Steinen, and 
 told Werner Stauffacher, whose sentiments he was acquainted with, 
 what had happened. Stauffacher communicated it directly to his two 
 friends, Furst and Melchthal. They all felt <lisconcerted by Tell's pre- 
 cipitance, as they were not prepared for the immediate insurrection of 
 the whole Waldstatten. They also disapproved of Tell's personal vio- 
 lence, justifiable as it might appear ; for those old single-hearted patriots 
 were conscientious and religious men, and abhorred the shedding of 
 blood, even of their enemies, excepting in self-defence. At a meeting 
 which they held at the usual place of Riitli, in November, 1307, the 
 three leaders brought each with him ten trusty and honourable men of 
 their neighl)ours ; and then the three first, raising their hands towards 
 heaven, and callmg on the Almighty to witness their engagement, swore 
 to live and die for the rights of their oppressed countrymen — no longer 
 to suffer injustice, and on their part to commit none; to respect the 
 rights of the house of Ilabsburg, and without offering violence to the 
 imperial governors to put an end to the arbitrary acts of their tyranny. 
 The thirty followers devoutly repeated the same oath, and engaged 
 themselves to fulfil it. The execution of their design was fixed for the 
 1st of the following January. After concerting their nueasures they 
 parted ; and every one was quietly at home next day, attending to the 
 cares of his house and fields. 
 
 On the 1st of January, 1308, as the bailiff Landenberg came out of 
 the castle of Sarnen to go to mass, twenty of the confederates "aj^peared 
 before him, bringing the customary presents of fowls, sheep, &c. The 
 
 * Doubts have been cast on the authenticity of Toll's ad veniure. because a similar 
 case is reported by Saxo Graminiiticus, a cbronii'lor of the twelfth century, to liave 
 happened in Denmark about the tenth century. Tell's incident, however, occurred at a 
 period wheninformation was much move spread throughout Europe: it is atttsttd by- 
 historians who lived early in the following century; ir was then consecrated by uni- 
 versal tradition by the building of chapels, and ly paintings. Grave modern historians, 
 Miiller among the rest, entertain no doubt of its truth; the narrative bears all the 
 requisites of moral proof. 
 
48 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period II. 
 
 PERIOD II.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 49 
 
 rPiflii;! 
 
 bailiff suspecting nothing, told them to go into the castle, while he him- 
 self proceeded to church. When arrived at the gate, the confederates 
 took from under their jackets spear-heads, which they fixed to the ends 
 of their staves : with these they disarmed the guard ; and having made 
 a signal to another party of thirty men wlio were waiting close bv, thcv 
 all rushed in and overcame the garrison. Landenberg hearing of thi« 
 escaped over the frontiers to Luzern without being pursued. His 
 people were set at liberty on condition of never returning into the Wald- 
 statten. At the same time, another parfv of confederates were intro- 
 duced into the castle of Rotzberg by one' of their number, who was in 
 ^e habit of visiting at night one of the female domestics of the castlo 
 1 he attcr used to let down a rope ladder from her window, by whioli 
 her lover ascended ; and on this occasion he availed himself of the 
 opportunity to serve his countiy, by introducing his friends, who soon 
 made themselves masters of tlie castle. Hitherto no blood had been 
 shed. At the same time, Stauflacher, with the men of Schwytz look 
 possession of Schwanau, and Walter Furst and his son-in-law, Wilhelm 
 i ell did the same by Gessler's castle in Uri. All these fortresses were 
 razed to the ground. Bonfires were lighted upon all the mountains; 
 and the following Sunday deputies of the three cantons assembled at 
 Brunnen to renew their old alliance by oath, and to thank God that 
 they had accomi.lisl.ed their deliverance without bloodshed, and without 
 violating the rights of the house of Habsburg. 
 
 The emperor Albert, on being informed of these proceedings, which 
 were in all likelihood not unacceptable to him, repaired in the month of 
 April, 1308 to Baden, in Aargau ; whilst there, he put the three Wald- 
 sta tens to the ban, forbidding any one to trade or hold communication 
 witli them ; and he summoned all his vassals to assist him in subduing 
 he rebels W Inlst making jireparations for invading and devastatin" 
 the poor forest districts, Albert, on the 1st of May, set out from Baden 
 to join 1.^ empress at Rheinfelden. He had with him his nephew, 
 John of Habsburg, son of Rudolph, duke of Suabia, who. being now 
 of age claimed to be put into possession of his father's inheritance! But 
 Albert was not willing to part with what he had once held. He refused 
 to comply with the demands of his nephew, whom he pronounced to^he 
 too young and inexperienced, and he replied to the voung man's com- 
 plaints by aunts and sarcasm. A similar scene had happenedTu t 
 before they eft Baden ; and John had formed a conspiracy to Ml lis 
 nncle with four noblemen of Albert's suite, to whom L t he eml o 
 was pecnharb- obnoxious. No sooner had the emperor crossed the ftrrj 
 on the river Reuss at Windisch, than the conspirators, who accompai ed 
 him, fell upon him, before the rest of his suite, who beheld the deeE 
 
 first to strike Ins uncle in the throat with his spear, exclaiming, 
 
 " This is the reward of injustice." Rudolph of Balm, wounded him 
 in the breast, and Walter of Eschenback cleaved his head with bis battle- 
 axe. Two Other noblemen, Rodulph of Wart and Conrad of Tagerfeld, 
 stood by, but did not assist in the murder. They then, all horror-struck 
 at what they had done, dispersed in various directions, leaving Albert 
 alone, bathed in his blood. The emperor drew his last breath in the arms 
 of a poor woman who happened to oe journeying on that road. 
 
 The report of this crime spread consternation even amongst Albert's 
 enemies and victims. The assassins wandered about, shunned by all 
 men, without asylum and without sympathy : Zurich shut its gates 
 against them : the brave W^aldstiitten, where the murderers hoped to be 
 received, since they had delivered that people from an implacable 
 oppressor, refused to admit them, scorning to purchase their deliverance 
 by countenancing a crime. 
 
 Elizabeth and Agnes, the widow and the daughter of Albert, as well 
 as Leopold of Austria, his son, fearfully avenged the murder. Innocent 
 and guilty were involved in one common slaughter, on the slightest sus- 
 picion of being accomplices of the murderers. The first nobility of 
 Helvetia perished in these abominable proscriptions ; their castles were 
 burnt, and their estates were confiscated to the profit of the dukes of 
 Austria. Agnes, queen of Hungary, the daughter of Albert, has 
 acquired an infamous immortality by the fierceness of her revenge. At 
 Fahrwangen, sixty-three knights, generally believed to have been inno- 
 cent, were beheaded in her presence, and amidst this scene of blood she 
 is reported to have exclaimed, " Now we bathe in the dews of May." 
 Rudolph von Wart, the least guilty of the assassins, being taken, w^as 
 condemned to be broken on the wheel. His wife implored at the knees 
 of Agnes a commutation at least of the dreadful mode of execution, but 
 in vain : Von Wart had his limbs broken on the wheel, but, by a refine- 
 ment of cruelty, was left still alive. From his bed of agony he continued 
 to console his devoted wife, who remained alone, kneeling by his side, 
 until he expired. Such was Agnes' revenge. About one hundred noble 
 families, and nearly one thousand persons of plebeian condition, of every 
 age and of both sexes, are said to have been immolated to the manes of 
 Albert. At last, satiated with carnage, mother and daughter built a 
 convent on the spot where the murder had been committed : it was 
 called Konigsfelden, and was enriched with the confiscated property of 
 the victims. In this convent, Agnes spent fifty years of her life in the 
 practice of the most austere asceticism, and she was buried there, by 
 the side of her parents : her apartments and the vaults were still to be 
 seen a few years ago, although the monastery of Konigsfelden has been 
 long secularized, and the remains of the Austrian princes and princesses 
 have been removed to Vienna, 
 
 In the midst of these and other cares, the sons of Albert lost sight of 
 the forest-cantons for several years, leaving them to the undisturbed 
 
 E 
 
50 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period II. 
 
 > 
 
 enjoyment of their ancient institutions. Henry of Luxembourg having 
 been proclaimed emperor, crossed Helvetia on his way to Italy, and he 
 appointed Rudolph of Habsburg, count of Lauffenburg, to be governor 
 of Zurich, Aargau, Thurgau, and the WaldstUtten ; the latter district 
 gave the emperor an escort of 300 men. In 1313, Henry perished 
 by poison in Italy ; and the electors were divided, on the appoint- 
 ment of his successor, between Louis of Bavaria and Frederic of Austria, 
 son of Albert. Helvetia was likewise divided between the rival candi- 
 dates. Bern, Soleure, and the Waldstatten, took the part of Louis, 
 whibt the rest sided with Frederic. The former, however, prevailed^ 
 and was finally acknowledged emperor. Frederic and his brother 
 Leopold had not forgotten the insurrection of the Waldstatten against 
 their father ; and now the partiality shown for Louis of Bavaria added 
 fuel to their resentment. In consequence of some fresh disputes be- 
 tween them and the monks of Einsiedlen, the Waldstatten were excom- 
 municated by the bishop of Constance, and the imperial chamber put 
 them to the ban of the empire as rebels to the emperor. But the Wald- 
 statten were relieved from the spiritual interdict by the archbishop of 
 Mayence, and from the ban by the emperor Louis. Frederic, however 
 111 his quality of protector of the convent of Einsiedlen, thought he had J 
 plausible opportunity of chastising the stubborn mountaineers, and he 
 committed to his brother Leopold the care of the expedition. Leopold 
 assembled, m the autumn of 1315, a body of 20,000 men at Baden, on 
 the Limmat. There he arranged his plan of campaign. His principal 
 attack was to be directed against the canton of Schwytz, the most im- 
 portant, as being the most fertile and populous of the three Wald- 
 stattens. The canton is not so mountainous and ruirged as those of 
 Uri and Unterwalden ; it consists of fine valleys and pasture lands on 
 the slopes of the lesser Alps. Leopold^s cavalry could, therefore, act 
 better there than in the deeper alpine recesses ; and it was also the 
 most accessible by an army coming from Baden and Zurich. About 
 the middle of November he advanced, at the head of the «iain body of 
 his troops, with a numerous cavalry, through the country of Zug in- 
 tending to penetrate into Schwytz by the defile of Morgarten. This 
 pass is situated between the eastern bank of the little lake E-eri and 
 the mountain called Sattel, which extends from the frontiers'^of Zu- 
 into the country of Schwytz ; it is one of the principal passes lead^- 
 ing into the latter. At the same time, Leopold had directed two other 
 attacks against Unterwalden, one from the side of Luzern, and another 
 from the Hash over Mount Brunig. The plan was well combined 
 and faithfully executed. Leopold also directed a false attack to be 
 made on the side of Art, along the coast of the lake of Zuff, 
 whence there is another road leading into Schwytz. The feint would 
 have succeeded, for the Waldstatten were hurrying to the latter spot, 
 had it not been for a knight of the house of Hunenberg, who was 
 
 PERIOD II.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 51 
 
 in Leopold's camp, and found means to warn them to *' beware of 
 Morgarten" Accordingly, 700 men from Schwytz, and 700 men 
 from Uri and Unterwalden were posted on the Sattel mountain. On 
 the morning of the 1 5th November, Leopold of Austria, at the head of 
 his cavalry, advanced to Morgarten; his troops marched on with the 
 greatest confidence, making sure of victory over a band of peasants ill 
 armed and undisciplined, and they only thought of the best means of 
 securing the booty they expected to collect. For this purpose they had 
 provided a large quantity of ropes to fasten round the heads of the fat 
 beeves of the Waldstatten. As Leopold's cavalry proudly advanced 
 through Morgarten, followed by the infantry, fifty men of Schwytz, 
 who, having been banished the canton for various offences, had, in the 
 hour of danger, begged of their countrymen to allow them to take part 
 in the defeilce of their common land, and who had posted themselves 
 on the rocks which overhang the defile, as soon as they saw the line of 
 cavalry far advanced into a narrow path, where they could only move on 
 in single file, began to roll down a quantity of large stones and trunks 
 of trees, which did much havoc among the horsemen, and threw the 
 whole body into confusion. The men of the three cantons, or Swiss,* as 
 we shall call them in future, who had taken position on the mountain, 
 perceiving this, rushed down in a body upon the enemy, and engaged 
 them with so much fury, that Leopold ordered a retreat upon the open 
 country, where his cavalry might act. The infantry, which followed, 
 was thrown into disorder by this manoeuvre ; the rugged nature of the 
 frozen and slippery ground was unfavourable to the movements of the 
 soldiers, whilst the Swiss, used to the country, and having their moun- 
 tain shoes studded with rough nails, came down with impetuosity upon 
 them, and put them completely to rout, before they could rally in the 
 plain. The Swiss halberds, a destructive weapon, shaped like an 
 hatchet on one side, and terminating in a spear, and their morgensteriien 
 or clubs, studded with iron points, wielded by strong, sinewy arms, 
 made dreadful execution among the troops of the duke. Between 
 1000 and 1500 of the cavalry were killed, and among them the 
 flower of the nobility. t The loss of the infantry is not known ; fifty 
 men of Zurich and another party from Zug, who had accompanied 
 Leopold as the contingent of those towns, were all found among the 
 dead. Leopold fled to Winterthur, where he arrived with few follow^ers, 
 
 * The people of the Waldstiitten were known from that time by the name of 
 Schwytzers, in high German, Schweitzers ; from the canton of Schwytz, the most 
 important of the three, and the foremost in the war of independence. As other 
 cantons became incorporated, the name of Swiss or Switzers became general to the 
 whole confederation. 
 
 t Among others, Rudolph, count of Lauffeuberg, of a lateral branch of the hotise 
 of Habsburg, Baron Ruesseck, Baron Baldeck, three Barons Bonstetten, two Barons 
 Halwyl, Beringer of Landenberg, the bailiff of Unterwalden, and two of the family 
 of Gessler,~chieBy Helvetian nobility, vassals of the duke of Austria. 
 
 £2 
 
52 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period II. 
 
 'ij 
 
 M.^' 
 
 in the greatest dismay. The loss of the Swiss was trifling, some say 
 only fourteen men. 
 
 Meanwhile, the count of Strassberg, on his side, with 4000 men, 
 had entered the country of Unterwalden. His troops plundered Sarnen 
 and other villages. The people were unprepared for this attack, and 
 they sent a messenger to their countrymen at Morgarten, who arrived 
 just after the victory. The 300 men of Unterwalden, joined by some 
 of Schwytz, returned immediately, crossed the lake, overthrew the 
 advanced guard of the enemy, and met the main body at Alpnach, under 
 Strassberg. But the count perceiving the two banners of Unterwalden, 
 which he knew to have been at Morgarten, concluded that the Swiss 
 must have repelled Leopold's attack, and thought it therefore prudent 
 to retire, which he did with the loss of several hundred of his men. 
 Thus was this great victory complete, and the Waldstatten were freed, 
 by their bravery and virtue, from the presence of the enemy. 
 
 On the 8th of December, of the same year, the three cantons entered 
 into a solemn compact of the following tenor : 
 
 They engaged to defend one another, each state at its own expense, 
 against all enemies. 
 
 No one of the cantons could apply for foreign assistance, or form 
 alliances, or place itself under a foreign power, without the consent of 
 the others. 
 
 Those individual inhabitants who were under the jurisdiction of a 
 lord or prince, should punctually fulfil their engagements, and pav 
 their dues, as long as he remained at peace with the cantons. 
 
 They were to receive no bailiffs or judges but such as were inhabitants 
 of one of the cantons. Every inhabitant was to appear whenever re- 
 quired before the judge or magistrate, and to obey the laws. He who 
 should slay a man was to be punished with death, unless he could prove 
 that he had acted in self-defence. An incendiary was to be banished 
 for ever. Whoever concealed an assassin was also to be banished for 
 ever. 
 
 These stipulations, which were afterwards adopted by the other can- 
 tons who joined the confederacy, were promulgated at Brunnen, and 
 sealed with the seal of the three cantons of Uri, Schwytz, and 
 Unterwalden. 
 
 The emperor Louis of Bavaria was pleased at this defeat of his 
 Austrian rival, Frederic, who still kept up the contest for the imperial 
 crown. He congratulated the cantons upon their success, and promised 
 them his assistance. Frederic himself was too much engaged in Ger- 
 many to think of pursuing the war against the Swiss, and he at last 
 concluded a truce with them in July, 1318, which was renewed till 
 August, 1323. But the war which was still carried on between Frederic 
 and the emperor Louis, could not fail to extend to Helvetia. The 
 dukes of Austria were in possession of a great part of that country, and 
 
 PERIOD IlJ 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 53 
 
 allied to the chief nobles. Bern and the people of Glaris as well as 
 the Waldstatten, took the part of the emperor Louis. The country of 
 Glaris belonged to the abbey of Seckingen, but the dukes of Austria, 
 who had the right of appointing the kastvogt, or warden of the abbey, 
 conferred this office on strangers, by which they violated the ancient 
 customs and privileges of the people. This treatment exasperated the 
 inhabitants of Glaris against Austria, and led at last to the complete 
 emancipation of that canton. 
 
 In 1318, Leopold laid siege to Soleure, a free imperial town, but after 
 ten weeks, he was obliged to retire, in consequence of the overflowing 
 of the river Aar, which carried away the bridge he had thrown across 
 the stream just above the town. By this accident a number of the 
 duke's men were cast into the foaming waters, and they would all have 
 perished in the current by which they were carried along, had not the 
 citizens of Soleure, at the peril of their own lives, rescued many of 
 them, whom they sent back to Leopold's camp without ransom. Leopold, 
 overcome by this act of magnanimity, made peace with Soleure. In all 
 these early wars of the Swiss against the dukes of Austria, nothing is 
 more aff'ecting than the singleheartedness and purity of those old re- 
 publicans, who never injured even their enemies excepting for the sake 
 of absolute self-defence ; and who as soon as the aggressors were re- 
 pulsed, spared both the lives and the property of those who had sought 
 their destruction. Untutored as they were, their conscience told them 
 that people who struggle for their rights, ought scrupulously to respect 
 those of others. 
 
 The city of Luzern, which since 1291, had become subject to the 
 dukes of Austria, felt all the inconvenience at being in a state of war 
 with its immediate neighbours of the Waldstatten. The great thorough- 
 fare to Italy through the St. Gothard was now stopped, and the trade of 
 Luzern suffered materially from the obstruction; its fiiirs were deserted, 
 its lands exposed to the incursions of the Swiss and Bernese, and its 
 burghers obliged to be under arms night and day for the defence of 
 their walls. Yet the duke of Austria, instead of endeavouring to make 
 some compensation to the people for these hardships, aggravated their 
 distress by imposing fresh duties on them to carry on the war. At last 
 the burghers of Luzern, weary of these undeserved calamities, made a 
 truce with their Swiss neighbours without consulting the duke. Al- 
 though the noblemen in the town and neighbourhood were still in their 
 hearts attached to the Austrian power, the citizens for their own safety 
 concluded, in 1332, a perpetual alliance with the Waldstatten, and were 
 admitted as o. fourth canton into their confederation, on the same terms 
 as the others. It was stipulated that in case any difterence should arise 
 between the three first cantons, Luzern should side with the majority. 
 
 Frederic of Austria had died in 1330, and by his death peace was 
 restored to the empire. But his succeessor, the duke Albert II., was not 
 
54 
 
 IIISTORT OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 'iH 
 
 [period II. 
 
 of a temper to give up tamely the possessions of his house in Helvetia. 
 The nobles of Aargau armed in his name against Luzern, and surrounded 
 the town; but the citizens, reinforced by their new allies of Schwytz, 
 defeated them at Buchenas and Ramschwag. The Austrian party at- 
 tempted next to gain possession of the town by a conspiracy. The nobles 
 who were in Luzern agreed to sally out in the night, and, after surprising 
 the leaders of the popular party in their beds, to open the gates to the 
 baron of Rothenburg. The conspirators assembled in arms on the borders 
 of the lake, in a subterraneous vault under the hall of the corporation of 
 tailors. A boy accidentally overheard their conversation, but he was 
 perceived, seized, and would have been put to death, but for the inter- 
 ierence of some more humane than the rest, who made him swear 
 solemnly not to reveal to any living person what he had heard. The 
 youth was then released, and he went to the butchers' hall where some 
 men were still loitering, drinking, and playing; he placed himself 
 facing the stove, with his back to the company, and there told in a 
 loud soliloquy all he had heard and seen, and tlie oath he had been 
 obliged to take. The others listened attentively, then rushed out and 
 awoke their townsmen. They seized the conspirators, sent to Unterwalden 
 for assistance, exiled the nobles who were still in the magistracy, and 
 formed a Council of 300 citizens to administer the affairs of the canton. 
 The duke of Austria, weary of these vain attempts, referred the affair of 
 Luzern to the arbitration of Bern, Zurich, and Basle. It was agreed, 
 in 1334, that the alliance of Luzern with the Waldstiitten should remain 
 in force, and a truce was concluded between the town and the duke 
 which truce was afterwards renewed from time to time. 
 
 Bern had remained faithfully attached to the emperor Louis, in the 
 midst of all the troubles of the contested election. Louis, however, being 
 at variance with the pope, was excommunicated in his turn, and it was 
 on this occasion that the electors of the German empire, assembled in 
 1338, passed a memorable resolution, importing " that an emperor and 
 king of the Romans Ijeing once elected by the majority of suffrages, had 
 no need of the sanction of the papal court in order to exercise the im- 
 perial rights." Thenceforth the emperor elect assumed the title of king 
 of the Romans, without being crowned by the Pope. Such was the 
 final result of the exorbitant pretensions of the Roman see. But the 
 Bernese were as yet too much under the influence of the Pope to slight 
 the thunders of the Vatican, and they forsook Louis, who, highly incensed 
 at this, joined the league of the nobles, ever jealous of Bern's pros- 
 perity and independence. The league was formidable, it consisted of 
 the counts of Gruyere, Kyburg, Nidau, Aarberg, and of Neuchatel, and 
 the town of Friburg. A great council was held at Nidau, at which the 
 emperor's messengers were present, and nothing less than the total de- 
 struction of Bern was determined upon. The republic, however, was 
 not disheartened. After several fruitless negotiations, the Bernese took 
 
 rERIOD II.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 55 
 
 the field in good earnest. They threw a garrison into the town of 
 Laupen, a sort of advanced post of Bern on the road to Friburg, having 
 chosen for this service one individual out of each family of Bern, that 
 every one should feel interested in the preservation of that important 
 place. The old avoyer, John of Bubenberg, took the command of the 
 garrison, and swore to sacrifice his life, and all that he possessed, for its 
 defence. The army of the nobles before Laupen consisted of 15,000 foot 
 and 3000 horse, commanded by the count of Nidau. They reckoned in their 
 ranks 700 knights with coronetted helmets, and 1200 cuirassiers. While 
 the Bernese council, assembled at the town hall, w^ere debating about the 
 choice of a general to lead their forces into the field, Rudolph of Erlach,son 
 of Ulrich, who had commanded his countrymen in 1298, at Donnerbuhl, 
 was seen entering the town on horseback. He was appointed general 
 by acclamation. Soleure, ever faithful to Bern, sent its contingent of 
 80 knights ; the three Waldstatten sent 900 of their hardy country- 
 men ; the baron of Weissenburg, who from an enemy had become an 
 ally and a vassal of Bern, arrived with 600 men from Hasli and Sim- 
 menthal. These forces, joined to the Bernese, formed a body of 5000 
 men. On the 21st June, 1339, this little army arrived on the heights 
 near Laupen in sight of the enemy's forces. The nobles did not expect 
 that the Bernese could collect even this number of men, and Mayenberg 
 the avoyer of Friburg advanced between the two armies, taunting them 
 with having women in disguise among them, to swell their ranks. 
 Cuno of Ringenberg, a Bernese knight, together with a warrior of 
 Schwytz, indignantly denied the charge, and offered the avoyer to prove 
 the trial by single combat. Mayenberg having returned to the camp of 
 the princes, proposed negotiations, but the majority rejected the proposal 
 with scorn. An attack on the Bernese position was decided upon. In 
 the Bernese camp the honour of being the first to encounter the cavalry 
 was o-ranted to the'men of the Waldstatten. These rolled down before 
 them a line of cars armed with scythes, so constructed that they could 
 not be wheeled backwards ; and when they came within reach of the 
 enemy's line, they threw from their slings, in the use of which they were 
 very expert, a shower of stones, which created confusion among the 
 horses. The Swiss then feigned to retire towards the hill in their rear, 
 and the princes pushed forward their cavalry ; but the cars opposing 
 their passage broke their ranks, and the Swiss rushing forward fought 
 man to man against them. Meantime D'Erlach, with the main body 
 of his troops, charged the Austrian infantry, which, unable to withstand 
 the shock, fell back in disorder, leaving the Bernese free to turn to the 
 assistance of their Swiss allies, who were hard pressed by the enemy's 
 cavalry. The latter, however, perceiving the retreat of their infantry, 
 wheeled round, without waiting for a fresh encounter ; for the slaughter 
 among them had been already very great. The combat lasted only an 
 hour and a half, Among the dead were found the count of Nidau, the 
 
56 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period II, 
 
 PERIOD II.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND, 
 
 51 
 
 first promoter of the war, count John of Savoy, the count of Valengin, 
 and a number of knights. Bircken, an Austrian writer, says that 14 
 counts and 80 knights perished. John of Winterthur, a contemporary 
 historian, states the whole loss of the princes at 1000 men, but this cal- 
 culation appears too low, from the number of leaders who were killed. 
 This victory, in every way glorious, whether we consider the motives' 
 which led to the war, or we compare the means which either i)arty had at 
 command, is stated to have cost the Swiss confederates only 122 men.* 
 The count of Kyburg arrived the morning after at Aarberg, with a re- 
 inforcement of four thousand men for the army of the princes, but his 
 troops, hearing of the defeat of Laupen, disbanded and went to their 
 homes. A desultory warfare, in which the Bernese had the advantage, 
 continued for some time, and inflicted great evils upon the country.' 
 Queen Agnes of Hungary, from her convent of Kunigsfelden, succeeded 
 m 1343, in establishing a truce, and afterwards strove to mediate a peace 
 between the parties. At length the nobles, wearied out, made most of 
 them their separate peace with Bern, and the town of Fribur- not only 
 followed their example, but some years afterwards entered, fo'i- the first 
 time, into an alliance with the Bernese. 
 
 The city of Zurich began about this time to be distracted by internal 
 dissensions, which continued for years, and brought that republic to the 
 verge of ruin. The council was composed of four nobles and eight of 
 the most influential burghers, who at the expiration of four months 
 chose their own successors. Power and office were, therefore, in the 
 hands of a few families, who were not responsible to their fellow-citizens 
 for their public conduct, or for their employment of the public moneys 
 The citizens murmured but submitted, until at last one of the members of 
 the council itself took their part and became their leader. Rudolph Braun 
 was a man of great talents, but ambitious. He won to his side some 
 of the other members, who supported the demand of the citizens that the 
 council should produce the accounts of the public expenditure But 
 the majority of the members endeavoured by procrastination to avoid 
 complying with this claim. At last the people, under Braun's directions 
 assembled m crowds round the town-house, and the obnoxious council- 
 lors left the hall, and afterwards the town, in alarm. Braun, supported 
 by his friends, and invested with discretionary powers, formed a new 
 government ; he divided the traders and artisans into tribes or guilds 
 and separated them from the gentry and nobles, who together formed 
 one class. One half of the council consisted of the heads of the guilds, 
 
 there he hved to a peaceful old aee. One dav his Jnin\ ^\'^;\^0"°*ry, and 
 
 and the other of members of the nobility, and each was to be renewed 
 every six months. Braun was named burgomaster for life, with exten- 
 sive powers. No alteration was made, however, in the relations of the 
 town with the empire, to which it continued to own allegiance. The 
 people sanctioned this new constitution in 1336. The heads of the 
 trades, having seats in the council, used their newly acquired power each 
 for the interest of his respective craft*, by excluding all foreign compe- 
 tition, and preventing the country people from manufacturing goods. 
 Another great object which they had in view, was to secure for the town 
 the monopoly of the transit trade between Italy and Germany. The 
 run-away councillors were banished for ever, with their adherents, and 
 fines v/ere levied on their property. But the exiles found refuge in the 
 castles of the neighbouring nobility, and were especially supported by 
 tlie count of Rapperschwyl, who was possessed of the Marches, the 
 Giister, and of several other districts. From his castle the discontented 
 emigrants made frequent incursions into the lands of their countrymen. 
 The people of Zurich, on their side, allied themselves with the count of 
 Toggenburg, who was in continual war with the lord of Rapperschwyl 
 concerning a disputed inheritance, when, after several engagements, the 
 latter was killed, with many of his men, near Grynau. Years passed, 
 during which time, former feuds being partly forgotten, several of the 
 exiles obtained leave to return to Zurich. These, in concert with 
 the rest of the emigrants, as well as with the neighbouring nobles, 
 formed a conspiracy to get rid of Braun and his friends. Many of the 
 conspirators came into the town under various pretexts, others were 
 waiting outside for their friends to open the gates for them. A baker's 
 boy overheard part of the plot in a house where the conspirators assem- 
 bled. Braun was informed of it in the night, he put on his armour in 
 haste, and ran to the town house, calling the citizens to arms. The 
 conspirators, in a body, endeavoured to effect a retreat out of the town, 
 but Braun, at the head of the citizens, met them in the market-place, 
 and an obstinate engagement ensued, in which most of the conspirators 
 were either killed or taken prisoners. The captives were beheaded or 
 broken on the wheel, together with several citizens of their party. Braun 
 then marched against Rapperschwyl, took the castle by stonn, drove all 
 the inhabitants out of the town, and then burnt it and razed it to the 
 ground. The counts John of Habsburg and Ulrich of Bonstetten being 
 taken prisoners, were kept as hostages. These events occurred in 
 
 1350. 
 
 The duke of Austria strongly resented the conduct of the Zurichers 
 towards Rapperschwyl, the lord of which town was his relative, and he 
 threatened the citizens with his vengeance. The nobility around rose 
 
 * The chief manufactures of Zurich consisted then of silks, Hnen, and leather; 
 the former article still continues to form in our days an important branch of its in- 
 dustry, together with cottons and muslins, of which latttr Zurich produces the best 
 in Switzerland. 
 
58 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period II. 
 
 PERIOD II.] 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 59 
 
 jJ^nK 
 
 also to avenge the humiliation inflicted on their own body. The people 
 of Zurich, seeing the storm gathering, apphed to the Swiss, and Zurich 
 was received into their confederation as a fifth canton in 1351. But in 
 consideration of the wealth and importance of the city of Zurich, the 
 others yielded to it the first place in order of rank, and it has ever since 
 been styled the first canton of the Helvetic body. This prerogative, 
 however, gave Zurich no superiority over the rest, but merely consti- 
 tuted it as a central point where all the afiUirs which concerned the 
 whole confederation were transacted ; its deputies had also for a time 
 the precedency in the general diets. 
 
 Albert, duke of Austria, repaired to Brougg in Aargau in the month 
 of August, 1351, and there he assembled his forces. The city of 
 Zurich sent a deputation to compliment him, and offer him presents. 
 He received the deputies with apparent friendship, not manifesting his 
 intention to them, except in as far as demanding the release of his rela- 
 tive, count John of Habsburg, who was kept prisoner in their town. 
 But as soon as the deputies had left him, he assembled his bailiffs and 
 vassals, and imparted to them his intention of taking a signal vengeance 
 on the people of Zurich. He then formally demanded of the Zurichers 
 that they should rebuild the town and castle of Rapperschwyl at their 
 own expense, and restore the Marches, of which they had taken posses- 
 sion. Upon their refusal to comply with these conditions, he laid siege 
 to Zurich with a considerable force. The Waldstatten ran to arms for 
 the assistance of their new confederate. The duke of Austria, on his 
 side, summoned the people of Claris for their contingent. The latter 
 refused, saying that " they were under the protection of the empire, and 
 subject to the abbey of Scckingen, and bound to take up arms for the 
 defence of these, but not for the private wars of the dukes of Austria." 
 The duke, however, in his quality of vogt or warden of the abbey, under- 
 stood the matter otherwise. Besides, he wislied to occupy the country 
 of Claris, in order to check the people of Schwytz on that side, and 
 }n-event them from sending succour to Zurich. But the Schwytzers, 
 anxious to secure their own frontiers, were beforehand with him ; they 
 occupied the country of Claris' in November of the same year, 'l 351 
 without striking a blow, and Claris was received into the Swiss con- 
 federation, of which it formed the sixth canton. The people continued 
 however, with the religious honesty of the old Swiss, to pay their dues 
 to the monastery of Seckingen until 1395, when the abbess allowed 
 them to redeem themselves. 
 
 The cavalry of duke Albert was stationed in the country of Baden 
 whence it made incursions into the lands of Zurich. The citizens 
 having resolved to attack the enemy, advanced on Christmas-day, to the 
 number of 1300 men, towards Baden, whose suburbs they destroyed 
 together with the baths, the Austrians having retired into the town.' 
 But the Zurichers were intercepted in their retreat near Mellingen 
 
 by 4,000 of the enemy, whom they bravely attacked; and, being 
 joined by the contingents from the banks of the lake, they obliged the 
 Austrians to retire, after the loss of 60O or 700 men. The Zurichers 
 had captured at Baden a number of mares, which they drove towards 
 the enemy's horses, and thus threw them into disorder — a stratagem 
 which mainly contributed to the defeat of the Austrians. 
 
 Next year Walter de Stadion made an incursion into the territory of 
 Claris, but was defeated and killed near Nafels. The people of Claris 
 pursued their advantages, and laid seige to the town of Zug, an hereditary 
 possession of the duke of Austria. Deputies from Zug repaired to 
 KOnigsfelden, where duke Albert was quietly enjoying the sports of the 
 chase, whilst a war, in which he had wantonly engaged, was desolating 
 the territories of his own subjects. The deputies, who came to implore 
 his assistance, found him engaged with his falconer : he would hardly 
 listen to their urgent requests for assistance, and told them peevishly, 
 that they might, if they chose, give themselves up to the Swiss. When 
 this answer was reported to the people of Zug, they immediately fol- 
 lowed the duke's advice, and were readily received, in 1352, into the 
 Swiss confederacy, of which they formed the seventh canton. 
 
 The duke of Austria arose at last from his apathy, and a second time 
 laid siege to Zurich, in the month of July ; but seeing no better chance 
 of success than before, he listened to the proposals of the margrave of 
 Brandenburg, who negotiated peace, or rather a truce, on condition 
 that the duke should acknow ledge the alliance of Claris and Zug with 
 the Swiss, w ith the understanding that the taxes and fees due to him in 
 those countries* should continue to be paid, and lastly that the Zurichers 
 should restore the count of Habsburg to liberty. 
 
 The republic of Bern, which had of late greatly extended its domi- 
 nions both by arms and by purchases, having some diflferences with its 
 subjects of the Oberhasli, the cantons offered their mediation, and in 
 1352, a diet was held at Luzern for that purpose. On this occasion 
 the three first cantons proposed that Bern should enter into the 
 Swiss alliance. The Bernese, grateful for the assistance the Swiss had 
 afforded them at the battle of Laupen, readily accepted the offer. Bern 
 was thus received into the confederation, of which it formed the eighth 
 canton. This important accession imparted to the Swiss confederacy a 
 reputation for power and stability which it had not till then enjoyed. 
 It also led to the settlement of a general system of polity among the 
 Swiss, which, while keeping inviolate the independent sovereignty of 
 each canton, provided for cases where a diversity of interests might lead 
 to a rupture. This last and most difficult object was obtained by 
 
 * Albert I. of Austria had purchased, in 1308, the mayorship of Windeck; he 
 was already in possession of the avouerie of Glaris, and he held the county of Zug 
 as an hereditary possession of the house of Habsburg. Thus the house of Austria 
 had the higher jurisdiction in these countries, modified by the privileges and franchises 
 of the inhabitants. 
 
60 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period II. H PERIOD II.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 61 
 
 !!<?Ǥ;' 
 
 ^?l«- 
 
 constituting the deputies from each state, into a diet or representa- 
 tive council of the whole Helvetic body, to whom the neighbouring 
 princes might accredit their ministers, and before whom all important 
 
 S'conTdeT"' "" ^"'"' "'""'" "' *' '"'"'^^' "'S"^' "" '•'^"-^'l 
 
 jltVf'TT-^^T ™«"'i''n«d-Schwylz, Uri, Unterwalden, 
 Lu.ern, Zurich Glans. Zug, and Bern, constituted for more than 
 century the whole federative republic of the Swiss, and even after the 
 accession of other cantons they retained, together with the title of the 
 eight oldcantom, a superiority over the younger members of the league 
 During that period they made considerable conquests, which were W 
 tnbutcd among themselves according to the decrees of the diets 
 
 The truce which duke Albert had made with the .Swiss was not of 
 long duration. He soon pretended that the stipulation which secured to 
 him h,s rights in the cantons of Glaris and Zug, meant the annihilation 
 of their al lance with the Swiss. The affair was brought before the 
 emperor Charles IV., who, after some vacillation, finding that the Swiss 
 would not hear of any infraction of their confederation, took the part of 
 the duke of Austria. The Austrians renewed hostilities in Julv, 1354 
 by laying se.ge, for the third time, to Zurich. The emperor join'ed them' 
 with the troops of the empire, as well as those of Soleure, Schaflhausen 
 and several other imperial cities. The combined army amounted to 
 more than 40,000 men. The garrison of Zurich, reinforced by con- 
 tingents from the other cantons, held out for several weeks against their 
 numerous enemies ; at last they hoisted on one of the towers their .-reat 
 banner, which consisted of the arms of Zurich surmounted by the" im- 
 perial eagle ; this reminded the contingents of the free towns that they 
 were waging war against one of their own body. The Zurichers al4 
 secretly made representations to the emperor, who, naturallv jealous of 
 the power of the house of Austria, and weary of a war from which he 
 could expect no advantage, at length withdrew his troops ; and duke \lbert 
 weakened by this defection, raised the seige. A desultory warfare' how- 
 ever, continued to be carried on ; fresh negotiations followed, and the 
 emperor was again appealed to on the question of the alliance of Zu- 
 andG!ar>s. At last duke Albert fell ill at Vienna, and Rudolph, his 
 son a prince of a mild and upright character, promised to arrange 
 matters satisfactorily, which, however, he was unable to do until after 
 his father s death in July, 1358*. It was then stipulated that Glaris 
 and Zug should remain in the confederation, and that the house of 
 Austria should preserve its rights and dues in those countries ; but in 
 order to prevent its officers from encroaching on the liberties of the 
 
 and Lupoid, the last „f thorn [h^rt- "f-'"^" '^'"^ '""'' K""^"'!'''' Albert, 
 S^pach^ Leopol, I who rr^ht »*«'■'• "'. '»'' "»T' "-"^ "fterward/kilied at 
 brother of duk^^l^Sert, died Sf326 ^^'"Sarten, .on of the emperor Albeit, and 
 
 people, tlie landamman of Zug was to be chosen from among the peoi)ie 
 of Schwytz, and the avoyer, or bailiff, of Glaris from those of Zurich. 
 Thus peace was at last re-established in Switzerland. 
 
 Disturbances arose in the western districts, between the bishop of 
 Basle and the Bernese, on the subject of the town of Bienne. Bienne 
 was an imperial town, but the counts of Neuchatel had the wardenship 
 of it, an office which, like all the other dignities of the empire, had 
 become hereditary in their family. In the feuds between the bishop of 
 Basle and the counts of Neuchatel, the former obtained possession of the 
 avouerie of the town of Bienne, which the emperor Rudolph of Habs- 
 burg confirmed to them. Bat the burghers had formed alliance with 
 the towns of Friburg, Soleure and Bern*, without any opposition 
 on the part of the bishop. In 1352, however, the burghers rendered 
 their alliance with Bern perpetual, and thus gave offence to the bishop, 
 who arrested several of the leading men of Bienne to force them to break 
 the alliance. The Bernese marched, in 1367, to the assistance of their 
 neighbours ; but arrived too late. The count of Nidau, an old enemy 
 of Bern, had plundered Bienne and set it on fire. The war continued 
 next year, between Bern and Soleure on one side, and the bishop's 
 troops on the other. The latter were defeated at the narrow pass of 
 Pierre Pertuis. Peace, however, was made between the parties, the 
 Bernese paying three thousand guilders to the bishop. 
 
 The whole of Switzerland now enjoyed tranquillity, until in 1315, an 
 army of strangers, French and Englishmen, after ravaging Alsace and 
 the iaorders of the Rhine, invaded the country on the banks of the Aar, 
 and, carrying fire and sword, advanced along the Limmat as far as 
 Wettino-en. This unexpected irruption, which recalled to mind the 
 former incursions of the northern tribes, was led by Enguerrand de 
 Coucy, a French nobleman, who had inherited, through his mother, a 
 grand-daughter of the emperor Albert, several towns and castles in 
 Alsace and Aargau, of which, however, he had never obtained posses- 
 sion. Leopold of Austria, Enguerrand's cousin, refused to deliver up to 
 him his mother's portion, and Enguerrand, who had married Isabella, 
 princess of England, availing himself of the peace between that country 
 and France, came with a large army of adventurers, chiefly English, to 
 regain his inheritance by force of arms. The count of Nidau, who was 
 the first attacked, offered little resistance ; his jealousy of the Bernese 
 made him perhaps see with little regret the storm approaching their 
 territory. He was, however, himself killed by the English in his town 
 
 * These alliances, or coburgheisliips, were very common in Helvetia under the 
 empire. The emperors had the nominal authority over the whole country, but being 
 unable to protect the rights of particular communities, not only the towns among 
 themselves, but even the great lords and their vassals, contracted alliances with the 
 latter, who having the right of banner granted by charters, could stipulate to give and 
 receive assistance in case of need. These alliances also served to regulate difFerencea 
 which broke out among the various neighbours, at a time when no public right or 
 judicial forms existed tor the whole country. 
 
62 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period II. 
 
 PERIOD II.] 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 63 
 
 M 
 
 of Buren. The invaders, dividing their forces, advanced with a strong 
 party towards Bern. One of their principal leaders, a Welshman, erro 
 neously styled by the chroniclers as duke of Wales, encamped at Fraucn- 
 brunnen on the road to that city. Having met little or no opposition so 
 tar, the English were reposing in security, when in the night of the 26th 
 and 27th of December, the Bernese surprised their camp. Thev found 
 httle resistance except in the convent, where the principal officers were 
 bdged and where they fought singly in the corridors and cells. The 
 English were thrown into confusion and dispersed in the darkness, with 
 the loss of 800 men. Others of tlieir bands met with similar reverses 
 m various parts of the country. The lord of Coucv, who had his head 
 quarters at the abbey of St. Urban, seeing this, and finding that he 
 could not maintain discipline in his motley army, or procure provisions 
 in a country which he had ravaged, began his retreat, and returned to 
 Alsace, which he completely devastated. This expedition was called by 
 the Swiss the war of the Gvglor,, from the pointed kind of helmet 
 which the English wore, and which in German is called m,nclhul*. 
 XT Tf ,^"''".'1* °f Kyburg, landgrave of Burgundy and count of 
 Neucliatel, having had disputes with the people of Soleure on the subject 
 of some border districts, attempted to surprise that town. The Bernese 
 hastened to the assistance of their old allies, and in 1383, their united 
 forces made incursions on the lands of Kyburg, and besieged the town 
 of Berthoudt. The Swiss confederacy, at the request of Soleure, sent 
 to inquire of Leopold II. of Austria, son of the late duke Albert, whether 
 he supported the pretensions of the count «f Kyburg, and Leopold pro- 
 mised them to remain neutral. Nevertheless a party of 200 Austrians 
 threw themselves mto the town of Berthoud, and thus prevented the 
 surrender of the place. The Swiss were indignant at the duplicitv of 
 Leopold, but as tlie quarrel was not one of their own, and as their truce 
 with the duke of Austria still continued, they withdrew their contingent 
 aiid left the troops of Bern and Soleure alone. Count Rudolph of 
 Kyburg having died in 1384. his sons made peace with the Bernese 
 selling to them the county of Berthoud for the sum of 30,800 guilders' 
 and resigning their rights over the county of Tlmn, which Hartmann' 
 of Kyburg had mortgaged to their father some years before The 
 history of Bern is more remarkable than that of the other Swiss cantons 
 by the steady policy which that republic pursued in gradually exfending 
 Its territory, either by conquest or by purchase, at the conclusion of 
 every war. The large sums which it paid for this object prove also its 
 wealth, and the economical administration of its finances 
 The truce which still existed between Austria and the Swiss cantons 
 
 did not prevent Leopold from annoying the confederacy in several ways. 
 He established a fresh toll at Rothenburg, which proved to be very op- 
 pressive to the traders of Luzern. The people of this town, without the 
 knowledge of their magistrates, marched to Rothenburg in 1385, de- 
 molished the castles and the walls of the town, without, however, in- 
 juring the persons or the property of any of the inhabitants. This led 
 to a renewal of the war. The canton of Luzern had admitted into its 
 community the districts of Entlibuch, and the towns of Sempach and 
 Richensee. A garrison of 200 men defended Richensee, but the par- 
 tisans of Austria surprised the town and took it by storm in 1386, when 
 they slaughtered or threw into the lake the whole of the inhabitants 
 without distinction of age or sex. Richensee was utterly demolished. 
 The confederates on their side took the town of Meyenberg ; but, on the 
 approach of the Austrian forces, they abandoned it, and, after removing 
 the inhabitants with their goods to a place of safety, set the houses on 
 fire. Such was the devastating character of that contest. 
 
 At last Leopold himself came to Switzerland to carry on the war with 
 more vigour. Having at first made some demonstrations against Zurich, 
 the other cantons sent 1600 men to reinforce that city. But on hearing 
 that Leopold was marching upon Sempach, they hastened in the same 
 direction, and arrived before the town at the same time as Leopold. The 
 cantons had demanded the assistance of Bern, but the Bernese, ex- 
 hausted by their contest with the house of Kyburg, and the expense and 
 taxation consequent upon it, were unable to fulfil their engagements 
 towards their allies. In fact many of the burghers murmured against 
 their government, on account of the burthens it had entailed on them, 
 necessary as these were for the preservation of their independence, and 
 the stability of the republic. 
 
 Meantime Leopold's advanced guard, 1400 strong, committed all 
 sorts of excesses on its line of march. Rutschman of Reinach, who 
 commanded it, approached the walls of Sempach mounted on a cart full 
 of ropes, threatening to hang all the burghers before sunset. The 
 duke followed him close with a body of 4000 picked men fully 
 armed, among whom were a number of counts, knights, and noblemen 
 of the first rank. The Swiss confederates did not muster above 1300 
 men, all on foot, badly armed, having only their long swords and their 
 halberds, and boards on their left arms with which to parry the blows of 
 their adversaries. Their order of battle was angular, one soldier fol- 
 lowed by two, these by four, and so on. Thus on the 9th July, 1386, 
 did this handful of men advance towards the Austrians. The knight 
 Ulrich de Hasenburg, seeing their firm step and steady demeanour, ad- 
 vised Leopold not to accept battle that day, but to wait for the reinforce- 
 ment of the baron of Bonstetten ; his advice was, however, disregarded, 
 and Leopold and all his noblemen, alighting from their horses, placed 
 themselves at the head of their men. The Swiss could at first make no 
 
64 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period II. 
 
 PERIOD II.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 6S 
 
 impression on the close ranks of the Austrian?, all bristling with spears. 
 But Anthony Zer Port of Uri cried to his men to strike with their hal- 
 berds on the shafts of the spears, which he knew were made hollow to 
 render them lighter ; and, at the same time, Arnold of Winkelried, a 
 knight from Unterwalden, devoting himself for his country, cried out, 
 *' ril open a way for you, confederates;" and seizing as many spears 
 as he could grasp in his arms, dragged them down with his whole 
 weight and strength upon his own bosom, and thus made an opening 
 for his countrymen to penetrate the Austrian ranks. This act of heroism 
 decided the victory. The Swiss rushed hito the gap made by Winkelried, 
 and having now come to close quarters with their enemies, their bodily 
 strength and the lightness of their equipment gave them a great advan- 
 tage over the heavily armed Austrians, who were already fainting under 
 the heat of a July sun. The very closeness of the array of the Austrian 
 men at arms, rendered them incapable either of advancing or falling 
 back, and the grooms who held their horses having taken flight, panic 
 seized them, they broke their ranks, and were hewed down by the Swiss 
 halberds in frightful numbers. Duke Leopold was urged by those 
 around him to save his life, but he scorned the advice; and seeing the 
 banner of Austria in danger, rushed to save it, and was killed in the 
 attempt. The rout then became general, but the Swiss had the 
 humanity, or the policy, not to pursue their enemies, of which otherwise 
 not one perhaps would have escaped. The loss of the Austrians 
 amounted to 2000 men, including 676 noblemen of the first f\imilies of 
 Germany and of Aargau, 350 of whom wore coronetted helmets. Most 
 of them were buried at Konigsfelden, with their leader Leopold. The 
 Swiss lost 200 men in this memorable battle, the second in which they 
 had defeated a duke of Austria at the head of his chivalry. 
 ' The sons of Leopold continued the war; Bern was again urged not to 
 abandon its confederates, who had, on former occasions, been ever ready 
 to rush to its assistance, and who now began to reflect on the calculating 
 policy of that growing republic, which seemed too much absorbed by its 
 particular interests to hazard any thing for the common cause of the 
 confederation: and this stigma has attached to the Bernese councils 
 even down to the fall of that state in our own days. At length, yielding 
 to their remonstrances, Bern declared for the confederates, proclaimed 
 war against Austria, and overran the dependencies of that power in Fri- 
 burg and Valengin. The Swiss, on their side, took the town of Wesen 
 and other districts. A tnice was agreed on, which lasted till 1388, when 
 hostilities were renewed with fresh fury. The Austrians retook Wesen 
 by surprise, and put to death the bailift'of Uri and the Swiss garrison. 
 From that position they annoyed the canton of Claris, and in April in- 
 vaded that country with several thousand men. A few hundred men of 
 Claris and Schwytz, unable to oppose any resistance, retired to the 
 mountains in the interior. The Austrians took the village of Nafels and 
 
 burned it ; but as they approached, on the 9th of April, the positions of 
 the men of Claris, they were received with a shower of stones, which 
 made them fall back, and the Swiss, availing themselves of their con- 
 fusion, rushed down upon them, and forced them to retreat in disorder. 
 When the Austrians arrived on the bridge on the Linth near Wesen, 
 they were met by another body of 700 men of Claris, and the combat 
 began afresh. A number of Austrians were drowned in the river by the 
 breaking down of the bridge ; and the victory of Nafels was equal in its 
 results to those of Morgarten, Laupen, and Sempach, and was the fourth 
 great triumph of the confederates. 
 
 The Bernese and the people of Soleure took Nidau and Biiren, where 
 the Austrians had placed garrisons, and Bern conquered, on its own 
 account, the upper Simmenthal and other places. At last, in 1389, a 
 truce was entered into with the duke of Austria for seven years, on con- 
 dition that the Swiss cantons, during that period, should retain possession 
 of their conquests, with the exception of Nidau and Biiren, which be- 
 longed to the lord of Coucy, to whom they were delivered up. This 
 truce was renewed in 1394 for twenty years longer, and was faithfully 
 maintained by both parties till 1415. 
 
 The Swiss availed themselves of this long period of peace for the pur- 
 pose of organising their military discipline. A series of regulations were 
 framed at Sempach in July, 1393, of which the following articles might 
 afford a lesson to nations boasting of much greater civilization : — 1st, Not 
 to attack or injure any church or chapel, unless the enemy have retired 
 into it. 2d, Not to violate or insult any females. 3d, Every Swiss 
 engages to sacrifice his property and life if required for the defence of 
 his countrymen. 4th, No Swiss shall abandon his post even when 
 wounded. 5th, It is forbidden to any man to straggle for the sake of 
 plunder without leave from his captain, or to appropriate to himself any 
 part of the booty, which must be all reported and divided equally and 
 in good faith. 6th, Whoever shall bring provisions to the confederates 
 shall be protected and receive a safeguard. 7th, Each of the eight 
 cantons engage not to undertake any war, unless it be approved of by 
 the rest. 8th, No Swiss shall take away anything from any of his 
 countrymen either in peace or war. 
 
 Cuided by such honourable principles, to which they strictly adhered 
 during the first ages of their independence, the Swiss carried the disci- 
 pline of their armies to a perfection never surpassed by any nation, and 
 this discipline, joined to their well known intrepidity and their strict 
 fidelity to their oaths, brought them into the highest repute among the 
 powers of Europe*. 
 
 The defeats of Sempach and Nsefels gave to the Austrian power in 
 
 * General Baron de Zurlauben has written a military history of the Swiss, in 
 which the reader may find numerous pr«fessional details on this subject. ^ 
 
66 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period II. 
 
 f 
 
 Switzerland a blow from which it never recovered. The feudal 
 nobility, the vassals of Austria, had lost in those fights their bravest 
 leaders, and the dukes of Austria, occupied with other matters, neglected 
 the affairs of Switzerland. The feudatories, finding themselves unsup- 
 ported, made the best terms they could with the cantons ; some of them 
 being in want of money sold or mortgaged their estates and jurisdictions 
 to the wealthy towns of Zurich, Bern, or Soleure, others entered into 
 coburgherships with them, engaging to assist them in their wars. In a 
 few years more than forty lordships belonging to the dukes of Austria, 
 or to vassals of that house, came into possession of the Swiss confede-' 
 rates, especially of Bern and Zurich. Rudolph, lord of Aarburg be- 
 came a burgess of Bern in 1385, and he sold to the Bernese his cLstle 
 of Simmenek, which commanded the pass leading into the Simmenthal 
 or valley of the Simmen, an Alpine river which rises in the high ridge on' 
 the Valais border, and flows into the lake of Thun. The Bernese were 
 already possessed of Mannenberg, and other places in the same vallev 
 The heirefb of Wyssenberg sold likewise to Bern her lordships 
 of Unspunnen, Oberhofen, and the town of Unterseen, between the 
 lakes of Thun and Brientz. The fine and extensive valley of Frutigen 
 watered by the Kander and forming part of the district which is now 
 generally called by the name of the Bernese Oberland, or Highlaud«= 
 was sold to Bern by the baron of Thurn, whose mismanagement had in" 
 volved him in difficulties. When the inhabitants of Friitigen heard of 
 the negotiation for the sale, they all agreed to strain every nerve in order 
 to redeem the seignorial fines and dues which had been transferred to 
 their new masters. Every one contributed for this purpose his little 
 savings, and it is stated in an old song, quoted by Muller, that the 
 whole valley engaged not to eat beef for seven years in order to free 
 themselves and their descendants from feudal burthens. Bern accepted 
 the redemption money, and Frutigen, thanks to those public-spirited 
 peasants became a free untaxed district subject to Bern, and such it 
 remained for ages after, until the fall of the republic 
 
 Other feudallords who had become coburghers of Bern sold to that 
 city their dominions castles, and jurisdictions in the fertile district 
 called the Emmenthal, or valley of the Emmen, near the borders of 
 Luzern and one of the richest grazing lands in all Switzerland. Thus 
 Hutwyl, Sumiswald, the Krauchthal, and other places, came into the 
 possession of Bern. Ego and Berthold, counts of Kyburg, gave up to 
 Bern the landgraviat of Burgundy, a jurisdiction so calledf Ihe relics f 
 a former and prouder ordship, and which extended from Thun to the 
 
 KlZfitZ77 ^r^^^^^r""^'' ^'^ ^^^ estate of thecountsof 
 Kyburg in Hel^ietia; this too they sold, and after passing through 
 several hands it came into possession of a Bernese family. Count Ego 
 of Kyburg forsook Helvetia, where his ancestors had been long weaUhy 
 
 PERIOD II.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 61 
 
 and powerful, and withdrew to St. Dizier, in Champagne, where his 
 wife had some property, and there he died in the early part of the 
 fifteenth century ; about a century and a half afterwards Hartman the 
 younger, the head of his family, divided with his cousin Rudolph of 
 Habsburg, the rich inheritance of the houses of Kyburg and Z'a- 
 ringen. 
 
 In 1393, Leopold, duke of Austria, and son of the Leopold who was 
 killed at Sempach, came to Baden on the Limmat, and from thence he 
 endeavoured to sow dissension among the Swiss, with whom, however, 
 he was at peace at the time. He succeeded in bribing Rudolph Sclion, 
 burgomaster of Zurich, and some of the other councillors of state, or 
 members of the executive, who agreed to conclude a treaty offensive and 
 defensive between Zurich and Austria, one of the conditions of which 
 was that Zurich should not support the other cantons in the possession 
 of the territories they had seized during the last war. A draft of the 
 treaty was made out and sent to Leopold for his sanction. All this was 
 done by the burgomaster without consulting the great or legislative 
 council of Zurich. Meantime the other cantons, having heard of the nego- 
 tiation, became alarmed-, and sent deputies to Zurich to remonstrate 
 against a transaction which they denounced as a treason against the federal 
 alliance which bound Zurich to the rest of the Swiss. But the notions 
 of federal compact and federal duties were not very clear or definite at 
 that time, as had been seen by the instance of Bern refusing "assistance 
 to the confederates before the battle of Sempach*. The Zurich magis- 
 trates contended that in contracting the alliance with the 'duke of 
 Austria, they were within the sphere of their legitimate functions. The 
 Swiss deputies then insisted upon the question being referred to the 
 Great Council ;'and they appealed in public to the citizens whom they met 
 in the streets. These adopted the same view of the matter, and angrily and 
 clamorously demanded the convocation of the Great Council. The ma- 
 gistrates were obliged to comply, and the Great Council being assembled, 
 summoned a meeting of the commune or general assembly of the citizens. 
 These impeached the magistrates, and ordered them for trial before the 
 Council of Two Hundred or Great Council, which, after hearing the parties 
 and examining the evidence, pronounced that the alliance with Austria was 
 illegal, and condemned Rudolph Schon, and seventeen other individuals 
 concerned in it, to banishment. After this the council and burghers 
 together adopted several resolutions, to the effect that in future the bur- 
 gomaster, and councillors of state, and tribunes, should be renewed every 
 
 * The Beraese alleged a separate truce which tbey had with duke Ijeopold, and 
 which would not expire for some months. This refusal of Bern to aid its confede- 
 rates, who had so generously come to its assistance at Laupen, has often been 
 made a subject of reproach against that state. It is recorded that when the de- 
 puties of the Waldstatten received the refusal from the president of the Bernese 
 council, they turned away in silent indignation, left the senate hall without uttering 
 a word, and immediately set off to return to their constituents. 
 
 p2 
 
I! 
 
 68 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period II, 
 
 PERIOD II.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 69 
 
 SIX months ; that the councillors should be chosen from among all classes 
 of citizens without exclusion ;; that all questions should be decided by 
 majority of votes and quickly ; and that in cases of indecision, or delav 
 
 c?nn " ?'k f T'^''^ ""'' «^'' '^'" 0Pi™°". ""d that Iny coun- 
 cillor or tribune should be at liberty to propose to the Great Council any 
 
 motion he might think proper. ^ 
 
 frnSl' ^Tl^ ''''"^ *''"' ^''^'^ '" •*'■= ^'^^^'"e of detaching Zurich 
 [n a fresh"t^"^r'""K T' """'"■'"« *" ^^-"""ence hostilities'entered 
 Ttwentv rr . '' '" 1394, renewing the former truce 
 
 quisS 'T^"'7' »"d regulating the question of their recent ac- 
 thenbr;- an^'tb P Tk' "l" '''''""-'^dged Sempach. Hochdorf, Ro- 
 thenburg, and the Enthbuch, as subjects of Luzem ; the Entlibuch 
 however, was to pay 300 livres annually to the duk^ He "ave ,n 
 
 r"e?;'lt Th" '^"' ""'• ^"" '" P^y •" '•'' ""■^^ "f Austria 
 Z.T ^ ! ; '^ '' " '=""°"" f"":' elicited by this treatv and 
 
 IS^Iu 2 b '° f ^^-,''°"-ty- *«t notwithstanding that the Wa d 
 statten had been independent for nearly a century, durin- the ~r 
 
 hati.: t?;; '; ?v:^^"h^' ^'' '-''' ^"^'''^' ^^-'-e^rintrtr : 
 .epenrfori;:^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ 
 
 r;;zrafy^dLrtt-!::L^^^^^ 
 
 by Bern and Soleure were ackno^Sdeld as b J T '"'""'''' 
 
 Iselgau. a valley which extends atnf the 1:1^™ T"" '"' ^ 
 Thiele and the possession of which wafdlsp^d bereen' ptyl ! .nd 
 
 Be™ ^'Z '" "7'-- It -as, however, ultimatelv gfven ' to 
 
 Bein. The possession of several fiefs acouirerl hv 7n„vi, , ^ 
 
 firmed by the treaty, and the others were rest red to fustrta ^ ","" 
 It was after the death of duke Leopold, and1l;f;; ::,tptt"nt 
 cessions and weak administration of the dukes Albert'lV 77a,i! Z' 
 that Austria lost her remaining influence t He ve a % '^ •^" 
 itself of the opportunity to make fZl ."«'^e"a. Zurich availed 
 
 lustration of justice was eutru^t.A f * i ^ . ^^"""^gen the admi- 
 presidency of a^ baiHff H zSVl^ if ^'^^^^^^^'. r ^^ ^^^ 
 exercised previously under that of aL A tir^^^^^^^ ^- 
 
 court was formed by convoking all the heads ofC^ "^ '"'* 
 
 As the administration of 7ur\X ^^^^^ «* ^amihes m the commune. 
 
 and security, its sZct nr T ^Z' '"^ ''^''^^' ^"^ ^^^^^^^ peace 
 
 its aUiance ' Th SJ ^ '''''' ''''' ^"^ ^«-- ^ht 
 
 coburghership wi h Zur cl 7" ? '"^ '" ^"^^^ ^^ Pfeffikon in 
 I with Zurich. The abbot of Cappel became likewise a 
 
 coburgher, as well as the lord Johann von Bonstetten for his domains of 
 Uster, Sax, Wilberg, and Gundisau, with the condition, however, that 
 he should retain his dominion over his serfs, even if they should come 
 to live upon the territories under the jurisdiction of Zurich. The lord 
 of Bonstetten bound himself to furnish Zurich with armed assistance 
 when required, but no contribution of money. 
 
 From the above narrative it may be perceived that the town cantons 
 of the Swiss confederation, namely, Zurich, Bern, and Luzern, at that 
 period did not form compact bodies under a uniform administration 
 emanating from a central government as is the case now. The chief 
 town, with its banlieue, was the ruling republic, and exacted certain 
 duties and contingents of men and money from the subject territories, 
 which it had gradually acquired by conquest or purchase, leaving them, 
 however, their local usages and franchises, regulated by the relationship 
 in which they had stood towards their former lords, who had more or 
 less authority over their feudal dependants according to the terms of the 
 original grant or investiture by which they had obtained the fief. The 
 cantonal towns of Luzern, Zurich, Bern, &c., therefore succeeded to the 
 rights of the former lord, and exacted feudal dues unless the inhabitants 
 re'deemed them by mutual consent. Besides these subjects, there were 
 the coburghers, consisting either of lords or of towns, which had re- 
 deemed themselves from feudal vassalage and become free, and who 
 bound themselves to one of the cantons by alliance, for mutual support, 
 under conditions more or less strict, and when summoned in case of war, 
 joined their respective banners to that of the chief town. In after times, 
 and during the wars of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, most of the 
 feudal families either became extinct, or lost or sold their estates ; these 
 were then incorporated with the neighbouring cantons, whose territories 
 became thereby more compact and uniformly administered. 
 
 The district or canton of Zug, when it belonged to the dukes of Austria*, 
 consisted of the town of the same name, and of the three communes of 
 Menzingen, Baar, and Egeri, and the custom was that in all questions 
 concerning the whole district, the three communes, when unanimous, 
 carried their motion against the town, but that the town and one of the 
 communes carried theirs against the other two communes. The banner 
 of the canton, however, was kept in the town of Zug. Some time after 
 the canton of Zug had joined the Swiss confederation, the three com- 
 munes resolved not to leave the banner and the seal of the canton any longer 
 exclusively in the hands of the burghers of Zug. The town proposed 
 that the question should be referred to the decision of the whole con- 
 federation, but the country people rejected the proposal, asserting that 
 as by the treaty of perpetual alliance between the cantons, made at Luzern 
 in 1352t, it was agreed " that each town, district, village, or farm, be- 
 longing to any one of the members of the confederation, shall retain entire 
 
 * See p. 59. f Ibid, 
 
 r.i 
 
10 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period II. 
 
 PERIOD II.] 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 11 
 
 Its laws, franchises, constitutions, rights, and usages, such as have 
 remained to this day, and shall not he disturbed in the enjoyment of 
 them;" the very words of the alliance confirmed the ancient usage 
 givmg an ultimate power of decision to the three communes, inasmuch 
 as the alliance had not been concluded with the council and burgesses 
 of the town of Zug alone, but with all the members of the ancient baili- 
 wick of Zug, which included the three communes. This dispute created 
 a great stir in the neighbouring canton of Schwy tz, most of whose coun- 
 cillors were of opinion that the appeal of the burghers of Zug ought to 
 be attended to, and that the question ought to be decided by a sentence 
 of the federal body. But others, and they formed the more popular 
 party m Schwytz, maintained that the three communes were in the right 
 that they were confederates as well as the town, and that the majority 
 ought to make law. Two serious consequences, which in after times 
 often divided the public mind in Switzerland, resulted from this affair of 
 Zug. One was that jealousy which began about that time to manifest 
 Itself between the rural cantons (the three Waldstatten and Glaris) and 
 the town cantons. The former being constituted on the principles of pure 
 democracy and universal suffrage, which was in harmony with the social ' 
 condition, simple habits, and no great inequality of fortunes of their 
 rustic mhabitants, felt their sympathies moved in favour of the rural 
 population of the neighbouring districts, who were subject to the chief 
 towns of the other cantons, whose government, as we have seen above 
 was municipal, like that of the Italian republics of the middle ages' 
 These cantons grew out of the free imperial towns ; the town was the 
 original repubhc, and as it extended its territory by conquest or pur- 
 chase over districts in a state of vassalage, it retained over those districts 
 the rights of sovereignty of their former lords. Whenever, in after times 
 disputes arose between the towns and their subjects, the popular feelinJ 
 of the democratic cantons was generally on the side of the latter and 
 against the ruling burghers of the towns, whose manners, wealth ' and 
 
 of the Waldstatten. The second important result of the affair of Zue 
 was the starting for the first time of the question concerning the com- 
 petence of the confederate body as a supreme tribunal for deciding on 
 the mtemal dissensions of any individual canton-a question of mo- 
 mentous importance in a federal state. In the present instance of Zug 
 all the cantons, except Schwytz, exhorted the three communes to subnet 
 their differences with the town of Zug to the decision of the confederates 
 But some popular leaders in Schwytz denounced this " as an attempt to 
 deprive their friends and neighbours, the free-born peasants of the canton 
 of Zug, of their liberties." The people of Schwytz assembled in their 
 villages, took loudly the part of the three communes, ill-treated their 
 own magistrates, who endeavoured to pacify and to reason with them 
 tumultuously demanded the banner of Schwytz to be brought out and 
 
 unfurled, and, without waiting for the decision of the council, they 
 marched in a disorderly mass to Zug, surprised the town, and obliged 
 the burghers to promise that they would submit their dispute with the 
 communes to the decision of the people of Schwytz assembled in lands- 
 gemeinde. But the deputies of the other cantons having hastily assembled 
 at Luzern, ordered that the militia of that canton, being the nearest, should 
 march directly upon Zug, and that the militia of the other cantons should 
 follow In three days 10,000 men were assembled m the territory ot 
 Zug Bern sent many of its councillors, Glaris sent six, and Soleure 
 as an ally, though not yet a canton, sent four, to act as mediators. The 
 three communes having assembled at Baar, promised to submit to the 
 decision of the confederates. The deputies of the cantons havmg 
 assembled at Beggenried, not far from the plain of Grutli, the cradle of 
 Swiss independence, decided that the pretensions of the three communes 
 concerning the banner and seal of Zug should be rejected, that both 
 burghers and country people should obey the landamman and council 
 of Zug elected agreeably to the existing laws, and that none of them 
 should in future presume to appeal to Schwytz alone. Schwytz was 
 condemned to pay 600 florins as an indemnity to the town of Zug, and 
 400 to the confederation ; and it was at the same time enacted, that 
 whoever in the canton of Schwytz will not submit to the present sen- 
 tence shall be punished as a disturber of the public peace, or given up, 
 person and property, into the hands of the confederates, to be treated as 
 a dishonourable and perjured criminal. The people of Schwytz, naturally 
 warm-tempered, but honest, submitted to this decision, and vented their 
 indignation upon the agitators who had misled them, and who, to the 
 number of eight, were expelled from the council, and fined 200 florins 
 among them. The rest of the fine was paid out of the public purse of 
 the canton. It was decided at the same^time by the federal deputies, 
 and agreed to by the cantons, that each canton is at liberty to change 
 its internal institutions, and adopt a new constitution, but that this can 
 only be done by orderly and legal means, and never by violence ; 
 and that whenever two parties cannot come t® an agreement, and 
 that one of them appeals in a becoming form to the decision of the con- 
 federation, the other party must abide by the sentence. Thus ended 
 the first intestine quarrel which broke out in a serious shape amongst 
 the Swiss confederates, and which involved a question of vital importance 
 to the very existence of the federal bond, a question which has often 
 recurred since, even to the present day. 
 
 Shortly after this, the inhabitants of.Hiinenberg having redeemed 
 their feudal dues to their lord by payment of 120 florins, voluntarily 
 joined the people of Zug. They assembled once a-year under a hnden 
 tree chose their local authorities from among themselves, and their 
 bailiff among the burghers of Zug, and resorted to the judicial court of 
 Zug for appeal from the decisions of their own magistrates. 
 
12 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period II. 
 
 ■'I 
 
 ■ 
 
 Luzern purchased, in 1405, of the duke Frederic of Austria, for 3000 
 golden florins, his seignorial rights over the large and fertile valley of 
 intlibuch, a fine grazing tract which Ues south-west of the city of 
 Luzern between the canton of Unterwalden and the Bernese Em- 
 menthal and whose inhabitants are remarkable for their robust forms 
 their fondness for gymnastic exercises, their independent spirit, native' 
 humour and taste for music. Tlie duke administered the forest laws 
 exercised evil and criminal jurisdiction, and exacted feudal services and 
 fees. He used to appoint a bailiff, by whose advice the people chose forty 
 
 nf r* r °T "''" '*■"' "^^^^^"^ °^ ^^e baiUfr, and, with him, 
 formed the judicial court, which decided by majority of votes. The 
 
 L7w:entb.hTff Tr'r,'"^ P"' "^ """'' sentences, were divided 
 between the bailiff and the duke. This constitution was maintained by 
 
 Luzern, who thenceforth appointed the bailiff j but some of the more 
 
 the people of Entlibuch at the price of 2500 florins. The people of Ent- 
 hbuch were bound to send an armed contingent at their expense in the 
 wars of Luzern. The Entlibuchers, however, wished to be considered 
 as allies, and not as subjects, and were hurt at their seal being removed 
 
 rtttns!"' '^'''^"'^" "^°'^'^ " ""''"^ '■"^ ^^P^'^'^d insur. 
 
 an^trhr'''*'r1;vi ^""f "- ^'""''"' ^"^«"' Merischwanden. 
 
 Tf W™ '"^'^'?."-%"> -choose their bailifffrom among the councillors 
 ll,r , [ of Aarberg, avoyer of the parish of Russwyl, sold 
 
 Sr^f^lTh "f "'^"T'f""'" ""^ •'"^P""' °f L"-- f-1200 
 florins. It has been remarked already that throughout all the revolu- 
 
 lons and conquests of the early Swiss, individual' ights and vest In 
 res s were generally respected, and at the peace they were eW e- 
 Btored to the proprietor, or valued and redeemed by money ; a just a^fd ■ 
 wholesome principle, often lost sight of by other nations IL I "ycl^l 
 to a higher social refinement than those old mountaineers. And i Z 
 probably owing to this scrupulous respect for justice that sJfs nde 
 pendence became consolidated, and being cemented, as Tw r t 
 opinion religion and morality, stood the brunt of ;ges of pd t'ical 
 
 SEt;r''^' -"^"^ "*^"^p"''"- ■'- -^'-pp-red fr::"re 
 
 The emperors of Germany, Wenceslas, Robert and Sigismund whose 
 interests were distinct from, and often at variance wifh,7o^'of th 
 dukes of Austna, seemed, in many instances, to favour th aggTandise 
 meiit and total emancipation of the Swiss towns and cantons, w'tn, 
 up to them whatever remains of imperial jurisdiction the emperor^s m 2 
 s .11 claim over them. Thus, Wenceslas made over to Luzern the fus 
 g adu, and hkewise gave up to Zurich his right to the appointment of is 
 bailiff to judge in capital cases. Similar cessions were^fterwrds made 
 
 PERIOD II.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 73 
 
 to Soleure, Glaris, Zug, and other cantons. Wenceslas also gave his 
 sanction to the establishment of a great fair at Zurich at Whitsuntide, 
 which, being frequented by merchants from Italy, Germany, and other 
 countries, became a source of wealth to the town. The coin of Zurich 
 was the best in Switzerland, and severe punishments, such as amputa- 
 tion of the hands, were resorted to against those who clipped, filed, or 
 otherwise deteriorated it. A similar punishment was inflicted upon 
 those who attempted to export it out of the country. At that time bullion 
 was scarce and very valuable, much could be done with small sums, 
 the sound principles of commercial intercourse were not understood, and 
 the possession of hard sounding coin was considered as the chief strength 
 and sinews of a state. For other offences, except deUberate murder, 
 punishments were lenient, being mostly banishment in the first instance, 
 but death was often awarded to those who broke their ban. 
 
 The pfaffenbrlefy one of the earliest enactments of the Jus Helveti- 
 cum, or federal law of the Swiss, was framed at Stanz, in the Unter- 
 walden, in October 1470, by common agreement between the three 
 Waldstatten, Zug, Luzern and Zurich, in consequence of some over- 
 bearing acts of the prior of the chapter of Zurich. The dignitaries of 
 the Swiss church, like those of Germany, united in their persons feudal 
 as well as ecclesiastical prerogatives, which they were inclined to stretch 
 to the utmost. The Swiss, however, were among the first people in 
 Europe to draw a proper distinction between the spiritual and temporal 
 jurisdictions. By the pfaffenbrief (priest's law) it was resolved — " that 
 the Swiss would defend their laws and liberties against any authority, 
 ecclesiastical or secular, and against any other power whatever. Nobles 
 and villains, priests and laymen, all subjects of either Austria, or any other 
 power, while inhabiting the territory of the confederation, were bound 
 to contribute to the honour and profit of the same. No personal vio- 
 lence was allowed, no appeal to foreign lords or courts, no endeavour to 
 bring a suit before a powerful neighbour. The clergy were especially 
 forbidden from trying temporal suits by canonical process. A confede- 
 rate could be tried only by his natural judges. Any priest who should 
 attempt any thing contrary to these regulations, was to be considered as 
 an outlaw, and to be cast out of all communion and protection, or hos- 
 pitality. All the roads across the territory of the confederates from the 
 foamy bridge, (the Devil's bridge, at the foot of St. Gothard.) to the 
 town of Zurich, to be open to all, and no one to be molested for debt, 
 without the sanction of the government*.". 
 
 In the midst of the successes of the town cantons, the municipal in- 
 stitutions of the ruling towns, which were originally popular, gradually 
 assumed an aristocratic character. At Bern the offices of state were, by 
 tacit assent, allowed to be retained, for an indefinite period, by indivi^ 
 
 , , . * Xschudi Chronicon Helvtlicum, under the^rear 1470. 
 
 7 c- 
 
 J' 
 
)4 
 
 HiSTORT OP SWITZERLAND, 
 
 fPERlOD 11. 
 
 If 
 
 duals who had rendered services to their country, and even by their 
 families, and heirs after them. Now and then/however, popular jealousy 
 took the alarm, and enforced the observance of the old handfeste or 
 charter given to the town by the emperor Frederic II., which provided 
 that every year the Council of Two Hundred should be renewed, a statute 
 which had fallen into desuetude. The avoyervon Bubenberg, who had 
 distinguished himself by his firmness in the war of Laupen, and had 
 rendered other important services to the state, having become obnoxious 
 to many, who imputed pride and haughtiness to him, was banished for 
 100 years, together with all his family, by a vote of the popular 
 assembly, and he retired to his native castle. In 1352, fourteen years 
 afterwards, voices were raised for his recall, and found favour among the 
 people, but were opposed by the council, who alleged that a decree of 
 the people was irrevocable. The people now became as clamorous for 
 Bubenberg's recall as they had been before for his banishment ; they 
 demanded that iht handfeste or charter should be read, in order to ascer- 
 tain whether it contained any clause rendering the decrees of the peo- 
 ple irrevocable. The town-clerk, in reading the charter, purposely 
 omitted a passage in which it was stated that any resolution was legal 
 which was for the advantage of the city. One of the bystanders, per- 
 ceiving the fraud, threw a bunch of cherries upon the face of the 
 town-clerk, who let the charter fall, when one of the burghers took it 
 up and read the passage aloud. The recall of Bubenberg was then 
 voted by acclamation. The exile, then ninety years of age, was received 
 in triumph, and soon after expired in peace within that city which he had 
 been instrumental in saving. 
 
 The principle of annual election, however, having become again 
 neglected from some cause or other, a general assembly of the burghers, 
 held on Good Friday, 1374, resolved that as, according to the letter of 
 the handfeste, the magistrates should be renewed every year, all the 
 actual magistrates were deposed, after which new ones were' elected 
 more acceptable to the people. This ebullition, however, was but 
 momentary ; the new magistrates contrived to evade the law of the 
 annual renewal, and things went on as before. And in order to restrain 
 the popular discontent, a secret tribunal was instituted which received 
 private information, and condemned several citizens to exile and other 
 pumshments. Any one was forbidden to appear in arms in the streets 
 of the city, and whoever was met out after a certain hour of the evening 
 without a lantern was banished for a month. At last a public calamity 
 brought about a reform. On the evening of the 14th of May, in the year 
 1405, a fire broke out in Bern, and being blown by a strong wind it raged 
 furiously, and consumed 550 houses, which were then built of wood. 
 Several thousand individuals were rendered houseless. But at the sight 
 of the flames the people of neighbouring communes ran to the assistance 
 ot the sufferers ; and the report of the disaster having spread further, 
 
 PERIOD II.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 IS 
 
 the whole country around, subjects, coburghers, confederates, vied with 
 each other in aflfording help. This was a most cheering evidence of the 
 good administration and equity of the Bernese government towards 
 its neighbours, notwithstanding its aristocratic character, and it aff'ords 
 to the historical reader a striking contrast with the very diff*erent 
 conduct of the neighbours of Rome, who, after that city had been burnt 
 by the Gauls,- rose to prevent the inhabitants from rebuilding their 
 houses. Even Freyburg, forgetting its old rivalry, sent 100 workmen 
 and twelve waggons, and kept them one month at its expense, to assist 
 the Bernese in clearing away the ruins. In the midst of the common 
 calamity the avoyer and council resolved to assuage the general grief by 
 restoring the ancient forms of annual election, and laying all im- 
 portant affairs before a general assembly of the citizens. This spon- 
 taneous resolve conciliated the whole people, and infused into them new 
 vigour for rebuilding their town. It was then built of stone, on an im- 
 proved plan, with broad streets, fine houses, and massive walls, such in 
 short as it is now seen, the handsomest town in Switzerland. The 
 wealthier citizens contributed money to rebuild the houses of their 
 poorer neighbours ; but it was also decreed that the circuit of the walls 
 should never after be enlarged, because it was thought that a robust and 
 healthv peasantry afforded better means of defence, and was kept more 
 easy in obedience, than too large a civic population. Fifteen years later 
 the cathedral was raised, and at the same time Conrad Justinger, the 
 town-clerk, was commissioned to write the first chronicle of Bern, in 
 which the traditions and recollections of the old men were embodied. 
 
 At Zurich, the people, excited by unfounded reports of cruelties com- 
 mitted by the Jews upon children of Christian parents, loudly demanded 
 the extirpation of that race. The affair being brought before the tribes, 
 all the Jews were ordered to be put in prison ; but the burgomaster and 
 the councils succeeded by their firmness in saving the persons of that un- 
 fortunate people; they were fined 1500 florins and banished. In con- 
 sequence of this instance of popular injustice, the two councils shortly 
 after swore, solemnly invoking all the saints, to the following funda- 
 mental law : " That in future no affairs should be brought before the 
 people, except questions*of war and alliances, or any questions with the 
 Germanic Empire, which might affect the franchises of the city." All 
 other questions were to be decided in the councils by majority. 
 
 At the beginning of the fifteenth century, the houseof Austria was still 
 possessed in Helvetia of the Thurgau, Aargau, Winterthur, Rapperschwyl, 
 and Freyburg. The house of Savoy was possessed of the Pays de Vaud. 
 The Valais as well as the valleys of Rhsetia were under the jurisdiction of 
 their feudal nobles. The counts of Neuchatel and the bishop of Basle in 
 the west, and the abbot of St. Gall and the counts of Toggenburg in the 
 east, were also powerful neighbours of the eight Swiss cantons. In the north 
 there were still three free and independent imperial towns, namely, So- 
 
16 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period II. 
 
 I^P if; 
 
 r' 
 
 II 
 
 leurc, Basle, and Schafi'hausen. The town of Soleure had frequent dis- 
 putes with the feudal lords in its neighbourhood, and with the counts of 
 K\ burg among the rest. Rudolph of Kyburg, having, through the mis- 
 management of his father and grandfather, inherited but a small part of 
 the ancestral estates of his family, and his own native town of Thun 
 being mortgaged to the Bernese, he retired to Bipp, a castle near the 
 Aar, a few miles north-east of Soleure, which belonged to the counts of 
 Thierstein, who had placed it in his hands as a security for moneys ad- 
 vanced to them by Rudolph. This extensive system of mortgages, loans, 
 pledges, and securities, which appears to have spread like a vast net 
 over most of the feudal domains in the middle ages, and kept them se- 
 questrated in the hands of creditors until full payment of capital 
 and interest, contrasts singularly with the notion of overbearing phy- 
 sical force which is generally considered as the supreme law of those 
 times. But even physical force could not be recruited without money, 
 and as the proud barons were often in want, they felt the necessity of 
 mutually respecting their engagements. An episcopal or imperial sheriff 
 with his warrant saw the drawbridges lowered before him, which would 
 have remained unmoved at the summons of a powerful hostile force. 
 The country feudatories wanted money for tournaments, for crusades, for 
 marriages, or funerals, or to be enabled to attend the imperial summons 
 to a distant field ; and they could only obtain the needful supplies from 
 the free towns, whose citizens were enriched by trade and industry pro- 
 tected by independence and good government. The towns lent the sums 
 required, for which they received in pledge castles and estates, or even 
 offices, or reversions to offices, both honourable and lucrative, such as 
 avoyerships, wardenships, &c. The debt in most cases was not repaid 
 at the expiration of the fixed time, and the pledge became the property 
 of the creditors. 
 
 Rudolph of Kyburg, in his castle of Bipp, fancied that the best 
 means to retrieve his fortunes was to attempt to take possession by sur- 
 prise of the neighbouring town of Soleure. Once in possession of the 
 town, he thought that by bringing forth some old contested titles of his 
 family he might obtain the sanction, or purchase the oblivion, of the dis- 
 tant imperial chancery. One of the canons of St. Urs, named Amstein, 
 was his uncle, and his house adjoined the city walls. The count's men 
 with their ladders approached the town on that side in a very dark 
 night. But a countryman who had observed the preparations of the 
 count at Bipp, and the number of men collected there, from some of 
 whom he had learnt something of the plot, ran towards the gate and 
 alarmed the watch. The watchmen wanted to ring the great bell of 
 St. Urs, but the canon had muflSed it ; their shouts, however, made the 
 citizens gather to the walls, and Rudolph on approaching saw that 
 his plot was discovered, and drew off his men in confusion. Amstein 
 was put to death and the countryman was rewarded, and Rudolph himself 
 
 period II.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 11 
 
 soon after died of grief and disappointment in 1384. His heirs fought 
 hard to recover part at least of their inheritance, but having been obliged 
 at last to give up Thun and Berthoud to Bern for a sum of money, they 
 asked and obtained as a boon that their names should be inscribed 
 among the citizens of Soleure. Elizabeth Senn, heiress of the counts of 
 Bucheck, also sold to the town of Soleure the castles of Bucheck, Teu- 
 felsburg, and Balmeck. 
 
 The main object of the towns in acquiring feudal estates, was to sur- 
 round themselves with strong holds and with a hardy peasantry, so as 
 to defend the approach to its walls from an enemy. All power in 
 western Europe was then founded upon feudal institutions ; kings and 
 emperors were but the head lords in their respective dominions, whilst 
 their tenants in chief were like kings in their own estates. The exercise 
 of authority, however, was not so direct or absolute as that of the 
 despotic monarchs who reigned in Europe after the decline of the feudal 
 system. Every lord had certain fixed rights, ' more or less ample, 
 according to the original grant of each particular fief, and the towns 
 and communes under his jurisdiction had also their rights and immuni- 
 ties, established either by the letter of the grant or by usage and pre- 
 scription. Stretches of authority on the part of the lord occurred fre- 
 quently no doubt ; but they were considered illegal, and in ordinary 
 times the injured party might seek redress at the hands of the superior 
 lord, of the emperor, or the king. When a feudal estate was sold or 
 mortgaged, or placed in trust, the purchaser, mortgagee, or trustee, 
 took it with all the conditions, rights, charges, and obligations, without 
 exception, which the seller or mortgager was subject to or enjoyed. 
 The free towns, therefore, which acquired feudal possessions attained 
 the character of feudal lords ; but the condition of their vassals was, ge- 
 nerally speaking, preferable to their former condition under some 
 haughty, overbearing, and at the same time time needy feudatory ; jus- 
 tice was better administered ; the burghers of the town being free from 
 those exaggerated notions of their own superiority which many of the no- 
 bility entertained, found their interest to be in making their subjects feel 
 happy under their rule. It was only after several generations had 
 passed, that the subjects of the towns having gradually risen in wealth 
 and importance, began to aspire to an equality of rights with their 
 rulers ; and felt that to be a hardship which their forefathers had con- 
 sidered as a happy state. 
 
 The town of Basle had become in the eighth century the residence of 
 the bishops, who before resided at Augst (Augusta Rauracorum). The 
 temporal jurisdiction of the bishop in the town of Basle was limited by 
 municipal franchises granted at various times by the kings of Burgundy 
 and their successors the emperors. Rudolph of Habsburg acknowledged 
 Basle as a free imperial town*. But there was a village or suburb built 
 
 * Pp. 33 and 36. 
 
78 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period II. 
 
 on the opposite or northern bank of the Rhine, and which was called Little 
 Basle; this the bishops surrounded with walls in 1270, and from that 
 time appointed its magistrates. The bishops greatly extended their 
 dominions by grants, purchase, and conquest. Rudolph III. of Bur- 
 gundy gave them the abbey of Moutier Grandval, with the provostshins 
 of Moutier, and the valley of St. Imier. They also acquired of the counts 
 of Toggenburg, Liestall and Romberg in 1305. Their increased posses, 
 sions involved them in disputes with their neighbours the counts of 
 Neuchatel, with the towns of Bern and Soleure on account of Bienne* 
 and even with the emperor. Meantime the free town of Basle prospered 
 by commerce. In 1356, Albert duke of Austria, who claimed some 
 junsdictions which the citizens would not acknowledge, was marchini? 
 with an army against it, when he learnt on the road that an Earthquake 
 and a fire had destroyed the greater part of the town. Some one sug- 
 gested to him that this was a fit opportunity to render himself master of 
 the place, when the duke exclaimed, " God forbid that I should proceed 
 another step against that unfortunate people ! Let them rebuild th^ir 
 houses and walls in peace ; it will be time afterwards to settle our dis- 
 putes." And he sent 400 of his peasants from the Black Forest to 
 assist the citizens ofBasle in clearing, the ruins, at his own expense. 
 Ihis generosity cemented a mutual alliance between Basle and the duke 
 Afterwards, in 1376, Leopold, Albert's successor, having purchased 
 Little Basle of the bishop, gave a grand tournament, and other feasts, to 
 which all the neighbouring nobles were invited. One day, after an 
 abundant banquet, it was proposed to adjourn to the great square of 
 Basle as affording more space for the games. The citizens made no 
 Objection, and crowded round to witness the amusements. But the 
 young nobles, heated with wine, began to insult the bystanders and to 
 molest the women. The citizens ran to arms and fell upon the intmders 
 of whom some were killed, while the rest were secured as prisoners' 
 by the exertions of the burgomaster ; indeed. Leopold himself had ^reat 
 difficulty in escapingt. The others were ransomed afterwards. From 
 hat ime Basle became more and more respected by its neighbours, but 
 It did not enter into alliance with the Swiss cantons until long after. 
 Basle was from the beginning essentially a commercial town; it has 
 remained such ever since, and is even now the wealthiest town of Swit- 
 zerland. 
 
 The imperial town of Schaffhausen, situated north of the Rhine, had 
 
 ZKIT 'TT'"' 7f *' ^^"''' ^''"^ ^^^"^ i' ^"^ divided both by 
 Austria ^'° ^ '^' intervening domains of the house of 
 
 the^"varir' '* f ''«gi""'»g.''f the fifteenth century, the condition of 
 SwitlXd. ^ "' °' "^^ '•'""'^y "°^^ '""^'J "•'"S^'her 
 
 • P. 61. 
 
 t This was the sam, Leopold «ho was afterward, killed in the battle of Sempacb. 
 
 PERIOD II.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 19 
 
 ' The authorities for this second period are mostly the same as for the 
 preceding, namely, Tschudi Joh ^ ^"HfT, ^"'^^ Wft|^.Pvillft. Others are 
 mentioned in the course of the narrative. Coxe's History of the House 
 of Austria has also been consulted. With regard to the story of Tell, 
 the reader is referred to the following works : Balthazar, " Defense 
 de Guillaume Tell," 1760; A. Emmanuel de Haller, "Lecture 
 sur Guillaume Tell," Bern, 1712, and, more especially, J. J. Hisely, 
 " Guillaume Tell et la Revolution de 1307," 8vo. Delft, 1826, in 
 which the author has fully examined the question concerning the authen- 
 ticity of the episode of Tell; he has inserted in his book Freudenberger's 
 ** Fable Danoise," as well as the two defences of Tell by Balthazar and 
 Emmanuel de Haller, adding his own arguments, and his work may be 
 considered as complete on the subject. In the year 1387, the canton of 
 Uri caused a chapel to be built on the spot where Tell leaped on shore 
 from Gessler's boat, and in the following year 1 14 individuals of the 
 landsgemeinde, or general assembly of the same canton, who remembered 
 Tell personally, (Tell had died about 1350 in his native village of 
 Burglen,) visited the spot. Klingenberg wrote his chronicle about that 
 time, and he mentioned the fact. In the following century Melchior 
 Riiss, Etterlin, and Schodeler, wrote their chronicles, and they all insert 
 the narrative of Tell as a matter of notorious tradition in their time. 
 Riiss mentions a song or ballad in memory of Tell, and speaking of the 
 Tellens Blatt, or flat stone, at the foot of the Axenberg, on which Tell 
 leaped from the boat, he observes that it was an old name, " called still 
 so in my time," is his expression, Riiss wrote about a century after 
 Tell's death. 
 
 The last male offspring of Wilhelm Tell's family, John Martin Tell 
 of Attinghausen, died in 1684, and the last female, named Verena, died 
 in 1720. 
 
THIRD PERIOD. 
 
 FIFTEENTH CENTURY. 
 
 FROM THE EMANCIPATION OF APPENZELL AND OF THE ORISONS, TO THE 
 END OF THE SUABIAN WAR, AND THE ESTABLISHMENT OF THE CONFE- 
 DERATION OF THE THIRTEEN CANTONS AND THEIR ALLIES. 
 
 About the beginning of the fifteenth century, misunderstandings arose 
 between the mountaineers of Appenzell and their lord, the abbot of St. 
 Gall. The agents of the abbot encroached on the privileges of the 
 people, and levied taxes in a harsh and oppressive manner : one of them, 
 the baihff of Schwendi, exacted a duty on the cheese and butter which 
 were carried to market, and he kept two fierce mastiffs to fly at any one who 
 attempted to pass the toll-house without having paid the duty. The 
 bailiff of the town of Appenzell had the right of catel or " chattel," in 
 virtue of which the best garment of every man who died became his per- 
 quisite. He one day caused the grave of a man lately buried to be re- 
 opened, m order to seize the clothes in which the children of the deceased 
 had dressed their parent. These and many other vexations, joined to 
 the example of their neighbours the Swiss, led the Appenzellers to think 
 of emancipating themselves from the abbot's rule. On a fixed day they 
 rose, surprised the castles, and drove the bailiffs away. The abbot 
 Cuno of Stauffen having no means of suppressing the revolt, applied to 
 the imperial towns of Suabia, who were his allies, and who sent mes- 
 sengers into Appenzell. The mountaineers said, " they were ready to 
 pay the abbot his lawful dues as before, provided he chose his baiMs 
 among a certain number of honest men whom they would propose to 
 
 fw* u r '™P'''^^ ^''''''''' ^^o^e^-e^-* '•ejected the proposal, and insisted 
 that the former bailiffs of the abbot should be reinstated, and these, 
 through mahce and revenge, treated the people worse than before. The 
 Appenzellers then turned to the town of St. Gall, which having grown 
 around the abbey, and being in some measure dependent on it, yet en- 
 joyed imperial franchises and immunities, and was allied to other im- 
 perial towns. Its position between Germany and Italy rendered it a 
 place of considerable trade, which the industry of its inhabitants had in- 
 creased by the establishment of manufactures. The people of St. Gall 
 had also their grievances against the abbot ; they listened readily to their 
 neighbours of Appenzell, and formed an alliance with them for the pur- 
 
 PERIOD III.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 81 
 
 pose of defending their respective privileges. The abbot, incensed at 
 this, redoubled his severity against the Appenzellers, and appealed again 
 to the league of the imperial towns of Suabia, which decided that tne 
 alliance between St. Gall and Appenzell must be dissolved, Y,,,:Z 
 abbot shall choose his bailiffs from among the natives of he latter 
 country. St. Gall submitted to this decision. The Appenzellers, per- 
 ceiving that the nobility of the imperial towns preferred the friendsnip 
 of a prince abbot to the interests of a race of humble mountameers, ad- 
 dressed themselves to their brethren of the Swiss cantons, expecting 
 more sympathv from that quarter. Schwytz and Glaris alone answered 
 the call ; the former entered into a coburghership with the people oi 
 Appenzell, and Glaris, without stipulating any act of alliance, proclaimed 
 " that all those among the citizens who chose to serve in the cause ot 
 Appenzell were free so to do." All the inhabitants of Appenzell at- 
 tended in their respective rhodes*, and they all swore to each other 
 and to the landamman of the village of Appenzell, to remain hrmiy 
 united for the defence of their common rights. On hearmg this 
 imperial towns, urged again by the abbot, collected a considerable torce 
 both horse and foot, and sent it to St. Gall, where the abbot reviewed 
 and entertained them. Thence they proceeded towards Trogen, a village 
 of Appenzell, the cavalry, in full armour, being followed by 5UUU 
 infantry. On the 15th May, 1403, they entered the hollow pass ot 
 Speicher, at the foot of the VOglinseck mountain. The men of ^PP^^^" 
 zell, informed by their scouts of the approach of the enemy, had lett 
 their wives and children, and after receiving the blessings of their aged 
 parents they posted themselves, to the number of 2000, on the 
 summit of the mountain ; eighty of them advanced to the chffs which 
 overhang the hollow way, while 300 men of Schwytz, and 200 
 of Glaris, placed themselves in the wood on each side of the 
 road. The enemy's cavalry boldly ascended the mountain. The eighty 
 Appenzellers began the attack with their slings, whilst the men of Glaris 
 and of Schwytz rushed upon the flanks of the column. The cavalry, 
 pressed in a narrow way, spurred their horses to gain the plain on the 
 summit of the hill, when they perceived the whole force of Appenzell 
 advancing to meet them. At this sight the leaders of the column or- 
 dered a retreat, in order to regain the open country below. The dismal 
 word retire ! sounded along the files of the long column— the infantry 
 in the rear thought all was lost, and began to disband— the people of 
 Appenzell, Schwytz, and Glaris, fell from every side on the cavalry 
 cooped up in the hollow way. Six hundred cavaliers lost their lives, 
 the rest spurred their horses through the ranks of their own infantry, 
 the rout became general, and the discomfited troops reached St. Gall in 
 the greatest confusion. ^ 
 
 * Rhodes, from Rotte, troop or band, means the communes or hundreds into 
 which Appenzell is divided. This denomination continues to the present day. ^ 
 
 G 
 
82 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period III. 
 
 PERIOD III.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 83 
 
 1 
 
 i 
 
 The imperial towns, disheartened by this defeat, and having lost many 
 of their most distinguished warriors, forsook the cause of the abbot, and 
 made their peace with Appenzell. The abbot, deeming himself not 
 safe m St. Gall, retired to Wyl. The Appenzellers, being masters of 
 the country, attacked and destroyed his castles, and ravaged his domains. 
 The abbot and the gentry his vassals implored the assistance of Frederic* 
 duke of Austria, who, after some hesitation, assembled a force in the 
 Tyrol, which he divided into two columns; the stronger advanced on 
 the 17th June, 1405, from Altstetten, in the Rheinthal, by the moun- 
 tain called Am Stoss, on the borders of Appenzell. The count Rudolph 
 of Werdenberg, who had been deprived by the dukes of Austria of his 
 possessions m the Rheinthal, offered his services to the Appenzellers, 
 and, throwing aside his knightly armour, assumed their mountain cos- 
 tiime. He was unanimously entrusted with the defence of the country. 
 The Appenzellers had posted themselves on the mountain, from whence 
 they threw down enormous stones and trunks of trees on the advancing 
 column. The day was rainy, so that the slope upon which the Appen- 
 zellers were posted, and which was covered with short grass, was ex- 
 tremely slippery. The Austrians had scarcely reached the middle of 
 the ascent when Rudolph gave his men the signal to advance. The 
 Appenzellers were barefooted, and they rushed safely down the hill upon 
 the enemy, whose ranks were thrown into disorder, and whose bow- 
 strings were rendered unserviceable by the rain. The Austrians, how- 
 ever, fought desperately man to man with sword and spear. On a sud- 
 den they perceived on the hills a fresh body of Appenzellers, which 
 threatened to cut off their retreat. A general panic then seized them ; 
 It was no longer a fight, but a slaughter ; and the streams of rain flow- 
 ing down the sides of the hill were reddened with the blood of the 
 mvaders. The combat and the pursuit lasted six hours, after which the 
 Appenzellers returned to the field of battle, and there, falling on their 
 knees, they returned thanks to the Almighty for the deliverance of their 
 country. The troop whose appearance had decided the flight of the 
 Austrians was composed of the women of Appenzell, in shepherds' 
 frocks, who had come to share the dangers of their husbands and their 
 brothers ! 
 
 Duke Frederic, who had advanced with another body of troops from 
 Arbon, and vainly besieged the town of St. Gall, attempted to penetrate 
 into Appenzell from another side, but was also repulsed and obliged to retire 
 into Tyrol. The Appenzellers now formed an alliance with St. Gall con- 
 quered the Rheinthal, and advanced into Tyrol, whilst another 'body 
 assisted their allies of Schwytz in conquering the valley of Waggis and 
 the Lower March, which have ever since formed part of the latter 
 canton. The war of Appenzell lasted five years, during which the 
 shepherds of that country, whose name was hardly known before, made 
 themselves formidable, extending their incursions to Bregentz and Lan- 
 
 deck on the Inn, and in Thurgau as far as Weinfelden. They took by 
 force more than sixty castles, and destroyed thirty. They also entered 
 the town of Wyl, and made the abbot of St. Gall prisoner. It was m 
 vain that they were excommunicated by. the bishop of Constance, and 
 put by the emperor to the ban, in 1406 ; they disregarded both. Their 
 too enterprising spirit, however, received a cbeck under the walls of 
 Bregentz, from whence they were driven back. At last, in 1408, the 
 emperor Robert, who had come to Constance, negotiated a peace, by 
 which the abbot of St. Gall gave up his seignorial rights over Appen- 
 zell, retaining, bowever, certain revenues. The Appenzellers restored 
 the Rheinthal to the house of Austria. They contracted, after this, an 
 alliance with the Swiss cantons, Bern excepted, but were not received 
 into the confederation until long after. The Swiss, in this alliance, 
 showed some mistrust of the newly awakened ambition of the moun- 
 taineers of Appenzell, for they stipulated that the latter should not en- 
 gage in any war without the consent of tbe confederates, and that in all 
 cases the expenses of the war should be defrayed by Appenzell alone. 
 
 In 1415, the famous Council of Constance began. No less than three 
 popes, John XXIII, Gregory, and Benedict, contended for the see of 
 Rome, to the scandal and distraction of the Christian world. The em- 
 peror Sigismund determined to put an end to this deplorable schism, 
 and for this object the council was mainly convoked. But the emperor's 
 disposition was false and rapacious*. The duke Frederic of Austria 
 favoured John XXIII, a prelate of a worldly, profligate character, and 
 protected and abetted him even after the council had deposed him, as 
 well as tbe two other pretenders to the papacy, and elected in their 
 place Martin V. For this, Frederic was excommunicated by the 
 council, whilst Sigismund, jealous of the power of the house of Austria, 
 and covetous of its vast domains, put him to the ban of the empire, and 
 invited all the imperial vassals and towns to make war against him. The 
 same invitation was addressed to the Swiss cantons. The Swiss refused 
 at first, with the exception of Bern, ever ready to seize a favourable 
 opportunity to aggrandize itself. The old forest-cantons hesitated; 
 they had lately renewed their truce with the duke of Austria for fifty 
 years longer, and although the bishops, in council assembled, absolved 
 them from their engagements, and the emperor promised them the per- 
 manent possession of all the conquests they should make on Frederic, 
 they for some time withstood the temptation, saying, " that a breach of 
 faith could never be justified either by the church or the empire." But 
 Zurich, more covetous and less scrupulous than the rest, having followed 
 the example of Bern, the other cantons, threatened on one hand and 
 tempted on the other, also declared war against Austria in April, I4I5. 
 
 * After eivinff a safe-conduct to John Huss, the Bohemian preacher, accused of 
 
 heresy, that he might appear before the council, Sigismund allowed him, as well as 
 
 his disciple, Jerome of Prague, to be given over to the secular arm, and burnt alive. 
 
 G 2 
 
84 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period III. 
 
 
 The canton of Un and the brave shepherds of Appenzell formed the 
 only honourable exceptions ; they remained faithful to their truce with 
 J^rederic, and took no part either in the war or in the spoil. Bern, joined 
 
 cradlf Jr"> ^'^""^' /»'"«d 'h« Aargau. This fine province was the 
 cradle of the house of Habsburg; it extends from the Aar to the Lim- 
 mat, and northward to the Rhine, and was divided between towns en- 
 joymg franchises under the protection of the dukes of Austria and seve- 
 ral lords vassals of the duke. Hearing of Frederic's interdict, and of 
 
 Lra 2! t."'"'"'""^ "'"'™' '" the approaching struggle, and form- 
 
 hL iSf- """".'f r°"S "" *' '"^'"'^'^ °f Aargau for the defence of 
 
 ce! K T!' ■ "?'' '" *'■'''' ^•'''' "'^ Swiss confederates in case of ne- 
 
 donl n"f 1" J"'" "'«■" "^ '^ 'li^'i'ict canton, as Claris and Zug had 
 
 havLtb!; t ? •^''^ ""' ^"'"^'' '" ""= '=°™P^'='; they preferred 
 he butt ""'^.a/'.^ their master to placing themselves on a level with 
 
 •r r. r , . ''■"' ""^ ""''^^ °'' ">« misfortunes of Aargau. and of 
 
 Hs state of subjection, which lasted till the end of the eighteenth century. 
 
 conferr!.' '''","• '" P'"" i^^^m^eUes under the protection of the 
 
 hL T '^^ ^""^^ "f- ^"'' ""= ''«l'"t'«^ ^vere rcturninL. to their 
 homes, they espied on the hills the banners and the troops of' the cZ 
 tons who had hostilely entered the country. The town of Zoffin^en 
 
 b, 1 A ""'' '"^" fi'^^'-'y '« Bern. The same happened to Aar- 
 burg Aarau, Brugg, Lentzburg, and others. In a few weeks the Be - 
 nese had conquered the greater part of Aargau, the rapidity of their 
 nioveniems preventing any effectual resistance' Luzern on its^sl t ok 
 
 Zv T r i^ ^'"■«^''"=- having crossed Mount Albis. occupied the 
 B len 1- r""\'^"="''^" -<! the banks of the Limmat'towa 
 th. it . ' "^ "" ^°"''^''«'"«^ ""ited between the Limmat and 
 
 aha^^.rTT' "I '°"'^""''' "' '='"""'°"> ■" "'^ "=">'« «f "'« ^even canton 
 L n TheT' ^■^^^'"f'^'> ^J«»-S«". Bremgarten, and the county 
 Baden. The strong castle of Baden held out for some time lon-^er for 
 
 fh til " "•"'"' •"■ "'^ """^^^ •"'^'"S battered down ^ t 
 the walls the garrison surrendered and the castle was burned The 
 confederates then divided their spoils. Bern, Zurich, and Luze n ke 
 each Its conquests with the same rights as the house of Austrb la 
 exercised over those dstricts. and the country conquered in commo 
 was formed into bailiw.cks under the authority of the united canton 
 who sent by turn bailiffs every second year to govern them. Bern, wWch 
 
 latwicts' Tb "".J 'I' '""'^ ^'"^' ''' "°' P^^'''='l"'t^ ■" the cLm n 
 ba, iw cks. Thus the Swiss republicans began to have extensive subject 
 
 districts over which they ruled as sovereigns. The practice was af er 
 wards widely extended, it became an abundant source of disconten id 
 
 PERIOD III.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 85 
 
 civil war, and was at last the main cause of the overthrow of the old 
 Swiss confederation. 
 
 Whilst the house of Austria was thus stripped of its ancestral posses- 
 sions in Helvetia, duke Frederic made his submission to the emperor 
 Sigismund, and, having given up pope John, became reconciled with the 
 church This re-establishment of peace was signified to the Swiss can- 
 tons, with the injunction that they should restore their conquests to the 
 duke. Uri again lifted up its voice for the cause of honesty, but its 
 scruples were laughed at by the other cantons, who were determined to 
 hold fast their prize, and they propitiated the cupidity of Sigismund by 
 a sum of 10,000 golden florins. By a treaty concluded in 1418 
 between the emperor and the duke of Austria, the duke renounced all 
 his rights over the Aargau, and the counties of Lenzburg and Baden, 
 and the other bailiwicks. Such was the end of the war called the War of 
 Constance, the first in which the Swiss acted on the offensive without 
 having received provocation. 
 
 About this period the Swiss cantons first carried their arms across 
 the Alps into the valleys of Italy. The cantons of Uri and Unter- 
 walden had grounds of complaint against the officers of the duke 
 of Milan, who had annoyed some of their countrymen and seized their 
 cattle. The duke refused to give them satisfaction. They crossed the 
 St. Gothard, took possession of the Val Levantina or Livinen*, and 
 then, with the full consent of the inhabitants, they occupied the valley of 
 Oscella or Ossola. The duke Visconti engaged the duke of Savoy to re- 
 conquer the latter. The troops of Savoy crossed the Valais, and, pene- ' 
 trating by the Simplon to Domo d'Ossola, drove the Swiss garrison 
 away. The cantons of Uri and Unterwalden next purchased of the 
 baron of Sax Misox, a Rhaetian nobleman, the town and valley of Bel- 
 linzona as far as the lake Maggiore. The duke of Milan sent a large 
 force under the command of Pergola, one of the ablest condottieri of his 
 time, to prevent the Swiss from keeping possession of their purchase. 
 The two armies met at Arbedo near Bellinzona, and an obstinate combat 
 ensued, which lasted the whole day. The landamman of Uri, the stand- 
 ard bearer of the same canton, and the ammanof Zug, Peter Kolin. were 
 among the killed. The son of Kolin seized the banner dyed with his 
 father's blood, again waved it at the head of the men of Uri, and 
 although he too perished the banner was saved. Swiss bravery, how- 
 ever, could not triumph over the steady discipline of the veteran troops 
 of Italy. Weakened by the loss they had sustained, the Swiss mourn- 
 fully recrossed the St. Gothard, leaving a garrison, however, in the Val 
 Levantina. The battle of Arbedo was fought in June, 1422, and Bel- 
 linzona was soon after given up to the duke of Milan by a treaty. 
 
 * The Vallis Lepontina of the Romans. The Ticiiio, descending from the St. 
 Gothard, waters the valley in its course to the Lago Maggiore. 
 
 - f 
 
86 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period III. 
 
 These Italian broils were the cause of a popular insurrection in the 
 Valais. The lord of Raron, captain-general of that country, had allied 
 himself to the duke of Savoy, whom he ;had assisted in his expedition 
 against the Swiss at Domo d'Ossola. The cantons resenting this, ex- 
 cited the people of the Valais against the lord of Raron, whose ambition 
 had already offended his countrymen.. An old custom prevailed among 
 the people of that country ; when they wanted to obtain from their lords 
 redress of their grievances, they hoisted in the market-place an enor- 
 mous club, one end of which was rudely carved into something resem- 
 bling a human face, bearing an expression of woe and crowned with 
 thorns ; this was called La Mazze, and was meant to represent oppressed 
 justice. A man stood behind it, and the people came one after the other 
 to ask of the Mazze what made it so sad ? Was it such or such a lord 
 mentioning several, that had grieved it ? The Mazze remained motion- 
 less. But when the lord of Raron came to be mentioned, the Mazze 
 made an inclination of the head. Then the man lifted up the Mazze 
 and earned it from village to village, the people following it, and in- 
 creasing at every step ; and it was proclaimed that the Mazze was going 
 to demand satisfaction of the lord of Raron, of his nephew the bishop of 
 Sion, and their adherents. The baron, seeing the whole country risen 
 against him, escaped to Savoy ; and the people destroyed his castle near 
 Siders, as well as that of the bishop. 
 
 Having obtained no assistance from the duke of Savoy, the lord of 
 Raron repaired to Bern, whose coburgher he was. Bern espoused his 
 cause, the forest cantons took part with the Valaisans. A diet, assembled 
 at Zurich, decided that the property of the baron should be returned to 
 him first, and that, on the other hand, he should do justice to the people 
 But the people were not satisfied with this decision, and hostilities com- 
 menced between them and Bern. The Bernese, joined by Fribur^ 
 and Soleure, sent an army of 13,000 men over the Sanetch Alps 
 into the Valais. The forest cantons offered their mediation in vain • 
 and the Valaisans, having refused to accede to any terms with Raron and 
 Bern were Id-t to their own resources. They fought desperately, and re- 
 pulsed the Bernese. At length fresh proposals of peace were made, and 
 tbe Valaisans agreed to restore Raron's domains, to pay 10,000 florins 
 as a compensation for the damage they had done him, an equal sum to 
 Bern for the expenses of the war, and 4000 florins to the Chapter of 
 Sion. This was in 1420 ; but the lord of Raron died at a distance from 
 his country, and his family losing all their influence, the Valaisans con- 
 tmued. ever after, to govern themselves according to their own muni- 
 cipal constitution. The upper, or German Valais was divided into six 
 dixains or hundreds, and the town of Sion formed a seventh. Each sent 
 deputies to the general assembly of the country, at which the bishop of 
 Sion presided. The lower Valais was afterwards wrested, by the upper 
 
 TEBIOD III.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 81 
 
 Valaisans, from the duke of Savoy, and was governed by them as a sub- 
 ject district. The Valais entered also into alliances with various Swiss 
 
 cantons, and particularly with Bern. ^ffi.,.tPil 
 
 Another country, more extensive and populous than the Vala.s effected 
 its emancipation about the same time. This was the highlands of Rlnetia 
 with their sixty valleys, where the Rhine and the Inn have heir source a 
 wild secluded regTon, surrounded and intersected on all sides by the 
 Se t C Tie house of Habsburg, or of Austria, had no pretensions 
 over the country. Its numerous nobles had become indei«=ndent, ho d- 
 ing directly of the empire ; indeed the bishop of Coire, who had great 
 poLssions in the country, was a prince of the empire A "ntury had 
 now elapsed since the Swiss cantons had achieved their mdependence, 
 and theirneighboursof the Rh^tianvalleysstill groaned under theoppres- 
 
 "on their petty lords, far more overbearing and capricious ban the 
 Aus rian rulers had been in Helvetia. Perched up in their castles, built . 
 on oTy cliffs, they sallied thence like birds of prey scaring the poor 
 sheph rds and cultivators below, and extorting from them the produce of 
 M nsulting the chastity of their daughters, and disposing of the 
 liberty and lives of their sons. The chronicles of Rh«tia record many 
 instaiLs of rapacity and barbarity perpetrated in those remote valleys 
 which have never been surpassed in the most corrup countries, and by 
 the most depraved tyrants. We read of a baron of Vatz, who used to 
 starve his prisoners in his dungeons, and listen with complacency to their 
 moans from his banqueting hall, and who, to try an experiment on the pro- 
 cess of digestion, had three of his servants ripped open some hours after 
 dhiner.* In another place, we find the chatelain of Guardovall send- 
 ing deliberately to demand, for his private pleasures, the young and 
 beautiful daughter of Adam of Camogask, one of his »«";"'='-«" «"'- 
 rage, however, which led to the revolt and emancipation of the fine valley 
 of Engadina. We are told of the governor of Fardun, driving h,s wild 
 colts among the ripe crops of the farmer Chaldar. whom ^e east m chains 
 into a subterranean dungeon for pursmng and killmg the destructive 
 animals. Such is man in every age, and under every clime, when left to 
 the uncontrolled indulgence of his passions over the persons and pro- 
 iiertv of his fellow creatures. 
 
 ^?he nobles were often at variance with each other. Hartmann. 
 bishop of Coire, unable to defend the scattered domains of his see, au- 
 thorized his vassals to form alliances with the neighbournig co.nmunes 
 and lordships ; accordingly, m 1396. his subjects of the valleys of Dom- 
 lesch" Avers Oberhalbstein, and Bergun, entered into a treaty offen- 
 svea^d defensive, with the powerful counts of Werdenberg lords of 
 sihams and Obervatz. This was the first origin of one of the three 
 feezes or federations of Rhetia, afterwards called the league Caddea. 
 
 * Miiller, Book ii., chap. 1. 
 
 \i\ 
 
 1 1 
 
 I \ 
 
88 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period III. 
 
 
 (Casa De.) or of the house of God, from its being under the bishop's 
 junsdiction The increase of strength thus derived by the prelate, ex- 
 wse IVi""'^ 1,-'" """'' "^ the upper Rhine, who formed like- 
 nX n^' r " ?"'' '''"' '^''" "«%hbours of the free canton of 
 uiaris. But they did not grant any franchise to their vassals as the 
 
 SrvLeTh"' '/."'' "'""""'' "'^ P^"!^'^ mor^impatient of their 
 1T,TT' u I n« Just.ce to expect from the courts, nor protection 
 on the h.gh roads, nor security for their persons or properties. Several 
 
 rfln / .r """"^ "" ''''"'"'' "^ '^^ «°""'^y fo™«d a secret associ- 
 ation for the ]„,rpose of devising a remedy for the evils with which the 
 
 cited t"o th? ! "^ ""''" resolutions, which thev communi- 
 
 davll .i ''' ""'""« "^"'■^ '''^'''^^ neighbours. On a fixed 
 
 ?ord H T""™'' "^^PP^^ ^•>''^''» ^'^"t deputies to their respective 
 
 Sdtvtlable ?h K ^""""'"=.''' ""'• J'"'''=^ ^"-J ^«<=""'y ^en- 
 uerea mviolable. The barons were taken unawares thev hiH W i 
 
 diers on whom they could depend. The abbot oeZtn^^J^^JZ i 
 P-ous man who belonged himself to an ancient n tive f m Iv r et "d th 
 
 ot Kazuns followed his example. Count Ulric of Sav nn» „f,i, 
 powerful feudataries of the Alps, did the same; a te^l' as tl H 'r"" 
 Hugo of Werdenberg, brothe'r to the defender oApL^j t.f" f 
 
 feated at Nafels by the people of Claris, rejected with scorn the denulies 
 of the communes. In May, 1424, the abbot and all the lords o Urn 
 Rh,-et.a joined the deputies of the various valleys, and of the Ivns Tf 
 an,z and Tusis, in an open field outside of thl village fTrn^nd 
 there forming a circle round a gigantic maple tree, all of them standht 
 nobles, magistrates deputies, and elders, swore, in the name of he I' 
 Trinity, a peri,etual alliance for the maintenance of justice: and the s ct 
 alles'r/V"r""'""K '?"•"■"' '"f""S'"5 <"' '>- righ s of' *'. Th" 
 
 The baron of Werdenberg-Sargans, who had alone stood aloof in that 
 
 >."til tl,. .p„ch of the KrS S ?,r "'''.r">- y-" ,•"•-'" i's sl.a.liiig branclus 
 
 PERIOD III.] 
 
 HISTORT OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 89 
 
 day of iov from his countrymen, soon lost his domains. The cruelty of 
 Sowna'gnts hastened the crisis. His chatelain of Fardun, aftjer 
 havr^ imprisoned Chaldar, as above mentioned, released him upon the 
 payment o^f a large ransom, by the united exertions of the pr^oner s 
 Ss Chaldaf had returned to his cottage; one day when he had jus 
 at down to dinner, with his numerous family round a table >« the midst 
 Tf^vl^rch stood a large bowl of boiling porridge, the dreaded chatelam 
 suddenly entered the room. All rose respectfully to receive h™, when 
 he. 1 ok^S -riily at them, approached the taTjle, and spit •« the mess 
 which w^ to sujply their humble repast. He then 'nsuUmg y told 
 Chaldar to begin his meal. The mountaineer could refrain »o Jonger, 
 he rushed upon the chatelain, and seizing him by the neck Wretch 
 he cried, '• thou alone shalt taste of the dinner thou hast contaminated 
 He then plunged the chatelain's head into the scalding liquid, and held 
 it there until life was extinct. Chaldar. leavmg the deformed body 
 stretched on the floor, rushed out to alarm the country around telling 
 them what he had done, and the provocation he had received. The peo- 
 ple, already ripe for revolt, rose to a man, attacked the casde, which they 
 took and demolished, and the valley of Schams and the Rheinwald were 
 free, and joined the Grey league which was able to protect them against 
 any further attempts of Werdenberg. „ „ , .• 
 
 The Engadin, one of the finest and largest valleys in all Helvetia, 
 is watered throughout its length, about sixty miles, by the river Inn, 
 an affluent of the Danube, and is separated on one side from Italy 
 and on the other from the rest of the Grisons by two lofty ridges of 
 the Rhffitian Alps. The inhabitants speak the ladin, a dialect of 
 the romantsch language, greatly resembling the Italian*. After the 
 emancipation of the neighbouring valleys, the people of Engadm 
 aspired to the same liberty as their brethren of the Grison league. 
 The brutal insult offered to Theresa of Camogask, which has been 
 noticed above, decided the explosion. Her father, with assumed com- 
 posure told the emissary of the tyrant, that he would himself bring 
 his daughter to the castle next morning in a more becoming attire 
 than she was in at present. Meantime he collected his friends and 
 exhorted them to follow the example of their neighbours. Next morn- 
 ing he led forth his daughter in her best clothes, and, followed by 
 several young men, proceeded to the castle, near which another party 
 had posted themseves in ambuscade. The chatelain came out of 
 the ■'ate, and, seizing the maid from her father's arms, he rudely kissed 
 her lips. At the same moment the father's dagger pierced his heart, 
 and he fell lifeless to the ground. The men of Eugadin rushed into the 
 castle, overpowered the guard, and destroyed the walls. The independ- 
 ence of Engadin was proclaimed, and that fine valley joined the Caddea 
 
 league. 
 
 • See in Appendix No. 11. siiecimens of the romantsch and ladin languages- 
 
90 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period III. 
 
 PERIOD III.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 91 
 
 .'i 
 
 ^ Some time after, the count Frederic of Toggenburg, having died 
 without issue, his numerous vassals at Davos. Meyenfeld, and other 
 parts of Eastern Rhaetia, on the borders of the Tyrol, assembled and pro- 
 posed to form a league similar to the other two for their common protec- 
 tion, during the troubles which broke out about the disputed succession of 
 loggenburg. " As soon as the legitimate heir shall be acknowleds^ed " 
 tliey said " we will restore him his inheritance, but our league shall 
 remain for the security of all. None of our countrymen shall be 
 arraigned before foreign judges, no commune shall form an alliance 
 without the consent of all." I„ 1436 they swore fidelity to the leaje 
 wh.ch was called 0/ the Ten jurisdictions. Thus were formed the three 
 leagues of the Gnsons, which have ever since maintained their inde- 
 pence and the.r municipal liberties. Most of the valleys gradually re- 
 deemed the dues they owed to their lords, but by mutual consent and 
 without violence. In 1450 a union, called the Black league, formed of 
 many noblemen who disliked the enfranchisement of the communes, en- 
 deavoured to reduce the communes to subjection, but it was defeated, 
 and many of the nobles lost their lives in a conflict in the valley of 
 hchams. The three leagues now proposed for their mutual supports 
 solemn alliance among themselves, embracing all the Rh^tian valleys. 
 Each commune sent deputies, in 1471, to the village of Vazerol. which 
 stands nearly in the centre of the country, and there a perpetual defen- 
 sive alliance was sworn to between the leagues, and general diets were 
 appomted to be held by turns in each of the three leagues to deliberate 
 on the interests of the whole. If differences should arise between two 
 of the >««g"es. the third was to be umpire, and the decisions of two 
 leagues should be obligatory on the third. But in their internal affairs 
 each league, and even each commune, governed itself according to its own* 
 laws and customs, held its own meetings, and elected its own ma- 
 gistrates; several communes together formed a jurisdiction, having 
 Its courts of civil and criminal justice, and a landamman was elected 
 for a time by the majority of voices; several jurisdictions formed a 
 eague, having its annual diet; and the three leagues together formed 
 the confederation of the Orisons. Their government, like that of the 
 Vala,s, contained a mixture of pure democratic and representative forms 
 su ted to an extensive but mountainous country, where each valley forms 
 a httle world of itself, being secluded from the rest by ice and'snows 
 dunng great part of the year. It was not till 1497, during the" 
 cabled of Suabia, that the Orisons contracted a perpetual alliLe wit 
 the Swiss cantons, which they maintained ever after, forming an im- 
 portant accession to Switzerland, and protecting its eastern frontiers on 
 
 Austria ^ ' '"'' "' ""^ "''''' '''""'"'°- »f *« h-- "f 
 
 of S S"" "^ *' ^""' '""f "^ Toggenburg. in 1436, became a source 
 of fatal dissensions among the Swiss. Zurich pretended to the inherit- 
 
 i 
 
 \ 
 
 arice, because the count had been a freeman of that city. But he was 
 also a burgher of the canton of Schwytz. His widow sided with Zurich, 
 but the subjects of the count who inhabited Uznach, Lichtensteg, and 
 other districts of Toggenburg, between the lake of Wallenstadt and the 
 river Thur, sent deputies to their neighbours of Schwytz, and requested to 
 be admitted among its citizens, saying that such had been their master's 
 wish before his death ; and in fact he had himself expressed this inten- 
 tion before the deputies of Schwytz and several other witnesses*. The 
 cantons of Schwytz and Glaris admitted the inhabitants as coburghers, 
 and took possession of Toggen and of the Upper March, of which the 
 count had given them the reversion by a former treaty. Zurich prepared to 
 oppose these arrangements by arms, and seized upon several other dis- 
 tricts. The other cantons interfered, and prevented the explosion for a 
 time, but in 1440 the war broke out between Schwytz and Glaris on 
 one side and Zurich on the other. One condition of the Swiss con- 
 federacy was, that any canton having disputes with another, and refusmg 
 to submit to the direction of arbiters chosen according to the prescribed 
 forms, should be constrained by force. Zurich was in this predicament, 
 having refused to abide by the decisions of the umpires, and she drew 
 upon herself the forces of all the other cantons. Uri and Unterwalden, 
 Lucern, Bern, and Zug all sent their contingents, and Zurich was 
 threatened with an immediate attack, when, perceiving the danger, it 
 submitted to what is called the jus Heheticum, or public law of the 
 confederation. Arbiters were appointed from the five mediating can- 
 tons, whose decision was, that Zurich should restore all it had taken out 
 of the Toggenburg estates, while Schwytz and Glaris were to retain their 
 
 conquests. 
 
 Stussi, burgomaster of Zurich, a bold ambitious man, thinking solely 
 on revenge, forgot the sacred ties of his country with the Swiss cantons, 
 and sought the alliance of the hereditary enemy of their common country, 
 Frederic III. of Austria. This prince had been elected emperor of Ger- 
 many, and he aimed at reconquering the Aargau, and the other domains 
 which his house had lost in Switzerland. An alUance offensive and de- 
 fensive between Zurich and Austria was concluded at Vienna in 1442. 
 Frederic soon after repaired to Zurich, when the citizens swore fidelity 
 to the empire, and tearing from their sleeves the white cross, the badge of 
 the Swiss in all their wars, assumed the red cross of Austria. The con- 
 federates were indignant at this conduct; Zurich had broken the fede- 
 ral pact, and in 1443 war was declared by all the cantons against the per- 
 jured republic. The confederates defeated the Zurichers and Austrians 
 in several battles, and took or destroyed many towns and villages. At 
 last they advanced against Zurich in the month of July. The Zurichers 
 came out of the city, and crossing the bridge on the river Sihl, under their 
 
 * Tschudi, Chroii. of Glaris, torn. ii. pp. 68, 190, 214. 
 
 ■ / 
 
 / 
 
92 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZEKLAND. 
 
 [period III, 
 
 wal s met the Swiss led by Ital Reding of Schwytz, a man brave and 
 resolute even to ferocity. A desperate battle was fought in the fields 
 near the Sihl close to the ramparts of Zurich. At last the Zunchers 
 gave way. and recrossed in disorder the bridge to re-enter their town. 
 The old burgomaster Stussi alone stood on the bridge, with his battle-a.xe 
 
 n hand, trying to stop the flight; but a citizen of Zurich, exclaimin. 
 
 hat he was the mam cause of all this mischief!" ran him through with 
 his spear^ Stussi fell in his heavy armour, and friends and foes passed 
 over h,s body on their way to the gate. Some of the confederates had 
 
 portcullis and hus saved the city from the horrors of n storming. Tlic 
 
 in the ? V '". '^: "'^"''' '^°"™'"^'' *>>« greatest devastations 
 
 in the conntry around, brutally cutting open the body of the burgo- 
 master Stussi. pulled out his heart, and then threw the mangled remains 
 n to the river. The mght was spent by the confederates in drinking and 
 carousing among the bodies of the dying and the dead. Such were the 
 brutahzmg effects of civil war, and so much altered were the Swiss since 
 the days of Morgarten and of Sempach ' 
 
 Ne.xt year the castle of Greifensee was taken by storm after an obsti- 
 nate resistance. Ital Reding, who led the confederates, ordered the com- 
 mander and the whole garrison to be beheaded by the public executioner. 
 In vain Holzach of Menz.ngen implored the Swiss not to offend their God. 
 not to stain the honour of the confederation, " by so inhuman an act;" 
 Dou-n with them, yy^ the answer of the ferocious soldiers ; head after 
 head fell to the number of si\tv • and thp wnrl- «f i.i„ a , , 
 
 by the light of torches. ' ^'""'^ ''*' completed 
 
 20 00o'Tf' °'''"! TT' ^^^'^^ confederates, to the number of 
 20,000.1a d siege to Zurich. The emperor Frederic, and his cousin 
 
 another enemy against the Swiss. They wrote to Charles VII., king of 
 trance, to wliose daughter Sigismund was betrothed, and who haviuL- 
 just concluded a truce with England, was not sorry to employ b;ord the 
 
 time of peace. These companies were composed of soldiers of fortune of 
 
 a ;:^::rirTT;'r ^''f "^r'^"'^^''"'' •''""''"'-" ■-p^^Sn:: 
 
 any restraint. An old chronicler calls them i=VV« BWw/, sons of the Devil 
 They were better kno^ni by the name of Arma,,nacs, bein. the rema ns' 
 of the faetion of that name which had figured in the civil wtrs of ^^""0" 
 The king collected them and sent them first into Alsace and then 
 
 Ws xf Jprncr * Th^Tr 1 *•' '•^-P'- L^u^aftli 
 J.oui» XI. of France They desolated the countries on the left of the 
 
 At u ; T:V " ''7''r ''^'' '"•• "' '-'' - '^^ 23V'„f 
 30 non ^ ^^l T'^" '^' *""' "f Basle to the number of 
 
 30,000 men, chiefly cavalry. The citizens of Basle sent one of thel 
 councillors n, great haste to request the assistance of the Swlls agdi::; 
 
 PERIOD III.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 )3 
 
 this formidable irruption. The Swiss detached 1200* men of Bern, 
 Soleure, and the forest cantons, from their camp, before Farnsburg, 
 which place they were then besieging. On the 26th of August 
 this little band met the advanced guard of the Armagnacs at Brattelen, 
 and drove them back beyond the river Birs. The main body of the 
 enemy was posted on the left bank of the river. The Swiss, seeing the 
 bridge of St. Jacob well guarded, threw themselves into the stream and 
 forded it, notwithstanding the fire of the French artillery. Having 
 reached the opposite bank, they cut their way through the numerous 
 ranks of the Armagnacs, with the intention of reaching Basle. The 
 inhabitants of that city, seeing from the summit of their towers the efforts 
 of this band of heroes, made a sortie to join them ; but a body of 
 8000 horse, whom the dauphin had placed on that side, drove them 
 back into the city. The Swiss were divided: a body of them, sur- 
 rounded in the plain by forces ten times their number, were all slain, 
 after making dreadful havoc among their enemies : they fell in their 
 ranks close to each other. Another party of 500 threw ;themselves 
 into the hospital and chapel of St. Jacob. The gardens of the 
 hospital were surrounded by high walls ; there this handful of Swiss, 
 hemmed in by a whole army, stood, determined to sell their lives dearly. 
 Three times they repelled the attack, twice they sallied out like lions 
 against the close ranks of their enemies ; at last the walls were battered 
 down by cannon, and the French cavaliers, having dismounted, entered 
 the breach ; yet the Swiss still opposed a desperate resistance. The hos- 
 pital and the chapel took fire, and the surviving confederates were 
 smothered among the ruins. Out of 1200 Swiss, who fought on that 
 dav, ten alone escaped by flight, and these were shunned and driven 
 away with scorn in every part of Switzerland, for not having shared the 
 fate of their comrades. The fight lasted ten hours. Thousands of men 
 and horses of the Armagnacs strewed the field of battle. The dauphin 
 was dismayed at the sight of his own loss ; and, hearing that the whole 
 confederate army was moving against him from the camp before Zurich, 
 he thought it prudent not to attempt to proceed any farther, after such 
 a specimen as he had witnessed of Swiss intrepidity. Eneas Silvius 
 Piccolomini, afterwards pope Pius II., who happened to be at Basle at 
 the time, mentions in his epistles several circumstances of that memo- 
 rable combat. He says the Swiss,, having emptied their quivers, 
 snatched out of their wounds the arrows of their enemies, and shot 
 them back. Burkardt Monch, a nobleman bitterly hostile to the 
 Swiss, who served in the ranks of the dauphin, as he was walking in 
 the evening among the bodies of the dead Swiss, and observing the 
 streams of blood which drenched the ground, exclaimed, " Now am I 
 
 * Some historians say 1500, but the calculation of the dead and wounded 
 found on the field of battle seems to correspond with the lesser number, ^ 
 
94 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period III. 
 
 <--^ 
 
 I 
 
 \ 
 
 bathing among roses." Arnold Schilk of Uri, who was lying near 
 wounded, overheard him, and picking „p a large stone, flnng it with 
 s.ich force at the inhuman boaster that he fell dead to the ground 
 
 Two days after the battle, the dauphin granted a safe-conduct to the 
 citizens of Basle, that they might bury the dead and carry awav the 
 wounded : 1158 Swiss were found dead, and 32 wounded. The' dau- 
 phin withdrew his army, and signed a peace with the cantons and with 
 Basle in the following October. Struck with admiration at the bravery 
 of the Swiss, he even sought their alUance, and this was the origin of 
 the long friendship and connexion between the French kings and the 
 Helvetic body. ° 
 
 The war against Zurich and its allies continued the whole of the fol- 
 lowng year ; several parties of Austrian troops were defeated by the 
 Swiss, who took the town of Rheinfelden. At length, in 1446, several 
 01 the German electors and the bishop of Basle interposed, and a peace 
 was concluded on these conditions: that Zurich should renounce its 
 alliance with Austria, and return again to that of the Swiss cantons ; 
 that the coiiquered districts should be restored on both sides, with the 
 exception of PfeiBkon and Wolran, which remained to Schwytz. The 
 Toggenburg, the cause of all this war, was left in the possession of the 
 lord of Raron a relative of the late count*, and both he and his subjects 
 remained co-burghers of the cantons of Schwytz and Claris. Tlie alli- 
 ance of Basle with the cantons was confirmed. This unnatural war cost 
 the Zurichers more than a million of florins. 
 
 But the differences between the cantons and Austria were not vet 
 settled. The vassals and partisans of the latter power in Switzerland 
 continued to make incursions on the lands of the confederates. They 
 pillaged Rhemfelden; they surprised Bmgg by night, and slaughtered 
 us inhabitants, or carried them away and obliged them to pay a hi-^h 
 ransom ; Aarau was partly burnt. John, lord of Falkenstein, distin- 
 gmshed himself m this predatory warfare. On the other hand, the Swiss 
 burn many of their castles The town of Freyburg remained faithful 
 to he house of Austria, although now become quite insulated in the 
 mids of hostile Slates. But the dukes of Austria did not reward the 
 fidehty of IS citizens ; on the contrary they burdened them with fresh 
 taxes, and its governors acted in an arbitrary manner by deposing the 
 avoyers and council. This conduct alienated the hearts of ^the Fr y- 
 
 Trftl ' ° ^:Z ^^ "'' ^''y- '^''^ ''"'^^ of Austria, despairing 
 
 iart o7r^ If f'' taking possession, by a stratagem, of the best 
 part of the burghers' plate. The citizens, preferring the domination of 
 
 iibtot^of sTaall^Tt ~±Z' rl? *^«',"">'«y »^T°*'g*°t'"g' " '468, to Ulrich, 
 century. remained subject to the abbey till the end of the eighteenth 
 
 • • - 
 
 PERIOD III.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 95 
 
 Savoy to that of Bern, which had long had views upon their country, 
 submitted to the foftner power in 1452, and swore fidelity to the duke 
 of Savoy, who guaranteed to them their ancient privileges. 
 
 The only possessions remaining now to the house of Austria in Swit- 
 zerland were the county of Rapperschwyl, the town of Winterthur, and 
 the landgravate of Thurgau ; and these were lost soon after. Rapper- 
 schwyl gave itself voluntarily to the three forest cantons and that of 
 Glaris. Duke Sigismund of Austria, upon this, treated the four cantons 
 as enemies. But Sigismund himself, happening to have disputes with 
 the pope, was excommunicated, and the pope called upon the Swiss to 
 seize on>is domains. The confederates were not slow in obeying the 
 call. In 1460 they entered the fine province of Thurgau, which ex- 
 tends from the frontiers of Zurich to the lake of Constance, and consists 
 of gentle hills and plains, fruitful in corn, flax, and wine, and watered 
 by the river Thur. They encountered no opposition ; the town of Dies- 
 senhofen alone defended its allegiance to Austria, but was obliged to 
 capitulate, retaining its privileges as a little republic, under the protec- 
 tion of the cantons. All the rest of Thurgau was taken possession of as 
 a conquered country, the cantons assuming the rights which the house 
 of Austria had till then exercised over it (as they had done with the 
 Aargau about half a century before). Each of the eight old cantons by 
 turns appointed the bailiff, who resided at Frauenfeld, and who was 
 changed every two years. This order of things continued till the end of 
 
 the 1 8th century. 
 
 I In 1467, duke Sigismund mortgaged Wintherthur, his last remaining 
 possession, to the citizens of Zurich, to whom it was finally' given up 
 ten years after. And here was the end of the power of the house of 
 Habsburg in Helvetia. When in the following century Charles V., the 
 haughty representative of that family, was raised to the thrones of Ger- 
 many, Spain, Italy, and "the Indies," when it became a proud boast of 
 his courtiers that " the sun never set on his dominions," at that very 
 period the house of Austria had lost every acre of its^ old patrimonial 
 estates; the castle of Habsburg itself having passed into the hands of 
 
 strangers*. 
 
 ^: Mulhausen, an imperial town in Alsace, finding itself annoyed by the 
 neighbouring nobility, contracted an alliance with the Swiss cantons, 
 which it maintained for centuries after. This, however, led to a 
 fresh quarrel with Sigismund. The banks of the Rhine, from Schaff- 
 hausen to Basle, were again the scene of a desultory though destructive 
 warfare, in which, however, the Austrians were worsted. At last a peace 
 was concluded in 1468, Sigismund then making a solemn cession in 
 favour of the cantons of all his rights over Thurgau, and paying them 
 
 * The solitary tower of Habsburg is now inhabited by a family of Argovian pea- 
 sants ; the outer walls of the castle, which remain standing, enclose a sort of farm- 
 yard. 
 
96 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period III. 
 
 10,000 florins towards the expenses of the war. But resentment 
 st.ll rankled m his heart, and he thought of raising against the Swiss a 
 new and formidable enemy. He repaired to the court of Charles, duke 
 of Burgundy, and mortgaged to him the districts of Suntgau, Brisgau 
 part of Alsace, and the four forest towns, over which Charles appointed 
 as governor Peter of Hagenbach, a declared enemy of the Sw^ss, who 
 encouraged his subalterns in every species of vexation against the citi- 
 zens of the cantons and their allies. 
 
 Charles the rash, as he has been styled,* was perhaps the most 
 powerfu pnnce of his time in Christian Europe. His dominions 
 extended from the Jura and the banks of the Rhine to the sea of 
 Holland. Tranche Comte, Burgundy, Alsace, Lorraine, Picardv, Flan- 
 ders, were subject to his sway. He had driven Ren,?, duke of Lorraine 
 from his territory, and had threatened Louis XI. under the very walls 
 of Pans. Brave and skilful in war as well as in afl^airs of state, but 
 irritable and impatient of contradiction, he became through the violence 
 of h,s temper the cause of his own ruin. He saw with an evil eve the 
 prosperity and growing importance of the Swiss commonwealths in his 
 neighbourhood, and paying no attention to the remonstrances of the 
 Swiss cantons, and especially of Bern, against the vexations of his ..o- 
 vemors, he treated with insolent contempt a solemn deputation sent°to 
 him by the Bernese senate. Louis XI., a bad but shrewd monarch, 
 watched with satisfaction the approaching rupture between his bitterest 
 enemy and the Swiss, whose valour his experience enabled him to esti- 
 mate. He flattered the cantons, sent gold chains to their leading coun- 
 cillors,-for the Swiss republicans had become sensible of the value of 
 presents.-and at last concluded an alliance with them in 1474, bv 
 which he promised each of the eight cantons 2000 francs a year, besidel 
 20 000 guilders for the expenses of the war. The emperor Frederic 
 II . was not on good terms with Charles, whose request to constitute 
 Burgundy and Belgium mto a kingdom the emperor had refused 
 Sigismund of Austria had been disappointed in his hope of marrying 
 Mary, Charles s daughter and repented of having pledged to him^ sf 
 many fine districts, whose inhabitants were cruellv nersccufi-H hv h7 
 bach Charles's bailiff. Sigismund offered to rlrtCbu btfr^^^ 
 posal being peremptorily rejected, at the instigation of the kin^^ of 
 France he concluded a treaty with the cantons, which was styled^he 
 t^redUaryunton wUh the lu^usc o/^«.Wa, by whicli the latter ack now- 
 edged and guaranteed for ever the actual possessions of the SwTss L 
 the can ons on their side guaranteed Sigismund's dominions. 
 
 Charles, having had information of these negotiations, sent messen- 
 
 called the hardi. U. de Baran e ha, [T^ H ' ''i°S«f *"•»■'«. t" his son Philip, 
 the second house of Burgundy. ««<>lly.ipubl.shed/an excellent, history oS 
 
 PERIOD III.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 97 
 
 gers to the cantons to say that he wished to remain at peace with them, 
 that he would make inquiries about the conduct of his own bailiffs, and 
 of Hagenbach in particular, and would prevent any future annoyance 
 being offered to the cantons, as he had taken in mortgage the districts 
 on the Rhine from Sigismund of Austria, at the personal request of the 
 latter, and not with any hostile views against the Swiss. The cantons 
 of the Waldstiitten, as well as Luzcrn and Zug, received the declaration 
 of Charles's ambassadors with every mark of gratitude and friendship 
 for the duke. But Bern and Soleure, who had suffered most from the 
 duke's agents, were not so easily satisfied. They complained chiefly of 
 Hagenbach, and of the continual vexations he offered to their allies of 
 the cities of Basle, Strasburg, and Mulhausen. It is evident that 
 Charles was only endeavouring to gain time *, in order to complete his 
 preparations of war. Hagenbach, knowing his master's dispositions, 
 redoubled his acts of oppression. He styled the burghers of the free 
 towns villains, and one of his familiar expressions was, " By heaven, 
 you villains, we will make you pass under the yoke." But having en- 
 tered, with a small retinue, tlie town of Brisach, near Basle, to effect 
 some new act of violence, the inhabitants took him prisoner. Sigis- 
 mund assembled a criminal court in May, 1474, to try him, at which 
 deputies from the Swiss cantons of Bern, Soleure, and Luzern attended. 
 Hagenbach was condemned to death and beheaded f. 
 
 Charles, irritated by the news of the death of his favourite, declared 
 war aaainst the duke of Austria. He wished at the same time to lull 
 the cantons, to prevent them from assisting Sigismund. But deputies 
 of the towns of Alsace, which were in alliance with the Swiss, came to 
 demand protection from the confederation ; and a diet was accordingly 
 assembled at Luzern in August, and Bern, whose councils were then 
 directed by the avoyer Diesbach, an eloquent and enterprising old man, 
 who had succeeded in removing from the government Hadrian of Buben- 
 berg, and others who were favourable to Burgundy, succeeded in pre- 
 vailing on the diet to declare war against Charles. The troops of the 
 confederation began the campaign in October with 18,000 men, and, 
 crossing the Jura, took Pontarlier and other places. They invaded at 
 the same time the Pays de Vaud, whose nobility had sided with Charles, 
 and took possession of Grandson, Orbe, and Morat, and committed great 
 devastations in those districts. The duchess of Savoy, notwithstanding 
 her promise to remain neutral, allowed her vassals, and among others 
 her relative James of Savoy, baron of Vaud, to recruit troops for the 
 service of Charles. The troops of Bern and Soleure overran the whole 
 district, to the banks of the Leman lake, as far as Geneva. The Va- 
 laisans, on their side, took possession of St. Maurice, which formed part 
 
 * Memoires dcCommines, t. iv. p. 392. 
 
 •f- This tragical event forms a striking episode of oue of Sir Walter Scott's novels, 
 *< Anne of Geierstein." ^^^ 
 
98 
 
 HI55TORT OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period III. 
 
 of the Chablais, a province of Savoy. Charles, meantime, having made 
 his peace with the king of France, and also with the emperor, in 1475, 
 turned all his vengeance against the league of the cantons and the free 
 towns. He crossed the Jura with an army of 60,000 men early in the 
 year 1476, and began the siege of Grandson, where the Swiss had placed 
 a small garrison. The Swiss defended themselves bravely against the 
 reiterated attacks of the Burgundian troops. Charles, irritated at 
 having lost ten days before tjiis insignificant fortress, threatened to hang 
 all the Swiss that were in the place. The commander and some of his 
 men, seeing no prospect of being relieved, became intimidated, and they 
 listened readily to the suggestions of a Burgundian knight, who pro- 
 mised them, on the part of the duke, a safe conduct, if they gave up the 
 place. The gaiTJson accepted the offer, made a present of 100 florins 
 to the mediator, and came out. But the duke had them seized, stripped 
 of their clothes, and some hanged on the trees, and the rest drowned in 
 the lake, to the number of 450 men. The duke was instigated to this 
 act of cruelty by the count of Romont and several other noblemen of 
 the country around, who had a grudge against the Swiss. Horror and 
 rage seized the confederates, who had assembled at Neuchatel, at the 
 news of this atrocious deed : thev marched immediatelv, to the number 
 of 20,000, upon Grandson. Their advanced guard, composed of the 
 men of Schwytz and of the mountaineers of the Bernese Oberland, issued 
 at break of day of the 3rd March, 1476, from among the vineyards near 
 the banks of the lake, and in sight of Grandson. Charles Jiurried out 
 of his entrenched camp, with only part of his army, to attack the Swiss. 
 The troops of Bern, Friburg, Soleure, and Schwytz, who were in ad- 
 vance of tlie rest, knelt down, according to their custom, to implore the 
 favour of Heaven for their cause. Charles's soldiers imagined that they 
 were begging for mercy, and they sent forth shouts of triumph. But 
 Ihey were soon undeceived. The Swiss formed themselves into a square, 
 having the spearmen in the first rank. The cavalry of Burgundy charged 
 them repeatedly, but without effect ; and at the third charge their com- 
 mander, the lord of Chateauguion, was killed, with many other noble- 
 men. At the same time another body of the confederates appeared on 
 the hills, their arms shining in the noonday sun. The banners of Zu- 
 rich and Schaff hausen were seen, and the horns of Uri and Unterwalden 
 sounded the charge. Duke Charles, who had fancied that the main 
 body of the Swiss consisted of the square battalion before him,'' inquired 
 what new troops those were on the hill? " They are the men before 
 whom Austria has fled,'* answered the baron of Stein. "Woe to us 
 then I " cried Charles ; " a handful of men has kept us at bay till now, 
 what will become of us when the rest join them ? " and he ordered his 
 advanced guard to fall back on the main body of his army. The van- 
 guard, mistaking this movement for a flight, ran in confusion towards 
 their camp. The Swiss followed them close, and drove them ** like a 
 
 PERIOD III.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 99 
 
 
 herd of cattle " (to use the words of Muralt, who was present) as far as 
 Montagny. They then took possession of the camp, in which they 
 found more than a million of florins, in precious -metals and other valu- 
 ables*, for Charles was fond of pomp and luxury. More than 3000 
 women were in the train of his army. The loss of the Burgundians in 
 men, however, was not very great, and Charles soon collected his army 
 again ; while the confederates, as usual with them, seeing no enemy in 
 the field, retraced their steps homewards. Before they separated, how- 
 ever, the Swiss dubbed as knights, on the field of battle, several gentle- 
 men who had distinguished themselves in the combat, among others 
 Roll of Bonstetten, baron of Usteri ; Felix Schwarzmaurer ; John of 
 Breitenlandenberg, of Zurich; John of Halweil; John Frederic of 
 Mulinen, of Bern ; and John Schlierback of Basle. 
 
 In the month of May the duke of Burgundy advanced again by Lau- 
 sanne towards Morat, which place was defended by Bubenberg of Bern, 
 with a garrison of 1500 men. Bubenberg was determmed to avoid 
 a repetition of the catastrophe of Grandson. He administered an oath 
 to his soldiers that they would run through the body any one, without 
 distinction of rank, who should exhibit any sign of pusillanimity or 
 irresolution. Morat was battered and a breach effected, but at the 
 assault the troops of Burgundy were repulsed. The confederates, 
 meantime, hastily reassembled their contingents and those of their 
 allies, which when united formed altogether an army of 30,000 in- 
 fantry and 4000 cavalry, about one half the number of the duke's 
 forces. Many noblemen of high rank joined the Swiss, among others 
 the count of Gruyere, Rene duke of Lorraine, count Oettinger of 
 Strasburg, and count Thierstein, with a party of Austrian gen- 
 darmes. SchafTliausen, Basle, St. Gall, and Sargans sent their con- 
 tingents by forced marches. John Waldmann, with 5000 men from 
 Zurich, entered Bern in the evening before the battle: the streets 
 of the city were lighted up, and tables were spread before the houses 
 with refreshments for the soldiers. After a short rest, the Zurichers con- 
 tinued their march towards Morat. Next morning, 22d June, the 
 anniversary of the victory of Laupen, the Swiss came in sight of the 
 enemy's camp. Duke Charles had drawn his army in long lines from 
 the shores of the lake of Morat to the hills on his right. The sky was 
 overcast and the rain fell in torrents. The Swiss, on arriving in presence 
 of the enemy, halted and knelt down to pray. At this moment the sun broke 
 out from behind a cloud. John of Halweil, who commanded the advanced 
 guard, waved his sword, crying out, " Confederates, God sends us the sun 
 to shine on our victory!" It was now noon, and the duke, thinking 
 
 * The laro-e diamond of the duke was found hv a Swiss soldier, who, beino^ unac- 
 quainted with its vakie, sold it for a few florins to a priest. After passiiig through 
 several hands, it was purchased by some Genoese merchants for 7000 florins, and 
 sold to pope Julius II. for 20,000 ducats. It became the principal ornament of the 
 papal triple crown. 
 
 h2 
 
 me- 
 
loo 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [PEHIOI) III. 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 101 
 
 the Swiss had no intention of fighting on that day, ordered his troops 
 back to the camp. As soon as this movement began, the confederates 
 advanced upon the retiring battalions, and having taken some of the 
 duke's cannon they turned them against his own men. Halwyl, with the 
 left of the Swiss, turned the flank of the Burgundians, while Buben- 
 berg detached 600 men of his garrison for the same purpose on the oppo- 
 site side, and the main body of tlie Swiss, under general Hertter, advanced 
 in good order, and pressed the enemy in front. The fight now became 
 general, the duke's troops, taken between two fires, gave w*ay and fled in 
 confusion. They were pursued by the cavalry as far as Avenches. The 
 slaughter of the Burgundians was dreadful; the war cry of the Swiss 
 was Grandson! and it excited their reveiige. The duke, seeing that all 
 was lost, galloped off the field, followed only by thirty horsemen, and 
 did not stop till he arrived at Morges, fourteen leagues distance from 
 Morat. Fifteen thousand of his men lav dead on the field of battle, and 
 above 10,000 found their death in the waters of the lake. The tents, 
 baggage, and equipages of the duke fell into the hands of the con- 
 querors*. 
 
 The Swiss, joined by the count of Gruyere, took Moudon, Lausanne, 
 and other places belonging to the house of Savoy, whose vassals had 
 joined Charles in the contest. Louis XI. of France, who was allied to 
 that family by marriage, sent deputies to mediate between it and tlie 
 confederates. A congress was held at Freyburg, at which the envoys of 
 France, those of Sigismund of Austria, of the duchess of Savoy, and of 
 the Swiss cantons, as well as Rene of Lorraine, the count of Gruvere, 
 and the bishops of Geneva and Strasburg were present. It was agreed 
 that the Pay ft de Vaiid should be restored to the house of Savoy in per- 
 petuity, upon the latter paying 50,000 florins to the confederates. 
 Morat, Grandson, and some other districts were given up to Bern and 
 Friburg. Geneva, on account of the hostility it had shown against the 
 Swiss during the war, was to pay 24,000 florins. The following year, 
 1477, Jolande, duchess of Savoy, renounced her rights on Freyburg, on 
 condition that the city should cancel a debt of 10,000 florins owing to it 
 by Savoy. Freyburg again became a free town allied to Bern, and re- 
 sumed the imperial eagle on its banners. 
 
 A deputation was sent by the Swiss to Louis XT. to receive payment 
 of 24,000 florins which that monarch had promised the cantons as a 
 subsidy towards the expenses of the war. The king received the depu- 
 ties with great distinction, and paid the sum, which was equally divided 
 between the cantons. Hadrian of Bubenberg, the defender of Morat, 
 received also a considerable present from Louis. 
 
 Charles of Burgundy, ever restless and ambitious, laid siege to the 
 
 * The chapel which was raised on the spot, and where the scattered bones of the 
 Burgundians were collected, was destroyed in the French invasion of 1798. A 
 pyramid has since replaced it, by the side of the high road from Bern to Lausanne. 
 
 PERIOD III.] 
 
 town of Nancy in Lorraine, in October, 1476. Rene duke of Lorraine, 
 demanded in person assistance of the sovereign council of Bern. After 
 some difficulties, Rene was allowed to enlist as many Swiss as he could. 
 He collected 8000, under the orders of John Waldmann of Zurich ; these 
 men set out from Basle towards the end of December, 1476, during a most 
 severe winter, and they mainly contributed to the victory which Rene 
 gained before Nancy on the 5th January, 1477, in which Charles of 
 Burgiuidy, being betrayed by the count Campobasso, who went over to 
 the enemy, again lost the day, and was killed by his pursuers in a marsh 
 while trying to escape. Thus ended the war of Burgundy, one of the 
 most glorious as well as the most just in which the Swiss were ever en- 
 gaged. 
 
 After Charles's death, the states of Upper Burgundy, called also 
 Franche Comte, sent deputies, with the bishop of Besan^on at their head, 
 to Bern to propose alliance with the cantons, or, if more expedient, their 
 incorporation with the Swiss confederation, with the guarantee of their 
 privileges and liberties. The Bernese were for. the union, " the Vosges," 
 said they, " will then be our rampart against France." The other can- 
 tons, especially the mountain ones, feared a too great extension of the 
 confederation ; they felt already jealous of the power of Bern, and of the 
 other town cantons ; they were alarmed at the idea of finding themselves 
 thereby involved in foreign wars. The offbr was, therefore, rejected, 
 but a perpetual peace was offered to Franche Comte, on the condition of 
 payment by the latter of 150,000 florins. The states of Franche Comtt^ 
 could not raise this sum. Louis XL, who coveted that fine province, 
 off"ered to pay the Swiss the same amount, if they would not oppose him 
 in its conquest. At the same time Maximilian, archduke of Austria, 
 son of the emperor Frederic, having married Mary, Charles's only 
 daughter, claimed Franche Comte as her inheritance. The cantons re- 
 solved to maintain neutrality, but they could not prevent their men 
 from enlisting on either side. The passion for military adventure, 
 and for the gain arising from it, had made a fatal progress among the 
 once simple Swiss. The country was full of young men who had lost in 
 war the relish for domestic life and honest labour. Louis XL en- 
 couraged this propensity by flattery and presents. He gave pensions 
 to the gentlemen, magistrates, and other persons of influence in the 
 country, who were not ashamed to recruit for him. The historian Philip 
 de Commines foresaw the evil results of these practices to the Swiss 
 themselves. '' They," he writes in his Memoirs, " have become so fond 
 of money, especially of gold pieces, to which they were little accustomed 
 before, that they are now ever on the point of quarrelling among them- 
 selves, and this may lead to their ruin." The cantons forbade recruiting 
 under severe penalties, but it was too late. At last, in 1479, they 
 yielded to Louis XL, notwithstanding the remonstrances of the arch- 
 duke of Austria, and gave up to him Franche Comte, for th^ sum of 
 
102 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period III. 
 
 PERIOD III.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND, 
 
 103 
 
 II 
 
 I: 
 
 200,000 florins. They also made a treaty of alliance with him, by which 
 Freyburg and Soleure gave him a subsidiary force of 6,000 men. But 
 the number of adventurers in Switzerland had become so great, that they 
 could not all find employment in foreign service. Bands of idle and 
 dissipated young men went about the country armed, living merrily as 
 long as their share of the booty made in the war of Burgundy lasted, 
 and afterwards proceeded to Bern, Freyburg, and Geneva, to ask for more, 
 saying they had been defrauded of their full due. They, however, com- 
 mitted no excesses, but Geneva and Lausanne were obliged to pay them 
 part of what they claimed, and at last they dispersed. Disorders broke 
 out in another quarter. In the year 1478 some young men of Uri had 
 an affray with the Milanese traders in the Yal Levantina, and illtreated 
 the inhabitants of the villages on the frontier. Upon this the duchess 
 Sforza, regent of Milan, dispatched a force to that quarter. The canton 
 of Uri took the part of the youths, and asked assistance from the confede- 
 rates, who granted it with reluctance. The advanced guard of the Swiss, 
 consisting of 600 men, encountered the Italian forces, several thousands 
 in number, near the village of Giornico. It was at the end of December, 
 1478. The Swiss opened the sluices of the river Ticino, and made it 
 overflow the slope of the hill on which they stood ; and the short turf was 
 immediately covered with a crust of ice. They were themselves fur- 
 nished with ice shoes garnished with iron spikes, by means of which 
 they descended sure footed against the Italians, who were labouring up 
 the slippery hill in disordered ranks. Theilig, a warrior of Luzern, 
 rushed among them sword in hand, a dreadful slaughter ensued, and the 
 Milanese army fled in confusion as far as Bellinzona, before a few hun- 
 dred men. The duchess of Milan, struck with this extraordinary feat, 
 made peace by giving up certain districts to the canton of Uri, on condi- 
 tion that the latter should send every year to the cathedral of Milan a 
 wax torch of three pounds weight. 
 
 Freyburg and Soleure had fought faithfully and valiantly for the con- 
 federates in all their late wars; they requested in 1481 to be admitted 
 as cantons in the confederation, and Bern warmly supported their re- 
 quest. But the mountaineers of the forest cantons objected to it; their 
 jealousy of the growing power and wealth of the town cantons' made 
 them dread to increase their number, lest they should at last gain the 
 ascendancy over the whole confederation. The town cantons, on their 
 side, whose form of government was aristocratic, and who held nume- 
 rous dependent districts in the country, which they had either conquered 
 or purchased, supported each other in their policy, fearing that the 
 example of the democratic institutions of the small cantons might some 
 day induce their own subjects to revolt. A conspiracy which was dis- 
 covered at Luzern confirmed the fears of the town cantons. Peter 
 Amstalden, a warrior peasant of Entlibuch, a district subject to Luzern, 
 had suffered grievances from the bailiff sent by that state, and he 
 
 resolved, with his friends and some men from Unterwalden, to destroy 
 the government of Luzern itself. On the day of St. Leodegar, the con- 
 spirators were to seize and kill the avoyer, the members of the council, 
 and 100 men of the principal families; the walls and towers of Lu- 
 zern were to be razed, so as to leave it an open town, and the Entlibuch 
 was to become an independent republic. Some incautious expressions 
 of Amstalden disclosed the secret. He was tried, confessed all, and was 
 
 beheaded. i i ^ c?^ 
 
 A -eneral congress of all the confederates was convoked at btanz m 
 the Unterwalden in 1481, to regulate, among other things, the fair distri- 
 bution of the Burgundian plunder, and to decide on the admission of 
 Frevburff and Soleure. The deputies of the forest cantons broke out in 
 violent upbraidings and threatening against the towns, the latter, and 
 Luzern in particular, complained bitterly of the encouragement given by 
 the forest cantons to the dissatisfied peasantry; from recriminations the 
 deputies were on the point of coming to blows. The confederation was 
 threatened with dissolution. There lived at that time, in the solitudes of 
 Obwalden, a pious hermit, called Nicholas Loevenbrugger, but known 
 by the name of Nicholas von Flue, from a rock near which his dwelling 
 stood He had fought in his youth, in the war of Thurgau, and had made 
 himself conspicuous by his bravery and humanity. Having returned 
 home, he took an aversion to all worldly things, and determmed to con- 
 secrate the remainder of his life to prayer and meditation. One day he 
 took leave of his assembled relatives, and embracing, for the last time, his 
 wife by whom he had had ten children, he left her the whole possession of 
 his patrimonial estate, and assuming the coarse garb of a hermit, took up 
 his lonely abode in a cell on a mountain, with bare boards for his bed, and 
 there spent his life amid fasting and prayer. Once a month only was he 
 seen when he went to receive the sacrament at church. He had lived 
 many years in this manner, and the reputation of his sanctity was great 
 in the whole Waldstatten. The report of the fatal discord arisen among 
 the confederates penetrated into his cell, and feeling the heart of a citizen 
 again throb in his bosom, he quitted his solitude, and, repairmg to 
 Stanz, suddenly appeared in the hall where the angry confederates were 
 assembled. His tall emaciated form, his mild and, though pale, still 
 handsome countenance, beaming with peace and charity towards all men, 
 struck awe among the rude debaters. They all rose instmctively at his 
 entrance. He spoke to them words of concord, and, assuming the dignity 
 of an apostle of truth, he entreated them in the name of that God who 
 had so often granted victory to the generous efforts of their fathers and 
 forefathers, when fighting in a just cause, and who had blessed their 
 country with independence, not to risk now all the blessings they en- 
 ioved by a vile covetousness or a mad ambition, not to let the fair fame 
 oUhe confederation be stained by the report of their intestine broils, 
 «< You towns," added he, " renounce partial alliances among yourselves, 
 
104 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period III. 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 105 
 
 which excite the jealousy and suspicion of your elder confederates ; and 
 you people of the VValdstatten, remember the days in which Freyburg and 
 Soleure fought by your side, and receive them in your common bond of 
 alliance. But confederates all," added he, "f/o jwt widen too much the 
 hedge which encloses you; do not mix in foreign quarrels ; do not listen 
 to mtngue, or accept the price of bribery and treachery against your 
 common land." This simple but pathetic appeal of a man who seemed 
 hardly to belong to this world, and wlio had no personal interest to 
 gratify, except the love of his countrymen, made a deep impression on 
 the assembly. In one hour all their difterences were settled. That same 
 day (22d December, 1481), Soleure and Freyburg were received into the 
 Swiss confederation, under the conditions that they should not engage in 
 any war or form any alliance without the consent of the eight old cantons, 
 and that they should submit to the arbitration of the latter in case of 
 dis]mtes arising between them and another canton. After this, the as- 
 sembly proceeded to frame a convention upon other debateable matters, 
 about which it also requested the advice of Nicholas of Flue. This was' 
 called the Convention of Stanz. It was agreed, I. That each canton shall 
 punish severely those of its citizens or subjects who commit hostilities 
 against another canton. 2. That any canton unjustly attacked shall be 
 assisted by the others. 3. In case of a revolt against the government of 
 one of the cantons, the others are not to encourage the discontented, but, 
 on the contrary, unite for the purpose of restoring peace and obedience to 
 the laws. 4. Not to allow any assemblies contrary to the laws. 5. 
 That all offences shall be tried by the judge of the place where they have 
 been committed. The former regulations, such as the Pfaffenbrief* of 
 1370, and the Sempacher Brief of 1393, were confirmed, and an equi- 
 table system was determined on by which future conquests or booty 
 made by the confederates should be distributed ; namely, that alt the 
 moveables should be equally divided in proportion to the men of all the 
 cantons who shall form part of the expedition, and that the lands and 
 other immoveables should be shared equally among the old cantons. 
 These terms being agreed upon and sworn to, Nicholas von Flue re- 
 turned to bury himself in his solitary cell, and every deputy repaired to 
 his respective canton. Rejoicings were made all over the country, and 
 the bells of every church, from the Jura to the Alps, announced the joyful 
 tidings of peace. 
 
 After the death of Louis XL, Charles VII L, who succeeded him, re- 
 newed the alhance with the Swiss cantons, one of the conditions being 
 the faculty of recruiting among them, in exchange for subsidies paid by 
 France to the Swiss. The friendship of the confederates was now courted 
 by most sovereigns ; the pope, the house of Austria, the duke of Milan, 
 and even Mathias, king of Hungary, made treaties with the Swiss. Vo- 
 lunteers enlisted, sometimes with, at others without, the consent of the 
 
 * Seepages 65 and 73, 
 
 PERIOD III.] 
 
 cantons, into the service of foreign powers, especially during the Italian 
 wars which raged at that period, for the possession of the Milanese and 
 the kingdom of Naples. Nor was this the only proof of the growing 
 importance of the Swiss ; the cantons offered to mediate for the termina- 
 tion of the differences between Charles VIII of France, andMaximilian 
 of Austria, king of the Romans ; and their mediation being acceptedled 
 to the peace of Senlis, in May, 1493, between those two princes, by which 
 the county of Upper Burgundy was ceded to Maximilian. Charles VIII. 
 being next at war with Ludovico Sforza, who had usurped the duchy of 
 Milan, offered to the Swiss the districts of Bellinzona, Locarno, and 
 Lawis or Lugano *, south of the Alps, if they would assist him in the 
 conquest of the Milanese. The cantons accepted the offer, with the ex- 
 ception of Bern, which preserved a strict neutrality, and no less than 
 20,000 men were raised for the French army in Italy. 
 
 This conduct of Bern excited fresh jealousies between that republic 
 and the popular cantons, who were attached to France, which showered 
 pensions and bribes among those once poor and simple mountaineers. 
 But a common danger came in time to unite the Swiss for their common 
 
 defence. 
 
 Maximilian succeeded in 1495, by the death of his father, Frederic 
 III., to the imperial throne. After his elevation, he convoked a general 
 diet, and he established at Worms a court styled the Imperial Chamber, 
 before which all the civil affairs of the empire were to be laid, and which 
 was to be supported by contributions from all the members of the empire. 
 A subsidy was also ordered to be raised of the hundredth penny, for the 
 sake of defraying the expenses of the war against the Turks. Maximi- 
 lian communicated these ordinances to the Swiss diet assembled at 
 Zurich in 1496, and ordered the cantons, as members of the empire, to 
 conform to it. The emperor required them likewise to join the great 
 Suabian league, of which he made himself the head, and which had been 
 formed in order to settle intestine differences, and he commanded them 
 to furnish him a contingent of troops. The Swiss, in all their wars 
 agaiiist the dukes of Austria and the emperor of the same family, had 
 never renounced their allegiance to the German empire, however ill de- 
 fined and problematic that allegiance had become. It was now Maximi- 
 lian's object to make of Switzerland a circle of the empire, as he had 
 done with Burgundy. Most of the cantons replied to Maximilian's am- 
 bassadors, that their alliance with France did not allow them to enter 
 into any engagement which might militate against the interests of that 
 power, and that the Swiss having achieved their independence, hoped to 
 be left undisturbed in possession of it. The pope's legate threatened 
 excommunication against the cantons who still held by their French alli- 
 
 * These districts, after being for centuries subject to the Swiss, now form the can- 
 ton of Ticiro, the only Italian canton of Switzerland 
 
 { 
 
106 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period III. 
 
 ance, and the emperor summoned several of the allies of the confedera- 
 tion before the Imperial Chamber. The town of St. Gall was put to the 
 ban of the empire. Maximilian having inherited, by the death of his 
 cousin Sigismund, in 1497, the dominions of Austria, applied to the can- 
 tons for the renewal of the " hereditarv union," and demanded likewise 
 that the Swiss would not favour the views of Louis XII., who had suc- 
 ceeded Charles VIII., upon the Milanese. The cantons, in reply, in- 
 sistetl, as a preliminary step, on the redress of the grievances of their 
 allies, and especially of St. Gall, before they listened to further proposals. 
 Maximilian said to the Swiss deputies, who had attended him to Inspruck 
 in the Tyrol, "You are rebels to the empire, and will oblige me at last 
 to pay you a visit in person, sword in hand." Nought dismayed at this 
 threat, the deputies replied that " they humbly begged his imperial ma- 
 jesty would abstain from such a visit, as the Sv/iss were rude-fashioned 
 men who had not yet learnt the respect due to crowned heads." 
 
 Hostilities broke out first on the side of the Orisons. The Austrian 
 regency in the Tyrol regarded with ill will those newly risen common- 
 wealths on its frontiers, and some border feuds between the two countries 
 kindled the flame. The Tyrolcse made an attempt to surprise the con- 
 vent of Munsterthal in January, 1499, but were repulsed by the inhabi- 
 tants. The Grisons upon this demanded assistance from the cantons. 
 ^Meantime the troops of the Suabian league, on their side, took Mezen- 
 feld by force, in the month of February, and put the Grison garrison to 
 the sword. But the Swiss having joined their allies, retook Mezenfeld 
 and the strong pass of Luciensteg, the key of the Grison country. The 
 troops of Bern, Freyburg, Soleure, Zurich, and SchafFhausen, entered the 
 field against the Suabian league, ravaged the Hegeu, and formed a 
 fortified camp at Schwaderloch, in a forest near the imperial town of 
 Constance. But the principal scene of action was on the upper Rhine 
 towards Bregentz, where 10,000 Germans were encamped; these the 
 Swiss and the Grisons attacked and put to flight with great loss. 
 
 Louis XII. of France was not slow in turning to his advantage this 
 quarrel of the Swiss with his rival Maximilian, who thwarted his views 
 on the side of Italy. Louis sent ambassadors to Zurich, and concluded 
 with the Swiss an alliance defensive and offensive, in which the amount 
 of pensions and subsidies to be paid by France was stipulated. The 
 cantons were deficient in artillery, and the king promised to supply them. 
 Meanwhile, the war was carried on with unabated vigour on the upper 
 Rhine. The Suabians and Tyrolese had entrenched themselves in a 
 strong position at Frastenz, near the river 111, from which they made in- 
 cursions across the Rhine into the land of the abbot of St. Gall, and 
 other allies of the Swiss. The confederates, having collected their forces, 
 drove back the enemy, and crossing the Rhine in their turn, determined 
 to force the German camp, under the command of Henry Wolleb of Uri. 
 They dislodged the enemy from their redoubts, and notwithstanding 
 
 PERIOD III.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 101 
 
 a formidable fire of artillery, which the Swiss avoided by lying down at 
 each discharge, they stormed the entrenchments sword in hand, and 
 completely routed the Germans, taking possession of the camp and of all 
 it contained, including many pieces of artillery. The Suabians lost 
 more than 4000 men in this affair. The emperor Maximilian was at 
 that time engaged in the Netherlands, warring with coifnt Egmont, about 
 the possession of Guelderland. The Suabian league, alarmed at the 
 successes of the Swiss, applied to him for assistance. He made a truce 
 with Egmont, and arrived in April at Freyburg in Brisgau with 6000 men 
 Thence he issued a manifesto against the Swiss, in which he upbraided 
 them in the strongest terms, calling them rebels to the empire, enume- 
 rating all the noble families which he said had been stripped by them of 
 their patrimonial estates, and never considering that most of those families 
 had brought their misfortunes upon themselves by their own injustice 
 and oppression, whilst others had deliberately sold their rights to the 
 Swiss. He concluded by inviting all the members of the empire to 
 join their forces, in order to destroy these rebel boors. This manifesto 
 produced but little effect in Germany, the great princes of the empire 
 looking upon the quarrel as a personal one of Maximilian, provoked by 
 him on slight grounds, a fact which his own state councillor, Birkheimer, 
 in his account De bello Helvetico, acknowledges. 
 
 The Swiss meantime pursued the war, from their camp at Schwaderloch ; 
 they defeated 8000 Suabians who had entered Thurgau ; they then 
 crossed the Rhine, devastated the Kletgau, and took the town of Thungen, 
 sparing the garrison nothing but their lives, and making them file off in 
 their shirts through their camp, each soldier bearing a white wand in his 
 hand. The noblemen they kept prisoners for the sake of ransom. They 
 also took several castles, in one of which was the baron of Roseneck, an 
 inveterate enemy of the Swiss, who was consequently excepted by them 
 from the capitulation by which the garrison had their lives granted to 
 them, together with whatever they could carry on their persons. The 
 baron's lady, abandoning all her valuables, came out bearing her husband 
 on her shoulders ; and so touched were the Swiss by this ingenious 
 trait of affection, that they not only gave the baron his liberty, but allowed 
 his wife to take away whatever belonged to her*. The Swiss then 
 thought of joining their arms to those of the Grisons, in order to strike a 
 blow on the side of the Tyrol. They heard, however, about this time, 
 that the emperor was assembling a force of 20,000 men in the Suntgau 
 for the attack of Soleure, which had thrown a garrison into the castle of 
 Dornach, near Basle. This intelligence induced the troops of Bern and 
 Freyburg to separate from the rest of their confederates, in order to protect 
 their old ally Soleure. After some fighting in the Val de Motiers, the 
 imperialists dispersed. The frontiers of the Grisons continued to be the 
 
 * Watteville, Histoire de la Confederation Helvetique, vol. ii. p. 130. 
 
108 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 '[period III. 
 
 PERIOD III.] 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 109 
 
 II 
 
 principal theatre of the war. Fifteen thousand Tyrolese, and othei 
 German troops, from their position of Malsheraid, annoyed the Orisons, 
 who, to the number of 8000, commanded by one Fontana, resolved to 
 attack their entrenchments. Fontana mounted the first ; being wounded 
 in the abdomen, he supported with his left hand his protruding intestines, 
 and defended himself with the right, until his friends joined him. With 
 his dying breath he encouraged them to drive the enemy before them, 
 and at last, exhausted, he fell into the ditch below. The entrenchments 
 were carried by the men of Engadina, and the Austrians were driven 
 away with the loss of 5000 men. 
 
 Maximilian himself repaired to Feldkirch in the Tyrol, where he 
 assembled his troops to strike a decisive blow on the Grisons. He de- 
 tached 2000 men, who penetrated into Engadina, and burnt several 
 villages, but the desperate resistance of the inhabitants, and the 
 want of provisions, obliged them to retire. The desolation was complete 
 in those border countries ; and the provinces of Maximilian had their 
 full share of the work of destruction committed by the soldiers and par- 
 tisans on both sides. Birkheimer, one of Maximilian's commanders, 
 relates that in crossing the Tyrol he found the country utterly devastated 
 and forsaken by the inhabitants ; he mentions, in his account of that 
 war, that he saw two women driving before them a troop of 400 children, 
 like a flock of sheep, and that as soon as this crowd entered a green field, 
 he saw them fall upon the grass, snatch it up by handfuls, and devour it, 
 to satisfy the cravings of hunger. 
 
 In July, Maximilian held a numerous diet at Constance, and a triple 
 attack was resolved against the Swiss ; one on the side of the Grisons, 
 another on that of Constance, and the third by Dornach near Basle. 
 This last, however, was alone carried into effect, the other two attacks 
 having been abandoned in consequence of the disunion which spread 
 among the various princes whose contingents formed the imperial army. 
 The count of Furstenberg, with 14,000 foot and 2000 horse, advanced 
 to the castle of Dornach, which was defended by the men of Soleure. 
 At this news Bern sent 3000 men under D'Erlach ; and Zurich, and 
 other cantons, sent also their contingents. Meantime the camp of 
 Furstenberg before Dornach was a scene of dissipation and merrymaking 
 for the Germans having been informed that the whole Swiss force was 
 assembled far away at Schwaderloch, rested in perfect security. As 
 soon as the troops from Bern and Zurich reached Dornach, the avoyer 
 of Soleure, who commanded the advanced guard, made his men assume 
 the red cross of Burgundy, so that they were mistaken by the Germans 
 for their own comrades, and allowed to enter the camp, where they soon 
 began to use their muskets and their halberds, and spread confusion 
 among the enemy. In the meanwhile, the main body of the army of 
 Furstenberg had ranged itselfin order of battle, and their artillery, as 
 well as the charges of the Gueldrian cavalry, greatly annoyed the con- 
 
 federates, and kept them at bay. At this critical juncture a reinforce- 
 ment came up, consisting of the men of Luzern and Zug, and revived the 
 ardour of the Swiss. The Germans began to lose ground, and in trying 
 to retire across the river Birs, their retreat became a decided flight. 
 Night prevented the confederates from pursuing them, but the count 
 Furstenberg, with 3000 of his men, lost their lives in the battle. Next 
 morning, 23d July, the troops of the Waldstat^eu also joined their allies, 
 and the whole Swiss army marched upon Basle ; but seeing nothing 
 more of the enemy, the confederates, according to their custom, separated 
 and returned to their respective homes. 
 
 In eight months Maximilian, by his own wanton aggression and ob- 
 stinacy, had lost more than 20,000 men, while hundreds of towns, 
 villages, and castles had been reduced to ashes on both sides ; and he 
 was now induced to listen to i^roposals of mediation which were made 
 to him by Louis XII. himself, as well as the duke of Milan. After 
 some negotiations, and some vacillations on the part of the emperor, 
 peace was concluded at Basle in September, 1499, by which Maximilian 
 yielded to the Swiss the high judicial power in Thurgau, and fully 
 acknowledged their unconditional independence as a nation. The differ- 
 ences between the Tyrol and the Grisons were left to an amicable adjust- 
 ment between the parties concerned. This war, called the Suahian ivar, 
 was the last the Swiss had to sustain for their independence. From 
 that time, and for three centuries after, neither Austria nor the German 
 empire, nor any other monarchy, made any attempts or put forth any 
 pretensions against the liberties of the Swiss cantons, which assumed 
 their station as an independent power in Europe. The towns of Basle 
 and Schaffhausen, in consideration of their attachment to their Swiss 
 confederates, were received in 1501 as tw^o additional cantons. The 
 bishop of Basle, and the chapter, who were not favourable to the Swiss, 
 had lost all their influence in that city, which by degrees made itself 
 completely independent of them ; and lastly Appenzell, another ally of 
 the Swiss, became also one of the confederation in 1513, and completed 
 the number of thirteen cantons, which have constituted the Helvetic 
 body till within our own times : namely, Zurich, ScKwytz, Uri, and 
 Unterwalden, the three Waldstiitten or forest cantons; Luzern, Glaris, 
 Zug, Bern, Freyburg, Soleure. Basle, Schaff"hausen, and Appenzell. 
 AUthese were essentially German, both in their language and habits. 
 Some districts belonging to Freyburg and Bern spoke Romance or French 
 dialects ; and the great bulk of the Pays de Vaud, which is essentially Bur- 
 gundian or French in language and habits, was afterwards incorporated 
 with Bern. But it is only since the overthrow of the old confederation 
 by the French arms, at the end of the eighteenth century, that there are 
 cantons in Switzerland which may be called French, and which were 
 formerly allies or subjects of the thirteen cantons. These are Vaud, 
 
no 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period III. 
 
 Geneva, and Neuchgltel, while Bern and Freyburg continue mixed, 
 though the German race and language preponderate in them. 
 
 The allies of the Swiss at the beginning of the sixteenth century were 
 of two sorts — the socii and the confcederati. The first, which consisted of 
 the abbot of St. Gall, the city of the same name, and the towns of Mul- 
 hausen and of Bienne, sent deputies to the federal diets, and, without 
 being cantons, were considered as parts of the Helvetic body. The con- 
 f(Bderait were either, like the Grisons and the Valais, allied to all the 
 cantons, or only to some of them, which last was the case with the re- 
 public of Geneva, and the county of Neuchdtel. They did not send 
 deputies to the diets, but were entitled to assistance in case of foreign 
 attack. Several of these associates and confederates had also their 
 subjects, as well as the cantons themselves. 
 
 The abhot of St. Gall was sovereign of a fine district extending from 
 the river Thur to the lake of Constance, and including several little 
 towns, such as Roschach, Wyl, &c. ; he was also prince of the county of 
 ToQ:£crnburG:, as far as Glaris and Schwvtz, and he had the lower juris- 
 diction over the Rheinthal. The abbot's palace, or rather castle, it 
 beinir surrounded with walls and ditches, stands in the middle of the 
 town, which had grown up around the abbey, but had become at an 
 early period independent of it, whilst the jurisdiction of the abbot was 
 maintained over the surrounding country, and to within a mile or two 
 of the city gates. This singular state of things gave rise to frequent 
 altercations, and it happened at times that the abbot was blockaded 
 within the precincts of his abbey by the citizens of St. Gall, whilst his 
 dependents in the country coming to his relief beleaguered the city. 
 
 Geneva and its bishop were under the protection of the German em- 
 pire, and they also contracted an alliance in 1438 with the cantons of 
 Bern and Freyburg in order to protect themselves against the dukes of 
 Savoy, who having become masters of the surrounding country by ces- 
 sion from the counts of the Genevois, were attempting to establish their 
 authority also within the city. The bishops continued to exercise a 
 partial jurisdiction in concert with the citizens, till the Reformation. 
 
 The district of Neuchatel had its coimts, who were vassals of the em- 
 pire and coburghers of Bern, till about the end of the fifteenth century, 
 when the last count, Philip, died, leaving only one daughter named Jane, 
 who married Louis d'Orleans, duke of Longueville. This prince, having 
 taken part against the Sw-iss in their Italian wars, was deprived of his 
 possession of Neuchatel in 1512 by the cantons of Bern, Freyburg, So- 
 leure, and Luzem, who sent bailiffs to administer the affairs of the 
 county in the name of the confederates. However, in 1529, through the 
 mediation of France, Neuchatel was restored to Jane, upon condition 
 that the treaties with the four cantons should continue in force. Jane 
 was the first to take the title of Princess Sovereign of Neuchatel. She 
 
 history of SWITZERLAND. 
 
 Ill 
 
 period III J 
 
 died in 1543, and her son Francis, duke of Longueville, succeeded 
 to the principality, to which the county of Valengin was imited in the 
 course of the same century. The town of Neuchatel enjoyed peculiar 
 privileges and franchises ; it had its own treaties of alliance with the 
 four above-mentioned cantons, and was included in the neutrality of 
 
 Switzerland. 
 
 Of the Grisons and the Valais we have spoken already. These were 
 the confederates of the Swiss cantons. The prince bishop of Basle, after 
 having lost all authority over the city and canton of that name, entered 
 into a partial alliance with some of the cantons for his great territories 
 in the valleys of the Jura, as we shall have occasion to notice hereafter. 
 
 Thus it was that, two hundred years after the first declaration of inde- 
 pendence by the Waldstatten, the confederation of the thirteen Swiss 
 cantons, their allies and subjects, had become possessed of the whole 
 country of Helvetia and Rha^tia, having for boundaries the Jiu-a to the 
 west, and the lake Leman and the Pennine Alps to the south, the further 
 chain of the Rhaetian Alps and the Rhine dividing it from Tyrol on the 
 east, and the lake of Constance, and the course of the Rhine from 
 Schaffhausen* to Basle, marking its boundaries towards the north. 
 These limits, which appear marked by nature's hand, Switzerland has 
 ever since maintained, with the addition of some valleys on the Italian 
 side of the Alps which were the subject of early contention with the 
 
 dukes of Milan. 
 
 We have seen that the cession of the valleys of Bellinzona, Locarno, 
 and Lugano was promised by l^uis XII., when duke of Orleans, 
 during the reign of his predecessor Charles VIIL, to the forest cantons, 
 if they assisted him in the conquest of the Milanese. The Swiss had done 
 so t ; the French,with their assistance, had become possessed of Milan, and 
 the cantons now demanded the fulfilment of the compact on the part of 
 Louis. But the French king, instead of acquiescing in their demand 
 concerning Locarno and Lugano, claimed of them the restitution of Bel- 
 linzona, of which they were already in possession, the inhabitants having 
 voluntarily put themselves under their protection. The blunt moun- 
 taineers answered, that they were determined to keep BeUinzona, and 
 
 * Tlie little canton of Schaffhausen, and the town itself, are on the right or Sua- 
 bian side of the Rhine, and consequently bej-ond the line stated. A very small por- 
 tion of the canton of Basle is also on the same side. 
 
 t When Ludovico Sforza reconquered for a short time the duchy of Milan, m the 
 beginning of the year 1500, he had 16,000 Swiss in his pay. The French had 
 nearly as many in their army. While the two forces stood in front of each other at 
 Novara, the Swiss diet sent orders to the Swiss of both parties, forbidding them to 
 fight. But the French envoy, Brissey, bribed the courier who was entrusted with 
 the order for the Swiss in the French camp, and he tarried several days on the road. . 
 The other courier having arrived at the quarters of the Swiss in the duke's pay, they 
 obeyed the orders. The French commanders meantime attacked Novara, which 
 Sforza being unable to defend, as his Swiss had forsaken him, he was taken prisoner 
 with all his adherents. This has been represented by Guicciardini and other histo- 
 rians as a treachery of the Swiss, but the MS. correspondence of Morone has re- 
 vealed the truth, Verri, Storia di Milano, ch. xx. 
 
112 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period III. 
 
 pERiot) Hi.] 
 
 history op SWITZERLAKfi* 
 
 113 
 
 V 
 
 n 
 
 that " if his majesty did not choose to ratify the cession, they would 
 appeal to God and their stout halberds." And they kept their word. 
 After several fruitless negotiations the forest cantons took up arms in 
 1503, demanding of their confederates their contingents as stipulated 
 by treaties. The other cantons, after vainly endeavouring to avoid 
 a rupture with France, felt themselves bound to send their troops ; and 
 an army of 15,000 men was collected, which, crossing the Alps, occupied 
 in a few days the whole covmtry around theLago Maggiore. Louis XII., 
 in his quahty of duke of Milan *, offered to make peace by giving up to 
 the three cantons Belhnzona and some other districts in perpetuity. 
 The treaty was signed on the 10th April, 1503. But the Swiss had be- 
 come mercenary in their engagements with foreign powers. A few years 
 afterwards pope Julius II., the declared enemy of the French in Italy, 
 having, by means of Matthew Schinner, bishop of Sion, formed an alli- 
 ance with the cantons, obtained from them a force of 6000 men, nomi- 
 nally for the defence of the papal states, but in reality for the purpose of 
 attacking the French in Lombardy. In spite of the opposition of the 
 French generals, the Swiss, in 1511, forced their way by Varese to the 
 very gates of Milan, which was thrown into the greatest alarm by their 
 sudden appearance ; when all at once, owing to a misunderstanding 
 among the confederates, their camp broke up and they retraced their steps 
 homewards. The year following the Swiss, having renewed the " here- 
 ditary union"t with Maximilian, and with his grandson Charles, after- 
 wards Charles V., they openly espoused the cause of the emperor and 
 the pope against France. Julius sent them the banners of the holy see, 
 and bestowed on them the title of " Defenders of the Church." They 
 entered Italy by way of the Grisons and Trento, and, uniting with the 
 Venetians, drove the French before them, and conquered the Milanese 
 in the name of the Holy LeaguCy for that pope Julius had called his cru- 
 sade against the French. Differences, however, broke out among the 
 conquerors, concerning the disposal of the duchy of Milan. The Swiss, 
 who had a garrison in the duchy, and the pope, insisted that it should 
 be restored to Maximilian Sforza, son of Ludovico, whom the French had 
 deposed and imprisoned. The Venetians, on their part, wished to keep 
 Brescia and Crema, with the whole country as far as the river Adda ; and 
 the emperor put forth his own pretensions. All these powers, as well as 
 the king of France, Ferdinand of Spain, and Henry of England, sent am- 
 bassadors to the Swiss diet, which was held at Baden. The cantons were 
 
 * He claimed the duchy of Milan as being the heir of the Viscontis through his 
 grandmother Valentina, daughter of Gian Galeazzo Visconti. The family of Sforza 
 succeeded to the Visconti in 14130, in consequence of the marriage of Francesco 
 Sforza with Bianca Maria, the only child of Filippo Maria, son of Gian Galeazzo, 
 the last duke of the Visconti dynasty. Francesco Sforza was succeeded by his son, 
 Galeazzo Maria. At the death of the latter, in 1470, his infant son, Giovanni Ga- 
 leazzo, was proclaimed, under the tutorship of his imcle Ludovico called II Moro, 
 who afterwards put to death his nephew and usurped the ducal crown, 
 
 f See page 96, * : '. •' 
 
 m 
 
 now courted, and bribes were offered to them by almost every couTt of 
 Europe. But they stood firm in holding the duchy of Milan for Maximilian 
 Sforza, and the emperor was ultimately obliged to accede to the treaty 
 which was concluded at Baden in 1512. By this treaty Sforza engaged 
 to pay the cantons 40,000 ducats annually, besides 200,000 ducats for 
 the expenses of the war, and to give up to them in perpetuity Locarno, 
 Lugano, and Valmaggia ; the Swiss, on their side, guaranteeing to him 
 the possession of the Milanese. The cantons then appointed deputies 
 to instal Maximilian Sforza as duke of Milan. On the 3Ist De- 
 cember, 1512, Sforza made his public entrance into Milan, and received 
 the keys of the city from the amman Schwartzmaurer of Zug, to whom 
 he expressed his deep gratitude towards the Swiss for all their good 
 services on his behalf. Thus we find the Swiss mountaineers, the rebel 
 boors as Maximilian had styled them a few years before, bestowing the 
 crown of one of the finest states of Italy against the will of that emperor. 
 The Grisons, whose troops formed part of the Swiss army, took posses- 
 sion for their pains of the fine district of the Valteline, and the counties 
 of Chiavenna and Bormio on the south side of the Rhgetian Alps, 
 which had formed part of the Milanese, and they kept and governed them 
 as subject bailiwicks till Bonaparte's conquests in Italy in 1796. 
 
 In 1513 the Swiss defended their Milanese ally Sforza against a new 
 army of France, at the battle of Novara, in which they lost 2000 men, and 
 killed more than 10,000 of the enemy. Guicciardini, the Italian his- 
 torian, describes their bravery on this occasion as surpassing all that we 
 read of the Greeks and Romans. At the same time, in order to make a 
 diversion against France, and at the instigation of the ever-intriguing 
 and restless Maximilian J a Swiss army of 16,000 men, paid by that em- 
 peror, and commanded by Jacques de Watteville of Bern, joined to an 
 equul number of imperial troops, entered Burgundy, and laid siege to 
 Dijon, which was defended by the French commander. La Trimouille. 
 This officer, doubting of his ability to hold out, treated with the Swiss 
 generals without having authority from his master to that effect : he sti- 
 pulated in the king's name, that France should renounce her preten- 
 sions on Milan, and that she should pay the Swiss 600,000 crowns 
 within a fixed time, on condition that the Swiss would leave Burgundy 
 and return home; and for the due performance of these stipulations four 
 persons of rank were named to be delivered to the cantons as hostages. 
 This being done, the Swiss departed, without having consulted with the 
 emperor their ally, alleging as a reason, that the emperor had not made 
 the payments he had promised them. Louis XII. disapproved of 
 La Trimouille's conduct, and would not listen to any renunciation of the 
 duchy of Milan*, to which he was still pertinaciously attached, notwith- 
 standing all his reverses. But Guicciardini, who relates the above facts, 
 does not notice the dishonest conduct of the French general with regard 
 
 * Guicciardini, Stor. d' Italia, lib, xii. ch.ii, 
 
 I 
 
114 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period III. 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND, 
 
 115 
 
 to the hostages. It had been agreed that, beside La Trimouille's own 
 nephew, the Sieur de Meziere, four of the principal inhabitants of 
 Dijon, whose names were mentioned, should be given over to the Swiss. 
 La Trimouille substituted in their place four persons of the lowest con- 
 dition and under false names. This conduct was keenly felt by the 
 Swiss, who, whatever may have been their love of money, were still ob- 
 servant of the faith of treaties. Blame was attached to their own 
 generals, but the public indignation rose chiefly against France, and 
 the ancient sympathy of the Swiss with that nation was turned into 
 hatred. The flight of De Meziere, who broke his parole at Zurich next 
 year, added to these angry feelings. The Swiss, as a measure of reprisal, 
 arrested the president of Grenoble, who was at Geneva, and treated him 
 severely. They then resolved to invade France again, and in 1514 
 sent deputies to king Henry VIII. of England, to propose an alliance 
 for that purpose. Henry dispatched in return two envoys to Switzer- 
 land; but he suddenly concluded the negotiations on learning that the 
 king of Spain had concluded a treaty of peace with France. 
 
 Leo X., who had succeeded the wavlike Julius in the papal see, adopted 
 a system of politics different from that of his predecessor. He inclined 
 to peace with France, and off*ered his mediation between that country 
 and the Swiss. In the midst of these negotiations Louis XII. died, in 
 January, 1515; and Francis I., who succeeded him, assumed the title of 
 duke of Milan, together with that of king of France. In notifying to 
 the cantons his accession to the throne, he requested the renewal of their 
 friendship. The Swiss replied that, if his majesty would ratify the 
 treaty of Dijon, concluded under his predecessor, he might rely upon 
 their friendship ; but otherwise they could not listen to any proposals 
 on his part. Francis made great preparations for war, and the emperor 
 and the duke of Milan on their side strengthened their alliance with the 
 cantons. The king of Spain also agreed that, should the French invade 
 Italy, he would enter France on the side of the Pyrenees ; he, however, 
 did not keep his word, and the defence of the duchy of Milan was ulti- 
 mately left to Swiss intrepidity alone. Hearing that a French army 
 under Trivulzio, an Italian himself, and a commander of great abilities, 
 had assembled at Lyons, the cantons sent no less than 40,000 men into 
 Lombardy, who occupied the passes of Mont Cenis and Mont Genevre. 
 But Trivulzio entered Italy by another pass, which leads by the Col d'Ar- 
 genti^re into the plains of Saluzzo, and which the Swiss had neglected as 
 impracticable. The Swiss then fell back upon Novara, and, finding them- 
 selves unassisted and alone, they were actually marching out of that town 
 on their return to their country, when the subsidy of money promised by 
 the pope reached them. This timely arrival decided the troops of Zu- 
 rich, Basle, Schaffhausen, Appenzell, the forest cantons, and Grisons, 
 to turn again towards Milan by the way of Galera. But the contingents of 
 Bern, Friburg, and Soleure continued their retreat towards Domo d*Os- 
 sola, at the foot of the Alps. This separation of the Swiss was occa- 
 
 PERIOD III.] 
 
 sioned by the intrigues of Francis I. among the cantons, with whom he 
 had never ceased to negotiate. The Swiss troops at Galera, expecting 
 to be attacked every day by the French, who had taken possession of 
 Milan, solicited their countrymen to join them, and they were supported 
 in their expostulations by Watteville, who commanded the Bernese, but 
 in vain. The latter, having heard from their country that negotiations 
 were far advanced, disbanded themselves; and of 1000 Bernese who 
 were at Domo d'Ossola there remained together no more than 1000. 
 At last the troops of the other cantons who were at Galera, with the ex- 
 ception of the Waldstatten and Glaris, agreed to a peace with France on 
 the 8th September, 1515, and took the road towards the Alps. The 
 men of the forest cantons refused to ratify the treaty, and those of Zurich 
 and Zug, persuaded by Schinner, the cardinal of Sion, following their 
 example, their united bands, not more than 10,000 strong, boldly took 
 the road to Milan. Trivulzio, on hearing of their approach, abandoned 
 that city, and took a position at Marignano, in order to prevent their 
 junction with the pope's troops. The position of the little Swiss army 
 was singularly critical. They had before them more than 40,000 sol- 
 diers of France, headed by the king in person, with whom several of 
 the cantons had just concluded peace. But they were joined by a num- 
 ber of volunteers, among whom was a Winkelried, from Unterwalden, 
 who left the ranks of the retreating army in order to assist their gallant 
 countrymen in the hour of danger. The Swiss began the attack late in 
 the afternoon ; the French camp was fortified by a double entrenchment, 
 and defended by a numerous artillery. On the report of the battle 
 having begun, all the Swiss that were still lingering at Milan ran out 
 without waiting for orders and joined in the attack. The Swiss forced 
 their way into the entrenchments and seized part of the French artillery. 
 Francis himself charged them at the head of his cavalry, and the com- 
 bat continued with the greatest obstinacy till four hours after dark. At 
 last the two armies separated through fatigue ; the French retired to 
 their camp, and the Swiss lay on the field of battle. The next morning, 
 15th September, 1515, the fight was renewed; but D'Alviani, who was 
 bringing up the Venetian auxiliary forces, arrived in the midst of the 
 battfe, and took the Swiss in their rear. This circumstance obliged 
 them to sound a retreat, which they effected in the best order to Milan, 
 carrying away their cannon and their wounded in the midst of their 
 column ; and so astounded were the French by their intrepidity, that 
 there was no one, either horseman or foot, who dared to pursue them. 
 Trivulzio himself used to call this '' a battle of giants." The number 
 of Swiss engaged in the battle was about 18,000, of which 6000 were 
 killed, with many officers, especially from Zurich and the forest cantons. 
 The loss of the French was equally great*. After this the Swiss took the 
 
 * Verri, Storia di Milano, ch. xxii. gives some interesting particulars concerning 
 this battle, taken from the chronicles of the time, 
 
 i2 
 
 I 
 
 5 
 
116 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND, 
 
 [period III. 
 
 '^ 
 
 road towards the Alps, and the whole duchy of Milan submitted to 
 Francis I. 
 
 In the following year (1516), the king of France, having agreed to 
 give up to the Swiss the Italian bailiwicks, which had been the first 
 origin of the war, a treaty of peace was concluded in November, at Frey- 
 burg, between France and all the cantons. This was called the perpe- 
 tual peace. The principal conditions were that the bailiwicks of Bel- 
 linzona, Locarno, Lugano, and Valmaggia, were to remain subject to 
 the Swiss, on condition that the privileges and liberties granted to these 
 districts by the dukes of Milan should be maintained. The Valteline 
 and county of Chiavenna were likewise to remain in possession of the 
 Orisons. The allies of the Swiss were included in the perpetual peace 
 with France. Each of the cantons, as well as the Orisons and the 
 Valais, were to receive a pension of 2000 francs a year. The king was 
 besides to pay 400,000 crowns for the expenses of the Dijon war, and 
 300,000 for those of the war of Italy. The Swiss merchants and other 
 citizens were allowed free ingress and egress through the French terri- 
 tories, with the privileges they had enjoyed under the preceding reigns. 
 In case of either of the contracting parties being engaged in war, the 
 other was not to give assistance, or passage over its territories, to the 
 enemy's forces ; and lastly, all differences that might arise between the 
 Swiss and the French were to be referred to arbitrators. This treaty 
 has served as the basis of all subsequent treaties with France during the 
 course of nearly three centuries. 
 
 In the subsequent wars of Francis L in Italy, Swiss auxiliary troops 
 fought in his ranks in several actions, especially at the battle of Pavia, 
 in 1525, in which the king was made prisoner, and the Swiss lost no 
 less than 7000 men. Such repeated and heavy losses gave them at last 
 a distaste for those disastrous Italian wars, where they could gain no- 
 thing but a barren reputation of mercenary valour. 
 
 The authorities for this third period are mainly the same as for the 
 preceding one. Barante, Histoire ties Dues dc Bourgogne de la Maison 
 de Valois, is an excellent authority for the events of the Burgundian 
 war; and Ouicciardini, Sloria d' Italia, ami Yerriy Storia di Milano^ 
 are good authorities for the wars of the Swiss in Lombardy. The' 
 Orisons have also their native chroniclers, one of which, Porta, has 
 written in the Romantsch language : Chronica Rhetica, ou Vhistoria dal 
 orifjine, guerras, aUeanza<;, et autcrs evenimaints da nossa cara 
 Pairia, la Rhetia, our da divers Authurs componeda da Nott da 
 Porta, et per bain public, a cusst seis, fatta stampar da N. Shuca?!. 
 In Scunl, anno 1742. Tschudi, the Swiss chronicler, has also written 
 about the Orisons : De prisca ac vera Alpina Rhcetia, cum ccetero 
 Alpinarum gentium tractu, Descriptio. 4^ Basel, 1538. 
 
 ■W2 
 
 .1 
 
 FOURTH PERIOD. 
 
 fA 
 
 SIXTEENTH CENTURY. 
 
 THE REFORMATION IN SWITZERLAND, FROM THE FIRST OPPOSITION MADE 
 BY ZWaNGLI TO THE SALE OF INDULGENCES IN 1518, UNTIL THE 
 FINAL ESTABLISHMENT OF THE REFORMED RELIGION AT BERN, 
 ZURICH, BASLE, SCHAFFHAUSEN, GENEVA, AND NEUCHATEL, A^D IN 
 PART OF CLARIS, APPENZELL, AND THE GRISONS. 
 
 While the Italian wars between Austria and France employed the arms 
 of the Swiss youth away from their own country, a most important 
 change was silently taking place at home. This was no other than the 
 great religious reform of the sixteenth century. 
 
 In Switzerland, as elsewhere, the abuses introduced during a long 
 course of ages into the rites and discipline of the church, had reached a 
 point which appears almost incredible to readers of our days. Removed, 
 as we fortunately are, from those unhappy times, it becomes us to judge 
 of them with calmness, and to guard against the exaggerations of party 
 writers ; yet it is impossible, after reading the mass of contemporary 
 evidence, even of those writers who were conscientiously attached to the 
 church of Rome, and adhered to it at the great crisis of the reformation, 
 not to come to the conclusion that the disorders of that church, the 
 worldly ambition of many of its prelates, and their notorious and un- 
 censured profligacy, — the relaxation of its discipline, and the venality of 
 its administration, brought its doctrines into discredit, and hastened the 
 schism : and that church itself, after the great separation was consum- 
 mated, derived from it this indirect benefit, that it became more vigilant 
 over its members, more guarded in its actions, more correct in its deci- 
 sions, — so that ever since that epoch it has not exposed itself to the 
 same charges, and it has in a great measure disarmed the hostility of 
 those who disclaim its tenets. The successive pontificates of Sixtus 
 IV., Innocent VIII., Alexander VI., Julius II., Leo X., and Clement 
 VII., for the space of sixty-four years, from 1471 to 1534, form perhaps 
 the darkest period in the annals of the Roman hierarchy, as regards its 
 moral and spiritual character. The personages that have succeeded 
 each other in the chair of St. Peter since that epoch, down to our own 
 days, have been, almost without exception, men whom it were highly 
 unjust to compare with those above- named. 
 
 i\ 
 
118 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period IV. 
 
 PKRIOD IV.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 119 
 
 In Switzerland the corruption of the clergy at the beginning of the 
 sixteenth century seems to have been even more general and barefaced 
 than in other countries of Europe. There was a grossness in it which 
 was characteristic of a rude, uninformed, and still imperfectly civilized 
 people. Remonstrances had been several times made by various can- 
 tons on the increasing licentiousness of the churchmen. As early as 
 August, 1477, the Bernese had complained to Benedict de Montferrand, 
 bishop of Lausanne, that " they saw with grief the clergy of their 
 country given up to lihertinism, openly keeping concubines, and fre- 
 quenting houses of ill fame." But little redress could be expected from 
 that quarter, for we find repeatedly the burghers of Lausanne complain- 
 ing still more bitterly of their own bishop, and more especially of Sebas- 
 tian de Montfaucon, who filled the see in the early part of the sixteenth 
 century, and " whose servants beat and killed the citizens in affrays, 
 and the bishops protected them openly and by force from the hands of 
 justice. And the canons, who then wore swords at their side like lay- 
 men, assaulted the citizens even in their houses and in church, seduced 
 married women and kept them in defiance of the law, violated poor 
 girls whom they enticed to their houses, and had a number of natural 
 children whom they sent about begging, &c.*" It is unnecessary now 
 to multiply quotations about similar disorders which occurred in almost 
 every part of the country ; the chronicles of the times are filled with 
 them ; but one important and serious reflection ought not here to be 
 omitted : the greater part and the most heinous of these disorders pro- 
 ceeded from one cause, the harsh and ill- devised regulation for perpetual 
 celibacy enforced by the church of Rome upon its clergy after the tenth 
 century, — not, as in the earlier ages of the Christian church, as a mere 
 recommendation to those pious persons who felt able to conform to the 
 rule, but as an absolute and irrevocable bond imposed for life upon 
 every one who entered the sacred ministry. This has been the fruitful 
 soiurce of most of the calamities, the individual misery, and public scan- 
 dal that have darkened the annals of the western church. Many of 
 those monks and priests against whom satirists and novelists have railed 
 for their incontinence, were in great measure the victims of an ill-judged 
 system. It is true they had bound themselves to it, but they did so at 
 an age when they were not aware of the extent of the obligation they 
 incurred, an obligation which it may be a matter of doubt whether they 
 had a right to impose upon themselves for life. This is no apology for 
 licentiousness; but it serves to moderate in some degree our impressions 
 in reading the history of past times ; it transfers the principal weight of 
 our censure from those who were the victims of the system, to the system 
 itself; and it restrains us from aggravating errors which, under a more 
 rational system of polity, would not have occurred. But this excuse by 
 no means applies to those who made a profession of hypocrisy and a 
 
 * See Ruchat, Histoire de la Reformation en Suisse, vol, i. p. 32. 
 
 trade of imposture, who availed themselves of their situation deliberately 
 to carry corruption among their flocks, or who, shielded by the power of 
 their order, set at defiance the laws of both God and man. Of these the 
 epoch preceding the reformation affords many instances among the 
 clergy. On the other side, the ambition of the popes Sixtus, Alexander, 
 Julius, and Leo, the dissensions they fomented amongst the Italian 
 states, their perpetual intrigues to establish their relatives m some pnn- 
 cipality or other, and the wars and bloodshed these intrigues occasioned, 
 are all matters of political rather than of ecclesiastical history. The 
 Swiss who fought in these wars of Italy, even in the Romagna, where 
 Julius and Leo employed them against the petty local pnnces, must have 
 watched the conduct of popes and cardinals, and must, it may be sup- 
 posed, have been little edified by the scenes they witnessed m what they 
 had considered the centre of Christendom, the fountain-head of rehgion. 
 A cardinal, Schinner, after having occasioned a breach of faith on the 
 part of the Swiss at the fatal battle of Marignano, acting agam the part 
 of recruiting serjeant, enlisted, for Leo, soldiers in Switzerland The 
 troops were raised first under the pretence of a war with the Turks, but 
 in fact to assist the pope in his wars against Delia Rovere, the duke of 
 Urbino, which cost Leo 800,000 crowns, and afterwards in the wars 
 against Francis I. The cantons had at this time, agreeably to their 
 treaty with France, a body of 12,000 men serving under Lautrec, the 
 French commander in Lombardy. But Schinner collected secretly a 
 body of equal number to join the opposite party, and thus Swiss were 
 brought to face their own countrymen. The cantons, heanng of this, 
 sent orders to all the Swiss in Lombardy to return home. The regular 
 contingent obeyed, but Schinner's recruits, being well paid by the 
 cardinal and promised more, attacked the now weakened French, 
 defeated them at the battle of La Bicocca, in April, 1522, and, m 
 concert with the Spaniards, drove them out of Lombardy. Thus, by 
 the artifice of a prelate of the church, Swiss faith was twice sullied, 
 though not by the cantonal governments ; and twice Swiss blood flowed 
 in a mercenary cause against the faith of treaties. These transactions 
 did not tend to raise the character of the hierarchy in the estimation of 
 the Swiss, especially of those who returned home from the fatal Italian 
 wars. The young men brought back with them habits of dissipation and 
 profligacy not favourable to religious veneration. But even the fnars 
 laboured as it were to throw discredit on religious ceremonies and prac- 
 tices. A disclosure of monkish imposture had been made at Bern some 
 years before, arising out of an ancient jealousy between the two rival 
 orders of the Dominicans and the Franciscans. The former, to obtain a 
 triumph over the Franciscans, resorted to pretended miracles: they 
 worked on the weak fancy of a poor tailor called Jetzler, who had en- 
 tered as a lay brother in the Dominican convent of Bern, and made him 
 believe that several saints, and the Virgin herself, whom a friar person- 
 
 \ 
 
 \ 
 
120 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period IV. 
 
 ated, appeared to him. Crowds flocked to the Dominican convent to see 
 Jetzler, the favourite of Heaven, who exhibited on the palms of his 
 hands and on his feet the stigmata, or marks m mutation of our ba- 
 viour's wounds, which the Franciscans boasted that St. Francis alone 
 had ever borne. Jetzler's marks, it appears, were produced by corro- 
 sives The whole was an impious piece of jugglery, but the Iriars re- 
 lied too much on Jetzler's credulity ; they were discovered ; Jetzler 
 confessed all : Pope Julius sent a legate to examine the friars, and the 
 council of Bern having taken cognizance of the matter, four friars were 
 condemned and burnt to death. This occurred in 1507. 
 
 Another subject of great scandal and mischief was the manner m 
 which livings in Switzerland were bestowed upon foreign adventurers, 
 chiefly Italians, who publicly bought them at Rome, or received them 
 from the favourite retainers of the papal court, for the popes arrogated 
 to themselves the right of nominating to all livings, even to those which 
 were in the gift of local chapters and corporations. Furnished with the 
 pope's bull, swarms of profligate young churchmen came to occupy the 
 best livings in Switzerland*. The licentious and heedless prodigality 
 of the givers often bestowed the same living upon two candidates, who, 
 meetin'- within the sacred precincts, undertook each to maintain his 
 own ckim by force. The Swiss cantons, in 1520, made remonstrances 
 to Pucci, the pope's legate, about this scandalous abuse ; and they issued 
 an order banishing all courtisans (the name they gave to the clerical 
 intruders on livings) as ** wicked, ignorant persons, who had nothing of 
 the spirit of God in them," and threatening, if found again within their 
 territory, to drown them in sacks. 
 
 All the sacraments of the church, communion, confession, extreme 
 unction, were made means of barefaced extortions. It was about that 
 time that a German abbot exclaimed, that had not Luther come, they 
 luould have at last persuaded the people to feed on hay / 
 
 But the immediate cause of the schism with Rome was in Switzer- 
 land, as well as in Germany, Leo X.'s famous bull for the sale of in- 
 dulgences in 1517. 
 
 The question of indulgences having acquired considerable historical 
 importance, as the immediate cause of the Reformation, it may be well to 
 explain it here briefly, adhering to the definitions given by Roman Ca- 
 tholic divines. In the earlier ages of the church repentant sinners, after 
 confession, had to undergo certain punishments, often public, and very se- 
 vere, in proportion to their off'ences. Some presbyterian churches have 
 retained traces of the practice of public exposure and penance inflicted 
 upon sinners in the face of the congregation. In the primitive church the 
 penalties were very severe ; they consisted of rigorous fasting, assiduous 
 prayers, exposure for years during service at the gate of the church, 
 
 * At Geneva, in 1527, of all the numerous canons of the cathedral only one was 
 nut a foreigner. 
 
 PERIOD IV.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 121 
 
 seclusion from social intercourse, and other austerities. Butthese penalties 
 we eTc rtain cases mitigated by the " indulgence' ' of the bishops who 
 IbTd'd the austerities enjoined by the canons, having -gard^^ bodily 
 orlntal weakness, and to the temporal necessities of mdividuals and 
 a Times commuted them for works of charity and pious exercises 
 tMMonat de Ind^lgentus), This practice aj^ears to Jave W^^^^^^ 
 tioned by the councils of Nic^a,Ancyra, and the fourth ^^ ^^^^^^^^^ 
 St Cyprian, in his Epistles 11, 12, 13, and 14, informs us that m h^^ 
 periods of persecution the bishops, at the request of the confessors, 
 g ntel to repentant sinners who were confined in prison by the heathens 
 tn indulgence remitting to them the temporal penalty which they had 
 ii cur^^^^^^ which they could not well perform in their state of confine- 
 
 In But this indulgence of the bishops led also to abuses, of which 
 
 ever^l of the primitive fathers, even as early as Tertulhan ODe puc/.a^ 
 and St. Cvprian (D. lapsis), complained, such as the bishop s granting 
 U with too much facility or partiality, and also that simple priests assumed 
 thl power of granting indulgences, which ought to have been the exclu- 
 ive irvilege of bishops. Matters, however, contmued m the same 
 sta e for ages; the bishops granted indulgences on condition of the 
 1Z^^^ of money for religious purposes, and the ancient discipline of 
 iano" c 1 penani was gradually laid aside. (Mabfllon's ^nnalj^l' 
 
 Svol. vi;p. 535, and also his Preface to the fifth cent, of the Acta 
 
 ^""^^r^.^^.^^^ of money for a certain penance may be compared to 
 a fine laid upon a person guilty of a lighter offence or misdemeanour. 
 Upon the same principle the church of Rome grants m some cases a 
 dispensation called " crusade" to persons who, for reasons of heath, do 
 not wish to abstain from meat on Fridays, Lent, and other fast-dap 
 and who pay a certain sum for this dispensation. About the eleventh 
 or twelfth century the popes began to grant " plenary" indulgences, tha 
 is to ^av indulgences which remitted not only the temporal or canonical 
 penaUy/l^ut also the penalty of purgatory, which, according to the 
 Roman church, is awarded to the lepentant sinner after death, in expia- 
 tion of his sin, and as a satisfaction to divine justice. This, it has been 
 contended by many, was a novel feature in the practice of indulgences, 
 for the bishops formerly had remitted only the canonical penalty. 
 Thomas Aquinas, however, contended that it was no innovation ; for 
 that the church has at its disposal a treasury of spiritual goods, consist- 
 in- of the superabundant merits of the Saviour, and of the supererogatory 
 good works of the saints, from which treasury the church can draw in 
 favour of its repentant sons, so as to acquit them of the penalties 
 
 * For a specimen of these penitential canons of the early church, and their seve- 
 ri.v The rea^r may consult Halitgur's (a German bishop of the nmth century) 
 pl«^/e.'/«/T^^'L ColtccUo antiqua Canonum Penitent ialU.m in Dache, lus or D'A^hery's 
 S'/i^i; vol. xi. ; and Rhegino's Specuhon PcnUrnU^. See also 1 leury, H^stcre 
 Ecclamtiqve, vol. viii. ; Discwn sur /cs sijr premiers Siecfes. 
 
122 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period IV. 
 
 PERIOD IV.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 123 
 
 they have incurred both in this world and the next. The first plenary 
 indulgences were granted by the popes to those who engaged in the 
 Crusades for the recovery of the Holy Land. They were afterwards 
 granted (for instance, in the Council of Lyons, a.d. 1245) to those who, 
 unable to join the crusade in person, contributed to its success by volun- 
 tary donations. By degrees indulgences were granted for other pur- 
 poses, for building or repairing churches, &c. Innocent IIL granted 
 plenary indulgence to all those who joined in the crusade against the 
 Albigenses, promising them the kingdom of heaven if they fell in battle. 
 In the following ages indulgences were regularly sold about the various 
 countries of Europe ; they were farmed in each province to contractors, 
 who paid a fixed sum to the see of Rome, and who employed agents 
 called quaestors, to go about retailing the written copies of the Bull of 
 indulgence. In Germany, in the century before Luther, these indulgences 
 were commonly sold for five ducats a-piece. The quaestors were often 
 ignorant or licentious men, who gave offence by their flagrant immorality, 
 and the local clergy repeatedly complained of this evil. The Council of 
 Soissons, in 1456, banished the quaestors from France. (Harzheim, 
 Ccmcilia, vol. iv., Supplement^ p. 945.) In the following century, the 
 Council of Bologna, in 1547, drew a sad picture of the "detestable 
 deceptions practised in the distribution of indulgences," of the cupidity 
 of the quaestors, of their deluding poor and uninformed men with the 
 promise of rescuing their deceased friends from the torments of pur- 
 gatory, &c. Another evil consequence resulting from the indiscriminate 
 sale of indulgences was, that many fancied that by their purchase they 
 were at once free from guilt, and all its consequences, without any other 
 trouble on their part, although the popes, in their bulls, generally ex- 
 plained that, without the necessary accompaniments of prayer, repentance, 
 and reformation of life, no indulgence could be valid. 
 
 Julius II., wishing to erect the new church of St. Peter's, and being 
 also in want of money for his Italian wars, published an indulgence in 
 Poland and France ; and after him Leo X., in his like necessities, ex- 
 tended the sale to Saxony and other parts of Germany. Leo addressed 
 the papal commission to Albert elector of Metz, and cardinal archbishop 
 of Magdeburg, who participated in the profits arising from the sale, and 
 who devolved the responsible part of the duty on Tetzel, a Dominican 
 monk, who, accompanied by many of his brethren, proceeded from place 
 to place, selling his wares. In 151 7, Tetzel began his round through the 
 diocese of Magdeburg. Luther, who was then professor and doctor of 
 theology at Wittenberg, was shocked at the presumption of Tetzel ; 
 when sitting at his confessional he heard the confessions of some of the 
 purchasers of indulgences, who refused to submit to the penance or 
 reparation which he enjoined to them, saying that the Dominican had by 
 his indulgences released them from every penalty. In return, Luther re- 
 fused them absolution, and they complained to Tetzel. Luther then drew 
 
 uphis famous ninety-five theses or propositions m which he ^^^^^J^^ 
 tended that indulgences could only remit the canonical or temporal penalty 
 according to the old custom of the church, but could not extend o the 
 penalties hereafter which may be exacted by Divine justice ; that true 
 contrition and amendment of life were the only means of obtaining for- 
 giveness; that the remission of sin, and of the penalty incurred by it 
 Lid only be obtained by justification through faith m the redemption of 
 Christ, and could not be purchased by money like a worldly favour. 
 
 Thus far Luther asserted no more than many catholics have asserted 
 before and since his time. However, the church of Rome, by the deci- 
 sion of the Council of Trent, has continued to affirm its power of granting 
 indulgences for penalties awarded both here and in purgatory ; but the 
 indulgences are no longer sold, they are granted on performmg certain 
 pious or charitable acts, and the bulls of indulgences contain the 
 clause— «* if any thing be paid for obtaining this indulgence, the indul- 
 gence itself becomes ipso facto null and void*." 
 
 It has been generally said that the produce of the indulgences wen 
 to defray the building of St. Peter's church, but this is an error for that 
 splendid pile was merely begun under Leo, and very little of the indul- 
 gence-money went towards it ; it was continued by thirty successive 
 popes, and was not finished a century after Leo's death. The vast sums 
 collected by the sale of indulgences went to supply the wanton expendi- 
 ture first of the collectors, and then of the retainers of the pope and of his 
 court and relatives. It has been also said that Leo gave his sister Mad- 
 dalena Medici, wife of Francesco Cibo, the whole produce of the indul- 
 gences in Germany, and that lady, or her agent Arcimbaldo, entrusted 
 the management of the sale to the Dominican friars, one of whom, the 
 notorious Tetzel, sold them in Saxony, where he was opposed by Luther. 
 This, however, is refuted by Robertson's History of Charles V., book ii. 
 
 in a note. , ^ . i ..i. 
 
 The cantons of Switzerland, the Valais, and the Orisons, and other 
 neighbouring countries, were allotted to the Franciscans. Bernavdin 
 Samson, of the Milan convent of that order, had the Swiss cantons for 
 his share. He passed the St. Gothard with his wares, his bulls, his red 
 cross, and his banners, and began the sale in the centre of Uri, a poor 
 district, where he made but little money. His practice was to proceed 
 to the village church, and there descant on the wonderful value of his 
 indulgences, after which he proceeded to sell them. From Uri he pro- 
 ceeded to the wealthier canton of Schwytz, but here he found Zwingli, 
 the preacher at Einsidlen, who deliberately opposed his mission. As 
 
 this remarkable man was the prime mover of the Swiss reformation, a 
 
 short notice of him will not be here misplaced. 
 * In the Bibliotheque Saci6e, ou Dictionnaire Universel EccUsiastique, par les Peres 
 
 Richard et Giraud, re-edited at Paris within the last few years, there is an elaborate 
 
 article under the head '' Indulgences," containing the approved and actual doctrine 
 
 of the church of Rome on this intricate subject. 
 
124 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND, 
 
 [period IV. 
 
 V. 
 
 Ulrich Zwingli was born at Wildhaus, in the Toggenburg, in 
 January, 1484. His father was a farmer in easy circumstances. 
 Young Ulrich studied first at Basle, then at Bern. From Bern 
 he went to Vienna in Austria, where he studied philosophy. Two 
 years after he returned to Basle, when he went through his four 
 years' course of theology under Thomas Wyttenbach, after which he was 
 admitted master of arts. He was ordained and said his first mass in 
 1506. He was then appointed incumbent at Glarus, the head town of 
 the canton of that name. He then applied himself to the study of 
 Hebrew, of the fathers, and of the early history of the church, and he 
 also perused the writings of Wiclift' and John Huss. Although at that 
 time a sincere Roman Catholic, it appears that he was struck with the 
 changes that had been introduced into the government and discipline 
 of the church, and he communicated his remarks confidentially, by way 
 of letters, to several learned men with whom he had become acquainted. 
 He continued ten years at Glarus, zealously discharging his duties, 
 inculcating the practice of gospel morality, but avoiding as much as he 
 could any allusions to the miracles of the saints, to the power of 
 their intercession, to relics and images, to fasts and pilgrimages, and to 
 other matters, of which he disapproved. This was remarked by the rest 
 of the clergy, but Zwingli was protected from their rancour by the free 
 constitution of the Swiss cantons, by which a priest was secured as well 
 as a layman from arbitrary punishment. Zwingli was beloved by his 
 parishioners, and respected for his irreproachable life. He twice accom- 
 l^anied as chaplain the troops of Glarus to the Italian wars. He was at 
 Milan, when, at theinstigationof Schinner, the rash battle of Marignano 
 was fought, in which the Swiss sustained an enormous loss. Zwingli 
 deplored these mercenary wars, and wrote several letters to the cantons 
 entreating them to put a stop to these immoral enlistments, and to the 
 effusion of the blood of his countrymen for interests not their own. 
 After his return from Milan, he was appointed, in 1516, preacher to the 
 famous church of Einsidlen, by Theobald, baron of Geroldseck, who was 
 avoue, or administrator of the abbey. There he continued to preach in 
 plainer language than he had done at Glarus, entreating his audience 
 to seek forgiveness through the merits and the intercession of Christ 
 alone, the Redeemer of the world, and not through that of the Virgin and 
 other saints, and to look to the Scripture as the only safe rule in matters 
 of faith. Cardinal Schinner, happening to be at Einsidlen, was pleased 
 with Zwingli, who had several conversations with him, in which the 
 cardinal appears to have agreed with him about the necessity of a reform 
 in the church. But the cardinal was a worldly, ambitious man, too 
 much engrossed by political intrigues to pay much attention to purely 
 spiritual subjects. To him as well as to the bishop of Constance, 
 Zwingli addressed his warm entreaties to begin immediately the work of 
 reformation, which ought to originate with the superiors ; to discounter 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 125 
 
 PERIOD IV.] 
 
 nance the numerous abuses which had crept into the church ; to check 
 the idleness and profligacy of monks, and to instruct the ignorance of 
 priests ; for the people, said he, ** are opening their eyes to all this cor- 
 ruption around them, and will lose all respect for the church, and the 
 consequences will be fatal not only to the clergy but to the people them- 
 selves, who will lose all check over their passions, and will plunge heed- 
 lessly into every species of disorder and licentiousness." At this time 
 it appears, Zwingli had not even heard of Luther ; whose proceedings 
 and opinions were first made known in Switzerland by the publication 
 of his writings through the press of Froben at Basle in 1519. 
 
 It was in 1518 that Bernard Samson appeared in the canton of 
 Schwytz to sell his indulgences. He had relied upon a rich harvest at 
 the 'sanctuary of Einsidlen, but Zwingli was prepared : he openly for- 
 bade the friar admission to his church, and was supported in his refusal 
 by the abbot and the baron. Zwingli then preached to the crowded 
 pilgrims against the abuse of indulgences, and exposed the mercenary 
 traffic of the friar. He, however, did not censure the head of the 
 church, but laid the blame on the subordinate agents. 
 
 And, in truth, Samson, and the other retailers of the indulgences, carried 
 the extravagance of their doctrines to a pitch of absurdity which could 
 not have been countenanced by their superiors, and which would appear 
 incredible to a Catholic of our own days, were it not proved by irre- 
 fragable testimony. They gave out that the bull of indulgences absolved 
 both the livins? and the dead, and released not only from purgatory, but 
 even from the place of eternal torments. Now the approved doctrine of 
 Roman theologians, as we have seen above, is, that indulgences can 
 only remit the punishments of purgak)ry for sins already committed and 
 repented of, poenarn sed non culpam. |No theologian asserts that 
 indulgences can save an unrepentant sinner from hell-fire. The doc- 
 trine of indulgences is strictly connected with that of purgatory, of a 
 place of expiation, after the culpa (not the pceiia) is remitted by re- 
 pentance and absolution ; it is essentially dependent on the doctrine of 
 purgatory. But Bernardin Samson was not so nice in his distinctions ; 
 he pardoned not only past sins, but those which might be committed in 
 future, and he evidently exceeded his instructions. Being repulsed 
 from Schywtz, he went to Zug, where he] exposed his indulgencps to sale 
 for three days. The crowd was so great, and so eager to reach the cross 
 and to purchase the bulls, that one of Samson's attendants, with con- 
 summate effrontery, cried out, ** Let those pass first who have money, 
 we shall afterwards listen to the poor." Hence he went to Luzern and 
 Unterwalden, and afterwards to Bern, where he hoisted his red cross 
 and banners in the great church, in which he officiated with great 
 pomp. The bulls he vended were some on parchment, and others on 
 paper ; the first were sold for a crown, the latter for two batzen. Some 
 of both have been preserved in the archives of various towns. But 
 
126 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period IV. 
 
 there were others more ample in their promises, and which cost very 
 large sums. Ruchat, who wrote at the beginning of the last century, 
 saw one which had been purchased by a gentleman of Orbe called 
 D'Arnay ; it had Samson's signature affixed, and had cost 500 ducats. 
 Jacob von Stein, a Bernese captain, gave a fine grey horse in exchange 
 for a bull, which was to include himself and his ancestors, his whole 
 troop of 500 men, and his vassals of the lordship of Belp*. 
 
 The last Sunday Samson passed at Bern he assembled the people in 
 the great church, and having ascended the central altar he promised a 
 complete forgiveness to all present who knelt down and recited three 
 paters and aves. He then said that the souls of all the Bernese, where- 
 soever and howsoever they had died, were at that moment released not 
 only from purgatory, but from hell, and were in the act of ascending to 
 heaven. He went away from Bern after making a large harvest, and 
 directed his steps northwards. But the bishop of Constance, or rather 
 his vicar Faber, a man of some learning, forbade him to preach in his 
 diocese, as his bulls had not been presented at the episcopal chancery 
 for registration. Samson tried Baden, where the rector gave him the 
 use of his church. Every day after mass Samson went in procession 
 round the churchyard, singing the office for the dead, and exclaiming 
 from time to time Ecce volant ! meaning that the souls of the departed 
 were taking their flight to heaven. On one of these occasions a wag 
 climbed up the belfry with a bag full of feathers, which he shook in the 
 air, crying out at the'same time Ecce volant. Some were for having the 
 man tried'' and executed, but others excused him saying he was light- 
 headed ; and most of the good people of Baden laughed at the jest, and 
 
 the man escaped.f r • j r ^7 • v 
 
 Samson attempted Bremgarten, but BulUnger, a friend of Zwmgli, 
 who was rector of the parish, resolutely opposed his entrance into the 
 church, upom which Samson excommunicated him, and proceeded to 
 Zurich! Here he again found Zwingli, who had lately been called by 
 the chapter of that city as preacher to the Gross Monster, or cathedral, 
 which office Zwingli accepted on condition that he should not be 
 obhged to preach any thing but the word of God, and that the seller of 
 indulgences should not be admitted. Even the partisans of Rome were 
 now ashamed of the scandalous scenes enacted by Samson. Other can- 
 tons refused him permission to preach ; and at last all remonstrated 
 with the Pope, who recalled Samson in 1519. The monk departed, 
 carrying with him, according to Stettler's Chronicle, no less than 
 800,000 crowns, besides gold and silver plate and jewels. 
 
 Zwingli proceeded now from the examination of the indulgences to 
 that of the other doctrines of the papal church. In this task he was 
 
 * Ruchat, book I., Hettinger. Ruchat gives extracts of some of the indulgences 
 which he saw still in possession of some families of the Pays de Vaud. 
 f Hottinger, p. 41. 
 
 PERIOD IV.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 121 
 
 supported by other men of learning in various parts of Switzerland. 
 Henry Lovit, of Glarus, called Glareanus, Kapflin, who latinized his 
 name into that of Capiton, Hauschein, of Basel, styled CEcolampadius, 
 the celebrated Erasmus, of Rotterdam, who had fixed himself at 
 Basel, where he published his version of the Greek Testament, with 
 notes, Henri Bullinger, of Bremgarten, Thomas Wittenbach, of Bienne, 
 and Berthold Haller, of Bern, — all these assisted in the first work of 
 reformation in Switzerland, lecturing against indulgences, and against 
 the multiplicity of forms of external worship, '* which fatigued the body 
 without enlightening the mind, or purifying the heart ; " they insisted 
 upon prayers being said in the vulgar tongue, and religious instruction 
 being rendered universal and easy. Gradually they w-ere all led, ex- 
 cepting Erasmus, who stopped short of an open schism, to question the 
 right assumed by the Roman see to decide definitively in matters of 
 religion. The court of Rome, whose attention, engrossed by Luther's 
 German reform, had taken, at first, little notice of the Swiss con- 
 troversy, now interfered and threatened. The bishop of Constance for- 
 bade the preaching of the new doctrines in his diocese, and he ordered 
 the chapter of Zurich to see that the bulls issued by the Pope against 
 Luther's doctrines were registered and obeyed. 
 
 The mendicant orders now brought charges of impiety and sedition 
 against Zwingli before the magistrates of Zurich, the reformer having 
 spoken against mendicant friars. Zwingli published his apology, Apolo- 
 geticus Archeteles, in 1522, which was read with avidity. Conferences 
 were held at Zurich between the champions of the two parties ; and 
 although the result, as usual in such cases, led only to a more inveterate 
 animosity and schism, each party claiming the victory for itself, yet it 
 appears that the evangelicals, for such the reformers styled themselves 
 in Switzerland, had a real superiority In the debates over the papal 
 advocates. Attack is generally more spirited than defence. The new 
 doctors were mostly men of pure morals ; they were firmly and con- 
 scientiously persuaded of the justice of their cause ; they were lovers of 
 their country ; they had studied hard in the works of the fathers, and 
 were well acquainted with the early history of the church, whilst the 
 defenders of the papal authority, accustomed till then to pronounce their 
 sentences ex cathedra^ and without fear of a rejoinder, were not in the 
 habit of investigating deeply questions of dogma in their various bear- 
 ings ; with Hebrew and Greek they were little acquainted ; Faber him- 
 self, who was considered a man of learning, acknowledged to Zwingli in 
 a conference held between them, his total ignorance of the former, and 
 his superficial knowledge of the latter language*. There can be no 
 doubt that at that epoch Rgme was lamely and inefifectually sup- 
 ported by its own theologians. In after times her defenders have 
 seen the necessity of deep study and research j they have become more 
 
 ♦ Zwingli, Opera, tom, ii., p. 613, 
 
128 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND* 
 
 [period IV. 
 
 k 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 129 
 
 cautious, and at the same time more eloquent, as the writings of Bellar- 
 mine, Baronius, Bossuet, Gerdil, and others, can amply testify. 
 
 The Swiss reformers, born in a republican country, and at a time 
 when the people, hardened by frequent warfare, still retained much of 
 the sternness of character of their great ancestors who had fought the 
 battles of Swiss independence, partook of their rude energy and national 
 impetuosity ; they had no idea of proceeding by degrees, and scorned 
 all worldly discretion or circumspection. Thus Zwingli, not con- 
 tent with attacking the church, censured also the civil power, reproach- 
 ing his fellow countrymen with their inconsistency in considering 
 it " a sin to eat the flesh of animals during Lent, whilst they thought it 
 lawful to sell human flesh to foreign princes." Upon hearing of this 
 and other similar attacks, the deputies of the cantons assembled at 
 Bern ordered his arrest. The great council, or legislative assembly of 
 Zurich, however, protected him, and in that same year (1523) con- 
 voked all the clergymen of the town and country, and forbade them, 
 under penalties, to preach any doctrines which were not clearly grounded 
 on holy writ ; at the same time they condemned images and image wor- 
 ship. In the following year the service of the mass was formally abo- 
 lished. These decisions, accompanied by the motives of them, were 
 communicated to all the cantons, and to the bishops of Switzerland. 
 Most of the cantons, and especially the three Waldstatten, made strong re- 
 monstrances against the new doctrines, as much perhaps from political 
 as from religious motives ; for the evangelical preachers, as we have 
 seen, condemned the practice of enlisting in foreign wars, which was 
 very prevalent and popular in the mountain districts. Deputies from 
 the cantons repaired to Zurich ; and while they promised that they would 
 reform clerical abuses, they exhorted the Zurichers to abstain from fur- 
 ther innovations, under pain of being expelled from the confederacy. 
 But the great council of Zurich replied, " that it was better to obey 
 God than man," and the work of reformation proceeded. They abolished 
 processions, fastings, and pilgrimages ; they buried the relics ; removed 
 the images, reduced the number of festivals, and established a new 
 liturgy. The convents were suppressed, their inmates released from their 
 vows, and allowed to marry ; the buildings being devoted to hospitals or 
 schools^ and their revenues applied to the support of the new establish- 
 ment, and to that of the clergy. The chapter of Zurich willingly gave up 
 its rights and property to the state, and its twenty-four canons became pro- 
 fessors, preachers, or tutors, and had an allowance secured to them for life. 
 Thus Zurich became the first reformed canton in Switzerland. The 
 cities of St. Gall and of Mulhausen soon followed the example, and the 
 canton of Schaffliausen, and somewhat later that of Basle, did the like. 
 
 Bern hesitated, its councils were divided, and anomalous enactments 
 followed each other. Endeavouring to avoid an open schism with 
 Rome, its magistrates curtailed the authority and revenues of the clergy, 
 
 period IV.] 
 
 and seemed disposed to allow both parties to follow their respective doc- 
 trines in peace, and thus save the country from civil war. They gave 
 permission to the nuns of Koenigsfelden to leave their convent, and 
 enter the marriage state. Several of them married young men of the 
 principal families. Nicholas Watteville, provost of the chapter of Bern, 
 gave up his titles and revenues to the state, and married Clara May. 
 Marriages of nuns and of churchmen took place likewise in several 
 other cantons, and gave occasion to the sarcasms of the Catholic party. 
 Female influence was certainly favourable to the evangelicals, and made 
 proselytes to their cause, which is not to be wondered at, considering the 
 gloomy and irksome restrictions under which the clergy had been placed 
 by the church of Rome. 
 
 Conferences were opened again in the town of Baden, in the year 
 1526, between the theologians of the two parties. The Catholics had 
 sent for a celebrated doctor of divinity from Ingolstadt, named Eck or 
 Eckius, and he was supported by two capuchins well versed in the scho- 
 lastic subtleties of those times. Zwingli was off'ered a safe conduct, to 
 which, however, he did not trust. Eck had been heard to say, that 
 " with heretics there were no better arguments than fire and sword;'* 
 besides, about that time an evangelical preacher had been burnt at 
 Lindau, and another had been drowned at Freyburg in the Brisgau. 
 Gi]colampadius, however, Louis (Exlin, Berthold Haller, and other evan- 
 gelicals, repaired to Baden. The disputations lasted eighteen days; 
 during which vituperation and recriminations were resorted to oftener 
 than argument. Those who are curious to see the style in which con- 
 troversy was carried on in those days, might consult the exposition of the 
 Baden conference, published afterwards by the Catholics, under the title, 
 Canssa Helvetica Orthodoxa; fidei, disputatio Helvetiorum in Baden, 
 contra Martinum Lutherum, Zwinglium, (Ecolampadium^ etc.^ Luzern, 
 1528. The Catholic cantons, Schwytz, Uri, Unterwalden, Zug, Luzern, 
 and Freyburg, became, however, after this conference, strengthened in 
 their hostility to the evangelical doctrines, and they issued decrees 
 of proscription against its professors in all places subject to them. In 
 the territories of the cantons themselves this course was comparatively 
 easy, as the new doctrines had not made much progress there, but the case 
 was diff'erent in the bailiwicks which were held by the Catholic cantons 
 in common with those which, either like Zurich, had embraced the 
 evangelical doctrines, or like Bern, wished to enforce toleration, and avoid 
 measures of persecution. Accordingly, the bailiwicks of Aargau, Thur- 
 gau, Rheinthal, Sargans, and Baden, became a wide field of discord and 
 violence. It must be here observed, that numerous proselytes to evan- 
 gelical reform displayed that fanatical spirit which often characterizes 
 new converts ; and that others, indeed, were far from inquiring into and 
 still farther from understanding the new doctrines they had nominally 
 adopted. These men, of whom many had rioted in licentiousness in the 
 
 II 
 
130 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period IV. 
 
 Italian wars, and whose sole philosophy consisted in hating priests and 
 churches, and sneering at religious observances, went about in troops, 
 heedless of the mandates of their preachers and magistrates, insulting 
 those who still remained attached to the religion of their fathers, pro- 
 faning the churches, pulling down the images, and even the crucifix 
 and the cross, the common symbol of redemption, trampling them under 
 feet, and abusing, in short, their triumph like savages, in all the brutal 
 pride of physical superiority. Several monasteries were attacked and 
 plundered. A shoemaker of Zurich was, for an act of this sort, impri- 
 soned and banished ; but having wandered to Klingnau, in one of the 
 bailiwicks of Aargau, and there again insulted the Catholic worship, he 
 was taken to Luzern, and there executed. 
 
 The unfortunate people of the bailiwicks were distracted between the 
 two parties, who preponderated according as the landvogt, or governor, 
 was from a Catholic or a reformed canton. The county of Baden at 
 first adopted the reformation, and the famous convent of Wettingen on 
 the Limmat was converted into a school. But afterwards Baden re- 
 turned to Catholicism, to which it has remained strictly attached ever 
 since, and Wettingen is at the present day inhabited by its wealthy 
 monks. In Thurgau, on the contrary, the Catholic cantons began by 
 forbidding the reading of the Bible, but the reformed religion afterwards 
 gained the ascendancy, and has maintained it to this day, as well as in 
 the Toggenburg, and the Rheinthal. 
 
 In the midst of the increasing discord, a new firebrand was thrown by 
 another set of fanatics. Two German enthusiasts fancied that the 
 epoch of the kingdom of Christ on earth was come, and that they wuic 
 to be its apostles. There was to be no more sin, no magistrates or 
 princes, no taxes, no tithes, no clergy of any sort. The poor peasants 
 of Germany, oppressed by their rulers, distracted by wars, and bewil- 
 dered with theological disputes which they did not understand, believed 
 the two impostors, one of whom, by name Munzer, seems to have been 
 the most popular. He preached community of goods, and the social and 
 domestic equality of all men. His disciples brought before him what 
 property they had, and it was equally divided. Munzer was proclaimed 
 king, but his kingdom was short, and he ended it on the scaffold. 
 These sectarians were commonly called wiedertdufer, i. e. anabaptists, 
 because they rebaptized adults. They spread into Switzerland. Two 
 men of Zurich became their chiefs. The dissolute, the turbulent, the 
 bankrupts in character joined them. They renounced every form of 
 worship, they assembled in great multitudes in the fields or forests, they 
 threw off all allegiance to the laws or magistrates. Some of their 
 bands had their wives in common. Thomas Schmoucker chopped off 
 with his axe his brother's head on the Muhlwegg, thinking of imitating 
 the example of Abraham, and offering a holocaust for the sins of the 
 world. These were the excrescences, the spurious offshoots of the re- 
 
 PERIOD IV.] ' 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 131 
 
 formation. Whenever an impulse is given to large masses by either 
 political or religious innovation, men of weak or disordered intellects, or 
 of corrupt passions, will plunge headlong beyond all rational bounds, 
 not knowing where to stop. Strong measures are then necessary to pre- 
 serve peace, and secure the community from confusion. The cantons, 
 both Catholic and reformed, tried persuasion and mild correction, but to 
 no purpose ; capital punishment was resorted to against the most out- 
 rageous of the leaders, but they went to the scaffold with the zeal of 
 martyrs. At last Bern assembled 6,000 men to put down the 
 bands which were infesting its territory, and were living in a state of 
 open rebellion. Freyburg and Soleure joined their contingents. Zurich 
 took similar measures, and by degrees the sect fell into disrepute, and at 
 last became harmless and unnoticed. The Catholics, however, did not 
 fail to throw the blame of these lamentable excesses on the new doctrines, 
 as being, at least, the indirect cause of all the mischief. 
 
 The council of Bern, which had long proceeded on religious questions 
 with a caution bordering on irresolution, came at length to a determina- 
 tion. In 1528 it announced the opening of a new and final conference, 
 in order to throw all possible light on the pending controversy. The 
 four bishops of Constance, Basel, Lausanne, and Sion, were invited to 
 attend, as well as the principal theologians of the two parties, the clergy 
 of the city and canton of Bern, and, generally, the learned of any country 
 or faith, with a guarantee of perfect freedom and security. The four 
 bishops, however, refused to attend, and six cantons, namely, the three 
 Waldstatten, Luzern, Zug, and Freyburg, declined sending any deputies. 
 The emperor Charles V. wrote to the confederation, advising them to 
 postpone the meeting, and wait for the council of the whole Church, the 
 assembling of which was then in contemplation. Bern, however, paid 
 no deference to these remonstrances. A great number of clergymen, and 
 men of learning, came from various parts of Switzerland, and the 
 neighbouring countries. Zwingli himself came with an escort. The 
 deputation of Zurich consisted of twenty-five distinguished citizens and 
 councilmen. The cantons of Glarus, Appenzell, Basel, and Schaff- 
 hausen; the towns of St. Gall, Bienne, and Lausanne, and the league of 
 the Grisons, sent each its theologians. It was altogether a solemn as- 
 sembly, the most important that had yet met in Switzerland on this 
 great controversy. Regulations were proclaimed by the council at 
 Bern for the maintenance of order, and to prevent insvilt or inj'ury on 
 either side. It was at the same time proclaimed that no argument 
 would he admitted in the conference which was not grounded on a text 
 of Scripture, to the exclusion of other authorities. This may be con- 
 sidered as deciding the question against the Catholics, in limine^ by re- 
 fusing the authority of the popes and of the church. Many Catholics, 
 however, attended ; the conference lasted nineteen days, and here again the 
 evangelical doctors displayed more learning thau their adversaries. A 
 
 k2 
 
132 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period IV. 
 
 zealous Catholic priest of Soleure observed in a letter, whicli was after- 
 wards published, that " the result would have been very different had 
 the bishops, and the other dignified ckrgy, paid more attention to study, 
 and devoted less time to their mistresses.'* 
 
 When the conference was closed, the council of Bern, considering the 
 result as decidedly in favour of reformation, decreed the abolition of 
 mass in the capital. They assembled the citizens of every condition, 
 and req'.iested their oath that they would support the government in 
 what they were going to do for the good of the state. They then ad- 
 dressed to all the subjects of the canton a general edict of reformation, 
 consisting of thirteen articles,* explaining the new institutions of the 
 reformed church with regard to dogma, worship, and discipline. The 
 jurisdiction of the bishops in any part of the canton was declared to be 
 at an end. Those parish priests who were refractory against the re- 
 formed doctrine were expelled, the images were suppressed. The in- 
 come of the endowments enjoyed by Cathohcs was secured to the present 
 occupiers for life, to be afterwards appropriated to beneficial purposes. 
 Clergymen were free to marry, all sorts of meat could be used at all 
 times, but " in a spirit of thankfulness, and without giving scandal to 
 their weaker brethren ;'* drunkenness was forbidden, taverns were or- 
 dered to be shut up at nine o'clock. Those monks who wished to 
 remain in their convents were allowed to do so, but they were forbidden 
 to admit novices. 
 
 These regulations, conceived in a spirit of justice, charity, and libe- 
 rality, while they reflect the greatest honour on the councils of Bern, 
 afford a most favourable contrast to the harsh and rash fanaticism of the 
 reformers in other countries ; and Bern became, and has continued ever 
 since, the steadiest pillar of reformation in Switzerland. At the same 
 time they prohibited for the future receiving pensions from foreign states, 
 or enlisting in foreign services, so far as this could be done without 
 infringing the treaties already existing with France, and other powers; 
 and, in fact, the following year Bern rejected the urgent request of the 
 king of France to extend the capitulation to a further contingent of 
 troops. This good resolve, however, was only kept while the religious 
 fervour lasted which had dictated it. 
 
 In November, 1528, the five Catholic cantons f and the Valals 
 formed a league for the defence of the Catholic faith, which was called 
 the " league of the Valais." The simple and ignorant population of 
 the latter country had, among their secluded mountains, but lately 
 heard of the new doctrines by means of some preachers from Zurich, 
 who made considerable impression upon them ; being solicited by the 
 Catholic cantons to join their league they had answered at first, " Let 
 the priests and the new ministers dispute these matters among them- 
 
 * See Appendix, No. iii. 
 
 f By this appellation the old central cantons are always meant la this period, 
 namely, the Waldstittten, Luzern, and Zug. 
 
 PERIOD IV.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 133 
 
 selves;" but they were subsequently gained over by their neighbours, 
 ihe canton of Freyburg joined the league afterwards, and, what was 
 worse, the hereditary enemy of Switzerland, Ferdinand of Austria, kin^ 
 of Hungary and brother of Charles V., was admitted the following year 
 into the alliance. ^ ^ 
 
 Zurich and Bern, alarmed at this, formed a particular alliance 
 between themselves, which they called Christian co-hurghersliip, to 
 which the towns of Bienne, St. Gall, Mulhausen, and Constance 
 acceded. The objects were, their mutual defence, and the protection 
 ot their subjects of the common bailiwicks who would embrace the 
 reformed doctrines, leaving to the rest full liberty of conscience, and ob- 
 serving m every other matter which did not concern religion the obliga- 
 hons which bound them to the other cantons of the confederation, 
 ilus treaty was concluded at Bern on the 3d of March, 1529 
 
 The five remaining cantons were divided. At Schaffhausen, the 
 Little Council, or executive, and many of the principal families, remained 
 attached to Catholicism ; but the burghers, assembled in the general or 
 sovereign council, in 1529, carried the resolutions for the reformation 
 by majority. The magistrates had already enjoined the two convents 
 hat were m the town to dispose by sales of the lands they possessed in 
 the district of Hegau. The clergy were allowed to marry ; but at the 
 same tinie they were strictly forbidden to keep concubines, which seems 
 to have been an openly prevalent practice among the clergy in Switzer- 
 land till that time. The mass and images were suppressed. Several 
 families emigrated from Schaffhausen on this occasion. The country 
 populatiori remained divided for some time longer; but the following 
 year, 1530, the evangelical faith obtained tlie ascendancy, which it 
 has maintained ever since. There w^as, however, no blood shed at 
 schaffhausen. 
 
 At Basle the people fought in the streets, the burghers against their 
 Ca ho he magistrates; they destroyed the images, and at last drove the 
 Cathohc clergy out of the city. The service was ordered to be read in 
 Orerman Most of the nobles, remaining attached to the old faith, were 
 excluded for ever from the senate. The famous Erasmus, a man of 
 quiet, studious habits, left Basle amidst all these tumults; but he 
 returned soon after, and passed the remainder of his life in that city, 
 although he never would openly abjure the doctrines of Rome. NichoIc4 
 Diesbach, coadjutor of the late bishop, and upon whom that rich see 
 devolved, refused the preferment. Basle, as well as Schaffhausen, was 
 ranked from that time among the reformed cantons. 
 
 At Glarus, the two parties being equally divided, the struggle was pro- 
 tracted, and the greatest confusion prevailed for a time in its sequestered 
 valleys The worthy landamman, CEbly, by his wisdom and firmness, 
 saved his country from greater calamities. He succeeded in having a com- 
 mission appointed, consisting of thirty members, half of each party who 
 
134 
 
 HISTORY OF SWIT35ERLAND. 
 
 [period IV^ 
 
 drew the articles of a treaty of pacification, including a general amnesty 
 for the past. It was an edict of mutual toleration, which has ever since 
 maintained peace in that little country, where Protestants and Catholics 
 have continued to this day to live mixed together in good harmony, 
 sharing without distinction in the government and administration of the 
 canton, and in several parishes performing their respective services 
 one after the other in the same church,* a rare example of religious 
 
 forbearance. 
 
 In the canton of Appenzell, the reformed doctrines gained ground, 
 chiefly in the external Roden or districts, while the interior and more 
 secluded parts remained attached to Catholicism ; and a separation fol- 
 lowed, by which each of the two districts formed a separate state, 
 although still representing together but one canton of the confederation. 
 
 At Soleure, where Berthold Haller, the Bernese reformer, had intro- 
 duced the new doctrines, the burghers of the city were mostly in favour 
 of reformation, while the magistrates and the chapter of St. Urs were 
 opposed to it. The Great Council, being divided between the two reli- 
 gions, wished to establish a full liberty of conscience for all. They pro- 
 claimed, "that faith is a free gift of God, which nobody can give, limit, 
 or take away ; that the empire over consciences belongs to God alone, and 
 that consequently all the subjects of the state have a right to follow that 
 doctrine which they think the best." Discord, however, continued to 
 rage in the canton. Bern interposed several times to restore harmony. 
 The reformed doctrines had spread largely in the rural districts ; out of 
 forty-four communes in which the canton is divided, thirty-four had em- 
 braced the reformation. At last, in 1533, the two parties broke out 
 into open war ; the evangelicals were obliged to leave the town. The 
 Catholics, thus having gained the ascendancy in the councils, by degrees 
 excluded the Protestants from the whole country, and Soleure has 
 remained a Catholic canton ever since. But this was not effected with- 
 out great struggles, of which the chronicler Stettler has given a full and 
 interesting account. Soleure is the only canton in which the reforma- 
 tion, after having once obtained a superiority, has been afterwards 
 
 obliterated. 
 
 The canton of Freyburg evinced from the beginning a dislike to the 
 
 reformed doctrines. A few individuals are mentioned, among others a 
 
 canon of the church of St. Nicholas, who favoured the new faith in 
 
 1522 ; but they found such a strenuous opposition that they were 
 
 * This has also been the case of late years in some communes of the canton 
 of Bern. At Lausanne, in the canton de Vaud, a small church has been allotted 
 for the common use of three communions which dissent from the national Helvetic 
 church, namely, Catholic, Lutheran, and Church of England, the latter congrega- 
 tion consisting of the English residents or travellers. On Sundays the Catholics 
 perform their mass first, after which a screen or curtain is drawn before their altar 
 and imagt-s, and then the other two congregations perform their respective services 
 in succession. At Geneva the English congregation have the use of one of the 
 churches belonging to the established communion, but the Catholics have a separate 
 church for themselves. 
 
 PERIOD IV.] 
 
 .HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND- 
 
 135 
 
 obliged to desist. The canon was expatriated. Great corruption ap- 
 pears to have prevailed among the clergy of Freyburg at that time, i^ we 
 are to judge from certain letters intercepted on the Bernese territory in 
 1530, as mentioned by Ruchat, vol. iii. p. 63, in which a country 
 curate wrote to a friend at Fffeyburg to send him a courtezan whom he 
 had engaged for his concubine, and also about the gallantries of a 
 famous preacher, Father Jerome by name. Freyburg, however, did not 
 take an active part in the religious wars that followed. 
 
 The reformation spread early among the Grisons, but did not produce 
 at first any serious troubles. Both parties availed themselves of the 
 opportunity to reduce the power of the Church ; the feudal rights of the 
 bishop of Coire and of the abbeys were suppressed, the corvees abo- 
 lished. The rights of fishing and hunting were restored to the 
 respective communes. The foundations for masses and festivals were 
 applied to relieve the wants of the poor. In all this both Catholic and 
 Protestant agreed, and without quarrelling about theological contro- 
 versies, they turned them to the account of political liberty. 
 
 The town of Bienne was one of the first reformed, through the agency 
 of its citizen Wyttenbach. That of Mulhausen, an ally of the cantons, 
 though without the borders of Switzerland, also embraced the re- 
 formation. 
 
 The most strenuous champions of Catholicism were from the first 
 the five old cantons^ namely, the three Waldstatten, Luzern, and Zug. 
 There, reformation made no inroads, or if it did at first at Luzern, it 
 was soon effectually checked by severe measures ; and strictly Catholic 
 they have remained ever since. These five cantons had frequent dis- 
 putes with Zurich and Bern about the common bailiwicks ; a new sub- 
 ject of discord arose concerning the country of Hasli and Oberland. 
 The inhabitants of those sequestered valleys, subject to Bern, but with 
 the enjoyment of important privileges, had embraced the reformation at 
 the same time as the capital. The convent of Interlaken being sup- 
 pressed, the subjects of the convent in the valley of Grindelwald thought 
 they would have no more tithes, offerings, and services to pay. But Bern 
 claimed the payment of these dues, as having devolved on the state. 
 The peasantry then thought they had gained nothing by the reforma- 
 tion, they listened to the suggestions of the expelled monks, they 
 drove away the evangelical preachers, and rose in arms and advanced to 
 Thun. Bern, wishing to avoid hostilities, appealed to the men of 
 Thun and of the neighbouring district, and invited them to decide upon 
 the question. The decision was, "That the temporal rights of the 
 convent devolved on the temporal authorities of the state, and could not 
 be considered as the property of the tenants." The insurgents returned 
 home dissatisfied vvdth the verdict. 
 
 Next, the mountaineers of Hasli, excited by their neighbours the 
 abbot of Engelberg and the people of Unterwalden, abolished, in 1528, 
 by a majority of votes, the reformed service, and sent for a supply of 
 
136 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period IV. 
 
 priests from the Catholic cantons. The other valleys of the Oberland 
 followed the example ; 800 Unterwalders marched over Mount Brunig 
 to their assistance, and advanced as far as Unterseen. Meantime, those 
 inhabitants who remained attached to the reformation applied to Bern for 
 protection. Bern behaved prudently, remonstrated, sent deputies ; but 
 to no effect. At last it put its troops in motion: the insurgents lost 
 conra-e, the Unterwalders returned home, and the country was recon- 
 quered without fighting. The people of Hash were deprived of their 
 banner and of their landamman, and the leaders were severely punished. 
 The rest were obliged to ask pardon in the midst of a circle formed by 
 
 the Bernese soldiers. 
 
 The canton of Unterwalden made some sort of excuse for the assist- 
 ance it had given to the insurgents. But other serious causes of irrita- 
 tion occurred in the common bailiwicks, especially in Thurgau, Gaster, 
 and the Toggenburg. Zurich demanded the free exercise of religion for 
 the people of those districts, among whom the doctrines of the reforma- 
 tion had widely spread. But the bailiffs sent there by the Cathohc 
 cantons, in their turn, persecuted the evangelical preachers and their 
 proselytes. Jacob Keyser, a minister from the canton of Zurich, as he 
 was one day going to preach as usual at the parish of Oberkirch, in the 
 bailiwick of Gaster, which was subject to the two cantons of Schwytz 
 and Glarus, was seized by four armed men and taken to Schwytz. 
 After seven days' trial, he was sentenced to be burnt. In vain Glarus 
 remonstrated, in vain Zurich protested, the unhappy Keyser was burnt 
 publicly at Schwytz at the end of May, 1529. In the midst of the 
 ■flames he conrinued to invoke the name of the Lord Jesus. Several 
 traders from Zurich, who had gone to Schwytz on business, were beaten, 
 pelted with stones, and obliged to escape. The Zurichers, on their 
 side, seized the landamman Wehrii of Unterwalden, on his return from 
 Thurgau, where he had, in his capacity of bailiff, persecuted the new 
 doctrines ; and although he wore his cloak with the colours of Unter- 
 walden, in token of his office, he was publicly executed at Zurich. 
 
 All these and other grievances produced at last an open rupture. 
 Zurich declared war by a manifesto against the five Catholic cantons, 
 and claimed the assistance of Bern. The latter put in motion a body 
 of 10,000 men. St. Gall, Mulhausen, Bienne sent also their contin- 
 gents to the evangelical cause. These allied troops advanced by Cappel 
 towards Schwytz. The five cantons marched to Baar to meet them ; 
 and thus 24,000 Swiss stood opposite to each other, ready to fight. 
 John (Ebly, the landamman of Glarus, who had already saved his own 
 canton from civil war, hastened to the field between the combatants, 
 and interfered with humane zeal in the name of his own and the other 
 neutral cantons, namely Glarus, Appenzell, Soleure, Basel, and Schaff- 
 hausen. Bern appointed a conference to take place at Aarau ; and a 
 suspension of hostilities having been immediately proclaimed, the soldiers 
 of both armies were seen mingling on friendly terms like brethren, 
 
 PERIOD IV.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 137 
 
 Seeing which, Jacob Sturm, deputy of Strasburg, who had also come on 
 the good errand of peace, exclaimed, "You Swiss are a strange people, 
 for although you seem divided you are still united, and do not forget 
 your ancient 'alliance I" Peace was happily concluded on the 26th of 
 June 1529. This was the first religious peace between the Swiss, and 
 it served as a precedent for subsequent treaties. The articles of the 
 peace were seventeen in number. The principal ones were : that the 
 Catholic cantons should renounce their league with Ferdinand of 
 Austria, the treaty being destroyed in presence of the deputies of all the 
 cantons, the seals being first torn off : that no endeavours should be 
 made to induce the five Catholic cantons or their subjects to embrace 
 the reformed religion. With regard to the common bailiwicks, every 
 parish should decide by plurality of votes whether they would have mass 
 or not, and abstain or not from meat on fast-days, and their decision 
 should be the rule in force as long as the inhabitants continued of the 
 same mind. That those parishes which had already abolished the mass 
 and the images should be left undisturbed. That a full amnesty should 
 be given on both sides for past transactions. The principle of the 
 whole treaty was, perfect toleration. Schwytz was to pay a pension to 
 the children of the murdered Keyser, otherwise called Schlosser. Lastly, 
 none of the cantons were to hold together partial diets, except for pri- 
 vate and particular business ; and the old covenant of Stantz, agreed to 
 in 1481,* was sworn to again as the national compact of the whole Swiss 
 
 federation. 
 
 This peace was favourable to the evangelicals, inasmuch as it pro- 
 tected the spreading of their doctrines through conviction, but not by 
 violent means, which is the fundamental principle of the reformed faith. 
 The Catholic cantons were reluctantly obliged to sign it, because they 
 found themselves forsaken by Austria and by the pope. These two 
 powers were then at variance, since Charies V.'s army had stormed and 
 piUa-cd Rome in 1527. On the other side, the Turks, under Sultan 
 Solvman, had overrun Hungary and besieged Vienna, giving full em- 
 plovment to Ferdinand, who, as well as his brother the emperor, deemed 
 it necessary to conciliate the Protestant princes of Germany. Thus 
 these ';rurkish and Italian wars proved indirectly the means of sheltering 
 the growth of reformation both in Germany and Switzeriand. 
 
 Meantime a dispute had arisen between the Swiss evangelicals and 
 the great German reformer, Luther, on the subject of the eucharist. 
 Luther understood the words pronounced by Jesus at the last supper, 
 « This is my body," in their literal sense, thus acknowledgmg, like the 
 Catholics, the real presence in the consecrated bread. Carolstadt, one 
 of his disciples, refuted this opinion, upon which Luther, through his 
 influence with his great protector, the elector of Saxony, obliged 
 Carolstadt to leave the country, and take refuge, in 1524, m Switzer- 
 
 * See page 104. 
 
138 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. [PERIOD IV- 
 
 land, where he published several pamphlets on the disputed subject. 
 Zwingli's opinion was likewise opposed to the real presence ; he con- 
 sidered that the consecrated bread was a sjTnbol of the body of Chri&t, 
 a pledge left to the faithful of their communion with their Master, and 
 of their participation in his work of redemption. Zwingli received 
 Carolstadt kindly, which greatly incensed Luther, who, with an incon- 
 sistency lamentable, but common among party leaders, whether in reli- 
 gion or politics, while he was attacking the pretensions of Rome to 
 infallibility, and complaining of its intolerance, acted in this affair as if 
 he were himself infallible, and were entitled to persecute those who 
 happened to differ from him on one particular point of belief. 
 
 Mallet, the continuator of Muller's history, observes that " men, as 
 long as they are weak and oppressed, claim toleration and liberty for 
 themselves ; but as soon as they become strong, they act in their turn as 
 unjustly and oppressively as their former persecutors." Luther repelled 
 the good offices of Bucer and the other Strasburg doctors, who wished 
 to avoid a schism in the rising church ; he said " that either he or 
 Zwingli and his followers must he the servants of the devil; that he 
 would not give way to those who wanted to weaken his reputation." 
 The landgrave of Hesse invited Luther and Zwingli to meet at Mar- 
 burg, in 1529, in order to come to an understanding on the point in 
 controversy. Zwingli came with (Ecolampadius, and Luther with 
 Melancthon, a man of a gentler mind and of an amiable temper, who 
 lamented these dissensions, but was overborne by the impetuous influ- 
 ence of Luther. The two parties had several conferences, but each 
 remained convinced of its own opinion. The landgrave prevailed on 
 them to shake hands at parting ; but Luther said pubhcly afterwards, 
 ** We have, by so doing, given the Zwinglians a token of Christian 
 charity, but not a title t;o our brotherhood." The landgrave, however, 
 was favourable to Zwir%li's doctrines, and ever afterwards he and his 
 successors bestowed their protection on the Evangelicals, as Zwingli's 
 followers styled themselves. 
 
 In the year 1530, the reformed religion made great* progress in 
 western Switzerland. Farel, a native of Dauphiny, a man of zealous 
 temper, who had been driven out of France by persecution, was the 
 evangelical preacher in all that part of the country where French is 
 spoken. He went first to several places in the Pays de Vaud ; he 
 preached also at Orbe, where he was severely assaulted by the women, 
 who took part with a Franciscan friar, who was preaching at the same 
 time there. Poor Farel was thrown down, beaten and scratched by the 
 infuriated women, some of whom were persons of rank, and he would have 
 been killed had not the Bernese bailiff saved him. He met with better 
 success at Morat, where the reformation was established. Thence he 
 proceeded to Neuchatel. That country was under the government of 
 Joan of Hochberg, the descendant of the counts of Neuchatel ^ but the 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 139 
 
 PERIOD IV.] 
 
 burghers of the town were allied by co-burghership with Bern and other 
 Swiss cantons. Already, in 1519, complaints had been made against 
 the clergy of Neuchatel. The canons enjoyed great revenues, but never 
 preached or did any other service but chauntmg the psalms, and they were 
 called " the dumb canons." The cantons, who at that time, owing to 
 some differences with the countess, had taken temporary possession of 
 Neuchatel, sent deputies to oblige the chapter to appoint a public 
 preacher. But on the reinstatement of the countess matters resumed 
 their former state. Farel was assaulted by the people at Valengin, 
 owing to the intemperance of one of his disciples, who snatched the host 
 • out of the hands of the officiating priest, saying " that was only a poor 
 piece of bread, and not the God they ought to adore." At Neuchatel, 
 on the contrary, the people burnt the images, upset the altars, and, m 
 spite of the opposition of the authorities, demanded that the question of 
 religion should be decided in a general assembly by the majority of 
 votes. They sent also to Bern for support. The councils of Bern 
 acted with their accustomed prudence and moderation. They first wrote 
 to Farel to be more temperate in his speech and acts, and above all " to 
 explain well to the people the nature of Christian liberty, which did not 
 mean bodily licence." The reformers having claimed the protection of 
 the landsfrieden, or " general peace," which had just been concluded 
 among the Swiss, and according to which liberty of conscience was 
 granted to those who adopted the reformation, Bern at last sent a 
 deputation to Neuchatel to protect the burghers, who having assembled 
 on the 4th of November, decided by a majority of eighteen votes that 
 mass should be no longer performed in the town, that images should be 
 removed, and that other Catholic observances should be abolished. At 
 the same time the property of the monasteries was to be respected, the 
 census or poll tax and tithes were to be paid to the countess, and in all 
 other respects the conditions of the landsfneden were to be observed. 
 After this they placed an inscription over the gate of the principal 
 church, stating that on the 23d of October idolatry was abolished there. 
 Farel proceeded next to the valleys of the Jura, which were under the 
 lordship of the bishop of Basle. The Val St. Imier embraced the 
 reformation ; but in the neighbouring valley or provostship of Moutiers 
 Grandval great disturbances arose. This district was under the feudal 
 jurisdiction of the chapter of Moutiers, of whom the people had been 
 complaining for some time, on account of their extortions for burials, 
 wax-tapers, and other pretences. Once a year, it seems, the provost 
 assembled the people in the church, and solemnly challenged them to 
 acknowledge whether they had been guilty of fornication or any other 
 secret sin ; and every one who did so acknowledge, or who was informed 
 against, was tried by a court of justice, which assembled in the church, 
 and the delinquent was fined three livres of Basle money. On arriving 
 at Moutiers, Farel found, therefore, the minds of the people disposed to 
 
140 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period IV. 
 
 listen to hira. They at once broke the images and prevented the service 
 of the mass. The bishop of Basle, hearing of this, wrote to the council 
 at Bern, requesting them to use their influence to remove Farel. Bern 
 wrote a monitory letter to Farel, recommending him to restrain his zeal 
 within proper bounds, and above all to explain to the people the nature 
 of evangelical liberty, *' for there are many persons who imagine that 
 if they join us they will be freed from the payment of tithes and 
 other duties." 
 
 Meantime the affairs of the reformation in Germany had come to a 
 crisis. In March, 1529, the diet assembled at Speyer passed, by a ma- 
 jority of votes, a proclamation restraining the liberty of conscience. 
 The electors of Saxony and of Brandenberg, the duke of Luneburg, the 
 landgrave of Hesse, and the prince of Anhalt, drew up a solemn protest 
 against this resolution, appealing to the emperor, who was then in 
 Spain, or to a free council. The imperial cities of Augsburg, Nurem- 
 berg, Ulm, Constance, Lindau, St. Gall, «&c., signed the protest and the 
 appeal. Hence the name of Protestants, which originally was only 
 applied to the German reformers, but which afterwards became a general 
 appellation for all the reformed churches who seceded from Rome. 
 
 Charles V. having settled his disputes with pope Clement VII. and 
 with France, turned his attention to the religious affairs of Gennjiny. 
 At a conference with the pope at Bologna, in November, 1.529, Clement 
 prevailed on him to promise that if the Lutherans could not be brought 
 back to the bosom of the church by mild means, which Charles naturally 
 preferred, they should be forced by arms. In January, 1530, the eni< 
 peror wrote to the states and princes of Germany to assemble in diet at 
 Augsburg in the following April, and that the evangelical members 
 should bring a written profession of their faith both in German and 
 Latin, in order that differences might be settled, and a general 
 reconciliation effected. The reformed theologians of the various states 
 were thereupon each commissioned to write a summary of their doctrines ; 
 and the task of examining all these papers, and of extracting from them 
 a good and explicit confession of faith, which should serve all the 
 German reformers, was entrusted to Melancthon. This was an arduous 
 charge, especially to a man of Melancthon's concihatory temper, which 
 greatly differed from that of Luther and of most other reformers. He 
 acquitted himself, however, creditably of his task. When the confes- 
 sion was written, John elector of Saxony sent it to Luther at Coburg to 
 revise it. The latter approved of it without any exceptions. On the 
 25th of June, 1530, the elector, accompanied by John Frederic his son, 
 by George margrave of Brandenburg, by Ernest and his brother Francis,' 
 dukes of Bnmswick and Luneburg, by Philip landgrave of Hesse, and 
 Wolfgang prince of Anhalt, and by the deputies of two imperial to'wns, 
 brought into the diet the confession of faith sanctioned by Luther, and 
 presented it to the emperor. It was then read aloud by the chancellor 
 
 PERIOD IV.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 141 
 
 in the presence of all the states of the empire. From that time it has 
 been known as the Confession of Augsburg. The article of it concern- 
 ing the mass had been somewhat softened down in order to propitiate 
 Charles V., who had declared, that he would allow the Lutherans to 
 attack popery in every thing except the subject of the mass ; " for the 
 mass was in his heart, and he could not bear to part with it." The fol - 
 lowing year, however, 1531, the Confession of Augsburg was printed at 
 Wittenberg, with some alterations on that as well as on the subject of 
 the eucharist ; and this corrected edition has been ever since considered 
 as the profession of faith of the Lutheran churches. 
 
 Zwingli, on his side, published his confession of faith, which differed 
 from that of Augsburg, especially on the subject of the real presence, 
 which he totally denied. This confession, which was called Evangelical, 
 was also taken to the emperor by the deputies of three cantons, Bern, 
 Zurich, and Basle, who had meantime entered into an alliance with the 
 landgrave of Hesse and the city of Strasburg to defend each other 
 against any one who should molest them concerning their religion. It 
 is a remarkable fact that Francis I. at that time asked to be received 
 into the alliance, but his offer was declined.* 
 
 On the 19th of November, 1530, Charles V. published an edict, 
 enjoining all subjects of the empire to live according to the regulations 
 of the Roman church, until a general council should be assembled, and 
 threatening those who should not conform to this order. It was then 
 that the German reformed states assembled at Smalkald, in December, 
 and entered into a resolution to defend each other mutually, and to 
 repel force by force. This was called the League of Smalkald. They 
 also protested, with the elector of Saxony at their head, against the 
 election of Ferdinand, Charles's brother, as king of the Romans, by 
 which Charles, who was occupied with the affairs of Spain and Italy, 
 meant to transfer to his brother the imperial authority. Ferdinand, 
 however, was elected at Cologne in January, 1531. 
 
 The reformed cantons were invited to join the League of Smalkald at 
 the instance of the landgrave of Hesse, who saw the urgency of the Pro- 
 testants strengthening themselves by all means within their reach ; but 
 the elector of Saxony imposed as a condition that they should all sign 
 the Confession of Augsburg. This the Swiss reformers refused to do, 
 upon which the elector of Saxony said that although the alliance of the 
 Swiss cantons would have been most useful to the Protestant league, 
 yet " his conscience would not permit him to ally himself with people 
 who differed so essentially from the rest upon the dogma of the eucha- 
 rist." From this cause the Swiss evangelicals continued separate from 
 the German Protestants, or Lutherans, ever after, and they remained in 
 great measure, and perhaps luckily for them, strangers to the religious 
 
 Hottinger, p. 580. 
 
142 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period IV. 
 
 wars of the empire. But there were in Western Germany many who 
 followed the evangelical or Swiss doctrines, among whom were the 
 elector palatine and the landgrave of Hesse. In a great synod held at 
 Bern in 1532 the articles of the "Helvetic Confession of Faith " were 
 finally established and proclaimed * They are essentially the same at 
 those of the French reformed church, of the kirk of Scotland, and ot 
 the greater part of the churches of the Netherlands. 
 
 The five Catholic cantons, dissatisfied with the spreading of the 
 reformed doctrines in consequence of the liberty of conscience granted 
 by the religious peace of 1529, and emboldened by the appearance 
 of affairs in Germany, sought an opportunity for a fresh quarrel. 
 The reformed cantons, and Zurich especially, were not long before 
 they furnished them with a plausible one. Zurich and the reformed 
 part of Glarus had been promoting the reformation in the territories 
 of the abbot of St. Gall with a violence of zeal that made them 
 overlook the dictates of justice and the faith due to existing treaties. 
 On the death of the abbot, in March, 1529, the four cantons, pro- 
 tectors of the abbey, Zurich and Glarus on one side, and Luzern and 
 Schwytz on the other, disagreed about the election of his successor. 
 The monks had elected Kilian ; but Zurich refused to acknowledge 
 him "unless he proved by the Scriptures that a monastic life and 
 its practices were acceptable to God." Those subjects of the abbey 
 who had embraced the reformation declared also against him. At 
 Wyl they openly revolted against the abbot's authorities. Kilian 
 escaped with his monks to Bregentz, in the Austrian territories, taking 
 with him the gold and silver of the abbey and the title-deeds. He 
 then went to Augsburg to ask the assistance of Charles V. ; but on 
 his return to Bregentz he was drowned, in August, 1530, in fording a 
 river. The monks next elected Diethelm Blaater. But Zurich and 
 Glarus took upon themselves to sell the abbey with its dependencies to 
 the town of St. Gall, after removing the remaining valuables. Six of 
 the monks embraced the reformed doctrines, and were allowed pensions. 
 The Toggenburgers were declared free on paying to Zurich and Glarus 
 14,000 guilders. The abbey was thus completely secularized by force. 
 The other cantons, and even Bern, disapproved of this arbitrary pro- 
 ceeding, which was an infraction not only of the rights of the abbey, but 
 also of those of the other co-protectors. At a general diet held at 
 Baden in January, 1531, the five Catholic cantons remonstrated 
 strongly. Zurich, on its part, assumed a very high tone, and demanded 
 that the Catholic- cantons should allow the Scriptures to be freely read 
 amongst them. At this diet the evangelical cantons objected to the test * 
 of plurality of votes in the diets being conclusive in matters of religion, 
 for the Catholic cantons, being many and small, were always sure of a 
 majority against the reformed ones, who were few though large. This 
 
 * See Appendix, No. iv. 
 
 PERIOD IV.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 143 
 
 was a grave question, thus first broached, for it affected the very con- 
 stitution of the confederation. 
 
 Zurich, in order to force the Catholic cantons to submit to its dicta- 
 tion, forbade all commerce with them, and even prevented the supply of 
 necessary articles of provisions, such as salt, which the people of the 
 Waldstatten used to receive through Zurich. Zwingli opposed, as 
 became a minister of the gospel, this uncharitable interdict, a«d he 
 even preached against its principle on Whitsunday, 1831. The inha 
 bitaiits of the five cantons became furious. They considered themselves, 
 and not without reason, unkindly treated. '* The sword alone can 
 unloose the knot," was the cry in the Waldstatten. In September 
 manifestoes appeared on either side. Ziurich, which had shown in this 
 business, as it had done in others, an intemperate and overbearing spirit, 
 asked Bern, and the other reformed cantons, for the assistance stipu- 
 lated by the so-called Christian League of March, 1529. Bern, although 
 wishing for peace, could not refuse the appeal ; it raised a body of 8,000 
 men. The few Catholic cantons, strengthened by a body of Valaisans, 
 assembled their troops at Zug ; and the Duke of Savoy, and the Pope, 
 Bent them some Italian auxiliaries. The Zurichers divided their forces 
 into small detachments, one of which, 600 strong, took a position at 
 Cappel, on the road to Zug. But as the Catholics threatened that po- 
 sition, they collected in haste a body of 2,000 men to reinforce it, and 
 Zwingli was ordered by the magistrates to accompany the soldiers, as it 
 was known that his presence would tend greatly to encourage them, and 
 as it was also customary for a minister to attend whenever the great 
 banner of the city was unfurled. Zwingli obeyed, though with gloomy 
 forebodings of the result of the strife, which he told his friends " would be 
 the death of him, and of many other honest citizens." He was observed 
 to pray fervently during the whole march. While this reinforcement 
 was moving from Zurich, the Catholic troops, 8,000 strong, marched 
 out of Zug on the morning of the 11th October, to attack the detach- 
 ment at Cappel. The Zurichers who were posted there, being joined by 
 people from the country, amounted to about 1,200 men. The attack 
 began by a cannonade, which lasted from twelve to three in the after- 
 noon, when the reinforcement of 2,000 men from Zurich appeared in 
 sight, but in a state of great confusion, the troops having been hurried 
 on their march by repeated messages, and having left a number of strag- 
 glers behind. The day was waning fast, and it seemed at one time as 
 if the Catholics would defer the attack to* the following morning. But 
 a veteran warrior from Unterwaldeu, by name Tauch, advised an imme- 
 diate assault on the Zurichers before the reinforcement had time to put 
 themselves in order. This advice was followed, and he led the attack. 
 The Zurichers, besides their great inferiority in numbers, were taken by 
 surprise ; their artillerymen had abandoned their duty, and their pieces 
 were not served. Their leader Lavater, and Zwingli himself, encou- 
 
144 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period IV. 
 
 raged the men, the latter crying out to them that " their cause was 
 good, and that God could still save them.'^ They fought bravely, 
 but without order. The main body of the Catholics having rushed 
 in upon them, broke through as far as the banner, which the Zurichers 
 defended desperately for a time ; at last the rout became general. 
 Zwingli had fallen in the thickest of the fight. The Catholics pursued 
 their enemies for some distance, after which they returned to the field of 
 battle, when they knelt down, according to the old Swiss custom, and 
 thanked Heaven, the Virgin, and all the celestial host, for having given 
 them the victory. They then went about asking the wounded if they 
 would confess or invoke the saints, and those who refused they de- 
 spatched with their pikes. Some, however, there were among the Ca- 
 tholics who had more humanity than the rest, and who took the wounded 
 to their tents and nursed them. 
 
 Next day the body of Zwingli was recognized among the slain. The 
 Catholics instituted a court-martial over the senseless corpse, and con- 
 demned it to be broken in four by the common executioner, and then 
 burnt to ashes, and the ashes mixed with rubbish and scattered to the 
 winds. Such was the end of Ulrich Zwingli, the great reformer of 
 Switzerland, a man single-hearted, pious, and disinterested ; who, al- 
 though warm and zealous in his cause, was as free as the times allowed 
 from any violence or fanaticism, and still more from inhumanity towards 
 his antagonists. He died in his forty-eighth year. His works, most 
 of which he wrote in Germany, were published in four volumes, folio, at 
 Zurich, in 1542; they consist of commentaries on the scriptures, theo- 
 logical tracts, letters, and exhortations, and the treatise *' on true and 
 false religion," which contains a brief exposition of his doctrines. 
 
 The defeat of Cappel threw Zurich into consternation. Nearly 100 
 burgesses, including 26 councillors, and 15 clergymen, and about 
 1,000 men, altogether had fallen ; 4 standards and 18 cannon were lost. 
 The disorder of the remaining troops, and their murmurs, gave fresh life 
 to a party, which still existed at Zurich, opposed to the reformation. 
 Nevertheless the national spirit of the people came to their aid ; and the 
 inhabitants of the country districts remained faithful in this emergency. 
 Mount Albis was covered with fresh troops, and messengers were de- 
 spatched to Bern to urge the advance of its contingent. The Bernese, 
 4,000 strong, were joined by volunteers from Basle, Schaffhausen, So- 
 leure, Neuchatel, and even from Lausanne and Geneva. This army, after 
 passing Bremgarten, followed' the course of the river Reuss, and plun- 
 dered on their way the convent of Muri. They then entered the canton 
 of Zug and took Baar three days after the battle of Cappel. The Catho- 
 lics, to the number of 10,000, were posted on the Zugerberg, a hill 
 which overlooks the town of Zug. But the Bernese, and their allies, 
 instead of attacking their enemies with all their force, amused them- 
 selves in marauding over the country. While many of them were thus 
 
 period IV.] 
 
 history of SWITZERLAND. 
 
 145 
 
 dispersed in the villages, Hug, son of the Avoyer of Luzern, surprised 
 them in the middle of the night of the 24th October, killed a great 
 many, and drove many more down the ])recipices, where they perished. 
 The main body of the Bernese remained inactive, fearing to strike 
 their own friends. The loss on their part was about 1,000. 
 
 This second defeat was fatal to the cause of the Evangelicals. The 
 people of Glarus and of Toggenburg detached themselves from the alli- 
 ance, and considered about the means of making a separate peace. Ten 
 thousand men from the Grisons, who were on their march to protect 
 the canton of Zurich, halted, and then returned home. The people of 
 Zurich called loudly for peace. Luckily, the Catholic cantons were no 
 less desirous of it : they felt severely the scarcity of provisions, arising 
 from the interruption of communications ; and many moderate men on 
 both sides deplored this war between fellow-countrymen. In these cir- 
 cumstances, the neutral cantons, as well as the envoys of France and 
 Savoy, interfered to bring about a peace. The demands of the Catholics 
 were at first moderate ; but the greatest difficulty was that of the com- 
 mon bailiwicks, the reformed cantons wishing them to have full liberty 
 of conscience, whilst the catholic ones earnestly maintained that " they 
 could not in conscience allow their subjects a liberty which must prove 
 detrimental to their salvation, and would be a temptation and a snare 
 unto their souls.'* Meantime the magistrates of Zurich, being urged by 
 the people and threatened by the Catholic troops, concluded in haste a 
 separate peace, which was signed at Baar on the 20th November, 1531. 
 The first article was as follows : " We, the people of Zurich, promise to 
 leave unmolested, as we ought, our faithful and beloved confederates of 
 the five cantons, their allies of the Valais, and all their adherents, now 
 and for ever, in their ancient^ true, and undoubted Christian faith, 
 without importuning them by any disputations, and renouncing all evil 
 intrigue or artifice. We, the five Catholic cantons, promise to leave on 
 our part our confederates of Zurich and their adherents in the peaceful 
 exercise of their religion." The Zurichers were to renounce the so- 
 called Christian league, and to pay the expenses of the war. 
 
 The Bernese, being left alone, soon after subscribed to similar condi- 
 tions. The common bailiwicks were thus left at the mercy of the Catho 
 lies, although the latter promised not to molest those of the inhabitants 
 who had already embraced the reformed religion. But covert means 
 were not wanting to suppress the reformed doctrines. The images were 
 re-established every where, the evangelical ministers were expelled from 
 many places. The Abbey of Wettingen was restored to its monks. 
 The abbot of St. Gall re-entered his abbey in triumph, and the town of 
 St. Gall lost its purchase, and was obliged to pay 10,000 florins. The 
 Toggenburghers were again placed under the dominion of the abbot, but 
 they preserved their liberty of conscience. Bern likewise maintained 
 vrith firmness the same privilege for those inhabitants of Aargau who 
 
146 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 PERIOD IV. 
 
 had embraced the reformation. At Soleiire fresh troubles broke out; 
 the Catholics were on the point of firing on the assembled Evangelicals, 
 when the old avoyer, Nicholas von Wenger, stepped before the loaded 
 cannon, crving out, « If you want the blood of your countrymen, take 
 mine first." This noble act, and the aspect of the venerable magistrate 
 checked the fury of the people, and no blood was spilt ; but the reformed 
 families were obliged to leave the canton. Soleure, as well as Freyburg, 
 joined henceforth \he five old cantons, so that the Catholic cantons be- 
 came seven, while the reformed ones remained four, namely, Bern, Zu- 
 rich, Schaffhausen, and Basle ; and this line of demarcation has conti- 
 nued ever since. Glarus and Appenzell alone remained mixed. The 
 treaty of Cappel, however, insured internal peace to the Swiss cantons 
 
 for more than a century after. , -, • ^ a 
 
 We now turn again to the affairs of western or romande Switzerland, 
 as it is called, to distinguish it from old or German Switzerland. It 
 wa^ onlv in the sixteenth century that Geneva and Vaud became con- 
 nected with the Swiss confederation, of which they now constitute an 
 essential part. Until that epoch, Geneva had been governed by its so- 
 verei-n bishop, who was a prince of the German empire. The bishop 
 was elected bv the chapter, conjointly with the burghers ; he had no 
 armed force at his disposal, and his authority was very limited. The 
 counts of the Genevois, Comites Genevensium, being feudal lords of the 
 empire over the province, of which Geneva was the chief town, adminis- 
 tered justice ; but their authority in the city was limited by that of the 
 bishop, who had his own courts of justice, and whose jurisdiction was 
 independent of that of the counts. Placed between these two powers, 
 the burghers contrived to extend their privileges; they secured lor 
 themselves the election of the four syndics and a treasurer, who ap- 
 pointed their assessors. The general assembly of the citizens was con- 
 suited about all new taxes, alliances, and other important affairs. 1 he 
 bishop, after his election, made oath before one of the syndics to preserve 
 inviolate the liberties of the citv, ^^hich liberties and franchises were 
 embodied in a charter, and made public in 1387, by order of the bishop 
 Fabri, and by him solemnly confirmed. Another powerful house, how- 
 ever, grew up in the neighbourhood of Geneva, and aspired to extend its 
 power over the citv. This was the house of Savoy, sprung from the 
 counts of Maurienne. Amadeus V., count of Savoy, had already, in 
 1285, formed an alliance with the citizens of Geneva, promising to de- 
 fend their liberties against their bishop, who happened to be brother to 
 the count of Genevois. Amadeus was made Vidomne, Ticedominus, 
 having jurisdiction in all civil causes, though subject to appeal. The 
 bishop agreed to this appointment, on condition that the count should 
 acknowledge himself as his vassal ; but the vassal, being more powerful 
 than the lord, often forgot his allegiance, and even expelled the 
 bishop's officers from the town. In 1417, Amadeus VIII., count ot 
 
 PERIOD IV.] 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 147 
 
 Savoy (afterwards pope Felix V.), purchased from the collateral heirs 
 of the last count of Genevois, all their rights over the county, after which 
 he obtained from the emperor Sigismund the formal investiture of the 
 same, as well as the title of duke of Savoy. He also proposed to the 
 bishop of Geneva to give up to him his temporal rights as prince of that 
 city, and he obtained for the purpose a bull from pope Martin V., au- 
 thorising the bishop to give up his sovereignty, if so inclined. The 
 bishop, in compliance with his oath, asked the opinion of the assembly 
 of the citizens. Their unanimous answer is contained in the following 
 resolutions, which form in a manner a charter of the liberties of that 
 small but interesting republic:— "Whereas for the last 400 years, 
 during which the city of Geneva and its territory have been under the 
 dominion of their church, they have experienced from the latter a mild 
 and kind treatment, and have been governed in peace, it appears to 
 them neither useful nor honourable to the church and the bishop, but 
 dangerous and detrimental to the state, to admit of any transfer or aliena- 
 tion. They are determined, as much as it lies in their power, never 
 to submit to any foreign dominion ; and they intend to remain, they 
 and their successors, under the government of the church and its pre- 
 late, requesting the latter to govern faithfully, and agreeably to his en- 
 gagements and oaths, and to maintain his rights as he has hitherto 
 done ; they, the syndics and citizens of Geneva, on their side promising 
 to give him every assistance in case of need, as well as to all his succes- 
 sors legitimately elected, that is to say, by the people in general council 
 assembled:' These resolutions were passed and solemnly confirmed 
 by the bishop in 1420. That same year the emperor Sigismund, by a 
 special diploma or bull, recognised Geneva *' as an imperial city, a 
 noble member of the empire, which he takes under the wings of the im- 
 perial eagle, subject only to himself and the empire directly, forbidding 
 all princes, barons, and other officers, and particularly Amadeus, duke 
 of Savoy, to annoy in any manner the bishop and church, and all who 
 are liege to them." But Sigismund and his successors were too much 
 engrossed by their own affairs to enforce their decrees about Geneva. 
 In fact, the dukes of Savoy continued to exercise much influence in that 
 city, by contriving to have"^its bishops elected among individuals of their 
 own house : one of them, Philip of Savoy, was elected at seven years of 
 age. Charles III., duke of Savoy, who at the beginning of the sixteenth 
 century- succeeded the good Philibert, showed himself especially disposed 
 to encroach on the liberties of Geneva, and was favoured in his views by 
 the bishop, Pierre de la Baume, a weak unprincipled man, who seemed 
 wiUing to abdicate his temporal rights in favour of Charles. The citi- 
 zens became alarmed, and turned their eyes towards the Swiss cantons 
 for protection. One of the former bishops had, in 1478, concluded a 
 treaty of alliance for himself and the citizens with Bern and Freyburg. 
 Berthelier, a citizen of Geneva, who was exiled on account of some 
 
 l2 
 
148 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period IV« 
 
 PERIOD IV.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 149 
 
 affray with the bishop's authorities, and had retired to Freyburg, of 
 which city he was also a burgher, proposed to the latter canton to rene\f 
 their alliance with Geneva. The project was approved of by both par- 
 ties, and the treaty of alliance and coburghership with Freyburg was 
 concluded in 1519. Berthelier returned to Geneva. The city was now 
 divided into two parties ; the more numerous, who were for independ- 
 ence and the alliance with Freyburg, styled themselves Eulgenosscn, 
 *' bound bv oath," in imitation of the Swiss confederates ; and they 
 gave their antagonists, who were devoted to the house of Savoy, the 
 appellation of Manielonks. Tlie word Eiclgenossen, disfigured by a 
 French pronunciation, was transformed into that of Huguenota^ and was 
 afterwards applied generally to the French Evangelicals or Calvinists, 
 for whom Geneva was the model or leading church. But, in the origin. 
 Huguenots meant the republican party at Geneva,most of whom became 
 also, as we shall see, converts to the reformed doctrines. 
 
 The Duke of Savov, incensed at the news of the alliance, marched 
 with 10,000 men against Geneva. The syndics protested ; but being 
 unable to resist, and counteracted by the duke's partisans witliin the 
 town, the gates were opened, the troops entered, and lived at free quar- 
 ters upon the inhabitants. Berthelier was executed, and other acts of 
 vengeance were perpetrated. The canton of Freyburg, being apprised 
 of this, marched troops into the duke's territories of the Pays de Vaud ; 
 whereupon the duke issued a general amnesty, and withdrew his army 
 from the city, having first obliged the latter to rescind its alliance with 
 Freyburg : but he continued, in concert with the bishop, to persecute 
 the Huguenots, under various pretences. This state of things lasted 
 several vears, duvinsr which Geneva suffered severelv. At last, in 1525, 
 tlie duke, having taken part in the great contest between Francis I. and 
 Charles V. for the succession to the duchy of ^Milan, found it necessary 
 to pass into Piedmont, and he never after returned to Geneva. During 
 Ins absence the Huguenots became bolder, and talked of renewing the 
 alliance with Bern and Freyburg. Tiie two cantons, being sounded, 
 were found to be favourably disposed. The bishop, Pierre de la Baume, 
 unal)le to resist the general impulse, and wavering between his devotion 
 to the duke's interests and the wish to retain his own authority, declared 
 that he would oppose no obstacle to the alliance. The citizens were 
 unanimous, and a treaty was concluded in February, 1526, by which 
 the two cantons engaged " to defend Geneva against all attacks on their 
 person?, properties, liberties, privileges, jurisdictions, and ancient 
 usages." Geneva took a similar engagement towards the cantons; 
 with this difference, however, that its citizens were to pay for all assist- 
 ance afforded to them, but were to furnish aid to Bern and Freyburg, 
 when required, at their own expense. This was a general condition in 
 all tlie treaties of alliance between the Swiss cantons and their weaker 
 neighbours. But as Geneva was more likely to be in want of assistance 
 
 than Bern and Freyburg, the Genevans thought themselves fortunate in 
 concluding the treaty. The duke exerted himself strenuously to dissolve 
 this alliance ; but the cantons stood firm, and at last signified to him 
 that, if he did not desist from annoying Geneva, they would rescind their 
 ow^n treaties with Savoy. From that moment the Mamelouks lost atl 
 influence in the town, and they at last emigrated. Being summoned by 
 the magistrates to return and give an account of their conduct, they 
 were, on their non-compliance, declared outlaws, and their property was 
 confiscated. They then joined the Savoyard nobles in the neighbour- 
 hood, and formed with them an offensive league against Geneva. They 
 took the name of " Knights of the Spoon," on account of their having 
 boasted that they would hew down the citizens, and cut them into small 
 pieces, so as to be able to cat them with their spoons, and they wore, 
 accordingly, as a badge of their confraternity, a spoon. They ravaged 
 the estates of the citizens outside the town, burnt the suburbs, killed those 
 of the inhabitants they fell in with, and blockaded the place in order to 
 starve it. It was during this most calamitous period that the Genevans 
 showed an energy and perseverance worthy of the highest praise ; 
 resisting all the intrigues of the duke and of the fickle-minded bishop, 
 who still lemained within the city, as well as the open attacks of their 
 enemies from outside, and holding fast by the treaty with the cantons, 
 as their only anchor of safety. At this time also the doctrines of the 
 reformation began to spread rapidly amongst them. The flagrant im- 
 morality of the clergy contributed to this. The bishop himself, Pierre 
 de la Baume, had the audacity, during the Lent of 1527, to carry off by 
 force a young woman of a respectable family ;* and it was not until the 
 people had assembled in great numbers round the episcopal palace, and 
 compelled him to do so, that he restored the girl to her parents. Bon- 
 nivard, prior of St. Victor, was one of the first to preach in favour of a 
 reformation in religion. But here again a new difficulty arose. Freyburg, 
 one of the two allied cantons, wrote tliat if the Genevans abandoned 
 their old faith it would renounce their alliance. The magistrates, 
 therefore, were cautious not to encourage the spreading of the new 
 doctrines. 
 
 Geneva meantime was reduced to the greatest extremities by the 
 Savoyard nobles and the knights of the spoon ; the citizens could not 
 venture out of the walls, no provisions were allowed to come in, and they 
 suffered the severest privations. At last, after rejieated but useless ne- 
 gociations, Bern and Freyburg resolved, in 1 530, to take the field, and 
 relieve their ally. A Bernese army of 7,000 men, under John d'Erlach, 
 joined by 2,000 men from Freyburg, 500 of Soleure, and 3,000 volun- 
 teers from other parts, and eighteen pieces of cannon, entered the Pays 
 de Vaud, which they crossed without opposition, although they com-v 
 
 * Ruchat, torn, ii. p. 277. 
 
 I J 
 
150 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period IV. 
 
 mitted serious depredations on the subjects of the duke, and arrived at 
 Geneva on the 10th of October, having on their march taken and 
 destroyed the castles of the knights of the spoon. The other cantons 
 and the Valais now sent deputies to mediate a peace, and the treaty of 
 St. JuUen was the result. The duke engaged, among other things, that 
 if he should be the first to attack the Genevans again he should forfeit 
 the Pays de Vaud to Bern and Freyburg. The Swiss army left Geneva, 
 after having been paid by the inhabitants, who with great difficulty 
 raised the sum required. By another convention concluded at Payerne, 
 in December of the same year (1530), before the deputies of all the 
 cantons, and to which Rene de Chelant, marshal of Savoy and ambas- 
 sador from the duke, affixed his signature and seal, the treaty of St. 
 Julien was confirmed, and particularly the clause concerning the Pays 
 de Vaud.* The prior Bonnivard, whom the duke had kidnapped and 
 confined in the dungeons of Chillon, was to be released. The Duke was 
 to defray the expenses of the war, and pay an indemnity to Geneva ; 
 and, on the other hand, he was to appoint a Vidomne in the latter cit)^, 
 to administer justice. The duke appointed this officer, but neglected to 
 perform the other conditions of the treaty. 
 
 The preaching of the reformation had formed two new parties in the 
 city. The majority of the people and some of the magistrates were 
 favourable to it ; but the clergy, most of the councillors, and of the 
 wealthy citizens, were for remaining Catholic. Farel, who had come to 
 Geneva, was driven away, but some of his disciples continued to preach. 
 In 1533 the animosity between the two parties had reached the greatest 
 height. Conspiracies, seditions, murders, were the melancholy conse- 
 quences. Relative was against relative, brother against brother, father 
 against son. The magistrates endeavoured to enforce mutual toleration. 
 On the one hand they forbade any one to preach without leave of the 
 ecclesiastical authorities, and on the other they forbade preaching in 
 favour of any dogma or rite that could not be proved by the Scripture. 
 By this singular impartiality they forbade, in fact, preaching at all. The 
 bishop had sent for a famous doctor of the Sorbonne called Furbitty, 
 who began to thunder against all heretics, Arians, Sabellians, Wal- 
 denses, Germans, and Swiss ; comparing them to the wretches who 
 divided amongst them the garments of our Saviour. Bern, offended at 
 the language of the doctor, dispatched a vehement letter to the council 
 of Geneva, demanding the arrest of Furbitty for the insult offered to the 
 evangelical cantons. Meantime Farel had returned, and was holding 
 
 * Delia Chiesa, and other historians favourable to the house of Savoy, deny this 
 clause ; but the treat} existed in the archives of Bern, whence Stettler copied it at 
 full length. Wursisen of Basle relates the same. Ruchat gives good proofs of the 
 fact ; among others, that the good citizens of Soleure, foreseeing that the duke 
 would not keep his promises, and wishing to have a share in the future division of 
 the Pays de Vaud, pressed their neighbours of Bern that they might also be included 
 in the treaty of Payerne, which demand the latter civilly evaded, 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 151 
 
 PERIOD IV.] 
 
 forth against Furbitty and the Catholics. Freyburg now demanded that 
 Farel should be punished for preaching against its religion, and threat- 
 ened to withdraw itself from the alliance. The grand vicar of the 
 bishop on his side issued a mandate to burn all the bibles in French or 
 German. Furbitty was arrested, and being ordered to retract, and to 
 apologise to Bern, he refused, and was detained in prison for two years. 
 Bern insisted on the pubhc preaching of the Gospel, and the council 
 being obliged to accede, Farel preached in the church of the Franciscan 
 convent, and made numerous proselytes. Then it was that the deputies 
 of Freyburg declared, in presence of the council of Geneva, on the 
 23d of April, 1534, that the alliance on their part was at an end, and 
 they publicly tore the seals from off the treaty, which they had brought 
 
 with them. 
 
 Bern remained now the only ally of Geneva, and its influence became 
 paramount. The reformers, thus emboldened, kept no measures ; they 
 overturned the altars, and destroyed the images. Many Catholic fami- 
 lies emigrated. The bishop, who had retired to Gex, excommunicated 
 the town. The sovereign council of Geneva then declared that the 
 bishop's authority was at an end, and his see vacant. The canons 
 retired to Annecy, whither the see of Geneva was finally transferred. 
 On the 10th of August, 1534, the Great Council forbade the mass till 
 further orders. Another edict enjoined that God should be worshipped 
 according to the Gospel, and it forbade every act of papal idolatry. The 
 Catholic party in the town dwindled to nothing ; but the nobles of 
 Savoy and the bishop blockaded Geneva, and annoyed the citizens. 
 Bern remonstrated repeatedly for more than a twelvemonth, but without 
 effect. The duke, who was engaged in war with France, pleaded his 
 inability to restrain his turbulent Savoyard nobles ; but he had certainly 
 given repeated proofs of his insincerity concerning the stipulations of 
 the Treaty of St. Julien. He still held Bonnivard in prison at Chillon. 
 On the other hand, Bern was probably not sorry to have an opportunity 
 of seizing the Pays de Vaud. But the Bernese council did not go 
 hastily or rashlv to work. Well aware that the other cantons were 
 jealous of them* they wished to be assured of the support of their own 
 countrymen ; and with that view, on the 25th of December, 1535, they 
 sent circular letters to all the communes of the canton, representing the 
 intolerable vexations inflicted by the duke and his subjects upon then: 
 allies and religious brethren of Geneva, whom they declared it to be 
 their intention to relieve. Being assured, in answer, of the general 
 sympathy of the people, and of their co-operation, the Great Council of 
 Bern formally declared war against the duke of Savoy, m consequence 
 of his breach of the Treaty of St. Julien, and of the state of mtolerable 
 oppression in which he held the city of Geneva, on account of its reli- 
 gion. The Bernese army, 7,000 strong, marched in January, 1536, by 
 Morat ; and as they proceeded, they received the submission of most of 
 
152 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND, 
 
 [period IV. 
 
 the towns in the Pays (le Vaud. except Yverdun. 4,000 of the duke's 
 men who were at Morges crossed over to Savoy, after plundering the 
 inhabitants, violating the females, and committing all sorts of atrocities 
 in a country which they were going to leave for ever. In eleven days 
 the Bernese entered Geneva, where they were hailed as deliverers. The 
 duke was at the same time attacked by the French, who conquered all 
 Savoy and the greater part of Piedmont ; so that he was stripped at the 
 same time of all his dominions. The Valaisans, on their side, by an 
 agreement with Bern, took for themselves all that part of the Chablais 
 which extends along the southern shore of the lake of Geneva, as far 
 west as the river Drance. 
 
 The Bernese now unexpectedly demanded of the Genevans the sur- 
 render of all the rights and revenues which the duke and the bishop held 
 over the city. The Genevans, surprised at this demand, calmly but 
 firmly refused. They sent deputies to Bern to represent that they had 
 borne and suffered much for the maintenance of their independence, and 
 they besought their allies of Bern not to stain the glory of their generous 
 assistance by enforcing oppressive pretensions ; at the same time they 
 offered to defray the expenses of the war. The negotiations lasted five 
 months, and, luckily for the character of Bern, not less than for the 
 independence of Geneva, the Bernese councils desisted from their unjust 
 demand. In August, 1536, a treaty was concluded between the free town 
 of Geneva and the canton of Bern. The coburghership was renewed for 
 twenty-five years, at the expiration of which it was converted into a per- 
 petual alliance. Geneva retained all the lands of the Bishop, Chapter 
 and Convents, and of the priory of St. Victor, the Bernese reserving to 
 themselves an appellate jurisdiction over those lands in all cases in which 
 formerly appeal lay to the Dukes of Savoy. The city and its territorv 
 were declared free from all jurisdictions of the neighbouring lordships. 
 It is a curious fact, that as soon as the Bernese claims had been set aside, 
 the King of France sent a message to Geneva, with a project for uniting 
 that city to his kingdom, under apparently very favourable conditions ; 
 but his offer was civilly though firmly rejected. Thus Geneva became a 
 really independent republic, and the evangelical religion was solemnly 
 established there. The effects of these changes were soon perceived in 
 the revival of activity, industry, and trade. A number of foreigners from 
 France, Italy, and Savoy, came to reside within the walls of Geneva, 
 bringing their property with them, for the sake of enjoying peace and 
 liberty of conscience. The Genevans reaped the fruits of a seventeen 
 years hard struggle during which they displayed a perseverance and a 
 steadiness of purpose beyond all praise. It was only in 1537, the year 
 after the liberation of Geneva by the Bernese, and after its independence 
 and religious liberty were both secured, that the celebrated preacher, 
 John Calvin, made his first appearance in that city. Of this remarkable 
 man and of his connexion with Geneva wc shall speak hereafter. 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 153 
 
 TFRIOD IV.] 
 
 The Bernese had, meantime, reduced the whole Pays de Vaud into sub- 
 jection. Those towns which submitted voluntarily had their privileges 
 confirmed, and the inhabitants were allowed the free exercise of either 
 religion ; whilst those that were forced into submission, such as Yver- 
 dun° were obliged to give up their charters and franchises to the con- 
 querors. Lausanne had not been visited by the Bernese, that city forming 
 a separate sovereignty, and being still governed by its bishop, who was 
 a prince of the empire. The citizens, however, had treaties of cobur- 
 ghership with Bern and Freyburg. The bishop, at this time Montfaucon 
 by name, had frequent altercations with the citizens, and in an evil hour 
 fjr himself he declared for the Duke of Savoy against the Bernese. The 
 latter marched upon the town and the bishop fled to Freyburg. Tlie 
 citizens opened the gates to Bern, which took possession of all the lands 
 and jurisdictions of the bishop, extending over Lausanne, Avenches, 
 Lucens, and Pully. Lausanne obtained the confirmation of its ancient 
 privileges ; it retained its local judicature and the possession of the pro- 
 perty of the convents and churches. The municipal government was 
 left as before to a burgomaster and three councils elected by the bur- 
 gesses. Bern reserved to itself the appellate jurisdiction, the right of 
 pardoning, the mint, the military command, the castle, and the cathedral. 
 The whole Pays de Vaud was divided into eight bailiwicks, a bailiff 
 from Bern being appointed to each. Every bailiff had a court of twelve 
 judges who received appeals from the local courts. A treasurer was 
 appointed to receive the taxes and dues and to enforce the sovereign rights 
 of Bern. The native militia was maintained. The bailiff of Lausanne, 
 who replaced the bishop, swore before the Burgomaster to maintain the 
 rights, franchises, and usages of the town, both writle?i and traditional. 
 The people in general were pleased with the change, except the nobility, 
 who lost their influence by passing under the dominion of a republic. 
 They were besides attached to Catholicism. Many of them even refused 
 the ofi'er of having themselves inscribed and admitted among the Patri- 
 cians of Bern. i -n i i 
 A religious disputation took place at Lausanne, in which Farel took 
 the lead; it lasted seven days, but the Catholic clergy of Lausanne de- 
 clined to take part in it. After its conclusion, the Bernese proclaimed 
 all over the country the abolition of the mass, and of images, and re- 
 formed clergymen were appointed to the various parishes. 
 
 The castle of Cliillon was the last place that surrendered. In the dun- 
 geons below the level of the lake was found Bonnivard, who had been 
 confined there for six years. 
 
 Although Freyburg had borne no share in the expedition, yet Bern 
 willingly allowed her to take possession of several districts of the con- 
 quered country, such as Romont, Rue, and Estavayer, which were conti- 
 guous to her own territory. Some years afterwards the two cantons 
 purchased the rights of the counts of Gruyeres, the last remaining of the 
 
154 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND.' 
 
 [period IV. 
 
 old feudal nobility of Helvetia. The fine district of Gruyeres was annexed 
 to Freyburg, and Bern had for its share the lordships of Rougeniontand 
 Oron. Bern had now doubled its territory, and it became^'by far the 
 most extensive and powerful of the Swiss cantons. 
 
 The reformation spread to the Italian side of the Alps, in the baili- 
 wicks or districts subject to the Swiss confederates. At Locarno, at the 
 northernmost extremity of the Lago Maggiore, the reformed doctrines 
 had found proselytes as early as 1526. Fontana, a Carmelite friar, 
 entered mto correspondence with Zwingli ; and several of the first fami- 
 lies of the town, the Orelli, the Muralti, and the Magorii embraced the 
 evangelical taith; but the bailiff ox lieutenant sent by the Catholic can- 
 tons, after the war of Cappel, persecuted the converts, and Beccaria their 
 leader was put m prison ; but the reformers released him by force 
 After many vexations and disturbances, and in spite of the protests of the 
 reformed cantons, an order was issued by the Catholic cantons, who in- 
 sisted that this was a question which their majority of votes ought to de- 
 cide, sentencing all the evangelical converts at Locarno to be banished 
 their country with their families. The sentence was carried into execution 
 in March, 1555. One hundred and fifty of the reformed were assembled 
 at the town-house of Locarno, where the decree was read to them. They 
 listened to it in silence. Suddenly a fanatical priest entered the hall 
 and cned out that the wives and children of the heretics should be de- 
 tained m order to work their salvation. But the Swiss Catholic deputies 
 were not prepared for this new rigour: «AVe will not alter the sentence 
 we have just pronounced," was their reply ; and the exiles, accompanied 
 by their women and children, set off to cross the Alps. Most of them 
 found an asylum at Zurich, where the famiHes of Orell and Muralt, with 
 a slight change m their names, became naturalized, and continue to this 
 day. Several of these Italian exiles were silk-weavers and dyers, and 
 they carried to Zurich those branches of industry from their Italian land 
 We have mentioned above. John Calvin. His name was Caulvin 
 some wnte Chauvin, and he was born in the little town of Novon in 
 Picardy, in 1509. He studied at Paris in the colleges of La Mari^he 
 and of Montaigu, being intended for the clerical profession ; this how- 
 ever, he abandoned for the study of the law, for which he removed to 
 Orleans, and afterwards to Bourges, where he learnt Greek and 
 Hebrew. His first notions of the reformed doctrines, which were then 
 begmmng to spread in France, he derived from Pierre Robert d'Olivet. 
 In 1532 he published at Paris a Latin commentary on the work of 
 Seneca de Clementia, Here he became acquainted wi^h Michael Cop 
 who was at that time rector of the university, and they both incurred the 
 censures of the Sorbonne and of the pariiament of Paris for their bold 
 expressions m favour of the reformed doctrines. But Calvin found a 
 protector m Margaret, Francis the First's sister, afterwards Queen of 
 JNavarre. As the persecutions against the heretics, as they were called, 
 
 PERIOD IV.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 155 
 
 increased, Calvin withdrew to Basle, where he wrote his great work on 
 the " Institution of the Christian Religion," which is an exposition of his 
 doctrines. He dedicated it to Francis I. in 1535. From Basle he went 
 to Italy, where Renee, daughter of Louis XII., and wife of Hercules 
 d'Este, duke of Ferrara, seemed to favour the evangelical doctrines. In 
 1536 he was obliged to make his escape from Italy, where his doctrines 
 had attracted the attention of the clergy and the court of Rome, and he 
 made his way into Switzerland by an unfrequented path over the Col 
 de Ferret, between Mont Blanc and the St. Bernard, which leads 
 from the Val d'Aosta into the Valais. Passing through Geneva he saw 
 Farel who earnestly invited him to fix his residence in that city and to 
 assist' him in the great work of reformation. Calvin, though at first 
 unwilling, was persuaded, and he was appointed the same year pro- 
 fessor of theolosy. He was then only twenty-seven years of age. Both he 
 and Farel went further in their innovations than the Swiss reformers , 
 they used leavened bread for the sacrament, they abolished all festivals 
 except Sundays ; they discarded all ceremonies, and they maintained the 
 doctrine of predestination in all its sternness. All this made them 
 many enemies, and drew upon them the disapprobation of the evangelical 
 synod then sitting at Lausanne for the purpose of regulating the disci- 
 pline of the reformed church. As Calvin and Farel, however, would 
 not submit to the decision of the synod, they were ordered by the magis- 
 trates to leave Geneva in 1538, and Calvin went to Strasburg, where he 
 established a French evangelical church. Soon after, however, a depu- 
 tation came from Geneva to invite him to return, as his presence was 
 found necessary to enforce order and religion. Farel had, meantime, 
 settled at Neuchatel, where he remained till his death. Calvin, on 
 his return to Geneva, in 1541, perceiving the necessity of having a 
 moral censorship, in order to restrain the utter licentiousness which 
 threatened the very existence of the community, proposed to establish a 
 consistory, to act as " censor morum," composed of the pastors or parish 
 incumbents, two members of the council of state or executive, two mem- 
 bers of the council of 200, one of the syndics, and a secretary. This and 
 other regulations proposed by Calvin concerning church government and 
 discipline, were approved by the general council of all the citizens, and 
 received the form of law in November 1541. The consistory assembled 
 everv Thursday, and Calvin, who always attended the sittings, may be 
 said to have been its presiding spirit. It had very extensive and a most 
 inquisitorial powers ; it took cognizance of immoralities of blasphemy 
 and profanation, and other offences against religion. The pumshments 
 were fine, imprisonment, and in some cases death. This institution of 
 the consistory has continued to exist to our own days, though consider- 
 ably modified. Calvin also assumed the task of collecting and revising 
 the old laws and edicts, so as to form a body of civil law for the repubbc, 
 which was approved of in 1543 by the council general. At the same 
 
156 
 
 IIISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [PEllIOD IV 
 
 time he was not unmindful of the cultivation of the mind, and he pro- 
 posed and effected the establishment of a public college, called Academy, 
 for teaching the arts and sciences, in whicli he himself lectured three 
 times a week on theology, and which soon acquired and has ever since 
 maintained a high character among the schools of learning in Europe, 
 and has been a nursery of clergymen and divines to the reformed churches 
 of France and other countries. 
 
 Calvin, notwithstanding his delicate frame and the numerous com- 
 plaints to which he was subject, was truly indefatigable. He preached 
 two or three times a week, gave lectures, attended the consistory, visited 
 the sick, kept a voluminous correspondence both friendly and polemical, 
 wrote commentaries on the scripture, and other tracts. The influence 
 of Calvin's searching and austere mind remained impressed on the 
 manners and habits cf the Genevans for ages after his death, and the 
 stamp is not yet altogether obliterated. He was intolerant according to 
 the temper of his age, but he was conscientious in his intolerance. The 
 execution of Michel Servetus is the act from which Calvin's memory 
 has suffered most. Servetus was a Spanish physician, he was a man of 
 a wild fantastic mind, who had adopted the tenets of the Samosatcnians 
 against Trinity; he denied the eternity and divinitv of the Son, and he 
 had written a book * De Trinitatis erroribus.' He held forth his doc- 
 trines in various places ; he disputed at Basle with CEcolampadius, and at 
 Pans with Calvin, then a student; and again, by a singular fatality, he 
 came to Geneva, where Calvin now reigned paramount. He was tried and 
 sentenced to the stake, as an obdurate heretic, although it appears that 
 Calvin voted for a milder mode of death. He was, however, burnt 
 ahve; another proof of the truth of what has been observed before, that 
 the persecuted, when thsy get power, usually and by almost a natural con- 
 gequence, become, in their turn, persecutors. Calvin's letter to Bucer, in 
 which he relates to the latter the tragedy of the unfortunate Servetus 
 " bellowing at the stake like a bull," shows a heart utterlv destitute of 
 all feelings of mercy. 
 
 Calvin was certainly a man of powerful mind, his learning was very 
 extensive ; his Latin compositions are, in point of stvle, above those 
 of his contemporaries ; his arguments were powerful and well drawn 
 He had a deep, earnest will, and a most unbending determination. In 
 his temper he was far from amiable : he had all the overbearing violence 
 of Luther, without the cheering warmth and straightforward frankness 
 of the great German reformer ; he had neither the modest simplicity 
 and self-control of Zwingli, nor the kind conciliatorv feeling of Me- 
 lancthon. Yet Geneva owes much to Calvin. He consolidated both 
 Its religious and municipal institutions; he founded its academy, which 
 has ever since maintained its reputation ; he made Geneva a model for 
 the evangelical churches of other countries. Calvin died on the 27th 
 May, 1564, at the age of 55, worn out by study and application, and the 
 
 PERIOD TV.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 157 
 
 diseases incidental to such a life. He was buried without pomp or 
 epitaph as he had himself directed, in the common hurymg ground of 
 Pleinpalais, and his funeral was attended by almost the whole popula- 
 tion All the property he left was valued at 220 crowns. He left the 
 care of his flock to his friend and disciple Theodore de Beza. Calvin's 
 works were published in 9 vols, folio. 
 
 In October, 1564, Bern, by a peace concluded at Lausanne, restored 
 to Emmanuel Philibert, Duke of Savoy, the Chablais, and the county of 
 Gex on condition that he should allow the free exercise of the reformed 
 relio^on in those districts. The Duke, on his side, made a formal ces- 
 sion to Bern and Freyburg of his rights on the Pays de Vaud and this 
 cession was confirmed in 1617 by Duke Charles Emmanuel. This treaty 
 was guaranteed in April, 1565, by Charles IX., King of France, a cir- 
 cumstance which served, in 1798, as a pretence to the French for inter- 
 fering in the affairs of the Pays de Vaud. Emmanuel Philibert main- 
 tained the article of the treaty concerning religion until his death, but 
 his successor, Charles Emmanuel, disregarding his fathers promise, 
 drove away, in 1598, the reformed clergy from the Chablais, and abo- 
 lished the reformation by force. He also resumed a system of annoy- 
 ance and intrigue against Geneva, and he encouraged several conspiracies, 
 for the purpose of recovering possession of that city. At length, m 
 1602, he made a bold attempt to take the town by surprise. Under 
 pretence of watching the movements of the French on his frontiers, he 
 assembled a body of troops near its walls, and in the night between the 
 llth and 12th of December (old style), scaling ladders having been 
 prepared for the purpose, a party of 200 of the duke's soldiers silently 
 mounted the walls at one o'clock in the morning, while the rest waited 
 outside for a signal to force the gate. They had been promised the 
 plunder of the citv, but Geneva was providentially spared the horrors that 
 would have followed their success. A sentry hearing noise m the 
 ditch oave the alarm, the citizens ran to arms and barricaded the streets, 
 the crifard at the gate let down the portcullis, and fired a cannon which 
 enfiladed the ditch, and swept away the ladders. The troops outside, 
 seeing the attack had failed, began a retreat, while those that were m the 
 town, being assailed on every side by the citizens, were either killed or 
 thrown into the ditches. Thirteen were made prisoners and hanged 
 next day as midnight assassins. Theodore de Beza, who, owing to his 
 great ai^e, had discontinued preaching, mounted the pulpit next morning 
 and began singing the 124th psalm, in gratitude to the Almighty who 
 had snatched his countrvmcn from the jaws of destruction. The amii- 
 versary of the escalade has been ever since religiously kept at Geneva. 
 The canton of Bern strongly resented this treacherous attack upon its 
 ally, but the neutral cantons interfered, and a new treaty was at length 
 concluded in Julv, 1603, by which the Duke of Savoy engaged not to 
 raise any fortress^or assemble any troops within sixteen miles of the city. 
 
158 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period IV, 
 
 From that time the Republic of Geneva was left in the undisturbed en- 
 joyment of its independence ; and, besides Bern, Zurich contracted with 
 it a perpetual alliance. 
 
 The authorities for this part arc chiefly,— 1st. Ruchat, HUtoire de la 
 Reformation en Suisse depuis Pan 1516 jusqu'en Pan 1556; 6 vols. 
 1 2mo., Geneve, 1 727. Ruchat was professor in the Academy of Lausanne 
 in the early part of the eighteenth century, at a period already far re- 
 moved from the strife and the heart-burnings of the epoch of the Re- 
 formation. He writes soberly and temperately, and quotes his authorities 
 at the foot of the page. 2nd. J. James Hottinger, son of the celebrated 
 orientalist of Zurich, wrote the History of the Helvetic Church ; Helve- 
 tische Kirchengeschichle, 4 vols. 4to., Zurich, 1729. 3rd. Stettler's 
 Chronicle, already mentioned at the end of Part I., and which comes 
 down to the year 1627. 4th. BtJrenger, ///5/0/re de Geneve, 4 vols., 
 12mo., Geneva, 1773. Besides the general historians of the Reformation. 
 
 FIFTH PERIOD. 
 
 FROM THE BEGINNING OF THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY TILL THE 
 
 EPOCH OF THE FRENCH REVOLUTION. 
 
 In the early part of the seventeenth century, the country of the Grisons 
 became involved in war with the courts of Spain and of Austria, in con- 
 sequence of a revolt which broke out in the Valtellina, and was a 
 source of great and lasting calamities to both countries. 
 
 The origin of the disturbances in the Valtellina was of a remote date. 
 The people of that valley (which had become subject to the Grisons a 
 centurv before) were Catholic, while the majority of their Grison masters 
 had embraced the reformed communion. The government of the Grisons, 
 stimulated by some of the more zealous evangelical clergymen, inter- 
 fered in a certain measure with the consciences of their subjects. They 
 prohibited legacies and endowments for pious purposes, they forbade all 
 correspondence between the Catholic clergy of Valtellina and their 
 foreign brethren or superiors, and the publication of bulls and licences 
 emanating from Rome. On the other hand, the conduct of the agents 
 of Rome excited the suspicions of the Grisons. The inquisition of 
 Brescia and Bergamo bad arrested several Protestants from Valtellma, 
 one of whom, a preacher called Cellaria, was kidnapped within the 
 limits of the Grison jurisdiction, and sent to Piacenza, and afterwards 
 to Rome where be suffered death as a heretic. Pope Pius V., a stre- 
 nuous defender of the prerogatives of his church, endeavoured to recover 
 -ertain tithes and other revenues in the Valtellina, which had been 
 Kiven up by the Grisons to lay improprietors. He commissioned for 
 this purpose John Planta, baron of Razuns, and his son Conrad, who 
 was a canon of the cathedral of Coire, to whom, in 1572, he issued a 
 bull, conferring on them the management of all church lands and reve- 
 nues in the Valtellina and in the adjoining county of Chiavenna, 
 "which were then held by improper persons," meaning thereby several 
 Protestants, and among others the Salis, a powerful Grison fani^byrid 
 ancient rivals of the Plantas. The Salis appealed to the diet of the 
 Grisons, who decided that the grant by the pope to the Plantas was 
 illegal ; and it threatened any one with severe punishment who shoidd 
 attempt to enforce the bull. The baron Razuns, not having paid suffi- 
 cient deference to this decision, was imprisoned, tortured, and put to 
 
160 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period V. 
 
 death. His son escaped, and soon after, through the mediation of the 
 Swiss cantons, public tranquillity was restored, at least in appearance. 
 
 In the beginning of the following century the duke of Fuentes, the 
 Spanish governor of Milan, raised, at the northern extremity of the lake 
 of Como, where the Adda flows into it, a fort, which commanded the 
 only carriage-road leading into the Valtellina. Spain had long been 
 ambitious of possessing that fine valley, through which lay the only 
 direct communication between Lombardy and the Tyrol, and other 
 Austrian territories ; for as the two branches of the house of Austria 
 were allied by policy as well as by blood, it was their interest to have 
 some road by which they could receive or send speedy assistance to each 
 other. On the other hand, the republic of Venice, which was then the 
 only independent power in Italy, and whose territories lay between 
 Austria and Spanish Lombardy, was essentially interested in maintain- 
 ing the Grisons in possession of Valtellina, which bordered on her two 
 provinces of Bergamo and Brescia, and through which she could obtain 
 recruits from Switzerland, her natuuJ ally against any encroachments 
 from Spain and Austria. In 1603, Venice made a treaty with the 
 Grison leagues for the purpose of having free passage through the terri- 
 tory of the latter. This excited the jealousy of the duke of Fuentes, 
 and the Grisons, in order to keep in good terms with the Spanish 
 governor, and to continue to receive the usual supplies of corn and other 
 provisions from Lombardy, granted likewise free passage to the Spanish 
 soldiers through the Valtellina. 
 
 In 1615, the alliance between Venice and the Grisons expired. The 
 Venetian senate sent an agent to renew it, who, in order to overcome 
 the obstacles made by the Spanish and Austrian agents, found means to 
 excite in the Protestants both religious and political suspicions of their 
 Catholic subjects of Valtellina. A great synod of the Protestant mi- 
 nisters assembled in the church of Bergun, where the Venetian alliance 
 was urged with expressions of violent rancour against Spain and its 
 supposed partisans in the Valtellina and the Grisons. The Protestant 
 comnmnes rose in arms against those who were suspected of beintr 
 favourable to Spain ; some persons were killed, and many more were 
 fined and banished, and among these were the two brothers Planta and 
 the bishop of Coire himself. This happened in 1618. The violent 
 leaders of the Protestants gave orders for the arrest of Nicholas Rusca, 
 the archpriest of Sondrio, the head of the Catholic clergy of Valtellina,' 
 a man much respected for his pious and moral conduct, but who had 
 opposed the efforts of the Protestants to make converts among his flock. 
 Rusca was taken into the Grison country, and tried before a summary 
 tribunal on the charges of treasonable correspondence with the Spani- 
 ards, and of resistance to the edicts of the government. The old mar, 
 denied the first charge, of which he appears, in fact, to have been inno- 
 cent ; and with regard to the second, he said he had only opposed, 
 
 PERIOD v.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 161 
 
 though not by seditious means, those innovations which were detri- 
 mental to the Catholic faith and contrary to the religious privileges of 
 Valtellina. He was put to the torture, and he died in consequence in 
 his prison after a few days. His body was burned by the public 
 executioner ! 
 
 These cruelties exasperated the people of Valtellina, as well as the 
 partisans of the Plantas among the Grisons. The emigrants of that 
 party assembled at Milan and in the Tyrol, they corresponded with the 
 discontented in Valtellina, and aimed at overturning the government of 
 their own country. A wealthy native of Valtellina, named Robustelli, 
 put himself at the head of the conspiracy, which was to shake off the 
 sovereignty of the Grisons. The duke of Feria, governor of Milan, 
 secretly encouraged the conspirators, and gave them money. At break 
 of day on the 19th of July, 1620, the day fixed for the breaking out of 
 the revolt, Robustelli and his companions, with a number of armed 
 men, entered Tirano, one of the largest villages of Valtellina, and having 
 rung the bells as a signal, they began to massacre the Protestants, whe- 
 ther Grisons or their own countrymen. At the first alarm, both 
 the Catholic and the Protestant inhabitants who were unacquainted 
 with the conspiracy arose from their beds, thinking that some party 
 of outlaws were come to commit depredations, as had before hap- 
 pened. The Grison governor, JohnCappoli, suspecting the same thing, 
 ordered the town -house bell to be rung to summon the people to arms. 
 But as these came out of their houses, the conspirators, who were in 
 waiting, fell upon the Protestants ; while the Catholics, being apprised 
 of the true cause of the tumult, and excited by the leaders of the insur- 
 rection, joined in the massacre, and having broken open the place where 
 the arms were deposited, proceeded to the well-known dwellings of the 
 Protestants. These strove to defend themselves, but in vain ; they 
 were hunted out and barbarously killed, five alone escaping. Several of 
 them who had run out of the town were attacked by the peasants of the 
 neighbourhood, who showed them no mercy. Some women were also 
 murdered. The governor was shot, and the Protestant preacher's head 
 was cut off and stuck on his own pulpit. The houses were plundered, 
 although the conspirators had solemnly agreed to respect the property 
 of the victims, for the sake of their wives and children : but those who 
 did not refrain from murder were not likely to* be re&trained from 
 robbery. 
 
 While this tragedy was taking place at Tirano, Robustelli and some 
 of his followers had taken post at the pass leading to Puschiavo, in the 
 Grison country, to intercept any communication with that quarter. 
 
 At Sondrio, the chief town of Valtellina, the insurrection broke out 
 in the same manner. The governor, however, had time to make a 
 show of defence, which enabled him to obtain a safeguard for himself 
 and his family ; but all the rest of the Protestants were butchered with- 
 
 M 
 
162 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period V. 
 
 out mercy, except two natives of the place, a man and a woman, who 
 had become Protestants, and who were sent to the inquisition at Milan. 
 The man abjured again, and so saved his life ; the woman, more firm 
 of purpose, refused to retract, and was burnt alive. 
 
 At Teglio, a small village, which has given its name to the whole 
 Valtellina, the assassins came just as the Protestants were attending 
 service in their church. The church was surrounded by armed men ; 
 the people within endeavoured to defend the entrance, but the assailants 
 climbed to the windows, and fired on the congregation. Men, women, 
 and children here fell victims promiscuously. The door was then 
 forced open, and the women being pushed out, the men were all killed, 
 with their pastor. Some had taken shelter in the belfry, but in vain ; 
 their tormentors lighted a fire underneath, and burnt them. 
 
 At Morbegno, in the lower Valtellina, the Protestants were few ; and 
 while their enemies tarried in making their appearance on account of 
 the distance, they had time to escape over the mountains into the Grison 
 country. A few, however, were seized and killed; one of them, 
 Andrea Paravicini, was burnt alive. In the other villages of the Valtel- 
 lina where Protestants were to be found, they met with a similar fate. 
 The whole valley thus fell into the power of the insurgents. 
 
 Several monks, such as a Capuchin, Ignazio da Bergamo, and a Do- 
 minican, Alberto Pandolfi da Soncino, were among the instigators and 
 leaders of the massacre. And to crown the impious profanation of tlie 
 name of religion, pope Paul V. (Borghese) granted a bill of indemnity 
 to these and other priests who had taken a share in the work of blood, 
 and who had thereby incurred the censures of the church, which in its 
 legitimate canons, misinterpreted as they have been both by fanatics 
 and unbelievers, has never countenanced similar atrocities. 
 
 The neighbouring county of Chiavenna, which adjoins the western 
 extremity of Valtellina, remained faithful to its allegiance to the Orisons. 
 The county of Bormio (Germanice Worms), which borders on the upper 
 or eastern end of Valtellina, and lies at the very foot of the Tyrolean 
 Alps, although it did not take a part in the massacre, nevertheless 
 entered into a defensive alliance with its neighbours of Vahellina, to 
 prevent any troops from coming down from the Grisons to reconquer the 
 country. 
 
 The victims of this catastrophe have been stated to have amounted 
 to 350 ; probably they exceeded that number. And as many of 
 the Protestants and their friends and connections, of whom several 
 who were not themselves Protestants were killed, were landed proprie- 
 tors in the country, the fanatical peasantry felt an additional inducement 
 to get rid of them ; as by so doing they freed themselves from their 
 landlords or creditors, and were enabled to appropriate their estates 
 to themselves. The fugitives were hunted after, shot at, stoned to death, 
 or thrown into the river Adda. 
 
 PER.IOD v.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 163 
 
 At the first news of this sanguinary revolt the Grisons loudly expressed 
 their indignation. Two of the leagues, Caddea and the Ten Jurisdic- 
 tions, sent 2,000 men, under one of the Salis, to march against Valtel- 
 lina ; but the Grey League, in which the Catholics were most nume- 
 rous, held back from the rest. The troops advanced by Chiavenna, 
 while another party came over the mountains direct to Sondrio, which 
 they took, and were there received with joy by many of the women, 
 who were in their hearts Protestant, but had pretended to be Catholic, 
 in order to save their lives. On the side of Bormio the Grisons did not 
 succeed, as a party of emigrants, with Rudolph Planta at their head, being 
 joined by a body of Austrians under the command of the archduke's 
 commissarv, Baldiron, invaded the valley of Munster, and threatening 
 the lower Engadina, obliged the Grisons to turn to the defence of their 
 own country. Planta, however, like most emigrants who have borne 
 arms against their country, found that he was only labouring for the 
 profit of the stranger. Baldiron took possession of the valley of Mun- 
 ster in the name of the archduke, as it afforded a convenient pass from 
 the Tyrol into the valley of the Adda. The insurgents of Valtellina 
 sent messengers to the Catholic cantons of Switzerland, to the duke of 
 Savov, to the Spanish governor of Milan, and even to the Venetian 
 senate, to interest those powers in their behalf ; representing, of course, 
 their revolt as justified by previous oppression, and passing over the 
 atrocities which had attended it as smoothly as they could. The duke 
 of Feria, governor of Milan, was the only one who sent them assistance. 
 A body of 500 Spaniards entered the county of Chiavenna, in conse- 
 quence of which the Grisons thought prudent to evacuate Valtellina, 
 and repass the mountains to their own country. An order came from 
 Madrid by which Valtellina was placed under the royal protection of 
 Spain, and Spanish garrisons were sent to Morbegno and Tirano. 
 
 The cantons of Bern and Zurich being applied to by the Grisons 
 for assistance against their revolted subjects sent a considerable body of 
 men, who entered Bormio and marched upon Tirano, committing many 
 acts of cruel retaliation on their way. Two thousand Spanish veterans 
 defended Tirano. The troops of each canton fought separately, those 
 of Bern hurried forward to the attack, without waiting for their allies of 
 Zurich, and were defeated with the loss of their commander. The 
 Zurichers came up next, but the Spaniards waited for them within the 
 walls of the town, and after seven hours of fruitless attack the Swiss 
 were obliged to retire with great loss ; and, being harassed by the 
 peasants, few of tliem succeeded in recrossing the Alps. 
 
 The people, of Valtellina, elated with their success, set about establish- 
 ing a regency, of which Robustelli was appointed president. « 
 
 The ministers of France did not behold with indifference the Spanish 
 power stretching itself over Valtellina, and threatening, in conjunction 
 with Austria, the independence of the Grisons. The Venetian senate 
 
 112 
 
164 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period V. 
 
 was likewise deeply interested in preventing the increase of Spanish 
 dominion in Italy. The duke of Savoy saw things in the same light. 
 And, as it happened, pope Paul V., the great supporter of the Valtellina 
 insurgents, having died in January, 1621, his successor, Gregory XV., a 
 man of moderate sentiments, felt as an Italian'prince a jealous suspicion 
 of the aggrandizement of Spain, and also openly disapproved of the 
 barharous transactions of the Valtellina insurrection. All these sovereigns 
 remonstrated strongly with the king of Spain against the occupation of 
 Valtellina ; and insisted on some conciliatory arrangement by which the 
 rights of the Orisons over the valley should be acknowledged with proper 
 security for the religion and privileges of their subjects. 
 
 The duke of Feria, on the other hand, not wishing to lose the fruit of 
 all his intrigues, endeavoured to bring about an arrangement with the 
 Orisons under his own superintendence, before the ministers at Madrid 
 should come to an understanding. He succeeded in persuading the 
 Grey League, where the Catholics were most numerous, to send agents 
 to Milan, and the Plantas favoured his scheme. The negotiations turned 
 in favour of Spain and of the Catholic party in the Orisons. Valtellina 
 was to remain for eight years garrisoned by Spaniards ; the executive 
 authority was to be restored to the Orisons, but no Protestant was to 
 settle in the valley; full amnesty was given for the past, and the 
 Catholic religion was prescribed as the only religion in Valtellina. 
 
 The other two leagues, however, would not listen to these conditions, 
 and they came to an open rupture with the Orey League. One of the 
 chief Protestant leaders, Oeorge Jenatsch, once a clergyman and now a 
 soldier, assembled his countrymen of the Ten Jurisdictions, entered the 
 valleys of the Orey League, drove away from it the auxiliaries sent by 
 the Catholic cantons, and obliged its representatives to renounce their 
 treaty with Milan. The abbot of Disentis, who was implicated in the 
 transactions of Valtellina, fled into the canton of Uri. Jenatsch having 
 surprised, in the castle of Rietberg, Pompey Planta, one of the two 
 emigrant brothers attached to the Spanish party, and whom he looked 
 upon as a traitor to his country, clove his head with a battle-axe. 
 
 Meantime the conferences at Madrid were proceeding, though slowly. 
 Philip III. died, but by his will recommended his son to settle the 
 Italian question according to the advice of the pope, and for the peace 
 of Europe. In April, 1621, a treaty was concluded at Madrid, by which 
 the Valtellina was to be evacuated by the Spaniards, and the Orisons 
 were to be reinstated in their possession of it ; a full amnesty for the 
 past and security for the future were to be given to the natives, under 
 the guarantee of the French king, the Swiss cantons, and the pope. 
 ' But these conditions pleased neither the Orisons nor the people of Val- 
 tellina. The Orisons again took up arms and entered the county of 
 Bormio, but the Spaniards advancing upon them on one side and the 
 Austrians from the Tyrol on the other, they withdrew again in confusion. 
 
 PERIOD v.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 165 
 
 Upon this the duke of Feria took possession of Chiavenna, and the 
 Austrian general, Baldiron, entered the league of the Ten Jurisdictions, 
 and on the plea of former claims to»k possession of it, as well as of Lower 
 Engadina, or valley of the Inn, in the name of Austria. The inhabitants 
 were obliged, under pain of death, to give up their arms, and to swear 
 fidelity to Austria. The other two leagues were also overrun by the 
 Austrians, who placed a garrison at Coire, the bishop of which town, avail- 
 ing himself of the terror of foreign arms, put forth his former pretensions 
 to sovereignty, and assumed the exercise of almost despotic authority. A 
 forced treaty was entered into in January, 1622, by the two leagues, the 
 other being considered as extinct, in which they gave up for ever their 
 sovereignty over the Valtellina and Bormio, they acknowledged the 
 incorporation of the Ten Jurisdictions, the Lower Engadina and the 
 Munsterthal, with the Austrian dominions ; and they submitted to the 
 passage of Spanish troops through their own territories. The independ- 
 ence of the Orisons was in fact annihilated. Such were the consequences 
 of their harsh and imprudent treatment of the people of Valtellina, and 
 of their obstinate rejection of the conditions of Madrid. 
 
 The overbearing conduct of the Austrians was, however, the cause 
 of the restoration of Orison independence. In that part of the country 
 which they now considered as their own, it having been incorporated 
 with the Austrian dominions, Baldiron's soldiers oppressed the in- 
 habitants with the greatest insolence, interfered with their property, 
 obliged them to carry heavy loads, and treated them more like beasts of 
 burthen than like men. A swarm of Capuchins spread over the valleys 
 to convert the peasants to Catholicism. All the reformed clergy were 
 driven away, seventy-five evangelical churches were left without pastors, 
 and the people were compelled by blows to attend the Catholic service. 
 This last act of tyranny roused them to resistance. The robust and 
 spirited inhabitants of the fine valley called Pratigau, on the banks of the 
 Landquart, disarmed as they were, hied to the mountain forests, made 
 themselves spears and clubs, and on Palm Sunday, 1622, they issued 
 out with loud shouts, surprised the Austrian detachments, cut them to 
 pieces or made them prisoners, and drove away the main body as far as 
 Meyenfeld. They then invested Coire, where Baldiron himself was. 
 The rest of the country followed their example, the mountaineers from 
 Appenzell joined them, and Baldiron was obliged to demand a truce to 
 withdraw from the country. Rudolph de Salis was named general of 
 the patriots. But Baldiron came again into the Pratigau the next 
 summer with 10,000 men, eager for vengeance. The people fought with 
 the fury of despair in the valleys, in the villages, in the mountains. It 
 is recorded that thirty brave men, in the last fight in the plain of 
 Acquasana, 5th of September, threw themselves, armed with clubs only, 
 into the enemy's ranks, and fell one after the other upon heaps of soldiers 
 whom they had slain. The succour from Coire came too late. The 
 
166 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period V. 
 
 whole country of Pratigaii was already in flames, and the population 
 almost entirely destroyed. 
 
 The Grison leas:ues sent envovs to the archduke of Austria at Lindau, 
 hut they had to submit to hard conditions. The league of the Ten Juris- 
 dictions was declared to belong to Austria, and free passage was to be 
 allowed through the whole Grison country to the Austrians and 
 Spaniards. 
 
 The king of France, Louis XIII., who was jealous of the Austrian 
 power, had already interfered by negotiations, in concert with the duke 
 of Savoy and the senate of Venice, to prevent the permanent occupation 
 by Spain and Austria of the important passes of the Grisons and the 
 Valtellina. At last, in 1624, he sent a force under the count de Coeuvres 
 into the Grison country. Bern and Zurich not only gave a free passage but 
 added their contingents. All the exiled Grisons, led by Rudolph de Salis 
 and by Colonel Jenatsch, led the van. As they reached the frontier of 
 their country a general rising took place, and the Austrian garrisons and 
 governors were driven away. The following year Chiavenna and the 
 Valtellina were reconquered from the Spaniards. The treaty concluded 
 at Mon^on, in Aragon, between France and Spain, in 1626, settled for 
 a time the affairs of the Grisons, though not to the full satisfaction of the 
 latter, who still clung pertinaciously to their rights of sovereignty over 
 the Italian vallevs. The Valtellina, Chiavenna, and Bormio were to 
 pay an annual tribute to the leagues, but they had the right of governing 
 themselves. Some troops in the service of the pope garrisoned the towns 
 of Valtellina pro tempore ; and Robustelli remained at the head of the 
 regency of the valley. 
 
 In 1628, the disputes about the duchy of Mantua brought the French 
 again into Italy. The Austrian armies sent to oppose them entered 
 suddenly the country of the Grisons, by the pass of Luciensteig, took 
 Coirc, and again occupied the Ten Jurisdictions and Engadina. Although 
 this time there was no slaughter of the inhabitants, yet vexations of 
 every sort were heaped on them. Famine followed, and a pestilence 
 brought by the German troops, probably from the frontiers of Turkev, 
 devastated the unfortunate Rhsetian valleys; 12,000 people died of the 
 latter scourge. Luckily for the Grisons the successes of Gustavus Adolphus 
 in Germany induced the emperor to conclude with France the peace of 
 Cherasco, in 1630, by which he engaged to withdraw his troops from the 
 Grisons. The duke of Rohan then came to Coire as ambassador from 
 France and brought with him some troops, who assisted the Grisons in 
 fortifying their passes towards the Tyrol. In 1635, war having broken 
 out again between France and the emperor, Rohan, at the head of a 
 Grison force, crossed the Alps, and after some sharp fighting, reconquered 
 Valtellina, Chiavenna, and Bormio from the Austrians and Spaniards 
 united. But the court of France now imperiously required that the 
 Italian valleys should be governed according to the treaty of Mon<jon. 
 
 period v.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 161 
 
 The French envoy Lanier, an overbearing man, assumed the tone of a 
 master at Coire, and talked of the Grisons as rebels. The Grison chiefs 
 said among themselves, " Austria takes and France lies ; let us trust no 
 foreign power, but seek help only from our own arms." 
 
 In February, 1636, several of the principal men of the leagues assembled 
 at Coire and swore to risk their all to deliver their country from all foreign 
 domination. Colonel Jenatsch was of the number, and he with great secrecy 
 ne"-otiated a treaty at Inspruck with the archduke of Austria, nephew to 
 the emperor Ferdinand II., by which the former relations of friendship 
 between the two countries were restored, and Austria promised to co-ope- 
 rate in driving the French out of the Grisons. Jenatsch armed his 
 countrymen secretly; but the duke of Rohan, nevertheless, suspecting 
 something, reinforced his posts on the banks of the Rhine and of the 
 Laudquart. On a sudden Jenatsch, with six battalions of his countrymen, 
 appeared before the French entrenchments, while at the same time a body 
 of Austrians showed itself at Lindau, threatening the rear of the French, 
 who, fearful of being surrounded, agreed to withdraw, which they did to 
 the number of about 5,000; and this time the deliverance was complete, for 
 no foreigners remained in the Grison country. The Grisons were left in 
 possession of the Italian valleys, to which they granted a full amnesty, 
 besides acknowledging the Catholic religion as that of the country. 
 Spain made a perpetual peace with the Grisons at Milan in September, 
 1639, on the above conditions, and Austria, too, renewed its former 
 treaties with the leagues, at Feldkirch, in August, 1641, preserving its 
 seignorial rights and fees in Engadina and the Ten Jurisdictions : these, 
 however, were bought off ten years after by the payment of 75,000 florins. 
 Thus Austria ceased to have any jurisdiction in the Grison territory ex- 
 cepting the baronies of Rhazuns and Tarasp, which Bonaparte, nearly 
 two centuries afterwards, pretended to give as a compensation to the 
 Grisons for the loss of Valtellina, which he took away from them and 
 joined to the Italian republic. 
 
 The brave Colonel Jenatsch, two years after he had freed his country, 
 was murdered in January, 1 639, while at a party of officers at Coire. 
 Conspirators entered the hall in disguise, and pressing round him, as if 
 in sport, murdered him in the middle of the festival. Rudolph Planta, 
 being accused by public rumour of having thus avenged the murder of 
 his brother Pompey, withdrew to his estates in Engadina, where he died 
 some time after. 
 
 Meantime the thirty years' war was proceeding in Germany. With the 
 result of that war the Swiss were deeply concerned, for had the house of 
 Austria, assisted by its relatives of Spain, succeeded inlaying the German 
 confederation at its feet, the Swiss cantons would not have been left long in 
 the enjoyment of their civil and religious liberties. The conduct of the 
 Austrians towards the Grisons, the allies of the Helvetic league, sufficiently 
 showed what the cantons themselves had to expect. The termination, how^- 
 
168 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period V. 
 
 ever, of that great contest by the peace of Westphalia, eventually put the 
 seal to the independence of Switzerland. It may be, therefore, worth 
 while to give a brief sketch of this great war, one of the most important 
 that Europe has seen in modern times. 
 
 The thirty years' war is the great historical event of the seventeenth cen- 
 tury, as the reformation, of which it was a consequence, although some- 
 what remote, was the great event of the sixteenth. It had a twofold 
 object— religious and political, the efforts of the emperor Ferdinand II. 
 being directed to abolish the Protestant religion in Germany, and at the 
 same time to establish his absolute authority, and that of the house of 
 Austria, over the ruins of the German constitution. The first symptoms 
 of this great struggle showed themselves in Bohemia. The great part of 
 the population of that kingdom, once the stronghold of the disciples of 
 John Huss, had embraced the similar doctrines of the reformation, as 
 followers of either Luther or Calvin, and were included in the treaties 
 and edicts of pacification and toleration issued at various times under the 
 reigns of Ferdinand I. and Maximilian II. This last wise and good 
 emperor became endeared to the Bohemians, who spoke of him as their 
 common father ; he protected their privileges, their laws, their rights, 
 their liberties, with the most equitable impartiality. But, unfortunately, 
 his son and successor Rudolph II. was bigoted and intolerant; he 
 gradually prohibited in his own hereditary states of Austria the public 
 exercise of the reformed religion, and in matters concerning the empire 
 he directed his Aulic council, consisting wholly of Catholics, to take 
 cognizance of affairs, which in their proper course belonged to the impe- 
 rial chamber, a body formed of Catholic and Protestant members in 
 equal numbers. The consequence was that, in suits between Catholics 
 and Protestants, favour was generally shown to the former. The Protes- 
 tant states of Germany took the alarm ; they formed, or rather enlarged 
 and strengthened, their confederation, which was called the Evangelical 
 Union, and even invited Henry IV. of France to place himself at their 
 head, and had not that prince been murdered by Ravaillac, a.d. 1610, 
 the civil and religious war in Germany would have begun eighteen 
 years sooner than it did. 
 
 Under Matthias, the brother and successor of Rudolph II., the dissen- 
 sions and rancour between the two religious parties in Germany continued 
 with the same violence. In Bohemia the archbishop of Prague demolished 
 several chapels of the Protestants or Dissidents, as they were called. The 
 latter, led by count Thorn, took up arms, and one of their first acts was to 
 hurl the governor of Prague and his secretary from the windows of the 
 town-house ; this occurred in the year 1618. The Dissidents of Upper 
 Austria and Silesia joined them, the Evangelical Union sent troops to 
 their assistance, and a desultory war began. In the midst of these quar- 
 rels Matthias died in the year 1619, and was succeeded by his cousin 
 Ferdinand II. an intolerant and arbitrary prince. The Bohemian states 
 
 I'ERIOD v.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 169 
 
 refused to acknowledge Ferdinand, and they elected as their king Fre- 
 deric elector palatine, who belonged to the Calvinistic communion, and 
 who had married a daughter of James I. of England. He formed an 
 alliance with Bethlehem Gabor, prince of Transylvania, who made an 
 irruption into Hungary, where he was joined by the Protestants of that 
 kingdom, and advanced within sight of Vienna. But the Catholic 
 league, formed among the Catholic states of Germany to counteract the 
 Evangelical Union of the Protestants, and headed by Maximilian duke of 
 Bavaria, took the field against Frederic, being joined by a body of Spa- 
 nish auxiliaries. The Catholics had for their general, John Tzerclas, a 
 Belgian, known as count Tilly, one of the greatest captains of that age, 
 but cruel and unprincipled. Meantime the emperor Ferdinand, work- 
 ing upon the animosity which existed between the Lutherans and the 
 Calvinists, secured the neutrality of the elector of Saxony, who was at 
 the head of the former, and of other Lutheran states, to whom he repre- 
 sented his contest with Frederic as a civil and not a religious quarrel. 
 He also entered into negotiations with Bethlehem Gabor, and concluded a 
 truce with him. Frederic and the Bohemians, being thus left to them- 
 selves, were completely defeated by the army of the Catholic league led 
 by Tilly, at the battle of the White Mountain, near Prague, on the 8th 
 of November, 1620, which is still remembered as a fatal day for Bohe- 
 mia, whose independence was then sacrificed. Prague surrendered, Fre- 
 deric ran away, and Ferdinand avenged himself by proscriptions and con- 
 fiscations. Seven hundred of the chief Bohemian families were deprived 
 of their estates. In the following year Ferdinand, having put Frederic 
 to the ban of the empire, invaded the palatinate, and transferred part of 
 it, with the electoral dignity, to the duke of Bavaria. The Evangelical 
 Union was dissolved, and the Protestant states were overawed by the 
 successes of Ferdinand, supported as he was by the Catholic league and 
 by the Spaniards, a body of whom, 24,000 strong, had marched under 
 Spinola from the Netherlands to assist the emperor ; Austria and Catho- 
 licism were triumphant in Germany. Thus ended, in 1623, the first act 
 of the great drama of the thirty years' war. Bodies of partisans, under 
 Count Mansfeld and Christian of Brunswick, continued to carry on an 
 appearance of resistance in the western borders of Germany, having the 
 united provinces of Holland as a place of retreat in their rear. This was 
 the time when the Austrians, under Baldiron, invaded the Grison coun- 
 try and endeavoured to subvert the Protestant religion there. 
 
 Cardinal Richelieu, the minister of Louis XIII., beheld with great 
 jealousy the overbearing power of Austria in Germany, and the close 
 union which existed between that power and the Spanish branch of the 
 same house, the councils of which were then directed by the ambitious 
 mind of Olivares, minister of Philip IV. The cardinal was, above all, 
 alarmed at the Austrians having possession of the Grisons, and the 
 Spaniards of Valtellina, by which a free communication was established 
 
170 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period V 
 
 PERIOD v.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 m 
 
 between the Austrian and Spanish territories of Germany and Italy 
 Richeheu, therefore, with that politic disregard of moral consistency 
 which was then considered as characteristic of a great statesman, while 
 lie was persecutmg the Protestants in France, encouraged underhand 
 those of Germany to resist the encroachments of the emperor, who, 
 flushed with success, did not conceal his intention of resuming the sees 
 benefices, and other ecclesiastical temporalities which the Protestant 
 states had appropriated to themselves since the peace of Passau. The 
 states of Lower Saxony, who were possessed of most of this kind of pro- 
 perty, were the first to rouse themselves from their apathy ; they formed 
 a confederacy « for the defence of their religion and liberties," assembled 
 troops, and, in 1625, invited Christian IV. of Denmark, a Lutheran 
 prmce and a relative of the expelled elector palatine, to assume the com- 
 mand. Christian found Tilly posted on the banks of the Weser • but 
 the campaign of that year ended without any definite success on c'ithcr 
 side. Meantime another and a principal actor was about to appear on 
 the scene. The emperor Ferdinand was, as it has already been 
 observed, impelled by two great objects: one was the destruction of 
 Protestantism, which he considered as tantamount to rebellion, and the 
 other that of establishing his own supreme power over the whole Ger- 
 inan confederation. With this second object in view, he was nearly as 
 jealous of the Catholic as of the Protestant states. The Catholic states 
 on their side, were on their guard against Ferdinand's ambition Tilly 
 was the general of the Catholic league, and not Ferdinand's general- he was 
 subject to the duke of Bavaria, the head of the league, and received his 
 instructions from Munich, and not from Vienna. Ferdinand had no 
 army of his own to oppose to Christian ; his treasury, notwithstanding 
 the confiscations, was far from being well stored, and he was scarcely 
 able to keep his own hereditary states in subjection. In this emer£?encv 
 he ^»et with a man who proposed to raise, equip, pay, and maintain an 
 army of 50,000 men m his service without cost to the emperor This 
 man was Albert AValdstein, or Wallenstein, of an illustrious Bohemian 
 family attached to the Catholic and imperial cause, who had distin- 
 gui.hed himself m the subjugation of Bohemia, and had received a 
 share of the confiscated estates as his reward. He was a man of extra 
 ordinary powers, with a mind fertile in resources, of a lofty romantic 
 ambitioi^ and an undaunted courage. He exacted as the conditions 
 of his offer that he should have the absolute and undivided command 
 of the army he should raise, and the appointment of the officers The 
 ministers of Ferdinand treated the proposal as a visionary scheme ; but 
 Ferdinand himself, eager to escape from the thraldom of his own allies 
 accepted it, and at the same time created Waldstein duke of Friedland' 
 The latter fulfilled his engagement; he soon raised an army of 30 000 
 men m Bohemia, which was swelled on its march to Lower Saxony by 
 crowds of adventurers, so as far to exceed the stipulated number of 
 
 50,000. Waldstein made the first disbursements out of his own purse, 
 and trusted to forced contributions, plunder, and confiscations for the 
 rest ; and these means proved fully equal to the support of his troops as 
 long as he remained at their head. 
 
 Waldstein, acting in concert with Tilly, defeated Christian of Den- 
 mark and his auxiliaries, count Mansfeld and the duke of Saxe Weimar ; 
 he conquered the Danish continental territories, invaded Mecklenburg 
 and Pomerania, and the island of Rugen, occupied the whole southern 
 coast of the Baltic, and began to collect ships of war, with which he 
 intended to attack Christian in his islands, and even threatened 
 Sweden, whose king, Gustavus, was another prop of the Protestant 
 cause in Germany. Ferdinand, elated with success, created Waldstein 
 duke of Mecklenburg, and named him Admiral of the Baltic Sea. The 
 latter, however, proved an empty title. Like other great generals, 
 Waldstein found that his fortune did not extend beyond the shore. The 
 Danes and Swedes, excited by a sense of common danger, foiled him m 
 his attack on Stralsund, and destroyed his squadron. Soon after, 
 Christian of Denmark, having made overtures of peace, Ferdinand 
 listened to them, and the peace of Lubeck was concluded in May, 1629. 
 Thus closed the second period of the thirty years' war. Two of the 
 emperor's most determined enemies, Count Mansfeld and Christian of 
 Brunswick, died soon after of disease. 
 
 Ferdinand, firm and persevering in adversity, but stern and over- 
 bearing in prosperity, now gave full vent to his animosity against the 
 Protestants. He began by resuming from the states of Lower Saxony 
 the rich benefices which they had taken from the Catholic clergy since 
 the peace of Passau, and he showed his own selfish disposition by 
 bestowing the best of them upon his son Leopold and other relatives. 
 He at the same time gave the signal of a cruel persecution against the 
 Bohemian Protestants, the three-fourths of the population of that king- 
 dom, who had risen again during the late contest, when count Mans- 
 feld made an irruption into their country. He ejected their preachers, 
 schoolmasters, and professors, and gave their churches and schools to 
 monks, most of them collected in haste, ignorant and fanatical. He 
 forbade Protestant worship under the severest penalties, declared their 
 marriages, baptisms, and wills to be null, forbade them from exercising 
 any trade or handicraft, and drove away the poor of their communion 
 from the almshouses and hospitals. This was in the towns, whence the 
 wealthier burghers were expelled with their families, and where the poorer 
 class were compelled to become Catholics. In the country districts it was 
 still worse, as parties of monks and Jesuits, accompanied by the mili- 
 tary, went round, hunting out the Protestants, giving up their houses to 
 pilla'o-e, and their families to the outrages of the soldiers. Every kind 
 of atrocity that can be imagined was perpetrated in the name of the holy 
 church and of the emperor. Ferdinand himself formally deprived the 
 
172 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period V. 
 
 Bohemian states of their right of election, forbade the use of the Bohe- 
 mian language in all public transactions, and lastly, abrogating the 
 former royal edict of toleration, he banished all those who would not 
 abjure their faith and turn Catholics. Thirty thousand families, with 
 thejr servants and retainers, left the kingdom i and by such means Bohe- 
 mia became again a Catholic country. 
 
 In Austria Proper Ferdinand abolished likewise the Protestant wor- 
 ship, as well as in his other dominions, except Hungary, where he was 
 restranied by the vicinity of Bethlehem Gabor and the fear of the 
 Turks, always ready to take advantage of the first insurrection. Well 
 might Ferdinand II. be compared, as he has been, to his relative Philip 
 II. of Spam, they being the two worst princes that the house of Austria 
 which has given birth to many good and great men, has ever produced.' 
 In the German empire, Ferdinand could not act at once in the same 
 arbitrary tenour as in his own hereditary dominions. But he cavilled 
 on the terms of the former treaties, the cupidity of the Protestants 
 themselves affording him pretences for so doing, and in March, 1629 
 he issued the Edict of Restitution, in which he ordered the restoration 
 of all ecclesiastical property secularized or appropriated to the Lutheran 
 clergy since the peace of Passau. Two archbishoprics, Bremen and 
 Magdeburg, twelve bishoprics, besides convents and other benefices 
 were thus restored to the Catholics ; the Lutheran canons were ejected 
 from Magdeburg, Halberdstadt, and other chapters ; and the Protestant 
 princes were stripped of all ecclesiastical property, especially in Lower 
 Saxony and Westphaha. The elector of Saxony alone was allowed to 
 retain the benefices appropriated to his family. Another measure of 
 Ferdinand was to declare that the Lutherans only were entitled to the 
 benefits of the religious peace, excluding all other sects, and especially 
 the Calvinists, from toleration ; and he authorized the Catholic prelates to 
 us^ every possible means for extirpating Protestantism in their territories 
 a licence of which they were not slow in availing themselves. 
 
 All this was but a prelude to the total extirpation of Protestantism from 
 Germany, and consequently from the continent of Europe,-a consumma- 
 tion the desire of which was openly avowed by the imperial partizans, es- 
 ^.Tll ^'"''''"' ^^ Waldstein himself,whose army, swoln to more than 
 100,000 men, was ever ready to enforce the imperial decrees, and bv the 
 agents of Spam, who were imbued with the persecuting spirit of the In- 
 quisition, which ruled over their own country. Ferdinand, however met 
 with an effectual check from his own allies-the Catholic states of 
 Germany, and especially from the duke of Bavaria. The German Catho- 
 lics, especially the higher orders, were not so led away by bigotry as the 
 Spaniards, Itahans, or French ; accustomed for nearly a century to mix 
 wuh Protestants on terms of equality, as fellow countrymen and brethren, 
 they had not against them the fanatical prejudices of nations exclusivelv 
 Catholic. They also saw through the bad faith of Ferdinand, who aimed 
 
 PERIOD v.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 113 
 
 at reducing them to the condition of dependants like the Spanish 
 grandees ; they beheld the spoils of the Protestants monopolized by the 
 imperial family and dependants, the convents given to the Jesuits, instead 
 of being restored to their original possessors ; they were above all in- 
 dignant at the insolence and licentiousness of Waldstein's army, which 
 was scattered over the empire, living at the expense of friends and foes ; 
 and they resented the pride of its commander, who assumed the tone and 
 state of a sovereign. The emperor added to these feelings of irritation 
 by sucgesting the dismissal of part of the army of the league. The mem- 
 bers of the league met at Heidelberg, and boldly replied that, until they 
 had been indemnified for their expenses during the war, they would not 
 dismiss a single soldier, or relinquish one foot of territory, and they called 
 on the emperor to convoke the diet. Ferdinand had just sent 30,000 of 
 his troops into Italy, through the Grison country, to expel the duke of 
 Mantua, whom he had put to the ban of the empire.* He had also sent 
 a force to the assistance of Sigismund of Poland who was engaged in 
 war airainst Gustavus of Sweden, and another corps against the united 
 provinces of Holland. The diet, which met at Ratisbon, demanded 
 the reduction of the imperial army, the dismissal of Waldstein, and the 
 suspension of the Edict of Restitution, and spoke of the necessity of con- 
 ciliating the Protestants. Richelieu had sent an ambassador to the diet, 
 accompanied by father Joseph, the celebrated Capuchin friar, the confi- 
 dent of the cardinal, whose diplomatic skill, concealed under the garb 
 of sanctity, was secretly employed in the most important affairs, and who, 
 intriguing with both Catholics and Protestants, aimed at one great object, 
 that of weakening the power of the house of Austria. Ferdinand com- 
 plied in great measure with the demands of the diet, he dismissed the 
 greater p'art of his cavalry, suspended the Edict of Restitution, and 
 prevailed upon Waldstein to resign his command. At the same time the 
 agents of Richelieu were encouraging Gustavus of Sweden to effect a 
 landing in Germany. Gustavus, besides his own personal motives ot 
 resentment against Ferdinand, who had assisted his enemy Sigismund, 
 and would not acknowledge him as king of Sweden, was, moreover, a 
 zealous Protestant, and as such felt strongly for his persecuted brethren 
 of Germany. Being encouraged by France, who agreed to pay him a 
 subsidy, and also by England, the United Provinces, and the Hanseatic 
 towns,' he collected a force of 15,000 men, with which he landed in 
 Pomerania in June, 1630, occupied Stettin, entered Brandenburg, and in 
 a manifesto declared that he came to war against Ferdinand, who had 
 given him personal provocation, and not against the members of the 
 Catholic league, unless they chose to join the emperor. The troops of the 
 league, however, assembled under Tilly, and were joined by a body of 
 
 * This is the army that spread devastation and carried the plague into North 
 Italy, aud committed enormous barbarities at the stormino: of Ma"tua, m July, IfrJO, 
 and whose fearful irruption is vividly desaibed by Manzom m his " Promes.i Sposu' 
 
114 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period V. 
 
 Austrian troops, the remnant of Waldstein's army. Tilly could not 
 prevent Gustavus from taking Frankfort-on-the-Oder, but was obliged to 
 fall back on the Elbe, where he formed the siege of Magdeburg, which had 
 revolted against the emperor. Gustavus was prevented from relieving 
 it by the lukewarmness of the electors of Saxony and Brandenburg, and 
 other Lutheran princes, who, instead of joining him with all their forces, 
 held back through selfishness or pusillanimity. On the 10th May, 
 1631, the unfortunate town of Magdeburg was stormed by Tilly's soldiers, 
 who inflicted on its devoted population all the horrors of cruelty, lust, and 
 rapacity united. Neitlier age nor sex was spared. Some officers, horror- 
 struck at the carnage, ran to Tilly, begging of him to put a stop to it ; 
 but that barbarian coolly answered, " Let the soldier have some compen- 
 sation for his dangers and fatigues." Of 30,000 inhabitants hardly 
 1,000 escaped, and to complete the havoc, the soldiers set fire to the 
 town, which was completely burnt down. 
 
 The horrors of Magdeburg awakened the German Protestants from 
 apathy, and Gustavus was joined by the troops of the elector of Saxony 
 and of the landgrave of Hesse, besides a reinforcement of 8,000 Swedes 
 and 6,000 English volunteers under the marquis of Hamilton. On the 
 7th September, 1631, Gustavus and Tilly met near Leipzig, when the 
 latter was utterly defeated, with a loss of 12,000 men and all his artillery 
 and baggage. This battle established the superiority of Gustavus ; all 
 Germany was open to him, and he marched without interruption to the 
 Rhine, while the elector of Saxony occupied Bohemia. Tilly himself 
 was killed in attempting to defend Bavaria. Ferdinand saw no safety for 
 himself unless by recalling Waldstein. That experienced commander, 
 after making his own terms with the emperor, soon raised a fresh army 
 well appointed and equipped. After many marches and manoeuvres on 
 both sides, Waldstein and Gustavus met at Lutzen on the 1st November, 
 1632, when a desperate battle was fought, in which Gustavus was killed, 
 but Waldstein was defeated. The battle of Lutzen may be considered as 
 closing the third period of the war. 
 
 The senate of Sweden, during the minority of Christina, Gustavus's 
 daughter, resolved to carry on the war in Germany, and the Chancellor 
 Oxenstiern was charged with the conduct of it. Oxenstiern succeeded 
 in forming at Heilbronn a league of the states, composing the four circles 
 of Sua])ia, Franconia, and the Upper and Lower Rhine, by which they 
 engaged to carry on the war in conjunction with Sweden, until the civil 
 and religious liberties of Germany sliould be secured, the deposed princes 
 restored, and a compensation made to Sweden for her expenses. The 
 duke Bernard of Saxe Weimar was entrusted with the principal com- 
 mand. The campaign of 1633 was a desultory one, Waldstein contenting 
 himself with hovering about the borders of Bohemia and Silesia, and 
 watching the movements of his antagonists. His caution and inaction 
 afforded occasion to his enemies at the imperial court to represent him 
 
 PERIOD v.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 115 
 
 as a traitor, and Ferdinand, who felt that Waldstein kept him in a state 
 of dependence, lent a willing ear to their suggestions. The duke of 
 Bavaria, between whom and Waldstein there rankled of old a mutual 
 jealousy, joined in the plot, and Ferdinand having ordered Waldstein to 
 divide his forces and to march to Ratisbon, in the midst of winter, that 
 proud commander refused. The emperor ordered him to be seized, ahve 
 or dead. Several of his confidential officers were bribed, a conspiracy was 
 formed, and he was basely murdered at his head-quarters at Egra, in 
 Bohemia, in February, 1634. Thus another great actor of the thirty years' 
 war was carried off the scene. 
 
 The archduke Ferdinand, afterwards Ferdinand III., being appointed 
 generalissimo of the imperial forces, obtained great successes in the cam- 
 paign of 1634, took Ratisbon, and completely defeated the Swedes and 
 their allies at the battle of Nordlingen. The elector of Saxony and other 
 Protestant princes made their peace with the emperor. Oxenstiern, in 
 this emergency, applied to Richelieu, who seized the opportunity of 
 playing a principal part in the affairs of Germany. He entered into an 
 alliance with Sweden on condition of retaining Alsace and Philipsburg. 
 A French army now acted in conjunction with the Swedes, with various 
 success, till Ferdinand IT., the primary cause of all this contest, died at 
 Vienna, in February, 1637. In the two following campaigns, the duke 
 of Saxe Weimar on the Rhine and General Banner at the head of the 
 Swedes on the Elbe, obtained great advantages over the imperial troops, 
 but the duke of W^eimar died of fatigue in July, 1634. A succession of 
 generals— Banner, Torstenson, and Wrangel — all formed in the school of 
 Gustavus, followed each other in the command of the Swedish forces in 
 Germany, and, in conjunction with France, carried on the war with 
 various success, till 1 648, when the peace of Westphalia was concluded. 
 
 During this long and stormy period the Swiss cantons had a difficult 
 task in manitaining their neutrality. Sometimes the Austrians or imperial 
 troops, sometimes the Swedes, at other times the French, would encroach 
 on the territory of the confederation, especially on the canton of Schaff- 
 hausen, and that part of Basle which lay north of the Rhine. In 1634, 
 the Swedes having attempted to attack the city of Constance, and pass- 
 ing through Stein, a town of the bailiwick of Thurgau, the Catholic 
 cantons sent troops to oppose their passage ; burgomaster Kesselring, of 
 Zurich, was arrested as having favoured the Swedes, and a rupture 
 between the Catholic and Protestant cantons appeared imminent. The 
 Austrians soon after violated the territory of Schaffhausen and burnt 
 several villages. The Zurichers came to its defence, but too late. The 
 towns of Mulhausen and Rottweil, though allied to the confederation, 
 being placed outside its boundaries, were left to the outrages of both 
 armies. In fact a federal republic, divided within itself by religious parties, 
 could not possibly act with vigour against powerful neighbours, except 
 indeed in extreme cases, when common interests of the most obvious 
 
176 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period V 
 
 PERIOD v.] 
 
 and pressing importance opened the eyes of all its members. Such a 
 government could have but little foresight, and no enlarged views of ge- 
 neral politics. This was seen in the affair of the Tranche Comte, which 
 belonged to the house of Austria, and the neutrality of which had been 
 guaranteed by solemn treaties with the confederation. Louis XIII. in- 
 vaded it without scruple, notwithstanding the remonstrances of the Swiss, 
 and afterwards his successor, Louis XIV., annexed it finally to France, 
 which formidable power became thus a close neighbour of the Swiss along 
 the whole line of the Jura. 
 
 Switzerland, however, was fortunate enough to escape being involved 
 as a party in the thirty years' war. Meantime Swiss soldiers fought in the 
 French service under J. L. d'Erlach of Bern, who distinguished himself 
 and won the baton of marshal of France, which was given him only a few 
 days before his death. The peace of Munster,or of Westphalia, in 1648, 
 in settling the politics of Europe, solemnly acknowledged the Swiss con- 
 federation as an independent state in Europe, free from all claims and 
 pretensions on the part of the German empire. The Swiss laboured 
 hard to obtain this acknowledgment, and at last succeeded. An imperial 
 decree of the 16th May, 1647, had already acknowledged " the full inde- 
 pendence of the city of Basle, as well as of the other Swiss cantons, as no 
 longer amenable to the jurisdiction of the imperial chamber at Speyer ;" 
 before which natives of Switzerland were, until then, occasionally sum- 
 moned. The influence of France and Sweden was exerted on this occa- 
 sion, in favour of the Swiss, to obtain for them the important boon. 
 
 Fresh troubles, resulting from various causes, broke out soon after in 
 the interior of Switzerland. During the thirty years' war the country had 
 been inundated with thousands of adventurers and vagrants from the 
 various hostile parties and armies, who excited the peopfe to disturbance, 
 and committed many disorders. Measures of severity were resorted to 
 and more than 200 of these outlaws were executed at Bremgarten in 
 one year. But their evil example served to demoralize the peasantry. 
 The expenses occasioned during the same period, in order to preserve 
 the security and neutrality of the country, obliged Bern, Zurich, and 
 other cantons to impose a property tax of one per thousand on capital, or 
 property of every description, without exception of rank or condition. 
 The estimate of the capital was left to the honour of each individual • 
 but it was not stated how long this tax should continued to be levied. 
 The country people feared that it would be permanent, and the fear gave 
 rise to partial insurrections, which were put down by Bern, without any 
 great display of se^^rity. In the canton of Zurich, however, the tumult be- 
 came more serious. Two communes, Wadenschwyl and Knonau, openly 
 resisted their magistrates. The military was sent from the town of Zurich 
 to enforce obedience, and the inhabitants were obliged to sue for pardon 
 on their knees ; seven ringleaders were beheaded, and the two communes 
 were fined 40,000 florins. This took place in 1645. 
 
 history of SWITZERLAND. 
 
 177 
 
 Several of the cantons having depreciated their small currency during 
 the thirty years war, as the German Princes had done, and wishing to 
 restore it to its real standard after the conclusion of the peace of 
 Westphalia, ordered the base coin to be reduced in its nominal value; 
 directing, at the same time, that all rents and payments to the public 
 treasury should, for a certain period, be received at the raised value as 
 heretofore. This measure, however, created confusion, especially among 
 the peasantry— a class naturally suspicious, and prone to take umbrage. 
 Other complaints were added to this source of discontent. The bailiffs, 
 eent by the towns to govern the rural districts, sometimes acted in an' 
 arbitrary manner. Appeals were of little use, for the bailiffs had friends 
 in the councils, the members of which, having a chance of filling the office 
 m their turn, would not contribute to curtail its prerogatives however 
 abused. The monopoly of salt, a most essential article in a grazing country 
 was loudly complained of; although at that time, when internal com- 
 munications and trade were much more uncertain than at present, the 
 system might be fairly attributed to foresight on the part of the govern- 
 ment in order to ensure a permanent supply. The government monopoly 
 of gunpowder appears less justifiable, but it was said to have been 
 resolved upon in consequence of the bad quality of the powder which 
 was previously manufactured by private individuals. A duty on the ex- 
 portation of cattle, and an excise tax on wine, were also reckoned among 
 the minor grievances. But the privileges of the corporations in the 
 towns by which the rest of the people, especially the rural population 
 were excluded from the manufacture or sale of many articles, were a con- 
 stant source of irritation among the peasantry.* People of little practical 
 information declaimed against all these things together as intolerable 
 abuses, forgetful that it was impossible to change at once the whole 
 system of society as established for ages ; and, by urging so many com- 
 plaints at one and the same time, they rendered the towns reluctant to 
 listen to the grievances of the country, and thus prevented any particular 
 subject from being attended to and redressed. Crowds of peasants as- 
 sembled here and there, nor were persons wanting to blow the fire into a 
 blaze. Several years, however, elapsed ere the flame burst out. 
 
 The peasants of the Entlibuch, a fine and extensive district of the 
 canton of Luzern, inhabited by a bold, vigorous race of men, were the 
 first to rise in open revolt in 1653. Their proximity to Unterwalden, and 
 the other democratic cantons of the Waldstatten, may have contributed 
 to excite in them a wish for a state of democratic independence, similar 
 to that of their neighbours. They at first sent deputies to Luzern to 
 demand the restoration of the coin to its late nominal value. The deputies 
 were ill received by the council, and on their return the -people drove away 
 the officers of the government. The Avoyer Dulliker of Luzern, accom- 
 
 * These privileges of corporations and guilds were at first the only effectual 
 means of encouraging manufactures and commerce, as it has been shown at p. 23. 
 
 N 
 
178 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period V. 
 
 panied by several other councilmen and magistrates, repaired to WoU- 
 hausen in the Entlibuch to reason with the peasants. He found the whole 
 country in arms, and a body of fourteen hundred men came to meet him. 
 They clamoured tumultuously about the currency, the taxes, and tolls, 
 the bailiffs, and their other grievances ; and the avoyer, seeing that his 
 remonstrances were fruitless, returned to Luzern. The revolted peasants 
 threatened to march on that town, but 400 men from the Waldstatten 
 came to reinforce its garrison ; Zurich and Bern armed likewise to sup- 
 port Luzern, and the insurgents asked for terms of accommodation, 
 which were in part granted, through the mediation of the other cantons. 
 The peasants of Entlibuch secured some valuable privileges, among others 
 that of having the avoyer of Willisau chosen among themselves, and of 
 having their own courts of justice, subject to appeal at Luzern, only for 
 causes above 100 florins. But the spirit of insurrection now spread 
 into the districts of the neighbouring cantons. The Emmenthal, ihe 
 Oberland, the Aargau arose against Bern, and the peasants of Soleure 
 joined them. The uproar and the disorder were great, but the municipal 
 towns, the wealthy proprietors, and the clergy remained faithful to the 
 government of the capital. The other cantons interfered here also, and 
 succeeded in bringing about a pacification ; the senate of Bern making 
 concessions, and the deputies of the rural districts begging forgiveness 
 for all past offences. Peace appeared to be re-established, when on a 
 sudden the peasants of Luzern rose again, and carried along with them 
 their neighbours of Bern. The insurrection now assumed a formidable 
 appearance, for it extended to four cantons, Luzern, Bern, Soleure, and 
 Basle. ^ The insurgents held a general assembly at Sumiswald in the Em- 
 menthal, when they appointed a countryman of the name of Leuenberger 
 as their commander ; and they sent circular letters to the subjects of the 
 other cantons, inviting them to meet together in order that all Swiss 
 should become free, and that the country districts should be indepen- 
 dent of the towns. But their measures were ill concerted ; they had no 
 regular steady purpose in view, no discipline, every one wished to com- 
 mand, and no one was w illing to obey. They would not listen to prudent 
 and temperate counsels, but lent a w^illing ear to the most violent among 
 themselves, and they disgraced their cause by .acts of cruelty against those 
 who would not go hand in hand with them, cutting off the ears of some, 
 scalping others, and carrying fire and devastation through the very 
 country which they talked about making free. At last Zurich, Bern, and 
 even the cantons of the Waldstatten sent their contingents, determined to 
 put down the insurrection. It has been observed by Zschokke that "the 
 forest cantons, jealous as they were of their own democratic liberty, joined 
 the to,vijs in putting down the peasants, who wished to be as free as them- 
 selves; and this, because the Waldstatten themselves had subjects in the 
 bailiwicks." But, besides this reason, it ought to be observed that the 
 situation of the Waldstatten, from their very origin, had differed greatly 
 
 1»ERI0D v.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 179 
 
 from that of the town cantons; their equality had existed on their 
 mountains from the very beginning of society, they had no large opulent 
 cities who had led the way to their independence ; the peasants of the 
 Waldstatten were the founders of their republic, whilst the peasants of 
 the other cantons had either been conquered by the towns from their 
 former lords, or had of themselves sought the protection of the towns, and 
 w^ere glad to obtain it, without stipulating at the time for any share in 
 the sovereign power. 
 
 The generals Wertmuller of Zurich, Sigismund d'Erlach of Bern, 
 and Zweyer of Uri, commanded the confederate forces, to the number of 
 20,000 men. As the insurgents threatened Bern, the council of that 
 city sent them deputies with offers of concihation, which some of the 
 leaders approved of, but the multitude would not listen to. Wertmuller 
 therefore advanced upon Mellingen, which was besieged by a body of the 
 insurgents, and having repulsed them they lost courage, and then sued 
 for terms. They were told to disband immediately, and deliver up their 
 arms, which they did. Another body, under Leuenberger, was attacked 
 by d'Erlach at Herzogenbuchsee, when a desperate combat was fought. 
 The peasants, being driven from the village, after disputing every house 
 of it, dispersed among the woods : but most of their leaders were seized, 
 and being tried by court-martial, wxre sentenced to death and executed. " 
 Leuenberger was taken to Bern, where he confessed upon the rack the 
 names of his accomplices and their designs : his papers being examined 
 confirmed his deposition, and he was beheaded. The insurgents of Lu- 
 zern, be boldest of all, were the last to submit, and by the mediation of 
 the forest cantons they obtained milder terms. Thus the " peasant war," 
 which had spread over one-half of Switzerland, was at an end. 
 
 Two years had hardly elapsed after the termination of the insurrec- 
 tion, when a new religious war broke out among the cantons. The fede- 
 rative bond was so loose that each state formed alliances with foreign 
 powers, without consulting the other cantons. The Protestant cantons 
 had entered into treaties with Holland and England, and the Catholic 
 with, the dukes of Savoy and the prince Bishop of Basle. These 
 foreign connexions, adverse to each other, strengthened among the con- 
 federates the feeling of mistrust and jealousy which had been kept alive 
 by the never-ending disputes concerning the subject "bailiwicks. A 
 fresh cause ripened this feeling into open hostility. Several families 
 from Arth, in the canton of Schwytz, having embraced the reformed 
 communion, were obliged to fly their country, where their lives were 
 not safe. They took refuge at Zurich in 1655, and entreated that 
 government to intercede for them, that they might at least be allowed to 
 remove their property along with them. The magistrates of Zurich 
 wrote to the people of Schwytz, but the latter answered that *' they owed 
 no account of the administration of their country but to God and them- 
 selves;" and they confiscated the property of the emigrants, and perse • 
 
 n2 
 
180 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period V. 
 
 1»ERI0D v.] 
 
 cuted their relatives. The other Protestant cantons interfered ; they 
 appealed to former treaties about toleration, and to the federal pact, 
 but all in vain. The Zurichers at last resorted to arms, and Schaif- 
 hausen and Basle joined them. They overran Thurgau, expelling the 
 officers sent by the Catholic cantons ; and the Zurichers laid siege to 
 Rapperschwyl, which was occupied by a garrison from the Walds fatten, 
 Bern put its troops in march to join Zurich, but this time the Bernese 
 marched without discipline, committing depredations on their way. 
 They encamped at Willmcrgen, in the Aargau, on the road to Bremgar- 
 ten, taking no precautions against surprise. Four thousand men from 
 Luzern, under general Pfyffer, were concealed in a wood on the heights 
 of Wohlen, in that neighbourhood; and on the 14th of January, 165G, 
 at two in the afternoon, they issued suddenly out of a hollow road and 
 directed their fire on the Bernese. The latter had not time to form 
 their ranks ; they made but two discharges of artillery, when they found 
 that tlieir ammunition was expended. At this moment general PfyiFer 
 received a dispatch from Luzern, directing him not to begin the attack, as 
 there was still some chance of accommodation ; but, probably guessing 
 the contents of the letter, he put it unopened into his pocket, and or- 
 dered the pursuit of the enemy. The rout of the Bernese was complete ; 
 they lost nearly 1000 men and eleven pieces of cannon ; a great part of 
 their troops had not time to join in the flight, and they too retreated. 
 This defeat was followed by an armistice, which led in the following month 
 of February to a treaty of peace, in which the government of Luzern, 
 mistrusting their own peasantry, were glad to concur. The Catholic 
 cantons were left at full liberty to settle as they pleased all re igious 
 matters concerning their own citizens and subjects. This woi of only 
 nine weeks cost Zurich nearly half a million of florins ; and the peace 
 thus hastily concluded left behind it the seeds of future contentions, for 
 the Catholics abused the power they had secured, and fresh scenes of 
 bloodshed were enacted, especially in Thurgau, where the Protestants 
 were very numerous. 
 
 Louis the Fourteenth's persecution of his evangelical subjects, and 
 his inhuman dragonades, in 1682, roused the indignation of the Swiss 
 Protestants. Many of the French Huguenots fled to Switzerland, where 
 they met with commiseration and assistance. Several thousands were 
 dispersed through the villages in the Pays de Vaud, subscriptions were 
 raised for them, and they were supplied with necessaries at the expense 
 of Bern and the other Protestant cantons. The subsequent persecution 
 of the Waldenses by the duke of Savoy, at the instigation of the Frencli 
 king, drove another flock of Protestants to seek asylum in Switzerland 
 in 1686 ; these were likewise assisted, but the burden became too great 
 for the cantons to bear. The diet negotiated successfully with several 
 German princes, and with the states of Holland, in order to find an asy- 
 lum for part of the emigrants in those countries -, but the difierence of 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 181 
 
 ' r%Tf.' "''''""^'^' ^^^d cli^at^' prevented most of the latter, especiallv 
 the Waldenses, from accepting the off-er. Thus they remained supported 
 by the Swiss until 1689, when the duke of Savoy allowed his subjects to 
 return to their native valleys in Piedmont. Fresh persecutions, how- 
 ever, drove 3000 of them back to Switzerland in 1694. The Swiss 
 already overburthened with French refugees, negotiated with England' 
 Holland, and Brandenburg, but it was not until the spring of 1699 that 
 a numerous body of emigrants of both nations, being supplied with 
 money by the cantons, actually left Switzerland, and proceeded to va- 
 nous parts of Germany, to Hesse, Wurtenberg, Brandenburg, and Hoi- 
 stem, where they formed colonies, having their own pastors, and retain- 
 mg their language and form of worship. The remainder settled in the 
 Ronrane or French part of Switzerland. These various refugees cost 
 the Protestant cantons large sums during the many years thev remained 
 in the country ; the state of Zurich alone contributed 400,000 florins 
 besides private subscriptions. 
 
 The Swiss had now managed to live for half a century in peace 
 among themselves. The disputes, however, between Toggenburg and 
 the abbot of St. Gall gave rise to another rehgious war.* ' The country 
 of Toggenburgcontammg about 50,000 inhabitants, and situated be- 
 tween Zurich, Appenzell, Glarus, and the lands of the abbot, had been 
 ever since the reformation, divided between the two religions, of which 
 the reformed reckoned by far the most disciples. The victory ^f Capp 1. 
 obtained by the Catholic cantons in 1531, having reinstated the abbo; 
 m all his jurisdiction, the Toggenburgers had returned to their allec^i- 
 ance to him, maintaining, however, their ancient privileges, their own 
 magistracy, the right of liberating accused persons upon bail, which 
 was a very old custom in Toggenburg, and, above all, their rehgious 
 freedom. ^ ^ome of the abbots, however, encroached by degrees on the 
 people s rights ; and at last the abbot Leodegar, at the begfnning of the 
 eighteenth century, assumed the authority of an absolute master over 
 Toggenburg. He established his own courts of justice, appointed the 
 local magistrates, and excluded the Protestants from all places of trust 
 He obliged the inhabitants to work at the public roads, although tlie^ 
 had twice redeemed themselves from the corv/^es to which thc^y were 
 formerly subject; and upon their remonstrating against this, he fined 
 them lieavily. He assumed the right of administering the church reve- 
 nues and disposing of ecclesiastical preferments, and lastly that of regu- 
 lating all matters concerning the militia. 
 
 Tlie two cantons of Schwytz and Glarus, coburghers and protectors 
 of Toggenburg, being the first wholly, and the other partlv, Catholic 
 remained indifl"erent spectators of these encroachments. Not so the 
 Protestant cantons, and Zurich in particular, after remonstrating with 
 
 of *St?Gall!*' *"" ^' ^^' ^°'' *^® Toggenburg came into the possession of the abbot 
 
182 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period Y. 
 
 the abbot, sent in 1109 some troops towards the frontiers of Toggen- 
 burg. The abbot, on his side, placed garrisons in the various castles, 
 and prepared for war. The people of Toggenburg rose in 1710 and 
 expelled the abbot's garrisons, and anarchy and confusion spread over 
 the country. The Protestant cantons openly espoused the cause of the 
 Toggenburgers, while the Catholic took the part of the abbot. The 
 Zurichers and Toggenburgers united attacked the abbot in his own 
 territories, ravaged them, and obliged him and his monks to escape to 
 Lindau, across the lake of Constance. The town of Wyl made a long 
 resistance, but surrendered at last. Cruelties were committed on both 
 sides. The Catholic cantons, in order to prevent the troops of Bern 
 from joining those of Zurich, seized on Baden, Bremgarten, and other 
 baiiiwicks, in the Aargau. Zurich and Bern then ordered a joint attack 
 on Baden, and, in the month of May, 1112, having taken Bremgarten, 
 they laid siege to the castle of Baden, which is built on a steep hill. 
 After a severe cannonade, by which the town was greatly damaged, the 
 commander of the garrison, Crivelli of Uri, surrendered, and from that 
 time the castle of Baden has remained in ruins, as it is seen at the pre- 
 sent day. 
 
 Negotiations were next resorted to, but without any results. A reli- 
 gious war now raged throughout Switzerland ; nearly 150,000 men, 
 Catholics against Protestants, were under arms. Austria and France 
 threatened to interfere, but fortunately England, Holland, and Prussia 
 kept them in check. After several desultory actions, an army of 12,000 
 men from Luzern and the Waldstatten, under Ackermann of Unter- 
 walden, advanced in July along the valley of the Reuss to Willmergen, 
 where they met on the 25th the troops of Bern, amounting to about 
 9000, on the same ground where the Bernese had been defeated fifty- 
 six years before. This second battle of Willmergen, however, had a 
 different result from the former one. It lasted six hours, and was ob- 
 stinately fought on both sides. At last the Bernese broke through the 
 ranks of their enemies, who fled, leaving on the field of battle 2000 
 men, three superior officers, five Capuchin friars, besides colours, can- 
 non, &c. The Bernese lost 800 men, and had most of their officers 
 wounded. The victorious army then entered the canton of Luzern, 
 whilst the Zurichers invaded Zug, took Rapperschwyl, and threatened 
 Schwytz. The five Catholic cantons sued for peace, which was con- 
 cluded at Aarau in the following August, 1112. The Catholic cantons 
 gave up to Zurich and Bern the exclusive sovereignty of Baden, Brem- 
 garten, Mellingen, and the other bailiwicks of Aargau, and admitted 
 Bern into the co-sovereignty of Thurgau; Rheinthal, and Sargans. The 
 regency of Toggenburg remained as Bern and Zurich had established 
 it, until matters should be settled with the abbot. This convention 
 served permanently to ensure religious liberty to the subject bailiwicks, 
 and the possession of the county of Baden opened a free communica- 
 
 VERIOD V.J 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 183 
 
 tion between Bern and Zurich. No more religious wars occurred in 
 Switzerland after the peace of Aarau. 
 
 The abbot of St. Gall, Leodegar, still persisting in his unreason- 
 able pretensions over Toggenburg, died in exile, and his successor 
 acceded to terms in 1718. All the ancient immunities and rights of 
 the Toggenburgers were guaranteed to them, whilst they, on their part, 
 acknowledged the sovereignty of the abbot. 
 
 From the peace of Aarau, in 1112, till the French revolutionary inva- 
 sion of 1 198, Switzerland enjoyed a long period of repose. During these 
 eighty-six years no war, foreign or domestic, disturbed its peaceful 
 boundaries. This seems, therefore, to be a fit opportunity to examine 
 the various institutions of its component states, and the condition of the 
 inhabitants, their allies and subjects, under the confederation of the 
 thirteen cantons, such as it existed till the period of the French revolu- 
 tion. 
 
 Specimens of almost every possible form of government were to be 
 seen within the limits of the old Swiss confederation. First of all 
 among the thirteen cantons, there were aristocracies, in which a certain 
 number of famiHes appointed the members of the sovereign council; 
 then there were municipal governments, like the Italian republics of the 
 middle ages, in which the burghers of the principal towns elected the 
 legislature, while the rest of the country was subject to them; and 
 again there were pure democracies, with annual comitia of the whole 
 male population of the canton. Each of these three classes ought to be 
 examined separately. 
 
 The self-elected aristocracies were four in number : Bern, Freyburg, 
 Luzern, and Soleure. Among these, Bern stood prominent for the wis- 
 dom and steadiness of its councils no less than for its wealth and power, 
 the extent of its territory, which embraced nearly one-third of all Swit- 
 zerland, the number and the spirit of its population, and its general 
 prosperity. The great council of Bern, called « the council of two 
 hundred," from its original number at the end of the thirteenth century, 
 was the sovereign power in the country. Its full complement had been 
 fixed, however, at 299 ; but this number was seldom complete, as the 
 vacancies were allowed to amount to eighty before an election took place, 
 which was in general the case every ten years. The members were 
 considered to be elected for life, though liable to be removed in case of 
 proved delinquency. They were all taken from among the burgliers of 
 Bern, and were to be full twenty-nine years of age before they could sit 
 in the council. The burghers themselves were either descendants of 
 the old families who had contributed to the foundation of the city, or 
 new families who had successively acquired' the burghership. It has 
 been already stated that Bern was founded at the end of the twelfth 
 century, by the subfeudataries or country nobility, as a place of refuge 
 against the oppression of the great lords, and of safety from the conten- 
 
184 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period V. 
 
 tions ami anarchy in which the latter involved the country. This se- 
 condary nobihty, with Guno von Bubenberg* at iheir head, constituted 
 the first body politic; they were the proprietors of the ground, the 
 owners of the houses, and for a time they, their families and servants, 
 formed the main population of the town. By degrees many of the neigh- 
 bouring farmers, small proprietors, as well as artificers and traders from 
 various parts, glad of the protection afforded by this rising free city, 
 placed themselves willingly under its sway, and many of them came to 
 live within its walls. Thus a plebeian population arose like that of 
 infant Rome, by the side of the patricians. But, unlike the patricians 
 of Rome, those of Bern ^visely shared of their own accord the freedom 
 of the city and the offices of the state with the new families, who were 
 divided into tribes or guilds, called after the principal trades. These 
 were originally four, — bakers, smiths, butchers, and tanners,— corre- 
 sponding to the four districts in which the city was divided, having each 
 a banner, the bearer of which was called banneret. Eight more tribes 
 were afterwards added, which, however, had no local district assigned to 
 them, but were dispersed among the original four wards. These guilds 
 or tribes, in course of time, were called abbayes, from the public halls 
 belonging to each corporation, which even now are known by that name, 
 although they have been mostly converted into boarding houses or 
 hotels, such as PAhhaye des Boulangers, &c. All the families having 
 the freedom of one of these abbayes were considered eligible to the sove- 
 reign council, and thereby to all the offices of state ; but, for a long 
 time, the chief magistrates were cheerfully elected from the old families, 
 by the burghers themselves. In 13S4, however, the burghers, dissatis- 
 fied with the overgrown influence of the nobles, deposed the magistrates, 
 and decreed that the council should be renewed in part every year, from 
 a list made by the bannerets out of all the honest freemen of the city. 
 To the bannerets were joined sixteen citizens called seizeniers. But 
 these regulations became, in course of time, obliterated ; no remon- 
 strances being made, the bannerets and seizeniers neglected their duties ; 
 the office of counsellor continued for life in the same individual, and 
 consequently the vacancies were filled from a small number of families. 
 In 1470 troubles arose in the great council itself, between the patrician 
 members and the other burghers, at the head of whom was a butcher of 
 the name of Kistler. The nobles left the city with their families, and 
 retired to their estates ; and Kistler, having become avoyer or first ma- 
 gistrate of Bern, enforced several harsh enactments against the emi- 
 grants. But the war of Burgundy breaking out soon after, put an end 
 to these differences. In the course of ages, most of the original noble 
 families became extinct ; and in the last century before the fall of the 
 
 * The family of Bubenherg continued at Bern till the sixteenth century, when 
 it became extinct. A large portion of the town belonged to them. Other families 
 'Acre owners of whole streets. 
 
 PERIOD v.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 185 
 
 republic, only six remained, namely, d'Erlach, Diesbach, Watteville, 
 Mulinen, Bonstetten, and Luternau. The whole number of families 
 which at that time constituted the burghership was about 250, and of 
 these about seventy were considered patrician, having furnished members 
 to the senate ; and out of these the vacancies in the great council were 
 usually supplied, although generally at every election some new family 
 was brought in. Thus a burgher aristocracy took the place of the ori- 
 ginal patrician one. The majority of the inhabitants of Bern were not 
 burghers, and were excluded from the legislation and government, toge- 
 ther with all the inhabitants of the country excepting a few who were 
 from time to time admitted into the burghership.* The burghers them- 
 selves, as a body, were never assembled, such assembly not being 
 acknowledged as a part of the state. The families who either did fur- 
 nish members to the great council, or aspired to do so, did not follow 
 any trade, but lived on their income, although they were of course in- 
 scribed as burghers of one of the tribes, of the bakers, butchers, &c. 
 Military service abroad supplied the young patricians with the only re- 
 source against idleness and straitened circumstances, while waiting for 
 their tardy admission into the sovereign council. 
 
 The sovereign council made and repealed laws, declared war and con- 
 cluded peace, superintended the revenues, imposed taxes, disposed of 
 appeals in civil causes, and nominated to the inferior courts and offices. 
 It delegated the executive power to the senate, or little council, which 
 was chosen out of its own body. The senate consisted of 27 members, 
 including the two avoyers, the two treasurers, and the four bannerets. 
 The senators were for life ; and vacancies among them were filled up 
 by the following complicated mode of election. Twenty-six balls, three 
 of them being gilt, were put in a box, out of which each senator drew 
 one ; those who drew the gilt balls were constituted electors. In the same 
 manner the members of the great council drew out of another box, in 
 which were seven gilt balls, and thus furnished seven electors out of 
 their body. These ten electors fixed upon a certain number of candidates 
 not fewer than six and not more than ten, out of the hst of those coun- 
 sellors who were eligible into the senate, the qualifications required l^eing 
 that they had sat ten years in the great council, and had therefore 
 attained the age of forty ; that they were married men or widowers ; and 
 that they had neither father, brother, nor son already sitting in the senate. 
 The candidates now withdrew from the council, with their nearest of 
 kin ; their names were affixed each to a box, and a second choice of 
 electors was made by lot, the number of golden balls being in this in- 
 stance two-thirds of the members present. Each of those who drew a 
 olden ball dropped it into the box of one of the candidates, and on ex- 
 
 
 * The city of Bern contained in 1776 about 11,000 inhabitants, while the burgher 
 families admissible into the council were, according to Busching, 274, which could 
 form but a small minority of the whole population. 
 
186 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period V. 
 
 aminiiig this ballot, the six who had the fewest votes were recalled into 
 
 the assembly. The four candidates remaining now drew lots from a box, 
 
 in which were two gold and two silver balls, and the two who drew 
 
 golden balls were lastly put to the ballot of the whole assembly, and the 
 
 final election was decided by the majority of votes. The object of all 
 
 these alternations of lot and ballot was to leave the greatest room for the 
 
 action of chance in the choice of the electors, rather than in the choice 
 
 of the candidates, to the vacant office, so as to open a fair prospect to the 
 
 meritorious, and to put impediments in the way of cabal and intrigue.* 
 
 The senate sat every day for the dispatch of current affairs, Sundays 
 
 excepted; it discussed all projects and prepared all statements that were 
 
 to be laid before the sovereign council, decided criminal causes, except 
 
 capital cases, within the jurisdiction of the city, which were reserved for 
 
 the great council ; it conferred all church preferments, and most civil 
 
 offices. Whenever the great council sat, which was generally twice a 
 
 week, except at harvest time, the senate became hicorporated with it and 
 
 retained no distinct authority. 
 
 The principal magistrates of the state were the two avoyers (Schult- 
 heiss), the two treasurers, and the four bannerets, all chosen by majority 
 of public votes of the great council. The salaries of the principal magis- 
 trates were as follows : — The avoyer, in office, 400/. a year, a banneret, 
 230/., a senator, 150/. The rest were in proportion. The avoyers were for 
 life, though liable to be removed, each assuming in his turn the office for 
 one year. The reigning avoyer, as he was called, was the chief magistrate 
 or head of the republic : he presided over both the senate and the great 
 council, where he sat under a canopy, having before him, on a table, the 
 seal of the republic. He did not mix in the debates, unless his opinion 
 was asked, and he had only a vote in case of equality of votes. The two 
 treasurers, one for the German district, by far the largest, and the other 
 for the Pays de Vaud, or Pays Roman, as it was called, were appointed 
 for six years. They laid their accounts twice a year before the great 
 council. The four bannerets were chosen from the four original tribes 
 or guilds, and each had the superintendence of one of the four bailiwicks, 
 or districts of the city, Seftingen, Sternenberg, Zollikofen, and Conolfin- 
 gen. In conjunction with the treasurers, they constituted the two boards 
 of finance, called the German and the French chambers. 
 
 There were, as we have mentioned, sixteen members of the great 
 council, called seizemers, elected out of the twelve companies or tribes, 
 generally from among those who had served the office of bailiff. Their 
 chief functions related to the nomination of magistrates and the election 
 of new counsellors. When the great council determined on complet- 
 ing their number, each senator and each seizenier appointed one member, 
 the avoyers two each ; the greffier, or secretary of state, the chancellor, 
 
 * The above particulars are taken from Planta, who has given the clearest ac- 
 count we have seen of the institutions of Bern. 
 
 PERIOD v.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERL4.ND* 
 
 18T 
 
 the grand sautier, or lieutenant of police, and the keeper of the town- 
 house had also the privilege of nomination. All these electors gave of 
 course the preference to their near relations, by which means most of 
 the seats in the council were generally filled from a small number of 
 families, about seventy in number. About fifty vacancies being thus sup- 
 plied, the remaining thirty w^ere filled up from among the burghers. 
 Each of the abbeys sent in the names of those burghers who being duly 
 qualified were nominated as candidates. All these names being put into 
 a box were drawn one by one and called aloud. At each name those 
 senators and seizeniers who approved of the candidate rose from their 
 seats. The votes for each candidate being duly registered, those who 
 were found at the end to have the majority of suffrages were declared 
 elected for the vacant seats. Thus, at every election, some new burgher 
 families were admitted into the great council. Families from the country, 
 and the Pays de Vaud, who were inscribed in one of the abbeys as 
 burghers of Bern, became eligible. All the rest were subjects of Bern, 
 but most of the towns enjoyed municipal privileges ; they elected their 
 own local magistrates, and had their communal councils. 
 
 The territory of Bern was divided into bailiwicks, thirty-eight in the 
 German part, including Aigle, and twelve in the Pays de Vaud, not in- 
 cluding the subject bailiwicks in other parts of Switzerland, which Bern 
 held in common with other cantons. Of the German bailiwicks six 
 were within the district of Bern, six in that of Biel or Bienne, ten in the 
 Argau, seven in the Emmenthal, and eight in the Oberland. Most of these 
 bailiwicks had been originally secularjurisdictions, purchased or conquered 
 from the feudal barons, the others had belonged to monasteries, secularized 
 a t the reformation, when part of their revenues was appropriated to the 
 maintenance of the clergy, to schools, and to charitable purposes. The 
 places of bailiff were w^orth the highest about 1,200/. sterling, and the 
 lowest 300/. a year, derived from local perquisites. They were the 
 great prizes in the lottery of the state. The bailiffs collected the various 
 taxes, dues, and fees payable to the government, which had succeeded 
 to the rights of the former lords; and they also managed the seignorial 
 domains, which had devolved to the state, upon the rental of which the 
 bailiff received a certain fixed allowance. He was also entitled to in- 
 cidental perquisites ; for instance, at the death of a peasant, to a small 
 per centage on the inheritance, and also to a share of the fines inflicted 
 for misdemeanours, which were, however, determined by the legislature, 
 and not left to arbitrary decision. The bailiffs were appointed for six 
 years ; it was required that they should be married men, and the same 
 person could not hold one of the more lucrative bailiwicks more than 
 once. Formerly they were elected by majority of votes in the sovereign 
 council, but a law, passed in 1712, established the election by lot; the 
 preference being given to senior counsellors over those of a more recent 
 date. They were the representatives of the sovereign power of the state, 
 
188 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period V. 
 
 in their respective districts ; they enforced the laws and ordinances, col- 
 lected the revenues, and acted as justices of peace, and as judges in civil 
 and criminal cases, subject to appeal to Bern. They delivered their 
 accounts to the economical chamber or board of finances, to which court 
 appeals lay in cases of exaction. 
 
 A singular institution existed at Bern, called " the exterior state.*' 
 It was a sort of mimic legislature, composed of the young men of patrician 
 families, who had not yet attained the age required to enable them to 
 enter the great council, and who assembled together in a splendid build- 
 ing; appointed their great council, senate, avoyers, &c., chosen in the 
 same manner as their prototypes, and with the same ceremonies ; dis- 
 cussed political subjects, and went through all the routine of statj. The 
 post of avoyer in this mock government, although attended with con- 
 siderable expense, was earnestly sought after, as the successful candidate 
 was sure of being admitted in due time into the sovereign council, with- 
 out any further recommendation. They had their mock bailiwicks, 
 which consisted of the ruined castles scattered about the country, that of 
 Habsburg figuring conspicuously among the rest. They had their 
 treasury, and their standing debt, being in this latter particular unlike 
 the real government of Bern, which had been ever conducted with the 
 greatest regularity and economy, and not only was free from debt, but 
 was possessed of a considerable surplus fund. This juvenile institution 
 was considered as a seminary for future counsellors and statesmen, but in 
 latter times it seems to have become a mere pretence for sumptuous 
 dinner-parties, and other gaieties. The coat of arms of the external state 
 was a monkey sitting on a lobster, and viewing itself in a mirror. 
 
 Tlie principal sources of the revenues of Bern were the demesnes, 
 chiefly abbey and convent lands devolved to the state at the reforma- 
 tion ; quit-rents on lands granted to individuals ; fines on the alienation 
 or sale of landed property in the Paysde Vaud, being in some cases one 
 sixth of the purchase money ; the monopoly of salt and gunpowder ; the 
 produce of the post-office, which was farmed ; the customs and toll's ; a 
 duty on the wine imported into the city ; fines imposed for misdemean- 
 ours; fees on judicial proceedings, and for grants of naturalization; 
 lastly the tithes, which were sequestered at the reformation, but the pro- 
 duce of which was especially appropriated to the support of the clergy, 
 of seminaries, and of various charitable establishments. The amount of 
 the whole net revenue has been variously stated, for no budget was pub- 
 lished. Stannyan, at the beginning of the eighteenth century, calculated it 
 at about 50,000/. sterling per annum. And yet with this small income, the 
 state paid the magistrates and public officers, provided for the constructing 
 and repairing of roads and bridges, for the splendid public establishments, 
 the asylums for the poor, the infirm, the aged, the prisons and houses 
 of correction, besides the liberal assistance it granted to the suflferers 
 from inundations, avalanches, fires, epidemics, bad harvests, and other 
 
 PERIOD v.] 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 189 
 
 casualties, no public calamity remaining miheeaed by the government ; 
 and it also contrived to accumulate funds, which were either placed in 
 foreign securities, or kept in ready cash at home to provide for any 
 sudden emergency. In 1*770, Bern held foreign stock of the value of nine- 
 teen millions of Swiss livres, of which ope half was in the English funds. 
 The interest of this investment contributed to swell the revenue in case 
 of need. Its treasure at home when the French plundered it, in 1 798, was 
 between thirty and forty millions of livres, or nearly two millions sterling. 
 Bern had not, any more than the other cantons, a standing army ; if we 
 except a city guard of 360 men, a detachment of 100 men in the castle of 
 Aarberg, and four companies of artillery. But every man, between 
 sixteen and sixty, was enrolled in the militia, was liable to be called out, 
 and was expected to provide himself with uniform, arms, and accoutre- 
 ments. Indeed, no one was permitted to marry unless he produced his 
 complete military equipment. Out of the whole number a body of 40,000 
 men was selected and formed into regiments, of which one third alone, 
 consisting chiefly of the younger and unmarried men, was called out, 
 except in cases of extraordinary emergency. The cavalry was formed in 
 the same manner, and consisted of eighteen squadrons of dragoons, each 
 man finding his own horse. These troops were exercised and reviewed at 
 particular times. The arsenal of Bern was well supplied with arms of 
 every sort, besides a small dep6t of arms at the chief place of each 
 bailiwick. 
 
 The ecclesiastical affiiirs were administered by a consistory, composed 
 of a senator, who was the president, of the dean of the collegiate of Bern, 
 one of the pastors, and six members of the great council. The whole 
 canton, containing 416 parishes, was divided into thirteen districts, 
 called chapters. The livings were divided into three classes, the most 
 lucrative being w^orth from £300 to <£150 per annum; the middle ones 
 from £150 to £100, and the rest less than £lOO. Vacancies in the 
 higher livings were filled by promotion from the lower, in order of 
 seniority ; those in the lowest by appointment from the senate. 
 
 Every commune in the canton had, and still has, a purse, or fund, for 
 the relief of its own poor, and this is generally the case all over Switzer- 
 land. These communes had also lands, which belonged to them in 
 common, and the rents or produce of which were distributed among the 
 burghers of each. The Abhayes or guilds of Bern had purses for the 
 relief of the poor members of their respective tribes. 
 
 The whole population of the canton of Bern amounted to nearly 400,000 
 inhabitants. 
 
 The style used by Bern, in all public documents of the state, was : 
 " We, the avoyer, the little and the great council of the republic of 
 Bern," &c. On some occasions the name of " burghers" was also added. 
 
 These are the outlines of this government, too much extolled by some 
 during its prosperity, and unreasonably vilified by others at its fall. As 
 
190 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period V. 
 
 an aristocracy, it was, perhaps, the best of its kind that has ever existed. 
 The people entrusted to its sway were prosperous and contented. But the 
 defects inseparable from such a form of government were undermining 
 it silently ; a long peace added to its weakness, and a violent shock from 
 without crumbled it to pieces. The late Mr. de Bonstetten, who was 
 himself a Bernese patrician, and had been a member of the senate, thus 
 describes it : — " It was, from its very nature, a stationary government, 
 but it made happy all those who remained stationary along with it ; and 
 we might have thus continued in a perpetual and contentjed mediocrity, if 
 nothing had arisen around us to tell us that we were not happy enough. 
 The government had all the faults, but it had also all the virtues, of an 
 aristocracy. Such was the disinterestedness of the patricians, that while 
 they were accountable only to themselves for the management of the 
 finances of the state, they lived in a state of bare competence, by the side 
 of forty or fifty millions of livres of accumulated savings, which were 
 finally plundered by our friends and allies from France. The Bernese 
 government existed for ages unarmed in the midst of its armed subjects. 
 Most unlike that of Venice, it resorted not to any inquisition or tyranny, 
 in order to maintain itself. .... A great characteristic of the Bernese 
 government was its scrupulous honesty ; I have sat in its councils and 
 tribunals, and I can aver that I never, in any one instance, saw an act 
 which even seemed to violate the strictness of this principle. I remem- 
 ber a circumstance which occurred in the German court of appeal, of 
 which I was a member. A peasant, who had a suit before our court, 
 left one day, unobserved, a basket full of lump sugar in the kitchen of 
 one of the judges, hoping thus to secure his favour without committing 
 either the magistrate or himself. The peasant was summoned before the 
 judges, charged with an attempt at bribery, reprimanded, and sent to 
 prison. A more vulgar mind would have been satisfied with returning 
 the bribe." 
 
 The case was different in other parts of Switzerland. " Twenty years 
 after I had become a member of the sovereign council of Bern, T hap- 
 pened to be sent to the Italian bailiwicks, to sit in a temporary court, 
 called the Syndicate, composed of deputies from the various cantons. 
 They thought only of making the best bargain each could for himself. 
 I remember one deputy, a man of information, teUing me one day — * You 
 do not take money, and we are much obliged to you for so doing, our 
 share will be the larger for it. Every man here who has a suit, lavs 
 aside a certain sum for the judges, and as you do not take your portion, 
 your generosity is only to our advantage, it is of no benefit to the suitor.' " 
 With regard to the Bernese bailiffs, however, their exactions have 
 been much exaggerated ; *' and it is certain," says Coxe, " that there 
 have been frequent instances in which the bailiffs, having been guilty of 
 oppression, have been impartially and severely punished." It was a 
 
 period v.] 
 
 history of SWITZERLAND. 
 
 191 
 
 proverbial remark at Bern, that a peasant was sure to succeed in a suit 
 against his bailiff. In this respect Bern afforded an advantageous con- 
 trast to most of the other cantons. 
 
 The historian Miiller, who was by no means blind to the defects of 
 the Bernese government, says, *' It were no easy matter to find, in the 
 history of the world, a community which has been so wisely administered, 
 and for so long a period, as that of Bern. In other aristocracies, the 
 people were kept in darkness, poverty, and barbarism ; factions were 
 encouraged amongst them, while justice winked at crimes ; and this 
 was the case in the territories of Venice. But the people of Bern stood, 
 with regard to their patricians, rather in the relation of clients towards 
 their patrons, than in that of subjects towards their sovereign." 
 
 The contempt for trade and industry among the patricians of Bern, 
 and their consequent idleness until they were called to the offices of the 
 state, are the heaviest charges that can be brought against them. The 
 morals of the young men were loose, chiefly in consequence of their want 
 of occupation; but once married, and raised to the magistracy, they 
 became different men. " It was very curious," says Bonstetten, " to see 
 the formal airs assumed by the officers and subaltern agents of govern- 
 ment ; for instance, the Serjeants of the courts of justice in their cloaks, 
 laced with black and red, proceeding to execute a warrant in some vil- 
 lage. The expression of high consequence exhibited in their whole gait, 
 their disdain of everything unconnected with their office was really 
 comical ; the peasants themselves, instead of being vexed, laughed at it. 
 These Bernese peasants have such a proper feeling of manliness, they have 
 so much good sense, their self-love is so intelligent, that they can easily 
 afford to forgive that which would hurt a people more vain and suscep- 
 tible. Their inherent philosophy is a remnant of ancient Germanic 
 liberty, which has been preserved among the Alps. Their villages, their 
 families, and their cattle, these are still the limits of their attachment and 
 of their ambition." It was, and is still, a common saying in Switzer- 
 land, that there is no oonditior preferable to that of a Bernese farmer. 
 They are generally proprietors, and often wealthier than most of the citi- 
 zens, to whom, in fact, they consider themselves superior. They are 
 proud of their condition, and the word *' bauer," i. e. peasant, carries 
 with it no humiliating idea. Indeed a feeling of national pride was cha- 
 racteristic of Bern and the Bernese people. 
 
 But, however the country population might be satisfied, the burghers 
 of Bern themselves from time to time showed themselves impatient of an 
 authority monopolised by about one-third of their number; and several 
 representations were made to the government, demanding that the right 
 of election should be secured to all the burghers. A captain Henzi, a 
 man of literary acquirements, who had been busy in procuring signatures 
 to one of these petitions in 1744, was banished for five years. On his 
 return home, in 1749, he engaged in a conspiracy, the object of which 
 
102 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period V» 
 
 PERIOD v.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 193 
 
 was to seize the arsenal, take possession of the city, depose the magis- 
 tracy and the council, and to select new ones from the various tribes in a 
 general assembly of the burghers, and, meantime, to appoint a dictator for 
 the execution of this project. But although Henzi and some others 
 recommended moderation, and wished to avoid, if possible, all effusion 
 of blood, they were obliged, in order to add to their number, to admit into 
 the plot men of more doubtful characters and intentions. These talked 
 broadly of using fire and sword for tlie recovery of liberty ; and the plun- 
 der of the treasures which were known to exist was not, perhaps, the least 
 incentive to some of them. Henzi, alarmed and disgusted at these senti- 
 ments, despaired of success, and even contemplated withdrawing from the 
 enterprise ; but he was arrested, with two of his accomplices, the conspi- 
 racy having been revealed to the government by one of the conspirators. 
 The prisoners were put to torture, and confessed the whole; and, 
 when brought to trial, an advocate, Watteville of Landshut, the author 
 of a history of the Helvetic confederation, spoke eloquently in extenua- 
 tion of their offence. On the IGili July, 1749, sentence of death was 
 Y)assed upon Henzi, Emanuel Fueter, and Werner ; the other conspira- 
 tors were banished. Henzi met his death with fortitude ; his two com- 
 panions, who, as appeared from the papers found in their possession, were 
 privy to the more deadly purposes of the plot, did not show equal firmness. 
 The peasants of the neighbourhood of Bern, hearing of the conspiracy, 
 came in arms to offer their assistance to the magistrates, and were not 
 persuaded to return home until they were assured of the punishment of the 
 conspirators ; and, in truth, the latter, in the wildest flights of their re- 
 volutionary scheme, had confined their views to a distribution of power 
 among the burghers of the city of Bern, and never troubled their heads 
 about giving any share of political rights to the people of the country. 
 
 The sketch we have given of the government of Bern applies equally 
 in its leading characteristics to the governments of the other three aristo- 
 cratic cantons, with this difference, however, that they were altogether 
 inferior to Bern in the public spirit of their governors, and in the condi- 
 tion of the governed. The aristocracy of Freyburg was a close one, like 
 that of Venice ; the members of the council of 200, or legislative body, 
 being always chosen out of seventy-one families. Originally the mem- 
 bers were chosen from the citizens of the town, classed under four ban- 
 ners or sections, and from the inhabitants of the old districts or territory 
 first annexed to it. By degrees the families called " old bourgeoisie " 
 alone were considered admissible, and lastly, in 1634, the list of these 
 was closed, and all other families excluded for ever from being inscribed 
 among the privileged ones. The council itself filled up its own vacan- 
 cies. From its members the senate or executive, which consisted of 
 twenty-four members, was chosen, and likewise the avoyer, the chancel- 
 lor, the burgomaster or chief justice, and the town clerk. Another 
 council of sixty members was also formed out of the great council, and 
 
 was called the "council of secrecy ;'* it had considerable authority, es- 
 pecially with regard to the appointments to office. The mode of election 
 to both the senate and the council of secrecy was called " blind ballot," 
 being left entirely to chance. The names of the candidates for the va- 
 cant place were put into a box, containing as many divisions and slits as 
 there were candidates. Each member of the great council threw a ball 
 into one of the compartments, without knowing for which of the candi- 
 dates he thus voted. He who had the greatest number of balls in his 
 compartment was chosen. 
 
 In the year 1781, two landed proprietors of the canton, Chenaux and 
 Raccaud, and a sawyer called Castellaz, from the district of Gruyeres, 
 having sounded their friends in the different country districts, made an 
 insurrection for the purpose of obtaining a share in the legislature. Two 
 or three thousand peasants, badly armed, marched against the town of 
 Freyburg, but the council had closed the gates and armed the militia. 
 Bern sent a body of 300 men to the assistance of the government ; and 
 one body of the peasants finding themselves surrounded, having thrown 
 down their arms, the rest fled home. In the flight, Chenaux was killed 
 by one of his own men ; Raccaud and Castellaz escaped. Chenaux'a 
 head was cut off by the public executioner, and placed on one of the 
 gates of the town. The insurrection being quelled, the burghers of the 
 town, as well as the twenty-four parishes of the old territory, made some 
 temperate remonstrances concerning their perpetual exclusion from the 
 ruling families, and begged to be allowed to look into the state archives 
 for the documents of the original constitution of the country. They were 
 told that the orders and regulations of their own trades and corporations 
 were sufficient for them to know their rights. They then appealed, as 
 the country districts had already done, to the three allies, Bern, Luzern, 
 and Soleure, for their decision. The decision came, and it was in favour 
 of the existing form of government, accompanied, however, by a recom- 
 mendation that the burthens of the country people should be lowered, 
 and that several abuses should be reformed. This was partly done, 
 and the number of privileged families was moreover increased by six- 
 teen, with the promise that, in future, at the extinction of any of the 
 ruling families, three new ones should be admitted from among the 
 burghers. At the same time some of the more prominent leaders in the 
 late remonstrances were banished the country. This happened in 1782. 
 Freyburg constituted the closest aristocracy, or rather oligarchy \\\ all 
 Switzerland. 
 
 At Solothurn (Gallice Soleure) the sovereign council consisted of 120 
 members chosen for life ; when a vacancy occurred, a new member was 
 chosen from the same tribe or company of citizens as the late member 
 had belonged to, the choice being made by the alt-rathen or senior mem- 
 bers of the senate or executive. This senate consisted of thirty-five 
 
194 
 
 HISTORY Of SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period V. 
 
 members, taken from out of the body of the great council. The four 
 principal magistrates, namely, the two avoyers, the banneret, and the 
 treasurer, were chosen for life out of the alt-rathen, or senior members of 
 the senate. The whole of the burghers of the town assembled once 
 a-year, and confirmed pro forma the appointment of the existing magis- 
 trates. All other civil employments, as well as church preferments, 
 were in the gift of the senate, which constituted also the supreme court 
 of justice, civil and criminal. 
 
 The legislature of Luzern consisted of a council of 100, the vacancies 
 in which were filled up by open suffrages from the body of the burghers 
 of the town. There was a distinction, however, between patrician aud 
 plebeian lamilies. The senate, which was in fact the ruling power, con- 
 sisted of thirty-six members of the great council, who were all considered 
 as noble, and who filled up vacancies in their own body generally from 
 relatives of the deceased senator. A seat in the senate raised a i)lebeian 
 and Ills fimiily to the patrician rank. The appointment of new members 
 by the senate stood in need of no confirmation by either the great council 
 or the burghers. The senate sat constantly, while the great council 
 assembled only upon particular occasions. Appeals from the senate lay 
 to tlie great council, but this was a mere formality, as the senators, con- 
 stituting more than one-third of that body, and having at their disposal 
 all the offices and emoluments of the government, could always sway the 
 resolutions of the legislature. All questions, however, concerning war, 
 peace, and alliances, and the imposition of new taxes, were referred to a 
 general assembly of all the burghers. 
 
 With regard to the spirit of the government, and the mental condition 
 of the people, Freyburg and Soleure stood lowest among these four aris- 
 tocracies. " In the thinly inhabited and dull town of Soleure," says 
 Bonstetten, *' canonries were the prizes of idleness and of ignorance, 
 there was no encouragement for industry or study, the spirit of political 
 oligarchy was rendered more obtuse by the stationary tendency of Ca- 
 tholicism. At Bern, the reformation and its consequent freedom of 
 thought tempered in some degree the narrowing influence of the aristo- 
 cracy." At Luzern, Catholic although it was, the same narrowing in- 
 fluence was modified by the neighbourhood of the democracies of the 
 forest cantons, and the ancient connexion of Luzern with them. The 
 breezes which blew over the Waldsfatter see could not but clear, par- 
 tially at least, the mists of prejudices and abuses. Accordingly we find 
 at Luzern occasional bursts of free thought and of sound principles in 
 the midst of much ignorance and superstition ; and enlightened views, 
 with Considerable information, were to be met with among persons of the 
 liiu^her families. The government was considered mild aud equitable, 
 and the people were upon the whole contented. Luzern was the first m 
 rank among the Catholic cantons ; it was the residence of the pope's 
 
 PERIOD v.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 195 
 
 nuncio, and all affairs relative to religion were transacted there ; but the 
 council of Luzern steadfastly resisted any attempts at encroachment from 
 the papal power in temporal matters. 
 
 The second class of cantons, the government of which might be called 
 municipal, consisted of Zurich, Basel, and Schaffhausen. The feature 
 which mainly distinguished them from the former was, that the sovereign 
 power resided among all the burghers of the principal city of each can- 
 ton, who elected the members of both the great council and of the 
 senate, every burgher being eligible to sit in either. 
 
 The burghers of Zurich were divided into thirteen tribes, one of which 
 was styled " noble," consisting of persons who did not exercise any 
 handicraft or trade. The legislative council was composed of 212 mem- 
 bers, and comprised within itself the little council or executive, consist- 
 ing of fifty members. These members were returned in equal numbers 
 by the various tribes, excepting the tribe of the nobles, which returned 
 twice as many as any other. Immediately that a vacancy occurred, the 
 burgesses of the tribe to which the late member belonged elected a suc- 
 cessor to fill it. Twenty, however, of the places in the senate were filled 
 up by the great council itself, which had also the annual appointment of 
 the two burgomasters, who presided over the senate, and were in power 
 each six months alternately. The senators, although they generally re- 
 mained for life, were liable to be removed, being subject to an annual 
 confirmation, either by the great council or by the particular tribe to 
 which each senator belonged. The senate was the supreme court in all 
 criminal cases, and there was no appeal from its sentence ; it was also 
 a civil couit, but with appeal in certain cases to the great council; it had 
 the administration of the revenues, the care of the police, and the right 
 of appointment to all the offices in the state. Every burgher was quali- 
 fied to vote at twenty years of age, was eligible to the great council at 
 thirty, and to a seat in the senate at thirty-five. The number of the 
 burghers of Zurich was about 2000, and they seldom admitted a new 
 member. These 2000 burghers constituted, therefore, the sovereign 
 power over the whole canton, which contained 150,000 inhabitants. In 
 earlier times the nobles, and a few of the principal burghers, constituted 
 the sovereign authority of the town, and they appointed their successors ; 
 but, after the insurrection of 1336, Rudolph Braun classed all the trades 
 and professions into tribes, of which one was reserved for the old patri- 
 cian families. The artizans of the city, having now obtained votes in 
 the council, carefully excluded all strangers and all country people, not 
 only from any participation in their political rights, but aho from any 
 competition in the way of business or trade ; they forbade the importa- 
 tion of manufactured goods, and the exportation of raw materials; and 
 they prohibited the exercise of certain branches of industry in the country 
 districts. In 1488, several districts of the canton revolted on account of 
 these restrictions, and the afi'air was referred to the arbitration of the 
 
 o2 
 
196 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period V. 
 
 PERIOD 
 
 ^^3 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 197 
 
 Other Swiss cantons. The arbitrators decided that the country people 
 should be allowed to exercise certain trades and establish certain manu- 
 factures in their villages, though not in the town of Zurich, and that 
 they might cultivate the vine on their lands ; that they should elect 
 their local magistrates ; and that, in case of new encroachments from 
 the town, two or three parishes might, by means of deputies, petition 
 the general diet of the confederation for redress. This award was 
 a^-^reed to in May, 1489. It was on this occasion that the burgomaster 
 Waldmann, who had forged a decision favourable to the trades of the 
 town, was convicted of this and other offences, and beheaded with se- 
 veral accomplices. The country people, however, remained strictly ex- 
 cluded from all participation in the government, and from all civil and 
 ecclesiastical offices and preferments. 
 
 The spirit of the citizens of Zurich is strongly displayed in the whole 
 history of their canton. A great aptitude for business, an activity carried 
 at times to restlessness, a love of independence, a mercantile spirit 
 somewhat grasping, a bravery often rash, a love of instruction with a 
 bias for contention and cavil, liberality without profusion ;— these have 
 been the virtues and the vices most conspicuous in the character of the 
 Zurichers. There was a greater spirit of open frank independence in 
 Zurich, and gi'eater liberality of sentiments, than in any other of the 
 large towns of Switzerland. Its magistrates were respected for their 
 justice and integrity, and the other cantons paid a willing deference to 
 their opinion in those matters which concerned the whole confederation. 
 In their domestic dissensions and foreign disputes there have ever been 
 found a vitality and an energy in the public spirit of the Zurichers that 
 have saved them repeatedly from destruction when they seemed to be 
 tottering on its very verge. Arts, sciences, and letters have also found 
 more encouragement in Zurich than in any other town of Switzerland. 
 
 At Basel (Basle, Beile) there was no patrician class, the nobles 
 having been all expelled from the town in 1445. The burghers were 
 distributed into eighteen tribes, from each of which twelve members 
 were sent, to form the great council. Upon a vacancy occurring in the 
 great council, six candidates from the tribe of the late member were no- 
 minated by the remaining members of that tribe, and these candidates 
 drew lots for the office. The same practice was followed in electing 
 the sixty members of the senate ; and so enamoured were the good citizens 
 of Basle of the lottery system, that not only their councillors and ma- 
 gistrates, but also the professors of their university, were chosen by lot. 
 Three candidates among those who had taken their doctor's degree, no 
 matter in what science, were nominated, and they drew lots for the 
 vacant professorship. The professor elect, if not qualified for his chair, 
 took the first opportunity of changing places with another similarly situ- 
 ated. A spirit of political equality and democratic freedom was more con- 
 Bpicuous at Basle than in any other Swiss city ; the meanest artizan was 
 
 eligible to the councils and to the first offices of the state. The conduct 
 of the magistrates, also, was freely discussed, and, if need was, severely 
 censured. Although many families were wealthy, yet there was no po- 
 litical exclusiveness in their favour. Once a-year the whole body of 
 the citizens assembled, when the magistrates took an oath to maintain 
 the laws and respect the liberties and immunities of the people, after 
 •which the reciprocal oath of allegiance to the magistrates was taken by 
 the citizens in their respective tribes. Nor were these altogether mere 
 formalities ; for the tribes of Basle have been known to depose, imprison, 
 and fine their senators for abuse of power : indeed, instances of this oc- 
 curred especially in 1690-1. At the same time the burghers of Basle 
 were as rigid as any in Switzerland in excluding strangers, and even 
 their own countrymen outside of the walls, from a share of their privi- 
 leges ; and to this cause the decline of the population of Basle has been 
 ascribed. But, although the city of Basle was sovereign over the canton, 
 the disproportion was not so great here as at Zurich, as the city con- 
 tained nearly one-third of the population of the whole canton. 
 
 Schaff hausen resembled Zurich rather than Basle in its constitution ; 
 the citizens, amounting to about 1600, were divided into twelve tribes, 
 and from these the members of the great council and senate were elected. 
 The great council consisted of eighty-five members, including the burgo- 
 master or first magistrate, and vacancies in it were filled up by the 
 free suffrages of all the members of the tribes. The burgomaster, the 
 stadtholder, and the two treasurers were appointed by the plurality of 
 voices in the council. Several patrician families having for a time mo- 
 nopolized the authority in the httle council, an act of reform was ob- 
 tained by the citizens in 1689, which restored the rights of the people. 
 
 In the three last mentioned cantons the places of councillor and se- 
 nator, although subject to a yearly confirmation by the citizens, were 
 considered to be for life, except in some extraordinary cases, as already 
 mentioned. The country districts were managed by bailiffs appointed 
 by the towns, which also nominated to the various livings. 
 
 ' The revenues of these three states, Zurich, Basle, and Schaffhausen, 
 were derived partly from national demesnes, partly from tithes, and 
 partly from duties levied on foreign goods, which last was the principal 
 source of the income of Basle and Schaffhausen. Zurich was the 
 wealthiest canton in Switzerland excepting Bern ; it had always a sur- 
 plus in the treasury, and had also investments in foreign funds. 
 
 Such were the governments of the Swiss town-cantons, — in some the 
 patrician aristocracy of the chief town, in others a burgher democracy, 
 governing the rest of the country. No new taxes were laid on the subject 
 people, who were kept, however, in a state of political and mental 
 tutelage. Several provincial towns, especially in the larger cantons, 
 enjoyed considerable municipal privileges, electing their local magis- 
 trates, and managing their communal property and revenue. It is also 
 well worthy of remark, that even in the more aristocratic cantons, such 
 
198 
 
 History of Switzerland. 
 
 [period v. 
 
 PERIOD v.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 199 
 
 ill 
 ■I 
 
 as Bern, the law provided that the property of deceased individuals 
 should be divided among all their children. 
 
 The administration of the ruling towns was generally orderly, econo- 
 mical, and mild. The salaries of the magistrates were extremely mode- 
 rate, and their conduct was generally honourable and disinterested ; the 
 only means of acquiring any degree of wealth were the offices of bailiff 
 or foreign service. Thejudicial system was very imperfect, the penal 
 code in many respects barbarous, and the course of criminal investiga 
 lion incpiisitorial ; nevertheless, few acts of oppression occurred, except 
 in times of political disturbances. Public education was sadly neglected 
 in the country districts ; these, however, were rapidly advancing in 
 wealth, as the fine villages on the borders of the lake of Zurich, and the 
 aspect of the farmers' houses in the canton of Bern, plainly attested. 
 The roads and bridges were kept in good repair, and fine public build- 
 ings were raised in the principal towns. 
 
 The third class of cantons consisted of the three Waldstatten, and of 
 Zug, Glarus, and Appenzell. All these were, and continue to be, pure 
 democracies. The legiblativc power is exercised directly by the people at 
 large, assembled in landsgemeinde, or general parliament of all the males 
 of the canton who have attained the age of sixteen* They meet generally 
 once a year, sometimes oftener as the occasion rccpiires, and in the open 
 field; and they there elect or confirm, by open suffrage, their landamman 
 and other magistrates, and the deputies to the federal diet ; they make or 
 abrogate laws ; fix the expenditure for the year, and provide the supplies ; 
 decide upon other state matters, such as peace, war, and alliances, in 
 short upon all atlliirs that are, in the town-cantons, laid before the 
 legislative councils.* These assemblies consist of from 4,000 to 8,000 
 men; and it may be easily imagined that such large meetings of 
 sovereign peasants do not always terminate peacefully, and that questions 
 are sometimes decided among them by the argument of physical 
 force. Yet tiiese peox)le (as will be seen in the sequel of this history) 
 are extremelv attached to their primitive form of government, imprac- 
 ticable as it is in larger and more populous states, and in a more refined 
 and artificial state of society. Small communities, where each individual is 
 known to the rest, and every man's character and conduct are daily open 
 to public scrutiny ; where but little inequality of condition or fortune 
 prevails ; where almost every man is a peasant or a shepherd, and no 
 one is destitute of means of support ; where habits, manners, dress, and 
 opinions remain the same generation after generation ; where the valleys 
 lie encircled one half the year by an impassable zone of snow and ice, 
 and where people live and die unconscious of tlie stirring events that 
 are taking place beyond the limits of their visual horizon; where there 
 are no newspapers and hardly any books printed— to such a country 
 
 * Ramond,the French translator of Coxe's ' Letters on Switzerland,' to which he 
 made many important additions, ^nves an interesting account of a meeting of the 
 landsgemeinde of the canton of Glarus, at which he was present. * Lellres sur Ptlat 
 poiitijtie, civil, et naturel de la Suisse Paris, 1788. 
 
 the simple forms of democracy seem well adapted. With the exception 
 of part of Glarus and of Appenzell, the democratic cantons are strictly 
 Roman Catholic, Each canton is divided into districts or communes, 
 which appoint the members of the landrath, or executive council; this 
 body is presided over by the landamman, and it exercises both the ad- 
 ministrative and judicial functions,* the division of powers being little 
 understood, and ill defined in these republics. The same individual, 
 who has given his judgment as a local magistrate or in a primary court, 
 will indeed often be found sitting afterwards in the court of appeal or 
 landrath, and will there have to revise his own sentence. It would appear 
 also that the nomination to offices is in ordinary times under the in- 
 fluence of a few wealthy families in each canton, and that the members of 
 the landrath and the magistrates, with the exception of the landamman 
 and his statthalster, or lieutenant, whose duration of office is fixed, may 
 be considered as elected for life, nnless they should render themselves 
 obnoxious to the people, in Avhich case the power of the democracy, 
 although slumbering at intervals, is easily aroused, and the resolutions of 
 the laiidsgemeinde are peremptory and irresistible. 
 
 Two of the democratic cantons, although singly represented in the 
 federal diet, are divided for their internal administration, each into two 
 distinct states ; Unterwalden is divided into Obwalden and Nidwalden, 
 and Appenzell into interior and exterior Rhodes, the latter distinction 
 being a consequence of the diversity of religion. Glarus, although the 
 population consists both of Catholics and Protestants, has preserved its 
 unity, and afftirds the most striking example in Switzerland, if not in 
 Europe, of perfect Christian toleration. In some villages, as we have 
 already said, the same temple serves for both forms of worship. 
 
 Such were the various forms of government of the thirteen cantons 
 before the French invasion. Their allies exhibited a still greater variety 
 of political constitution. The government of the Grisons was a confedera- 
 tion in miniature, in wliich pure democracy and the representative system 
 v>-ere united. The whole country was subdivided into about sixty small 
 communities or vallevs, each forming a distinct republic, having its 
 general assembly of all the men, who appointed their local magistrates, 
 and administered tlieir own internal affairs as independent states. Each, 
 liowevcr, returned a deputy to the general diet of the three leagues, 
 which met every year in September in one of the three capital towns, 
 Coire, Davos, and Ilantz, where the general affairs of the confederation 
 were discussed. Here the same remark that has been made with regard 
 to the forest cantons applies in a stronger sense to the Grison communi- 
 ties. A few families, or individuals superior in intelhgence or wealth to 
 
 * At Schwytz ihtre was, and perhaps is still, a primitive institution, called tlu; 
 street court, a sort of extempore jury. The gross weibel or lieutenant i)f police, on 
 receiving a complaint, summoned together the first seven competent persons he met 
 in the street, who heard both parties on the spot, and delivered their verdict. Their 
 iurisdietiou was limited to sums not above fifty florins. 
 
200 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period V. 
 
 'M 
 
 their brother mountaineers, influenced the return of the deputies to the 
 diet, and the latter often gave their votes without consulting the interest 
 or the wishes of their constituents, notwithstanding the democratic insti- 
 tutions of the countr}'. The history of the Orisons has proved this abun- 
 dantly. The Orisons were confederates or allies, but not associates of the 
 Swiss cantons, and therefore sent no deputies to the diet of the latter. 
 
 The Valais was divided into ten districts, called dizams, seven of 
 which, forming the German or Upper Valais, were sovereigns over the 
 three Lower districts, having conquered them in 1475, after a bloody 
 struggle. In the subject districts the French patois is spoken ; and the 
 river Morge below Sion was the boundary between them and the sovereign 
 districts. Of the latter, six dizains were pure democracies, like the 
 Orison communities, each administering its own internal affairs, whilst it 
 returned deputies to the general diet. The dizain of Sion was an aris- 
 tocracy, governed by a burgomaster, and a council of twenty-four mem- 
 bers. The diet of the Valais, called landrath, consisted of the bishop 
 of Sion, the captain-general, and the deputies of the seven sovereign 
 dizains, in all nine votes. It met twice a year at Sion ; it decided upon 
 all matters concerning the whole state, appointed bailiffs to the subject 
 dizains, received appeals from the courts of the dizains in cases of im- 
 portance, confirmed the lands-hauptmann, or captain-general of the 
 militia, or named another in his place, and upon the decease of a bishop, 
 it chose his successor out of a list of four candidates named by the 
 chapter of Sion out of their own body. The bishop of Sion was formerly 
 sovereign of the greater part of the Valais, but the inhabitants, after 
 several insurrections, reduced his power in the fifteenth century, and he 
 remained a sort of nominal prince, having a vote and some influence in 
 the diet, all public documents running in his name, and the coin bearing- 
 likewise his name, with the arms, however, of the republic ; he had also 
 the power of pardoning criminals. The six democratical dizains were 
 extremely jealous of their liberties, and more watchful than the Orison 
 communities over the conduct of their deputies to the diet, givino- them 
 instructions resolved upon by the general assembly of the people, with 
 strict orders not to depart from them. The Valais was an allv but 
 not associate of the Swiss cantons, to whose diet it sent no deputies. 
 
 The abbot of St. Oall has been often mentioned in the course of this 
 history. He was a titular prince of the Oerman empire, and was chosen 
 by the Dominican monks of the abbey, out of their own bod v. His 
 territory, after the loss of the city of St. Oall and of Appenzell, consisted 
 of the old abbey territories, atte landschafft, and of the To"-genburff. 
 His limited jurisdiction over the latter has been already described. In 
 the old territory, containing 45,000 inhabitants, the dominion of the 
 abbot was monarchical and absolute, excepting certain municipal 
 privileges which the towns enjoyed. The principal towns were Wyl and 
 Roschach; the latter being on the lake of Constance. The abbot used to 
 
 PERIOD v.] 
 
 history OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 201 
 
 send a deputy to the federal diet of the Swiss.. The city of St. Gall en- 
 joyed the same privilege, both being socii of the confederation. The city 
 was surrounded by the territories of the abbot, whilst the abbey itself 
 stood within the city, and was surrounded by walls and ditches. The 
 government of the city was a mixture of aristocracy and democracy. 
 
 The town of Bienne was, like St. Gall, a member of the confederation, 
 and sent a deputy to the federal diet. The titular bishop of Basle, who 
 should rather be called prince of Porentru, was the high sovereign of 
 Bienne, and had the appointment of its mayor, who presided over the little 
 council or executive and the chief court of justice, but without having 
 himself any vote. Neither the Prince- bishop, nor his representative, 
 had any share of the legislative powder, which resided in the great council. 
 Each council supplied vacancies occurring in its own body; the 
 councils jointly imposed taxes, contracted alliances, and exercised in 
 short all the rights of sovereignty, while the bishop merely lent his name 
 to all public acts, and received a civil list of about 300/. a year. The 
 town of Mulhausen in Alsace, although it had at one time been an 
 associate, lost, in 1586, its rights of suffrage in the Swiss diets, in conse- 
 quence of disturbances among its citizens. It was still, however, con- 
 sidered as a confederate. The principality of Neuchatel and Valengin, 
 which was a confederate though not an associate* of the Swiss cantons, 
 was, and is still, governed by the king of Prussia as a limited monarchy. 
 The house of Brandenberg succeeded to the sovereignty, in 1*107, by 
 the vote of the states of Neuchatel, and as the nearest akin to the former 
 counts of the house of Chalons ; the succession being confirmed by the 
 treaty of Utrecht. The constitution of this little state was extremely 
 complicated, the legislative authority resided jointly in the prince, repre- 
 sented by 2 governor in the council of state nominated by him, and in 
 the council of the town of Neuchatel. The consent of the three master 
 burghers of the town of Valengin was also required to the enactment of 
 any new laws. The " three estates," as they are called, of Neuchatel 
 were not a representative but a judicial body, and constituted the superior 
 tribunal of the country; they were composed of twelve judges, being 
 four counsellors, four ch^telains of the country districts, holding their 
 places for life, and four councillors of the town of Neuchatel appointed 
 annually. The estates proposed the laws, which being approved by the 
 council of state, the council of the town, and the prince, were then pro- 
 mulgated. ' The town of Valengin had also its estates, but their functions 
 were merely judicial, they having no share in the framing of the laws. 
 The council of state, above mentioned, formed the executive or admiuis- 
 
 • The socii were allied to all the cantons ; they formed part of the Helvetic body, 
 sent deputies to the federal diet, and were included in the treaties with France and 
 other powers ; the confederates were allied to part of the cantons, and as such were 
 entitled to assistance if attacked ; hut they sent no deputies to the diet, and ,vere 
 not necessarily included in the treaties of the Helvetic hod^ foreign powers. 
 
 Watteville, Hist. Con/eder. Hehct., b. x. 
 
 
 I' 
 
 / 
 
 ( 
 I 
 
 __, / / 
 
200 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period V. 
 
 their brother mountaineers, influenced the return of the deputies to the 
 diet, and the latter often gave their votes without consulting the interest 
 or the wishes of their constituents, notwithstanding the democratic insti- 
 tutions of the countr}'. The history of the Orisons has proved this abun- 
 dntly. The Grisons were confederates or allies, but not associates of the 
 Swiss cantons, and therefore sent no deputies to the diet of the latter. 
 
 The Valais was divided into ten districts, called dizains, seven of 
 which, forming the German or Upper Valais, were sovereigns over the 
 three Lower districts, having conquered them in 1475, after a bloody 
 struggle. In the subject districts the French patois is spoken; and the 
 river Morge below Sion was the boundary between them and the sovereign 
 districts. Of the latter, six dizains were pure democracies, like the 
 Orison communities, each administering its own internal aftairs, whilst it 
 returned deputies to the general diet. The dizain of Sion was an aris- 
 tocracy, governed by a burgomaster, and a council of twenty-four mem- 
 bers. The diet of the Valais, called landrath, consisted of the bishop 
 of Sion, the captain-general, and the deputies of the seven sovereign 
 dizains, in all nine votes. It met twice a year at Sion ; it decided upon 
 all matters concerning the whole state, appointed bailiffs to the subject 
 dizains, received appeals from the courts of the dizains in cases of im- 
 portance, confirmed the lands-hauptmann, or captain-general of the 
 militia, or named another in his place, and upon the decease of a bishop, 
 it chose his successor out of a list of four candidates named by the 
 chapter of Sion out of their own body. The bishop of Sion was formerly 
 sovereign of the greater part of the Valais, but the inhabitants, after 
 several insurrections, reduced his power in the fifteenth century, and he 
 remained a sort of nominal prince, having a vote and some influence in 
 the diet, all public documents running in his name, and (he coin bearin"- 
 likewise his name, with the arms, however, of the republic ; he had also 
 the power of pardoning criminals. The six democratical dizains were 
 extremely jealous of their liberties, and more watchful than the Orison 
 communities over the conduct of their deputies to the diet, givino- them 
 instructions resolved upon by the general assembly of the people, with 
 strict orders not to depart from them. The Valais was an allv but 
 not associate of the Swiss cantons, to whose diet it sent no deputies. 
 
 The abbot of St. Gall has been often mentioned in the course of this 
 historj. He was a titular prince of the German empire, and was chosen 
 by the Dominican monks of the abbey, out of their own bod v. His 
 territory, after the loss of the city of St. Gall and of Appenzell, consisted 
 of the old abbey territories, alte landschafft, and of the Toggenburg. 
 His limited jurisdiction over the latter has been already described. In 
 the old territory, containing 45,000 inhabitants, the dominion of the 
 abbot was monarchical and absolute, excepting certain municipal 
 privileges which the towns enjoyed. The principal towns were Wyl and 
 Roschach. the latter being on the lake of Constance. The abbot used to 
 
 PERIOD v.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 201 
 
 send a deputy to the federal diet of the Swiss. The city of St. Gall en- 
 joyed the same privilege, both being socii of the confederation. The city 
 was surrounded by the territories of the abbot, whilst the abbey itself 
 stood within the city, and was surrounded by walls and ditches. The 
 government of the city was a mixture of aristocracy and democracy. 
 
 The town of Bienne was, like St. Gall, a member of the confederation, 
 and sent a deputy to the federal diet. The titular bishop of Basle, who 
 should rather be called prince of Porentru, was the high sovereign of 
 Bienne, and had the appointment of its mayor, who presided over the little 
 council or executive and the chief court of justice, but without having 
 himself any vote. Neither the Prince-bishop, nor his representative, 
 had any share of the legislative powder, which resided in the great council. 
 Each council supplied vacancies occurring in its own body; the 
 councils jointly imposed taxes, contracted alliances, and exercised in 
 short all the rights of sovereignty, while the bishop merely lent his name 
 to all public acts, and received a civil list of about 300^. a year. The 
 town of Mulhausen in Alsace, although it had at one time been an 
 associate, lost, in 1586, its rights of suffrage in the Swiss diets, in conse- 
 quence of disturbances among its citizens. It was still, however, con- 
 sidered as a confederate. The principality of Neuchatel and Valengin, 
 which was a confederate though not an associate* of the Swiss cantons, 
 was, and is still, governed by the king of Prussia as a limited monarchy. 
 The house of Brandenberg succeeded to the sovereignty, in 1^07, by 
 the vote of the states of Neuchatel, and as the nearest akin to the former 
 counts of the house of Chalons ; the succession being confirmed by the 
 treaty of Utrecht. The constitution of this little state was extremely 
 complicated, the legislative authority resided jointly in the prince, repre- 
 sented by a governor in the council of state nominated by him, and in 
 the council of the town of Neuchatel. The consent of the three master 
 burghers of the town of Valengin was also required to the enactment of 
 any new laws. The "three estates," as they are called, of Neuchatel 
 w ere not a representative but a judicial body, and constituted the superior 
 tribunal of the country; they were composed of twelve judges, being 
 four counsellors, four chatelains of the country districts, holding their 
 places for life, and four councillors of the town of Neuchatel appointed 
 annually. The estates proposed the laws, which being approved by the 
 council of state, the council of the town, and the prince, were then pro- 
 mulgated. ' The town of Valengin had also its estates, but their functions 
 were merely judicial, they having no share in the framing of the laws. 
 The council of state, above mentioned, formed the executive or admiuis- 
 
 • The socii were allied to all the cantons ; they formed part of the Helvetic body, 
 sent deputies to the federal diet, and were included in the treaties with France and 
 other powers ; the confederates were allied to part of the cantons, and as such were 
 entitled to assistance if attacked ; hut they sent no deputies to the diet, and »vere 
 not necessarily included in the treaties of the Helvetic body with foreign powers. 
 Watteville, Hist. Confeder, Helvct., h, x. 
 
 11 
 
 •i 
 
 I 
 
 / 
 
202 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND, 
 
 [period V. 
 
 trative power of the country, but every ordinance it issued wasprevioush 
 laid before the councils of the towns of Neuchatel and Valengin, who 
 certified that .t contained nothing contrary to the laws and privile<'es of 
 the country. The town of Neuchatel had its great and little council, its own 
 magistrates and police ; some of the magistrates being chosen by the general 
 assembly of the citizens. The whole of these powers and their attributes 
 are described in detail by Coxe, in his letters on Switzerland, who speaks 
 verj- .nghly of the liberty and security enjoyed by the people of this little 
 pnnci,-ahly. Frederic the Great behaved in a most liberal manner 
 owards h,s subjects of Neuchatel. He not only confirmed but extended 
 the,r privileges, he authorized the formation of a representative council 
 by the diflferent communes, he improved the judicial system, and 
 ISeuchatel, under him, became, and has since continued to be, one of the 
 most happy and thriving states in Switzerland. Unrestricted commerce, 
 the absence of all duties on either importation or exportation, thriving 
 manufactures, security for persons and property, the facultv which llie 
 inhabitants enjoyed of following whatever trade, and of setllin.- where- 
 soever they pleased, together with that of serving in the armies of anv 
 power, even though it should be at war with Prussia, from whose state's 
 this Pnncipality was considered as totally distinct-all these advantages 
 placed Neuchatel in a truly enviable position ; and the more so since the 
 protection of a powerful monarch ensured respect from other states, and the 
 markets of the Prussian cities were open to its manufactures, on tlic same 
 looting as those of other Prussian subjects. They enjoyed all the security of 
 a monarchical government, without au^of its burthens, and the freedom 
 ot a republican state without its turbulence. The revenues of the sovereign 
 amounting to 5,0001. a year, are derived from the demesnes and a snmll 
 land tax. In consequence of these circumstances, the district is now one 
 of the richest and most industrious in Europe ; its valleys of Locle and La 
 Lhaus de Fonds, which a century since were covered with forests, are 
 become one vast manufactory of watches, clocks, and jewellery • nu- 
 merous looms for muslins and calicoes are at work at Boudry and other 
 vilages; and merchants from Neuchatel are to be found in almost 
 all the great commercial towns and harbours of Europe. The whole 
 population of Neuchatel amounts to 50,000 inhabitants 
 
 Be™ l?f' -"k^ ^T-^v T ""'y " '^""fe'lerate of th'e two cantons of 
 Bern and Zurich. This little state has been the scene of so much agita- 
 tion and cml contention during the eighteenth century as to have ac- 
 quired the character of being the most turbulent republic of modem times 
 The more opulent families, who had taken possession of the councils, and 
 confirmed or elected the members, separated themselves from the rest o 
 the citizens. They took up their residence in the upper part of the citv 
 while the people engaged in trade or business remained in the lot; 
 town, where they had their warehouses and shops. Among thesea spir 
 of jealousy and dissatisfaction was thus generated, and itlas incr a ed 
 
 period v.] 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 203 
 
 by the number of French and other refugees who resorted to Geneva, to 
 avoid religious persecution. Still the general assembly of all the citizens 
 and burghers ^vas convoked occasionally, and was acknowledged, in 
 principle at least, as the sovereign power in the state. The citizens were 
 those sons of citizens or of burghers who were born within the walls of 
 Geneva, The burghers were either the sons of citizens or of burghers 
 born abroad, or inhabitants who had purchased the burghership. The 
 citizens and burghers together, who were above five-and-twenty years of 
 age, and as such entitled to vote, amounted to about 1,500. They chose 
 the principal magistrates out of a list of candidates presented by the 
 senate and great council. The latter, or council of 200, and the senate of 
 twenty-five elected each other reciprocally, as in the aristocratic cantons 
 of Switzerland. In order to restrain their authority, the assembly of 
 the citizens, in 1107, after much disturbance, in which blood was shed, 
 and one citizen of the popular party, named Fatio, w^as executed and 
 others were exiled, procured a law enacting that every five years a 
 general assembly should be convened to deliberate upon the affairs of the 
 republic. But at the very first assembly — thus convened in 1712 — the 
 magistrates contrived to obtain a majority of suffrages for the abolition 
 of the above ordinance. Deception as well as undue influence was said 
 to have been employed in order to bring about this singular act of 
 political suicide,* which gave nearly absolute power to the senate, and 
 enabled them to issue edicts at their pleasure. A new tax, which tliey 
 imposed for the construction of a regular hnc of fortifications round the 
 city, was a source of fresh troubles. In the course of these Micheli 
 Ducrest, one of the popular leaders, was obliged to leave Geneva. After 
 many years spent in France he went to Bern, where he was allowed to 
 remain under a sort of arrest; but having tampered in Henzi*s con- 
 spiracy he was shut up in the castle of Aarburg, where he lived to an 
 advanced age, beguiling his confinement by the study of natural philoso- 
 l)hy and the construction of barometers and thermometers, which went 
 by his name. 
 
 After several years of disturbances, in wlficli eitherp arty by turns 
 gained the ascendancy, a convention was made, in 1738, through the 
 mediation of France, Bern, and Zurich, which determined the basis of 
 the Genevan constitution. It secured the annual meeting of the general 
 assembly, who were to confirm or replace the principal magistrates, and 
 discuss state matters laid before them by the council. Some time after- 
 wards a sentence passed by the senate against Rousseau's E?7iile and 
 Contrat Social, as containing passages derogatory to the Christian faith 
 and to social order, led to another civil dissension. The popular party 
 contended that the sentence was illegal, and that the question ought to 
 be referred to the general assembly. The senate and council maintained 
 
 * See Rousseau's '' Lettres Ecrites de la Montague," on the subject. 
 
 n 
 
 
 I 
 
 H 
 
 ./ 
 
204 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period V. 
 
 k 
 
 their right of putting a negative or veto upon the discussion. Hence 
 arose two parties, the Negatifs and the Representans. The latter, in 
 1768, succeeded in obtaining an enactment that the general assembly 
 should fill up one-half of the vacancies in the great council, and should 
 be authorized to displace annually, if they thought fit, four members of 
 the senate. The right of representation^ or petition, was secured to every 
 citizen or burgher. This was a signal advantage gained by the popular 
 party, and it led to a pacification between the whole body of citizens and 
 burghers and the magistrates. But now another class of people, called 
 Natives, being those who were born at Geneva of originally foreign fa- 
 milies and had not purchased the burghership, claimed also a share in the 
 government. This class had become very numerous in course of time. 
 They were opposed, however, by the citizens generally, and having 
 broken out into open insurrection, were put down by force, in 1170. 
 Some perished in the affray, others were banished. 
 
 The government of Geneva, as settled by the pacification of 1768, 
 consisted of a great council, a senate, and the general assembly. AH 
 laws were proposed by the senate, discussed in the great council, and 
 then laid before the assembly of the citizens, who approved of them or 
 rejected them by majority of suffrages, but without discussion. The 
 senate had the executive power, administered the finances, and had the 
 privilege of conferring, under certain conditions, the right of burghership, 
 which w^as rendered more accessible than before. The principal magis- 
 trates, such as the four syndics, were chosen from among the senators. The 
 senate also appointed* to one-half of the vacancies in the great council, 
 who in their turn filled up vacancies in the senate. The general assembly 
 approved or rejected the proposed laws, imposed taxes, declared war or 
 peace, and contracted alliances. 
 
 In 1781, new disturbances arose between the Negatives and the Re- 
 presentatives on the subject of the publication of a code of laws, which 
 was either opposed or delayed by the former, who had a majority in the 
 councils. The Natives soon joined in the contest, which broke out into 
 an open insurrection in March, 1782. The principal magistrates and 
 senators were arrested, others ran away, and the whole city was in a 
 state of confusion. France, Bern, and Zurich, as former mediators, and 
 even the king of Sardinia, marched troops towards Geneva ; to whom the 
 inhabitants, distracted by their dissensions, opened their gates. A re- 
 action now took place, the leaders of the Representatives escaped in 
 boats by the lake, and the Negatives had complete sway ; all citizens 
 who had taken part in the disturbances were excluded from the general 
 assembly, which being thus reduced to less than one-half its proper 
 number, and awed by the presence of foreign troops, abandoned most of 
 the rights recognized by the convention of 1768, and vested nearly ab- 
 solute authority in the councils. The militia was disbanded, and a 
 foreign garrison introduced in the pay of the state. This event, although 
 
 PERIOD V.J HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 205 
 
 it immediately resulted from the overbearing interference of France and 
 Savoy, was brought about in the first instance by the rashness of the 
 popular party, who had not patience to wait for the sure though slow 
 operation of the right of election, which they had won in 1768, and by 
 means of which the senate and council would have become filled by 
 degrees with members of their nomination. 
 
 Among the Genevan emigrants, of 1782, some went to Paris, where 
 they afterwards became connected with the Girondins, and as such 
 figured in the first stage of the French revolution, others settled as 
 merchants in various towns of Italy, Holland, and other countries. A 
 certain number of them, at the head of whom were Chalons and 
 Claviere, proposed to go and settle in Ireland. A memorial signed by 
 above 1,000 individuals was presented to the Lord-Lieutenant, Earl 
 Temple, praying that a spot might be assigned to them to form their 
 colony. This petition was well received ; and in September, 1782, being 
 submitted to the Privy Council at Dublin, it was acceded to, and after- 
 wards received the assent of George III. The Irish parliament voted 
 50,000/. for defraying the preliminary expenses, and building a town for 
 the colonists. The site chosen for the purpose, consisting of twenty- 
 seven acres of crow^n land, was near the mouth of the river Suir, about 
 eight miles from Waterford and nearly opposite Duncannon. A deputa- 
 tion of the emigrants proceeded to Waterford in July, 1783, to super- 
 intend the building of the new town, which was called New Geneva. 
 The buildings soon began to rise, and assume the appearance of a city, 
 30,000/. had already been expended on the spot, when the whole scheme 
 was suddenly abandoned, from causes which have never been entirely 
 cleared up. It was said that the Genevan emigrants demanded too many 
 privileges in the articles of their charter, and that the corporation of 
 Waterford became jealous, and wanted to extend its jurisdiction over the 
 new colony. At the same time the recall of Earl Temple, from Ireland, 
 contributed greatly to the failure of the scheme, of which he had been 
 the principal patron. The emigrants, by an address presented to his 
 successor, the duke of Rutland, signified their intention of relinquishing 
 the project. The buildings of New Geneva remained unoccupied for 
 years, until they were used as barracks in the beginning of the war. The 
 demesne was afterwards sold, the houses were pulled down, and few 
 traces of the projected colony are now to be seen. 
 
 In 1789, a fresh insurrection compelled the magistrates to re-establish 
 the elections and other rights of the general assembly upon the footing 
 of the convention of 1768. All the exiles were recalled, and all natives 
 whose families had resided in Geneva during four generations were 
 admitted into the class of burghers. Things remained in this state until 
 the example of the French revolution brought about a fresh catastrophe. 
 
 The history of these miniature convulsions and revolutions, of which 
 the mere outline is here given, is very interesting and instructive. A full 
 
 
^06 
 
 HISTORlr OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [t'ERIOD V. 
 
 account of them may be found in Sir Francis d'lvernois's *' Revolutions 
 of Geneva in the eighteenth century." 
 
 Besides the above associates and confederates of the Swiss, there were 
 some other districts only partially allied to particular cantons. The 
 dtular bishop of Basle was possessed of a considerable territory, inchiding 
 the districts of Delemont and Porentru, which he governed as a monarch, 
 and the valleys of Erguel and Montiers which enjoyed certain franchises,' 
 m which they were guaranteed by being coburghers of Bern. The 
 bishop himself was allied to the Catholic cantons alone. 
 
 The abbot of Engelberg was absolute lord of a mountain tract round 
 his abbey in the Alps, between Bern and Unterwalden, containino- about 
 4,000 inhabitants, and was allied to the forest cantons. 
 
 Lastly, the diminutive republic of Gersau, on a slip of land on the 
 northern bank of the Walstatter see, and numbering 1000 inhabitjuits, 
 was also under the protection of the forest cantons. It was the smallest 
 state in Europe, San Marino not excepted. Gersau was a democracy 
 with an assembly of all the citizens, and it had its landamman, its land- 
 rath or council, its court of justice, and its militia. 
 
 The whole population of the thirteen cantons was rather under 
 1,000,000, that of their subjects was about 250,000, and that of their 
 associates and confederates, and the subjects of these confederates, 
 amounted to nearly half a million more; altogether, the territory belong- 
 ing to the Helvetic federal body, towards the close of the last century, 
 contained about 1,700,000 inhabitants. Durand's statistical tables,' 
 which have been quoted by Planta and others, are evidently inexact,' 
 some of the numbers are too high; for instance, he gives 150,000 inha- 
 bitants to the Grisons, besides 100,000 for the Valteline, while the Gri- 
 sons did not then number above 73,000 or 74,000 inhabitants, and now 
 hardly attain 96,000 ;* and the Valais is rated at 100,000 inhabitants, 
 while its population does not amount to 70,000. 
 
 The subjects of the Swiss were either subjects of certain particular 
 cantons, or common bailiwicks, subject to all the cantons. The foUowino- 
 is a table of them : — ^ 
 
 ihl }bT^f^'- ' f^'V"'"T"'^ GJographiq,<e Statistique de la Siusse/ Lausanne, 1 830-7 • 
 the latest statistical work on Switzerland. "uaauuL, loou / , 
 
 PERIOD v.] 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 201 
 
 Bailiwicks. 
 
 Val Levantina or Livinen thai 
 
 Bellinzona 
 
 Val di Blegno or Polenzerthal 
 Riviera or Polese .... 
 
 Lugano 
 
 Locarno ••••.. 
 
 Mendrisio 
 
 Val Maggia 
 
 Tliurgau .... . . 
 
 Sargans 
 
 Rheinthal 
 
 Gaster and Uznach . 
 
 County of Baden 
 
 Frey Amten or free baili-i 
 
 wicks / 
 
 The two towns of Mellingen ) 
 
 and Bremgarten , . . i 
 
 Morat 
 
 Gran son 
 
 Orbe et: Echallens 
 Schwartzenburg • • . . 
 
 9,000 
 
 9,000 
 
 8,000 
 
 4,000 
 
 26 , 000 
 
 17,000 
 
 15,000 
 
 6,000 
 
 60,000 
 
 12,0C0 
 
 18,000 
 
 9,000 
 16,000 
 
 20,000 
 
 5,000 
 
 8,000 
 
 9,000 
 
 11,000 
 
 To whom subject. 
 
 Canton of Uri. 
 
 Uri, Schwytz, and Unterwalden. 
 
 Ditto ditto. 
 
 Ditto dit^o. 
 
 All the cantons except Appenzell. 
 
 Ditto ditto. 
 
 Ditto ditto. 
 
 Ditto ditto. 
 
 The eight old cantons. 
 
 Ditto. 
 jThe eight old cantons, with 
 t Api)enzell. 
 Schwytz and Glarus. 
 Zurich, Bern, and Glarus. 
 
 Ditto ditto ditto. 
 
 Ditto ditto ditto. 
 
 Bern and Freyburg. 
 Ditto ditto. 
 Ditto ditto. 
 
 10,000 iDitto ditto. 
 
 The Valtelina, and the counties of Chiavenna and Bormio, with a 
 population of about 70,000 inhabitants, were subject to the Grison 
 leagues. 
 
 The Aargau, with the exception of the Frey Amten and the towns of 
 Mellingen and Bremgarten, formed part of the canton of Bern, as well 
 as the Pays de Vaud, with the exception of Morat, Granson, and Orbe, 
 which were possessed by Bern and Freyburg jointly. 
 
 All these subject territories were governed by bailiffs, sent by each of 
 the ruling cantons in rotation. These bailiffs, unless restricted by the 
 local privileges of particular districts, acted as the representatives of an 
 absolute sovereign ; they had jurisdiction in civil and criminal causes 
 with some limitations, and a fixed revenue arising from different duties 
 and taxes. Once a-year several deputies from the ruling cantons formed 
 themselves into a syndicate, examined the accounts of the public revenue 
 delivered by the bailiffs, heard and decided on appeals, &c. In im- 
 l^ortant cases another appeal lay from this court to the superior tribunal 
 of each of the cantons to which the bailiwick belonged. But, notwith- 
 standing all these precautions, many complaints against the bailiffs were 
 never redressed. These bailiffs must not be confounded with those who 
 were sent by the towns to the various districts forming integral parts of 
 each canton, and whose authority, especially in judicial matters, was 
 
 It 
 
 >' 
 
 /^ 
 
/ 
 
 203 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period V. 
 
 PERIOD v.] 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 209 
 
 1 i 
 
 much more limited. But the bailiffs sent to the suhject and distant 
 baihwicks had or assumed all the authority, administrative, judicial, and 
 military. Of all the subjects of the Swiss, the Italian valleys were 
 the worst governed, and in these it was remarked, as we have before 
 saiQ, that the bailiffs sent by the forest or democratic cantons were the 
 most arbitrary and oppressive, leaving behind them when they crossed 
 the Alps their unassuming simplicity, and becoming imperious and 
 grasping proconsuls. The office of bailiff was, in fact, sold by the forest 
 cantons to the highest bidder, who of course reimbursed himself by ex- 
 actions on the inhabitants, and often by selling justice ; whilst at the 
 same time appeals to the democratic cantons led seldom to any satisfac- 
 tory result. The complaints of the subjects, however, were not always 
 grounded on justice and truth. The Val Levantina, which lies to the 
 south of the St. Gothard and along the banks of the river Ticino, had 
 been for ages suhject to the canton of Uri, indeed ever since the wars of 
 the Swiss against the Visconti dukes of Milan. It enjoyed considerable 
 privileges, guaranteed by the act of cession of its former masters Uri 
 drew from the valley some trifling taxes, and a toll upon the transit of 
 goods. The people of the valley held their assemblies, and elected their 
 local magistrates and council, subject, however, to the higher jurisdiction 
 of the sovereign canton, which appointed a bailiff and a receiver of the 
 
 their 1 T T""^°^ *' """^y ^="' "^"^ g""'y "*■ P«<=»l''tion in 
 their capacity of guardians to orphans and widows, and complaints were 
 
 forwarded to Uri, whose council ordered the accused to produce their ac- 
 counts. The persons thus summoned, seeing no other means of extri- 
 cating themselves from their dangerous position, excited an insurrection 
 among their countrymen, under the pretext of obtaining their independ- 
 
 Tnllrri Tf^"" ^'°'" '^' "'''''' «"<» "f ^''P^S the produce 
 
 Of 1775, at a season when, the country being covered with snow, the 
 
 tCrr T,, "'"'' I'T^ ^°' congregating and listening to the agi- 
 tators. They arrested the bailiff from Uri and the receiver, and thev 
 mvested their own council with the supreme judicial authority. The 
 canton of Uri summoned the insurgents to return to their allegiance, 
 but they answered by assembling in arms at the foot of the mountains 
 owards Uri. The militia of Uri. being joined by a contingent f m 
 Unterwalden, crossed the St. Gothard, and occupied all the passes Tf 
 he valley; and the insurgents, hearing that the other cantons had 
 united against them, were panic struck, and returned to their homes 
 Ihe leaders, however, were seized; and the people of the valley, being 
 convened in the plain of Faido to the number of 3,000, were surrounded 
 
 rl^V!P''lV''ff "''''• ""'' "'^ ^*"''="^'= fr'"»Uri was then 
 read to them, by which they were deprived of all their privileges, and 
 were ordered to swear unconditional obedience to the sovereign canton 
 ims being done, they were made to knee! down with their heads unco- 
 
 ^\ 
 
 vered, whilst the public executioner struck off the heads of Furno, Urs, 
 and Sartori, the three principal leaders of the revolt. Eight more of 
 the insurgents were led into Uri and there beheaded. This terrible ex- 
 ample scared the spirit of insurrection ever after. 
 
 The federal bond which united the various cantons and their allies 
 was very loose, and far different from that which connected together the 
 United Provinces of Holland, or even from the federal compact of the 
 United States of North America. There was not in Switzerland any 
 permanent sovereign body, no standing federal magistrate equally ac- 
 knowledged by all, no central government having its own establishment, 
 its own treasury, its own servants, civil and military. The general 
 diets could not decide upon any important question, unless it had been 
 previously debated and decided on in the councils of each of the cantons, 
 who were applied to by their own deputies for fresh instructions at every 
 new case which was brought before the diet. The cantons were not 
 even each allied to all. The eight older cantons had among them a federal 
 compact for their common defence, and even of these eight the five first 
 only, viz., Zurich, Schwyz, Uri, Unterwalden, and Luzern, were bound 
 to enter into no other alliance without each other's consent, while the 
 other three, Glarus, Zug, and Bern, were at liberty to form alhances 
 with other states or foreign princes, provided such alliances contained 
 nothing prejudicial to the federal bond. The eight cantons were also 
 bound, by the convention of Stanz, to assist one another in supporting 
 the form of government established in each of them. 
 
 The five junior cantons, viz., Fribourg, Soleure, Basle, Schaffhausen, 
 and Appenzell, had no federal bond with the whole of the rest, nor among 
 themselves, but every one of them was aUied to some one or more of the 
 others. The three forest cantons alone were allied to every one of the 
 other cantons. By these means, however, the guarantee of common de- 
 fence was secured to each ; for, as any canton attacked had the right of 
 calling some other cantons to its assistance, and as these were entitled to 
 call others, all would be brought in to take a part, in virtue of their parti- 
 cular bonds. 
 
 The general diets of the confederation were either ordinary or extra- 
 ordinary. The ordinary diets met once a-year at Fratienfeld in Thurgau, 
 instead of Baden, where, until the treaty of Aarau in 1712, they had 
 been accustomed to meet. The deputy from Zurich presided: he 
 brought forward the matters to be discussed, collected the votes, framed 
 the resolutions, &c. Each canton or associate had one vote, and ques- 
 tions were decided by a simple majority. The sittings were held with 
 closed doors, and at the end of the session the deputy of Zurich drew up 
 a statement of the decisions of the diet, of which he sent a copy round 
 to each canton. The principal business of the diet was to hear appeals 
 from the common bailiwicks, and to inspect the accounts and inquire 
 into the conduct of the bailiffs. 
 
 I 
 
210 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period V« 
 
 Extraordinary diets were assembled at the request of any particular 
 canton, or of any of the foreign ministers in case of urgent business. 
 In such a case the canton of Zurich summoned the other cantons to send 
 their deputies to Frauenfeld, or any other place fixed upon, acquainting 
 them at the same time with the nature of the subjects which were to be 
 discussed, in order that the cantonal governments might give instructions 
 to their deputies accordingly. The foreign minister, at whose request an 
 extraordinary diet was convoked, was bound to pay the expenses of the 
 deputies who were thus called from their homes at an unexpected 
 season. 
 
 Tlie partial diets were held by the Protestant cantons at Aarau, and 
 by the Catholic ones at Luzem. There was no fixed time for their 
 meeting, but they were summoned as the occasion required it. 
 
 A regulation, called " the defensional," was agreed upon at a general 
 diet held at Baden in 1668, for providing against sudden emergencies, 
 such as an attack from foreign powers, when the proceedings of the diet 
 would have proved too slow for the common safety. In such a case de- 
 puties were to be named by all the members of the Helvetic body, and 
 invested with full powers to direct the military force of the nation, which 
 was to be raised by contingents from the militia of each state. This 
 body consisted of 9600 men for the thirteen cantons, 1400 for the asso- 
 ciates, and 2400 for the subject bailiwicks, — in all 13,400 men; which 
 number, however, might be doubled and trebled if required. 
 
 The militia of each canton consisted of all the males from sixteen to 
 sixty years of age, and these received military instruction at certain 
 epochs. Only one- third of the whole, however, consisting of the youngest 
 and strongest, were enrolled into regiments, the other two-thirds supply- 
 ing them with recruits if necessary. The regiments were divided into 
 fusileers and electionaries, the fusileers being all young unmarried men, 
 who were considered as always ready to march at a moment's notice; 
 the electionaries were composed of the married men, of an age and size 
 proper for service, and these were called out after the fusileers. When 
 in active service they received regular pay ; but every man was bound 
 to provide his own uniform, arms, and accoutrements. 
 
 The Swiss, it is well known, furnished troops to several European 
 powers, according to certain treaties or capitulations, as they were called, 
 agreed upon between those powers and the various cantons. The chief 
 power having Swiss troops in its service was France, which had retained 
 them ever since the treaty made between the Swiss and Louis XI. 
 See pages 94 and 101. Under Louis XIV. the number of Swiss troops 
 in the French service amounted to 28,000 men; but, in 1790, at the 
 beginning of the French revolution, tlicre were not more than 15,000, 
 who were divided into twelve regiments. Six Swiss regiments were in 
 the service of Holland, four were serving in Piedmont, four at Naples, 
 and four in Spain : the pope had also a small body guard of Swiss. The 
 
 J 
 
 PERIOD v.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 211 
 
 cantons from which the regiments were drawn received an annual sub- 
 sidy from the power for whose service they were raised. The capitula- 
 tion of each regiment was for a certain number of years, after which the 
 officers retired on full pay. The regiments were raised by the colonels, 
 who received a stated remuneration, and were proprietors of the corps. 
 The soldiers were all volunteers, and received enlistment money. 
 
 Switzerland is not the only country in which the practice of enlisting 
 volunteers for foreign powers has been in use; the principal difference 
 IS that in Switzerland several of the cantonal governments were parties 
 to the arrangement, and derived a profit from it, whilst the other Eu- 
 ropean governments have either forbidden the practice, without, how- 
 ever, succeeding in preventing it altogether, or have tolerated without 
 countenancing it ; and, in fact, it would be impossible to prevent the 
 natives of any country from entering the service of another, if they so 
 list; the only just reservation seems to be that they should on no account 
 bear arms against their native land. It has been said by the apologists 
 of the Swiss system of foreign recruiting, that the interference of the 
 cantonal governments in a practice which they could not possibly have 
 prevented (for it is well known that, in spite of all their prohibitions, in 
 the times of Louis XII. and Francis I. thousands of Swiss went to join 
 the French armies in Italy, while as many went to serve the opposite 
 party), was in fact beneficial to the men, inasmuch as it secured to them 
 the fulfilment of their capitulations; whilst it preserved in the cantons 
 the right of recalling their respective regiments in case of an emergency 
 at home, or in case the power under which they were serving behaved 
 hostilely towards the Swiss confederation. On the other hand, there has 
 been considerable misconception abroad upon this subject ; the cantons 
 have been represented as selling their countrymen as if they had been 
 cattle, while the truth is that the men were not sold, but enlisted of their 
 own accord for a certain period of time, receiving the bounty money. 
 
 As long as there are powers that will give a bounty to foreigners who 
 choose to enlist in their service there will be found people, not only in 
 Switzerland but in every country, ready to accept of that reward, and it 
 is impossible to conceive any law sufficiently stringent to prevent them. 
 But the system of foreign recruiting in Switzerland was too extensive 
 and too much encouraged by the cantonal governments not to deserve 
 pecuhar animadversion, as being a source of corruption to all classes of 
 the people. 
 
 An instance of the evil effects resulting from the system which pre- 
 vailed in several Swiss cantons of receiving pecuniary subsidies from 
 foreign powers, on condition of supplying those powers with mercenary 
 troops, occurs in the history of Zug in the eighteenth century ; and an 
 account of the transactions which took place there will serve at the same 
 time to exhibit a picture of the social slate of those little democracies, in 
 which, as in most other democracies ancient and modern, the influence 
 
 p 2 
 
 ^\ 
 
212 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period V. 
 
 PERIOD v.] 
 
 history of SWITZERLAND. 
 
 213 
 
 of certain families and their clients gave rise now and then to turbulent 
 factions, and destroyed the individual liberty and security which are sup- 
 posed to constitute the essence of a popular form of government. 
 
 Tiie canton of Zug was divided into four districts, of which the town 
 of Zug and its immediate territory formed one. The landamman uas 
 chosen by turns from each of the four districts, but some of the old 
 families of the canton had found means to monopolize, or at all events 
 greatly to influence most of the votes in the council of state, the members 
 of which, as has been already observed, were generally allowed to remain 
 in office for life. Among these families were the Zurlauben, who were 
 not only one of the principal families of the canton, but also enjoyed 
 considerable favour with the court of France, partly on account of the 
 military services which several of its members had rendered to that 
 power, and partly because it supported in the councils of Zug the alliance 
 which existed between the canton and France. The subsidies paid by 
 France to Zug, according to the stipulations of the alliance, as well as the 
 money sent to be secretly distributed among the supporters of French 
 interests, passed through the hands of the Zurlauben. The same family 
 had farmed the monopoly of the salt, which the government of the canton 
 drew from Burgundy and retailed to the people at a considerable profit. 
 There was a party, however, hostile to the Zurlauben, and consequently 
 hostile to the French connexion also. At the head of this party stood 
 Anthony Schumacher, a man of talent, but violent and ambitious. He 
 wished to have the farm of the salt himself, as he was concerned in the 
 trade of so much of that article as was drawn from the mines in the 
 Tyrol. He began by casting suspicions on the honesty of his antagonists 
 in their administration of the farm, as well as in their distribution of the 
 French subsidies, which he contended ought to be divided equally among 
 all the citizens. The turn for electing a new landamman having come 
 to one of the country districts, the people elected to the office one of 
 Schumacher's party, who instituted proceedings against the former 
 landamman and several of his friends on charges of malversation. Several 
 of the accused ran away and were banished for life, and their property 
 was^confiscated, in 1 128. Schumacher himself being elected landamman, 
 in 1731, annulled the alliance with France, that power having refused to 
 remit its usual subsidies to be distributed among all the citizens. A per- 
 secution now began against the French or Zurlauben party, who were 
 styled the soft, by the partizans of Schumacher, who were favourers of 
 the Austrian alliance, and who were called the hard. Schumacher having 
 formed a new landrath or council of state from among his friends, en- 
 forced the most arbitrary measures, filled theprisons with persons of the soft 
 party, some of whom were executed, others were condemned to the pillory, 
 and others were sentenced to wear for a twelvemonth a red worsted cap 
 as a mark of infamy. Schumacher raised troops in order to repress the 
 discontent which these measures excited, the gates of the town of Zug 
 
 t 
 
 i 
 
 were regularly guarded and closed at particular hours by his order; in 
 short, he established a system of terror which he supported at a consider- 
 able expense to the country. At the expiration of Schumacher's period 
 of office, the people, weary of the rule of his faction, chose as his successor 
 a man of different sentiments, who was favourable to the party of the 
 exiles, many of whom returned home. Some months afterwards Schuma- 
 cher, having given in his accounts, was charged with mal-administration 
 of the public revenue, his name was erased from the list of counsellors, 
 and he was thrown into prison with several of his friends. A general 
 reaction then took place against the hard faction. Schumacher being 
 convicted, probably with as little regard to the forms of justice as he had 
 himself shown towards his enemies, was led to the scaffold in March, 
 1735 ; but having begged for his life, he was condemned to hard labour, 
 and died seven months afterwards. 
 
 Zug renewed its alliance with France, but new troubles having taken 
 place concerning the application of the subsidies, the other cantons were 
 obliged to interfere, and it was stipulated that the sums paid by France 
 should in future be distributed amongst the citizens. 
 
 The criminal laws of Switzerland were founded on the Caroline code, 
 or code of Charles V., with modifications and additions in several of the 
 cantons, which had their own statutes and customs. The judicial legis- 
 lation in general was in a very defective state. The principle that "the 
 confession of the criminal was requisite in capital cases, and the practice 
 of the torture, which was a derivation of the same principle ; the custom 
 of appointing special commissioners to judge of particular cases ;. the too 
 great discretionary power given to the judges ; the union of political and 
 judicial attributes in the same individuals ; these and other anomalies 
 disfigured the administration of justice. In many cases, especially in the 
 democratic cantons, the penalty of banishment, which to some individuals 
 may be a very severe one, while to others it is hardly any penalty at all, 
 was resorted to for the sake of economy, in order to save the expenses of 
 keeping the prisoners in confinement. The unjust practice of confisca- 
 tion likewise prevailed. In ordinary times cases of flagrant injustice 
 were rare, owing to the principles of honesty and justice which form a 
 part of the national character, but when civil dissensions had excited 
 violent passions, acts of judicial partiality and oppression were by no 
 means rare, as the above narrative of Schumacher rnd other similar 
 instances, which may be found in the history of almost every canton, 
 amply prove. 
 
 The sciences, and especially natural philosophy and mathematics, 
 were successfully cultivated in Switzerland during the eighteenth century. 
 The names of Bernouilli, Euler, AVeiss, and Iselin, at Basle ; Lavater, 
 Gesner, and Hirzel, at Zurich ; Haller, at Bern ; Bonnet, Saussure, and 
 Deluc, at Geneva ; Muller, at Schaffhausen ; and many more who could 
 be mentioned, prove that Switzerland contributed its full share towards 
 
 '\ 
 
214 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period V, 
 
 increasing the stock of European learning during that period. The acute 
 and eloquent though wayward J. J. Rousseau must not be omitted, for he 
 was a native of Geneva, though he lived and wrote mostly away from his 
 country. Another additional glory of the Swiss philosophers is that they 
 were, with the exception of Rousseau, moral men and religious without 
 bigotry. The Helvetic society, which was instituted in 1761, constituted 
 an assembly of all the most enlightened men in the country, who met 
 once a year for the purpose of discussing not only scientific subjects, but 
 also matters connected with the encouragement of sound public and 
 private morality, of education and useful industry, and especially of im- 
 provements in agriculture. 
 
 Such was the state of things in Switzerland in the eighteenth century, 
 a state of things in which, after making due allowance for all the evils 
 and imperfections of the political system, there was still enough of good 
 left in the social and domestic condition of the people to entitle their 
 country to be called one of the happiest in Europe. 
 
 The chief authorities for this 5th period are the following :— Mallet, 
 Continuation de VHistoire dea Siiisses de I. Midler. Stannyan, Ac- 
 count of Switzerland, 1714. Wm. Coxe, Sketches of the Natural, Civil, 
 and Political State of Switzerland^ in a series of letters^ 1778. 
 Berenger, Histoire de Geneve, 1772. Leu, Lexicon Helveticum. Flisi, 
 Erdbeschreibnng der ganzen Helvetischen Eidgenossenschaft. Geogra- 
 phische^ und Hisiorisches Lexicon der Schweiz, Ulm, 1796. Bon- 
 stetten. Souvenirs de 18.31. For the thirty years' war, Coxe's History 
 of the House of Austria and Schiller have been consulted. The troubles 
 of the Valteline have been related by Lavizzari, Quadrio, and others. 
 
 SIXTH PERIOD. 
 
 FROM THE FRENCH INVASION OF 1798, AND THE CONSEQUENT DISSOLU- 
 TION OF THE OLD HELVETIC CONFEDERATION OF THIRTEEN CANTONS, 
 TO THE NEW ORGANIZATION OF SWITZERLAND AS A FEDERAL STATE, 
 CONSISTING OF TWENTY-TWO CANTONS, IN 1814. 
 
 The great revolution of France, whilst it totally dissolved the social re- 
 lations in that country, produced in the sequel a similar effect on the 
 political system of Europe which had existed since the time of Charles 
 v., and had been consolidated during the latter part of the reign of 
 Louis XIV. In the numerous continental wars of the seventeenth and 
 eighteenth centuries between France, Spain, Austria, and the lesser 
 powers of Europe, although encroachments and violations of treaties had 
 often occurred, still, at the end of each war, former stipulations were 
 referred to as precedents, and the principle of a balance of power was 
 appealed to as in some sort the state law of Europe. War itself (ex- 
 cepting indeed that great stain on the history of modem Europe — the 
 dismemberment of Poland) was made rather for the purpose of partial 
 aggrandizement, than for the total overthrow of any particular state, or 
 the subversion of its internal social system. But the wars of the French 
 republicans, partly owing to the want of moral principle, and partly also 
 to the irritation produced by the overbearing denunciations of foreign 
 monarchs at an early period of the revolution, assumed quite a novel 
 character, aiming at a total change, internal as well as external, social 
 as well as political, in every one of the European states. Former 
 treaties, balance of power, sovereign rights theretofore acknowledged, 
 respect for neutrals, and the other fundamental maxims of the law of 
 nations, were ineffectual barriers against the tide of conquest, which 
 rushed on with the avowed purpose of destroying the whole existing 
 system of society, assuming it to be altogether wrong, and founded on 
 false principles. No former treaties were considered as binding, since 
 they had been entered into by powers which the jurists and politicians 
 of the French republic chose to consider as illegal and usurped. Ac- 
 cording to them there was not a single legitimate government in all 
 Europe, because none of the governments of Europe were elected by 
 the numerical majority of the people. With such new maxims of in- 
 ternational law in the leaders, and a corresponding fanaticism in their 
 
 ■"^^_ 
 
216 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND 
 
 [period VI. 
 
 M 
 
 ■[ 
 
 agents and instruments, all former ideas of reason and justice became 
 confused, and the solution of every question was left entirely to physical 
 force, or to the arts of conspiracy. All means were considered lawful 
 for the overthrow of institutions which were denounced as tyrannical. 
 Humanity and even justice were considered as treason against liberty. 
 The wars of the French revolution in their intolerant fanaticism closely 
 resembled the religious wars of the middle ages. Nor is this a matter 
 for surprise; for when a set of men persuade themselves that they alone 
 are in the right, they will needs be repeatedly roused to deeds of 
 desperate valour, and often be hardened to tie commission of remorseless 
 cruelty. The fanatical revolutionists adopted the dangerous principle 
 that, for the sake of liberty, all means are justifiable, and to this principle 
 they gave the most ample latitude of interpretation. 
 = ' There is a fine passage in Sir James Mackintosh's defence of Peltier, 
 which exhibits in a vivid manner the fearful havoc which the French 
 revolution made among the independent states of Europe. Alluding to 
 the republican governments of the United Provinces of Holland, 
 of Switzerland, and of the imperial towns of Germany, he says : '* These 
 governments were in many respects one of the most interesting parts of 
 the ancient system of Europe. Unfortunately for the repose of man- 
 kind, great states are compelled, by regard for their own safety, to con- 
 sider the military spirit and martial habits of their people, as one of the 
 main objects of their policy. Frequent hostilities seem almost the 
 necessary condition of their greatness ; and, without being great, they 
 cannot long remain safe. Smaller slates, exempted from this cruel 
 necessity, devoted themselves to the arts of peace, to the cultivation of 
 literature, and the improvement of reason. They became places of 
 refuge for free and fearless discussion ; they were the impartial spec- 
 tators and judges of the various contests of ambition, uhich, from time 
 to time, disturbed the peace of the world. They thus became peculiarly 
 qualified to be the organs of that public opinion which converted Europe 
 into a great republic, with laws which mitigated, though they could not 
 extinguish, ambition ; and with moral tribunals to which even the most 
 despotic sovereigns were amenable. * * « « 
 
 These governments were, in other respects, one of the most beautiful 
 and interesting parts of our ancient system. The perfect security of 
 such inconsiderable and feeble states, t eir undisturbed tranquillity 
 amidst the wars and conquests that surrounded them, attested, beyond 
 any other part of the European system, the moderation, the justice, the 
 civilization to which Christian Europe had reached in modern times. 
 Their weakness was protected only by the habitual reverence for justice, 
 which, during a long series of ages, had grown up in Christendom. 
 This was the only fortification which defended them against those mighty 
 monarchs to whom they offered so easy a prey. And, till the French 
 revolution, this was sufficient. Consider, for instance, the situation of 
 
 -■^ 
 
 PERIOD VI.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 211 
 
 the republic of Geneva : think of her defenceless position in the very 
 jaws of France ; but think also of her undisturbed security, of her pro- 
 found quiet, of the brilliant success with which she applied to industry 
 and literature, while Louis XIV. was pouring his myriads into Italy 
 before her gates ; call to mind, if ages crowded into years have not 
 effaced them from your memory, that happy period when we scarcely 
 dreamt more of the subjugation of the feeblest republic of Europe, than 
 of the conquests of her mightiest empire, and tell me if you can imagine 
 a spectacle more beautiftd to the moral eye, or a more striking proof of 
 progress in the noblest principles of true civilization. These feeble 
 states, these monuments of the justice of Europe, the asylum of peace, 
 of industry, and of literature, the organs of public reason, 'the refuge of 
 oppressed innocence and persecuted truth, have perished with those 
 ancient principles which were their sole guardians and protectors. They 
 have been swallowed up by that fearful convulsion which has shaken the 
 utmost corners of the earth. They are destroyed and gone for ever. 
 
 * That revolution has spared many monarchies, 
 
 but it has spared no republic within the sphere of its destructive energy." 
 
 At the time of the first outbreak of the French revolution, the Swiss 
 confederation collectively, and the cantons individually, were bound to 
 the old French monarchy by long existing ties; most of them had 
 entered into treaties, called as we have alieady said '* capitulations," 
 by which they furnished a certain number of regiments to the French 
 service. The revolutionary clubs in France endeavoured to make pro- 
 selytes among the Swiss soldiers, and in one instance they succeeded. 
 In 1790, a part of the Swiss regiment of Chateauvieux, in garrison at 
 Nancy, mutinied, the soldiers jjlundered the regimental chest and killed 
 some of their officers. The tumult was soon quelled, and the leaders of 
 the mutineers were tried by a court martial of their own officers, ac- 
 cording to the disciplinary laws of the Swiss regiments. Several of the 
 culprits were condemned to death, whilst others, who had shared in the 
 plunder of the military chest, were, to the number of forty-one, condemned 
 to the gallics. They were given up to the French police and conducted 
 to Breit. But in the following year, upon a motion of Collot d'Herbois, 
 supported by the club of the Jacobins, they were ordered to be released, 
 were led in triumph to Paris, introduced into the hall of the legislative 
 assembly as the victims of tyranny, and were declared by that body to 
 have well deserved of the country. Rewards were given to them. 
 
 Early in 1792 the Bernese regiment of Ernst, in garrison at Aix, after 
 having sworn to the new constitution of France, was suddenly at- 
 tacked in its barracks by a numerous band of Marsedlais, who were on 
 their way to Paris, where they afterwards figured on the memorable ' 
 10th of August, and 2d and 3d of Septeml)er of that year. The Mar- 
 seillais wanted the arms of the Swiss, which were in fact Swiss property. 
 
218 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period VI* 
 
 ( 
 
 ll 
 
 The colonel of the regiment kept his men in the harracks, waiting for 
 the orders of the French commandant of the town. The commandant, 
 Puget Barbantane, who had been lately raised to his station on account 
 of his violent politics, advised the colonel to give up the arms. The 
 colonel, to prevent a useless massacre, marched out his men, leaving 
 their arms behind them in the barracks. Bern recalled the regiment 
 home, and demanded the arms which belonged to it, but the demand, 
 although supported by the king when presented to the legislative as- 
 sembly, was contemptuously disregarded. 
 
 The regiment Steiner of Zurich, in garrison at Lyons, received orders 
 to march to the south by separate battalions, but the lieutenant-colonel 
 and the captains resisted the measure as contrary to their capitulations. 
 The government of Zurich approved of their conduct, and wrote to the 
 king at the same time as Bern, complaining of the infraction of solemn 
 treaties, and of the insults to which their countrymen were exposed while 
 they Mere honourably fulfilling their duties. These remonstrances 
 afflicted the king, but produced no other effect. M. Barthelemy was 
 soon after sent to Switzerland as minister of France ; he was a man 
 of honourable character and of conciliatory temper ; and he had the 
 difficult task of smoothing down the resentment of the Swiss, and pre- 
 venting an open rupture, which could only have added to the king's 
 perplexities. 
 
 At last the 10th of August, 1792, arrived. The massacre of the Swiss* 
 guards, uselessly sacrificed through the king's indecision, plunged into 
 mourning a thousand families in Switzerland. In the old times of 
 Sempach and Morat, one-tenth part of such atrocious injuries would 
 have roused a cry of defiance and revenge from every valley and every 
 nook between the Alps and the Jura; but it was not so now. The 
 larger and more aristocratic cantonal governments were afraid of break- 
 ing altogether with France, and of thus losing the pensions and emolu- 
 ments they derived from that power. They fancied the monarchy 
 would survive the storm. They were also afraid of their own country- 
 men, for at that time the rural population of the town cantons began to 
 show fresh symptoms of discontent at their exclusion from the legislature. 
 Many Swiss capitalists were holders of French stocks and of assignats, 
 and they of course deprecated a rupture. M. Barthelemy took advan- 
 tage of all these circumstances, and although he was ill received at first, 
 and was obliged to quit Soleure, the customary residence of the French 
 ambassadors, and to retire to the town of Baden, yet, by his insinuating 
 address, he contrived by degrees to conciliate the minds of the leading 
 men of the cantons, and to confirm them in a system of neutrality 
 during the war which had broken out between France on one side, and 
 Austria and Prussia on the other. The diet declared its neutrality in 
 May 1192. Louis XVI. contributed to this decision by his personal 
 
 PERIOD VI.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 219 
 
 and urgent communications to M. Bartht^lcmy, and through him to the 
 men of greatest influence in the cantons. The king wished to keep the 
 bwiss neutral, in order that France should not be open to an attack on 
 that side, the most exposed of its frontiers ; for Louis XVI. was sincere 
 Jn wishing to spare his country the horrors of foreign invasion. 
 
 The court of Austria, which was then the principal power at war with 
 J^ ranee, did not reply to the communication of the diet relative to the 
 neutrality of Switzerland until four months after it was made ; then 
 however, the emperor stated that "he conceived this resolution of the 
 ^^wiss to be adapted to the present circumstances, as the Swiss mi^ht 
 expect thereby to remain safe from the irruption of a superior enemy » 
 ihe en^peror, however, invited the Swiss, now that new and unforeseen 
 events had occurred, alluding to the massacre of the guards, &c., to con- 
 sider whether they should persevere in their first resolution; should 
 hey do so however, his imperial majesty declared - that he acknow- 
 ledged and would scrupulously respect their neutrality." This note was 
 dated from Vienna, 29th of August, 1792. No invitation to the Swiss 
 to join the coalition, no ofler of assistance or of subsidy was made. The 
 Swiss, therefore, had every reason of prudence and policv for perse- 
 vering in their neutrality. ^ ' ^ 
 
 The French convention, which had succeeded to the legislative assembly 
 in September, 1792, was then swayed by the party called Des Girondins, 
 who proclaimed the republic. Brissot, one of the leading members o 
 this, party, carried a motion to dismiss all the Swiss re^ments in the 
 French service, without previously consulting the respective cantons, or 
 even informing them of this decision, without granting to the officers the 
 pensions to which they were entitled by treaty, or paying the soldiers up 
 to he time of their capitulation, nay, without even paying the arrears 
 
 n 000 r; .. '^T"^ '^''" '"^ ''^^'^^ ^'^'^y -'^^ -finally 
 1^,000 but the preceding massacre and mutinies had reduced their 
 
 number) were thus at once thrown out of the profession they had en. 
 gaged in, on the guarantee of solemn stipulations. 
 
 At the same time the frontiers of Switzerland were threatened by 
 of he bisho"'; T. 1 'T ''''''''''-''' ^^d broken OMt in the territory 
 
 the people. The bishop, who was a prince of the German empire as 
 well as an ally of Switzerland, applied first to the cantons ; but o'the 
 declining to interfere, he appealed to the emperor, whos troops came 
 and occupied the country. In the following year, war having begun 
 beuveen Austria and France, the French in their turn occuJiedThe 
 bishopric of Basle, and drove the Austrian garrison away. The French 
 were thus masters of the passes of the Jura, and stood onihe very borders 
 
 several of the cantons; his territory was included in the neutrality of 
 
 s\ 
 
220 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period VI. 
 
 PERIOD VI.] 
 
 »■ < 
 
 I : 
 
 Switzerland, and was under the protection of the confederation ; yet the 
 diet made no remonstrances on this account. The bishopric of Basle 
 was turned into a republic, with the classical name of Rauracia ; but 
 this little republic, after an existence of three months, became merged 
 into the great French republic in March, 1793. From that time until 
 1814 it constituted a department of France, call'ed the department of 
 Mont Terrible. 
 
 The republic of Geneva, placed on another extremity of Switzerland, 
 was at the same time threatened by the French army under General 
 Montesquiou, which had entered Savoy, war having broken out in 
 September, 1792, between France and the king of Sardinia. The 
 French executive, at the instigation of Claviere, the minister of finances, 
 himself a native of Geneva, who had fled his country in consequence of 
 the political troubles of 1782, ordered General Montesquiou to enter 
 Geneva either by force or by stratagem, to proclaim the rights of man, to 
 seize the arsenal, and " send the 20,000 good muskets it contained to 
 France, where they were much wanted." Such were the words of 
 Servan, minister at war of the convention, in his dispatch to General 
 Montesquiou, 3d October, 1792, a dispatch quoted in the general's cor- 
 respondence, which was afterwards published. Geneva was at peace 
 with France, and had given no offence to that country. Bern and 
 Zurich, the old allies of Geneva, being informed of the threatened inva- 
 sion of Geneva by the French, sent a body of 1,500 men, with orders to 
 defend it to the last. Soon after Bern marched a corps of 10,000 men 
 under General de Muralt to the frontier towards Geneva. The Bernese 
 general signified to Montesquiou his determination to protect Geneva ; 
 and the French general, himself a man of moderation and of honourable 
 principles, concluded a convention, by which the neutrality of Geneva 
 was acknowledged. The Swiss troops then left the town. This con- 
 vention, however, was not approved of by the French republican govern- 
 ment; and General Montesquiou was superseded, and obliged to save 
 himself from the guillotine by flight. It was on this occasion that 
 Brissot made his memorable report of the 23d November to the National 
 Convention, in wihich he declared that "Geneva shall obtain from us no 
 treaty unless she adopts our principles. You will decide whether a 
 free nation should be bound by treaties made with governments that do 
 not hold their powers from the people. This is, perhaps, the great 
 secret of our revolution, and of the other revolutions which are now in 
 course of preparation." Three days before, the convention had, on the 
 motion of Lareveillere Lepaux, proclaimed to the world that it offered its 
 fraternity and its assistance to all people who wished to recover their 
 liberty; and on the 31st October preceding the Deputy Gregoire had 
 carried a motion to demand of the canton of Soleure the liberation of 
 three officers who had been arrested for sedition, adding that the French 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 221 
 
 republic would consider a refusal on the part of the Soleure government 
 
 Ter Lut bn T.f ''' T'"' " ^" ^°"^^"^P^ ^^ ^^ P-^p'-, and all 
 riZ of't »'''i ' P"'"^ '^^"' ^^^"^^ - offence uglinst the 
 tie Girond . I /' 'T"' '"" ^^"^^^1 Dumouriez' Memoirs, that 
 
 Zs after Tl' "p ' ^T?'' ""'' "^' ^^^"^^^ ^^'^ '«^^' ^^ --« 
 gZ^ ^^^ \^T^ ^'^ ''^'' ^"^^"^^^ "^^-^r home. The 
 
 he ti ^"^^^V" P"'"'- i^^b^^Pi^'-re even affected a marked regard fo; 
 o hfs f"^ -f /^e a--ed Colonel Weiss, one of the senators of Bern, 
 
 to ilv! T'f ' .TT'' ''^^'^'^^ '^''^' I- ^^^^' Robespierre seems 
 to have abandoned the plan of revolutionary proselytism adopted by his 
 
 Another reason may have contributed to the moderation shown by the 
 
 wStr:"""!?""'^ ^'^ '^^^^- ^y^- -^ ^^--"es were in 
 md th S '^ ^ T''''''''' ' '^^"^^^ ^'^^ ^-"P-d by the allies. 
 
 Had the Swiss marched 20,000 men to the assistance of Lyons, while 
 
 Savov Ir" 'T': ""' ^'^^"^^"^ ^" ^^^ --^ d--t-n through 
 
 fhroJ: i ^ "''^' ^T' '""^'^ '''' '''^'^ ^^^'^ «--^d Lvons, and over- 
 
 h own the power of Robespierre in September, 1793.' And it seems 
 
 Ind Sar7 '^"TI' '? '''^ '''''' "^^^ ^^'^ '' ^he cantons by Austria 
 and sardmia which, however, led to no result. All the measures of 
 
 DuHnV't. fi "T^"' ^""' ""^ ill-combined or ill-fated. 
 
 French rPn„Ki;„ ., ""L^- /' ^feneva the diplomatic agent of the 
 
 bl had ro™;nt "The f ^^^^^^ "Ti' '"'"'""^'^ ''="^'"'' *^^ ^^'- 
 political XhKf Jl ^'^""' "^ *^ *"""' *"'^"'S "'^'''"'^d the 
 
 old Slief of tl; ". "' '"' '■°™^^'y ''^"> «' ^^"--^^ -ith the 
 
 u tamihes of the citizens, were now united with the latter against any 
 
 MesKoT. ^"' ,T''" "'''''' •'^"^"^ ^''^ -'"'b>tants. whose 
 thZ Lrtw .r" f"'^ '' ^*°^™ ^"^ *« period required to give 
 Irlndinf ' ,, '^^"'"P' ''''' dissatisfied, and the peasa^of^.he 
 
 clZ a tri 1 r* "'". '"""""^'^ ^""^J^^* '» '>^« town begTalso to 
 clmm a part cipa ,on in the political power. Soulavie, by preaching to 
 them the principles of the rights of man, fanned the flame.' Soon aft" 
 
 tll^r T "^ Y ^''' «^"^^''' *«= malcontents seized on the 
 ar ena , and conyoked a general assembly of the people, which they 
 obhged all the burghers to attend. They easily carried ^ motTon for 
 deposing the great and the little councils, whih were repTac d by a 
 
 par!y to de^r H f^ ^°"'"'''' ^""'''"^ ^«« '" '"d"<=e the popular 
 
 party to demand the incorporation of Geneva with France ; but in thl 
 
 ik 
 
/ 
 
 ^'2-2 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND, 
 
 [period VI. 
 
 PERIOD VI. J 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND, 
 
 223 
 
 i 
 
 he was disappointed. The question being proposed, the popular govern, 
 ment rejected it as decidedly as the citizens, or aristocrats, as they were 
 called, had done before. The government of Robespierre, not wishing 
 to come to open hostilities with the Swiss, Soulavie contented himself 
 with excitine: discontent among the more violent of the lower classes, 
 who, at Geneva as in France at the same epoch, controlled the adminis- 
 tration and the laws. All trade being at an end, the mechanics and 
 small traders, who constitute a great proportion of the population of 
 Geneva, were deprived of the means of subsistence, while at the same 
 time they were told that they were equal to their wealthier countrymen. 
 The next step was to carry this equality into practice. One summer 
 evening, July, 1794, a party of revolutionists seized on the gates, the 
 fortifications, and the artillery, turned the cannon against the town, and 
 then arrested several hundred citizens among the principal families, 
 magistrates, merchants, men of science, many of whom had never inter- 
 fered in political disputes ; some were murdered either publicly or in 
 prison, and a tribunal was formed to try the rest. Forty were con- 
 demned to death as aristocrats, 100 more were exiled, and their pro- 
 perty confiscated; the rest were condemned to imprisonment and other 
 penalties. Of those condemned to death, some had escaped, several more 
 were reprieved by the general assembly ; but a band of infuriated wretches 
 stormed the prison, and led the victims to the place of execution, where 
 they were shot. The revolutionary tribunal, which was not composed 
 wholly of men of the lower classes, passed its sentences under the fe-ir 
 of the same mob. Heavy contributions were imposed on all who were 
 possessed of property ; and as most of these could not pass for patriots, 
 according to the meaning of the word at the time, they were divided into 
 two classes, the indiffei'entists, or apathists, who were taxed twice as 
 much as the democrats, and the aristocrats, who were made to pay a 
 treble amount. 
 
 This system of terror, which lasted more than a year, fell after the 
 overthrow of the terrorist government of France, to .which it owed its 
 origin, and which it copied on a diminutive scale, but in a spirit of equal 
 atrocity. Some of the actors in those transactions were still living at 
 Genevrflk few years since. In 1795, all parties being tired of anarchy and 
 violence, an approximation took place; the constitution of 1782 was re- 
 established, and the enjoyment of political rights was extended to all the 
 inhabitants born in the canton. The exiles were recalled, and peace seemed 
 once more re-established at Geneva; but it was not to be permanent. 
 
 Meantime disturbances of a different character, and derived from 
 more plausible grievances, broke out in other parts of Switzerland. The 
 inhabitants of Stncfa and other villages on the banks of the lake of Zurich 
 demanded in 1794 a participation in the rights enjoyed by the citizens, 
 and particularly the freedom of industry and of trade. It has been 
 mentioned already that the rural population of Zurich, Basle, and some 
 
 other town cantons, had no share in the employments and offices of the 
 state ; that they could not carry on any trade on their own account; 
 that the cloth they wove they were obliged to sell to the town merchant 
 from whom they received the raw cotton for its manufacture ; that, in 
 short, their commerce was restricted to the sale of their corn, wine, and 
 other agricultural produce, all other branches of industry being monopo- 
 hzed by the freemen of the city. The petition from St^fa was sent 
 round the other villages for signatures. The government of Zurich 
 having learnt this, arrested several of the promoters of the petition, some 
 ot whom were banished, and others condemned to fines and other penal- 
 ties, in January, 1795. Several elders of the commune of Stsfa made 
 researches in their municipal archives, and discovered an old convention, 
 dated 1489, between the town and the rural communes, and several 
 subsequent documents, by which freedom of trade and industry was 
 guaranteed to the latter. The people of St^fa and the other villages 
 sent a deputation to inquire whether and when such acts had been 
 annulled. The government in answer sent a body of troops with 
 cannon, who surrounded St^fa, and forced the inhabitants publicly to 
 renounce by oath whatever title or claim they might have had to the 
 ?« mn^? mentioned. Sta^fa was condemned to pay a fine of 
 
 78 000 florins, and several of the principal persons in the place, among 
 others a magistrate of the name of Bodmer, were condemned to perpetual 
 imprisonment. This scene of injustice occurred in July, 1795. 
 
 In the old territory, alte landschaft, subject to the abbot of St. Gall, 
 one of the allies of the cantons, the communes assembled and formed 
 a committee who drew out a list of grievances, which they presented to 
 he abbo in March, 1795. The principal complaints were, that fresh 
 taxes had been levied by the abbey upon the country people, while the 
 ecclesiastics and public functionaries were exempt from all charges: 
 that feudal personal services were still enforced; and that the people 
 were deprived of all municipal rights. The abbot, named Beda, was 
 mmself the son of a peasant, and was therefore well acquainted with the 
 truth of these complaints. He listened favourably to the petition, but 
 his authority was limited by that of the assembly of the monks, where 
 he found the majority opposed to all concession. He, however, insisted 
 upon reforming the abuses, and actually signed, in 1795, a charter by 
 which he gave to his subjects the right of electing their magistrates and 
 the members o the landrath or executive council, and of buying off the 
 feudal dues and other charges ; he abolished the corve'es (o^ service on 
 he roads), and ordered that all classes, ecclesiastics as well as laymen, 
 should pay their share of the taxes. The people were rejoiced, and the 
 name of the abbot Beda became venerated all over the country 
 
 The government of the executive directory had now taken the reins of 
 affairs in France. That government is generally acknowledged to have 
 been as unpnnciph.d and dishonest in its foreign relations as it ^as vuc Ua 
 
224 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period VI. 
 
 PERIOD VI.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 225 
 
 1/ 
 
 ting in its internal policy, and it was indebted for a few years* existence 
 only to the general dread of the return of the rule of the terrorists, who 
 had preceded it, and to the splendid successes of Bonaparte, who 
 finally overthrew it. The directory, which on its first appointment 
 numbered among its members two men of honourable principles, Carnot 
 and Barthelemy, the latter of whom had been recalled from his Swiss 
 embassy, appeared for a time disposed to respect the neutrality of the 
 confederation. The minister of Switzerland had a public audience at 
 the Luxembourg, and the Swiss flag was placed in the hall of the con- 
 vention by the side of that of the United States. But the governments 
 of the cantons w^ere continually annoyed by peremptory notes from Paris, 
 now requiring them to drive out of their territory the French emigrants, 
 now demanding the expulsion of the clergjy of Savoy, who had been 
 obliged to take refuge among the Swiss Protestants, and had received 
 hospitality at their hands; sometimes complaining of false assignats 
 being circulated in Switzerland, at o'lier times denouncing the ministers 
 of the allied powers in Switzerland as intriguing against the French 
 republic. The Swiss governments showed themselves docile almost to 
 servility to these and other overbearing messages from the directory. 
 They had, in fact, placed their only hope in a passive neutrality, and 
 that neutrality proved in the end their ruin. When in 1796 general 
 Moreau made his well-known retreat through Suabia, the left of his army, 
 pursued by the Austrians, threw itself on Swiss ground for refuge, they 
 laid down their arms on the frontiers, but they were kindly supplied 
 with all necessaries, and safely escorted, they and their baggage, and 
 even the plunder which they had gathered in Germany, through the 
 territority of Switzerland to the frontiers of France. 
 
 The events of the 18th Fructidor, 4th September, 1797, in which the 
 executive directory by an act of tyrannical violence triumphed over the 
 more moderate portion of the French legislative councils, and arrested 
 and transported to Guiana between fifty and sixty deputies, including 
 the ex-director Barthelemy (Carnot found means to escape), had a fatal 
 influence on the destinies of Switzerland. The Swiss lost the support 
 of those men who had always deprecated the attempt to carry war and 
 devastation among a people whom they esteemed, and who had given to 
 France no ground of complaint. The new directory, now all powerful 
 in France, began to assume a hostile tone towards the Swiss confedera- 
 tion. It evidently sought for a pretence to come to an open rupture. 
 The objects of the directory in attacking Switzerland were various. One 
 was the notion then prevailing among military men that the possession 
 of the mountains by one of two belligerent powers ensured the success 
 of its armies in the plains. This may be true of the plains or valleys 
 immediately at the foot of a mountain, but in an extended warfare on a 
 hne of some hundreds of miles, the possession of a mountainous country 
 like Switzerland placed in the centre of that line has no great influence 
 
 ; 
 
 on the operations carried on by the left or right wings on the Rhine, the 
 Po, or the Danube, and this appeared manifest in 1799, for while the 
 French and Austrians were disputing inch by inch the mountains and 
 high valleys of Switzerland, the real decisive actions of the campaign 
 took place in Lombardy and in Suabia, and while the French were in pos- 
 session of Zurich and Luzern, they lost all Italy, and were driven beyond 
 the Rhine, the possession of Switzerland serving only uselessly to 
 extend a line of warfare already enormously long, and to sacrifice thou- 
 sands of men on both sides by small parties in a series of desultory and 
 hard-contested mountain engagements, in which no great strategic 
 operations could be executed. But another and more immediate pur- 
 pose of the French directory in 1798 was to ransack the treasuries of Bern, 
 Zurich, Basle, and other wealthy towns of Switzerland, where it was 
 known that considerable sums of money had been accumulated through 
 the provident economy of the cantonal governments. The advantage, 
 too, of spreading their political system over a neighbouring country 
 which could supply their armies with hardy recruits, was not without its 
 weight in the speculations of the French directory ; and the outcry of 
 many Swiss emigrants encouraged them in their plan; although it must 
 be observed that the discontent in Switzerland was, in fact, confined to 
 a few districts, and was by no means general throughout the country. 
 The ostensible pretence was, as usual in those times, to give to the Swiss 
 people liberty and equality, and to put down the aristocracies which, 
 under various shapes, had possession of several of the cantonal govern- 
 ments. The Pays de Vaud, a country subject to Bern, but bordering on 
 France, and where French is the language of the people, afforded the 
 directory a favourable opportunity for interfering. 
 
 When Bern, in the first part of the sixteenth century, conquered the 
 Pays de Vaud from the dukes of Savoy, that district had a representative 
 body, called the states, consisting of the nobility, the higher clergy, and 
 the chief magistrates of the towns, which states were convoked by the 
 dukes to give their assent to any new laws, and more particularly to any 
 subsidy or tax proposed by the sovereign. States of a similar descrip- 
 tion existed in Savoy and Piedmont, as well as in Naples and other 
 feudal monarchies of the middle ages; but they were by degrees discon- 
 tinucd in the course of the sixteenth century. Duke Emmanuel Phili- 
 bert of Savoy, on returning to his dominions, which had been occupied 
 by the French for nearly a quarter of a century, when the peace of 
 Chateau Cambresis restored them, in 1559, to the house of Savoy, super- 
 seded altogether the assembly of the states, both in Savoy and in Pied- 
 mont, by establishing fixed taxes or tailles instead of the temporary ones 
 formerly granted by those bodies. He created a council, to be consulted at 
 his pleasure, and he transferred the archives of the states to the chambre 
 des comptes, or general board of accounts. At that.time the Pays de 
 Vaud had been for many years under the dominion of Bern, and in 
 
 Q 
 
226 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period VI. 
 
 1564 Emmanuel Philibert finally ceded it to that canton for ever, with 
 the general condition that the rights and privileges of the country should 
 be maintained. This treaty was guaranteed by Charles IX., king of 
 France. Whether Emmanuel Philibert meant to stipulate for the main- 
 tenance in Vaud of the assembly of the states which he had himself 
 abolished in his own dominions, may be a matter of doubt ; indeed the 
 whole question of these states and of their attributes is involved in con- 
 siderable obscurity, and has been the subject of much literary contro- 
 versy between MM. Laharpe, De Mulinen, Monod, Jean Cart, and 
 lately count Dalpozzo, and other publicists. One thing is certain, that 
 such assemblies, composed of the three estates, nobles, clergy, and the 
 towns, had once existed in Vaud under the counts and dukes of Savoy, 
 but they were very unlike our modern popular representative assemblies, 
 being entirely under the influence of the two privileged orders, and they 
 never met or attempted to meet after the conquest of the country by 
 Bern. On the other hand, it is true that Bern did not impose fresh 
 taxes on the country, the consideration of which seems to have been the 
 principal function of the states. De Mulinen also observes that the 
 elements of which those assemblies were once formed existed no longer 
 in Vaud, as the nobility did not retain any feudal authority or influence, 
 and the upper clergy had disappeared with the reformation ; and there- 
 fore the states now demanded by Laharpe and others must be in their 
 nature totally different from the old ones, which could not be appealed 
 to as precedents. This was said by Mulinen in answer to the Essai sur 
 la Constitution du Pays de Vaud, which Laharpe wrote while he was 
 at Petersburg as preceptor of the grand dukes Alexander and Con- 
 stantine. Some years afterwards Laharpe came to Geneva, and pub- 
 lished another work, inviting his countrymen of Vaud to demand the 
 convocation of the states; and exhorting them, in case Bern should 
 refuse, to claim the guarantee of France, that power having been a party 
 to the treaty of Lausanne of 1564. Such was the ostensible origin of 
 the revolt of th^Pays de Vaud against Bern, and of the French inter- 
 ference, which led to the destruction of the old Helvetic confederation. 
 
 Some partial disturbances had occurred in the Pays de Vaud in the 
 first years of the French revolution ; but they were confined to small 
 parties of young men from some of the towns, who, having assembled to 
 celebrate the events of Paris, and being elated with wine, publicly broke 
 forth into seditious expressions against the magistrates of Bern. A 
 court was instituted to try the leaders ; five or six were condemned to a 
 short imprisonment, a few more to banishment for a limited period, and 
 one only, by name Laharpe, a cousin of the author, was capitally con- 
 victed in default of appearance (par contumace), as he had run away. 
 The great mass of the people of Vaud took no part in these transactions; 
 the representations of several communes about certain duties and fees 
 were amicably arranged ; and the country showed no symptoms of dis- 
 
 PERIOD VI.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 227 
 
 affection till the end of 1797. On the 17th December of that year, the 
 French directory demanded of its own minister for foreign affairs " a 
 report on a certain petition from several inhabitants of the Pays de 
 Vaud, claiming the guarantee of France for the recovery of their rights 
 in conformity to ancient treaties." This petition was presented by 
 Laharpe and other emigrants from Vaud, then living at Paris. The 
 report of the minister Talleyrand being presented accordingly, the direc- 
 tory resolved, on the 28th of December, " that a declaration be made to 
 the governments of Bern and Freyburg, signifying to them that the 
 members of those governments shall be personally answerable for the 
 safety of the persons and property of those inhabitants of the Pays de 
 Vaud who had petitioned, or might yet petition, the French republic, 
 claiming its mediation for the maintenance or recovery of their rights in 
 virtue of ancient treaties." The directory thus threw off the mask. 
 Having concluded peace with Austria at Campoformio, it had now full 
 leisure to prosecute its designs upon Switzerland. At the same time, 
 while a body of French troops under General Menard approached the 
 frontiers of the Pays de Vaud, another corps of 8,000 men suddenly 
 took possession, in November, 1797, of the districts of Erguel, the 
 Munsterthal, and the towns of Bienne and Neuveville, on the north- 
 western frontier of the canton of Bern. These districts made part of the 
 Helvetic confederation; although nominally under the high dominion 
 of the bishop of Basle, they were allies and co-burghers of Bern, and of 
 the other Protestant cantons, who guaranteed their rights and immuni- 
 ties. This was so well known, that the French themselves, in their 
 invasion of the bishopric of Basle in 1792, scrupulously abstained from 
 touching the Erguel, and the other districts similarly situated. But the 
 directory was determined no longer to show regard to neutral rights. 
 It was only after the districts had been seized by the French troops that 
 the French chargt* d'affaires, Bacher, notified to the Helvetic confedera- 
 tion the occupation of them, adding, moreover, that the French republic 
 " intended to demand indemnities for the obstacles which the Swiss 
 government had hitherto opposed to its occupation of those districts." 
 The French were now within one day's march of Bern, and commanded 
 from their positions the whole lowlands of that canton. 
 
 About the same time, a citizen Mengaud, who styled himself commis- 
 sary of the directory, came to Bern without any diplomatic character, 
 but as the bearer of a letter addressed to the avoyer, requesting the 
 government of Bern to order the English minister, Mr. Wickham, to 
 quit its territory. Bern answered that this was a measure which con- 
 cerned the Whole Helvetic body ; upon which Mengaud proceeded to 
 Zurich, where the chancery of the confederation was, and he there re- 
 peated the demand of the directory in the same unceremonious manner. 
 Mr. Wickham, however, foreseeing this event, and wishing to spare the 
 confederation the embarrassment resulting from his presence, had 
 
 q2 
 
228 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period VI. 
 
 already left Switzerland and retired to Frankfort, writing at the same 
 time to the English cabinet, stating the nature of the case. The English 
 ministry approved of his retirement, and charged him to state to the 
 confederation that the withdrawal of the British legation proceeded 
 merely from the anxious wish of the king to avoid giving the directory 
 any pretence for annoying Switzerland, and disturbing the tranquillity 
 of that happy country. Mr. Wickham communicated this message in a 
 dignified and at the same time a very friendly note, dated Frankfort, 
 22d November, 1797, which he addressed to the avoyer and little council 
 of Bern. 
 
 Another note of the directory, dated 25th November, demanded of 
 the confederation the expulsion of all the emigrants, priests, and others 
 who had taken refuge in Switzerland, and the delivery into its hands of 
 the members of the French legislative councils, and other individuals, 
 condemned to transportation after the affair of the 18th Fructidor. The 
 confederation evaded this last request by a counter-demand that the 
 directory should dehver the Swiss conspirators who had taken refuge in 
 France. But the magistrates of Basle had the weakness to give up 
 Richer Serisy, one of the proscribed deputies, and all his papers, after, 
 however, having warned him to quit the town, a warning which he 
 neglected. 
 
 Another demand of the directory was, that all the Swiss officers who 
 had served in France, and had received decorations from the monarchy, 
 should lay them aside. For the sake of peace, the Swiss governments 
 consented to this. Their humiliation, however, did not save them from 
 ultimate ruin. 
 
 General Bonaparte, under the pretext of some remonstrances and 
 complaints on the part of the inhabitants against their rulers, had seized, 
 in 1797, upon the bailiwicks of Valtelina, Chiavenna, and Bormio, 
 which had been for centuries dependent on the Orisons, and had incor- 
 porated them with the Cisalpine republic. At the same time all the 
 property, houses, and lands, belonging to citizens of the Orisons which 
 were situated in those districts, were confiscated, to the amount of some 
 millions of florins, and many families were thus ruined. After the 
 treaty of Campoformio Bonaparte left Italy, and took his road through 
 Switzerland to return to Paris in November. He passed thi;ough 
 Geneva, Lausanne, and Bern, affecting a forbidding and supercilious 
 demeanour towards the Bernese authorities, who had shown him 
 the attention of preparing relays of horses, and had sent a deputation to 
 greet him, and to invite him to a banquet. He rejected all their civili- 
 ties, and even neglected to return the visit of ceremony which the avoyer 
 paid him on his passage through Bern. It was only on his arrival at 
 Basle that he exclaimed that he found himself again in a free country. 
 
 Basle was the part of Switzerland where revolutionary ideas had 
 made most progress. Several leading members of the legislative council, 
 
 PERIOD VI.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 229 
 
 among others Ochs, openly proclaimed the necessity of a total change 
 of government, not only at Basle, but over all Switzerland. Their idea 
 was to merge, by fair means or foul, the whole of the cantons, allies and 
 subjects, into one democratic representative republic, after the model of 
 France. They formed a club of " friends of liberty," and they were 
 encouraged by Mengaud, who had now assumed the title of minis- 
 ter of the French republic. Ochs wrote a letter to the executive of 
 Basle on the 1st 'of January, 1798, in which, after styling them as usual 
 " most honourable and gracious lords," he told them that this was, 
 perhaps, the last time in which their excellencies would hear themselves 
 addressed in this antiquated formulary, as he considered that a revolu- 
 tion was unavoidable, that all distinctions should be abolished, and that 
 primary assemblies of the people should be formed to choose representa- 
 tives in order to frame a new constitution ; that meantime the old func- 
 tionaries should at once resign their offices, and that a provisional com- 
 mission should be formed to carry on the government. So far as this 
 concerned Basle, the people of that canton had, no doubt, a right to 
 settle their own internal affairs according to the wish of the majority ; 
 but Ochs proceeded to say that all the cantons must be formed into one 
 democratic representative republic, — a plan which was certainly not the 
 wish of either the majority of the cantons, or of the majority of the 
 people in any one canton, as was abundantly proved by subsequent 
 events. Ochs was an enthusiast, and it would appear a sincere one ; 
 he had sustained heavy losses in the French funds ; he had lost his 
 relative, Dietrich, the burgomaster of Strasburg, who perished on the 
 revolutionary scaffold ; and yet he laboured to bring similar misfortunes 
 upon his own country. The peasants of Basle, who were excluded from 
 all political rights, and shackled by the commercial monopoly of the 
 burghers, were easily induced to demand an equality which had been 
 too long denied them ; they broke into open insurrection, drove away 
 the landvogt or bailiffs, and set fixe to their castles. Two or three 
 members of the council of the town, who were themselves of the popu- 
 lar party, were sent to meet the peasants, whom they assisted in draw- 
 ing out three fundamental articles. 1. The admission of the principle 
 of equality and of a representative government. 2. Political and civil 
 equality between townsmen and peasants. 3. The convocation of a 
 national assembly. This declaration of rights was called Magna Charta. 
 A numerous band of peasants carried this declaration into the city on 
 the 20th January, 1798; and the magistrates, overawed by this display 
 of physical force, recalled their deputies from the federal diet, then 
 sitting at Aarau, and on the 5th February resigned their authority into 
 the hands of a commission of sixty persons, selected from all classes. 
 This was the first breaking up of the old Helvetic confederation. It 
 ou£rht to be observed that previous to this event, French trooi>s had 
 spread all around the canton, who, in concert with Mengaud, who re- 
 
23a 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period VI, 
 
 PERIOD VI.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 231 
 
 sided at Basle, openly countenanced the revolution. Under pretence 
 that the French republic had succeeded to all the rights of the bishop, 
 they introduced guards into the city in order to sequestrate the episcopal 
 palace, which still remained in the bishop's possession. 
 
 Meantime a general diet of the confederation had assembled at Aarau, 
 to consult on the crisis with which the country was threatened. On 
 the 25th of January the deputies renewed their federal oaths. The 
 president, burgomaster Wyss, of Zurich, called on them " to follow the 
 example of the three heroes of Schwyz, Uri, and Unterwalden, who 
 were the first to call God to witness their determination to secure the 
 liberties of their countrymen. He reminded them that this determina- 
 tion was crowned with success, and had secured to their descendants the 
 blessings which they still enjoyed." Then every deputy swore in the 
 name of his canton, " to observe and maintain their reciprocal alliances, 
 and mutually to defend and protect their respective constitutions." But 
 this solemn ceremony proved only an empty pageant ; Basle, already 
 revokitionized, refused to concur in it, and the deputies of that canton 
 were hastily summoned away by its government. Soon afterwards the 
 diet separated without coming to any resolution. Mengaud, escorted by 
 some French hussars, had been repeatedly at Aarau, vexing the diet 
 with notes, spreading revolutionary pamphlets among the people and 
 the militia, and attending the democratic clubs which he had assisted in 
 organizing. Some of his emissaries having been arrested in the act of 
 exciting the people to sedition, Mengaud had written, on the 2d January, 
 a note to Bern, demanding their release, " as they were friends of the 
 French republic." Bern answered that the accused had not been 
 arrested for mere opinions, but for overt acts of sedition ; and that tlic 
 government of an independent state was only accountable for its con- 
 duct to its own laws and constitutions, and to God above all. On the 
 6th January Mengaud wrote again on the subject, declaring that all the 
 members of the government of Bern should be made *' personally re- 
 sponsible to the French directory for the safety of the individuals 
 arrested, who were the particular objects of the directory's good will." 
 He next asked for explanations concerning the assembling of the 
 militia by the canton of Bern. 
 
 As soon as the diet had left Aarau, an insurrection broke out in that 
 town, which was subject to Bern ; the municipality proclaimed its inde- 
 pendence, and hoisted the tree of liberty ; the regiment of the Aarburg 
 militia, near Aarau, revolted against its officers, and formed a revolu- 
 tionary committee ; the officers of the regiment of Zoffingen refused to 
 serve, and were cashiered ; a battalion of Lenzburg refused to march 
 upon Aarau ; and the revolt spread over other parts of the Aargau. A 
 sudden impulse of vigour prevailed in the councils of Bern ; troops were 
 marched upon Aarau in spite of Mengaud's threats ; the miUtia re- 
 turned to their duty ; several of tlie mutineers were arrested, and the 
 
 others fled to Basle. The country people loudly testified their attach- 
 ment to the government. At the beginning of February, things had 
 assumed a more promising aspect for Switzerland Many deputies of 
 the cantons had repaired to Bern, where they formed a sort of federal 
 representation. The double contingent of the confederation, amounting 
 to 26,000 men, was ordered out, and the Swiss began to look to a war 
 with France without fear, and even with some confidence of success. 
 
 The insurrection, however, had triumphed in the Pays de Vaud by 
 means of the French arms. On the 24th January. 15,000 Frenchmen 
 from the army of Italy, under the command of General Menard, entered 
 the Pays de Vaud without any previous declaration of hostility, drove 
 away the Bernese authorities, and organized a provisional assembly at 
 Lausanne. Colonel Weiss, who, previously to this, had been sent from 
 Bern with full powers, lost his time in fruitless discussions with the 
 disaffected, who formed only a small minority of the people of Vaud, for 
 the great bulk of the inhabitants were evidently attached to the govern- 
 ment of Bern, and only petitioned for the abolition of certain feudal 
 charges, which dated from the time when the country was under the 
 dominion of the dukes of Savoy. Out of thirty battalions of miUtia, 
 which included almost all the men capable of bearing arms, twenty-four 
 had just taken their oath of allegiance to Bern without the least reserva- 
 tion, and the other six showed only a partial hesitation. The disaffected 
 in some of the towns never thought of calling hi the French ; one or 
 two petitions, scantily signed, certainly were sent to the French general, 
 without the concurrence of the remaining towns ; but what the value of 
 these documents was may be judged from the fact, that the petition 
 from Lausanne contained only 130 names, out of a population of about 
 10,000 inhabitants; that a pretended petition from Yverdun was im- 
 mediately disavowed by the people of that town ; and that all the other 
 petitions for redress of grievances were addressed to Bern itself. Never - 
 theless, Menard and the French directory proclaimed that they entered 
 Vaud in conformity withi;he unanimous wish of the population. 
 
 A fatal irresolution prevailed in the councils of Bern. The choice of 
 colonel Weiss decided the loss of the Pays de Vaud. Instead of dis- 
 solving the revolutionary committee of Lausanne, and showing a bold 
 front to the French on the frontiers, which he might well have done, as 
 he had 20,000 men under his command, he was busy writing a pam- 
 phlet, entitled, *' Reveillez-vous, Suisses, le danger approche,'' which he 
 fancied would put down disaffection without further ado. When at 
 last he perceived his mistake, he withdrew his forces to Yverdun, at the 
 northern extremity of Vaud, and thus left the whole country at the mercy 
 of the conspirators and their French auxiliaries. The great majority of 
 the people were taken by surprise, and a separation, which had never 
 entered into their views, 'took place at the bidding of a few individuals, 
 backed by French bayonets ; but when the separation had been once 
 
232 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period VI. 
 
 PERIOD VI.] 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 233 
 
 II 
 
 I 
 
 I 
 
 effected, and Bern itself had lost its independence, the people of Vaud 
 by degrees accommodated themselves to their new situation, a distinct 
 . national character was formed among them, and tliey would then no 
 longer listen to any proposals for a re-union with Bern. 
 
 Menard, after entermg the Pays de Vaud, sent an aide-de-camp 
 escorted by two hussars, to colonel Weiss at Yverdun, notifying to him 
 that he would consider any opposition to his advance as a declaration of 
 war. On their return the party passed in the night through the village 
 of Thierens, the mhabitants of which, being well affected to Bern, had 
 armed themselves, and had posted sentries to give the alarm. The sen- 
 tries challenged the French party, upon which the hussars fell upon 
 them with their sabres, and in retaliation were fired at, and one of them 
 was killed. This incident was immediately construed by Menard into " a 
 premeditated assault by the partisans of oligarchy, an assassination wliich 
 the great nation could never forgive, &c." * Bern immediately ordered 
 an investigation of the affair, and it was proved by numerous witnesses 
 to have been an accidental affray occasioned by the unjustifiable attack 
 of the French troopers. The directory made a highly-coloured report 
 to the legislative body, recommending a declaration of war against Bern • 
 and the unfortunate village of Thierens was set on fire by the French. 
 
 The councils of Bern persisted in their vain hope of propitiating the 
 French directory ; they sent explanations and made apologies, couched 
 even in humiliating terms. At the same time they thought of strength- 
 ening the bonds between them and the country people. The German 
 part of the old canton had not shown the least signs of discontent; the 
 people even felt indignant at the encroachments of the French' and 
 determined upon resistance. Twenty thousand of the militia 'were 
 assembled, and the number might easily have been doubled. On the 
 31st of January the sovereign council of Bern invited the communes to 
 elect a deputation of fifty-two members to take their seats in the 
 assembly. These deputies behaved in an admirable spirit. They 
 addressed to their constituents a declaration, dKted 5th February, full of 
 the most affecting candour and patriotism ; the v spoke of the improve- 
 ments which had been proposed in the council, of the necessity of pre- 
 ser^'iqg the sound parts of the constitution, of the happiness they had 
 till then enjoyed, of the duty of rallying, with one consent, round the 
 standard of the state whilst attacked or threatened from without, and of 
 their own determination to leave unsullied to their descendants the fair 
 name of their country. " We may cease to exist," thus ended this decla- 
 ration, "but our honour must be preserved to the last." For a moment 
 the idea was entertained in the council of establishing a temporary dicta- 
 torship untd the crisis of the foreign attack had passed ; public opinion 
 wasm favour of the measure, which would probably have saved Bern and 
 
 8 et 9 Pluviose (27 and 28 January, )798). 
 
 all Switzerland from the horrors of invasion, but the party of peace and 
 half measures prevailed in the council, and was joined by some of the 
 new deputies from the towns ; and although the wish to save the country 
 was universal, they could not agree about the means. Instead of pro- 
 viding in the first instance for repelling the invader, they appointed a 
 commission to draw the plan of a new constitution, upon the basis of 
 election by the people, and of the admissibility of all the inhabitants to 
 the offices and honours of the state. One year was allowed to the com- 
 mission for the completion of its work, but two months had not expired 
 before Bern had ceased to exist as an independent state. The council 
 of Bern hastened to inform the French directory of their resolution, and 
 they deputed four of their own body to notify it to Mengaud at 
 Basle, hoping to disarm his hostility by this approach to the principles of 
 the French republic. They were soon undeceived. Mengaud wrote, 
 on the 13th of February, an insulting reply, demanding " the immediate 
 abdication of the executive, and especially of the council of war, and the 
 creation of a provisional government, framed on a democratic basis, from 
 which all the members of the old government should be excluded. The 
 majesty of the French republic would not allow of any more vacillation 
 and delay, would not wait for the announced reforms, &c." This was 
 too much even for the temporizing councils of Bern. The party of 
 peace and humiliation lost their influence, and instructions were sent to 
 the deputies at Basle to communicate to Mengaud an unqualified refusal 
 of his demands. 
 
 Meantime the councils of several of the other town cantons follow^ed, 
 but with greater precipitation, the example of Bern, by changing their 
 constitutions. At Luzern and Soleure the mass of the country people 
 refused all participation in the government. At Soleure a body of pea- 
 saHts entered the town on the 16th of February, and demanded of the 
 council the arrest of the leaders of the revolutionary clubs, whom they 
 qualified as traitors, and, without waiting for an answer, seized about 
 thirty of them, and put them in prison. At Freyburg also parties ran 
 very high, but nothing decisive was effected : so little unanimity was 
 there in Switzerland in favour of democratic institutions. In fact, with 
 the exception of Basic and Zurich, it was the magistrates that revolted 
 against themselves by abdicating their powers under the influence of a 
 panic. In Zurich, however, the old spirit of resistance to the unjust 
 monopolies and privileges of the towns having showed itself at Stsefa 
 and in the other villages near the banks of the lake, the government 
 released those who had been arrested in 1795, and allowed the exiles to 
 return home. These formed committees, demanding the extension of 
 their rights. The government made some concessions, and at the same 
 time called out the militia for the defence of the country ; but the bor- 
 derers refused to send their contingent. -The great council then ordered 
 the election of 120 deputies from all classes of the people, to remodel 
 
234 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period VI. 
 
 : 
 
 the constitution. The old magistrates, however, were left by common 
 consent at the helm of the state as a provisional executive. In these 
 transactions the people of Zurich in general displayed much greater 
 moderation and soberness of judgment than those of Basle, although the 
 grounds of complaint were the same in both countries. But the French 
 and their emissaries were far from satisfied ; they did not want reforms 
 in particular cantons, but a general revolution all over Switzerland, and 
 the fusion of the country into one republic, the ally or rather the hand- 
 maid of France. Mengaud actually distributed his plan of an Helvetic 
 republic, one and indivisible, like the Cisalpine and Batavian republic, 
 to be divided into twenty-two departments, with a directory and a legis- 
 lative body, after the approved fashion of the day. It is worthy of 
 remark, that this man, who arrogated to himself the high office of legis- 
 lator of Switzerland, did not even understand German, but employed as 
 his interpreter a low German woman, the sister of a carrier, who accom- 
 panied him in his mission. He published, among an infinity of other 
 pamphlets and flying sheets with which he inundated Switzerland, 
 a parody of the creed, beginning by, «* I believe in a constitution, one 
 and indivisible, conceived with joy in the bosom of all the patriots of 
 Helvetia, born of freedom, which has suffered under the oligarchs," &c. 
 One change took place, which was demanded by justice as well as 
 by policy. The subjects of the Swiss were emancipated. Most of the 
 cantons agreed to this, and the rest were obliged to conform to the general 
 wish. The smaller bailiwicks became incorporated with the cantons 
 whose subjects they were, and participated in the common rights. On 
 this occasion specimens of the old Swiss feeling of equity displayed 
 themselves. The people of Gaster, who were subject to the joint can- 
 tons of Schwyz and Glarus, on being emancipated, returned of their own 
 accord the sum which the two cantons had paid to their old barons three 
 centuries before, and for which they had received the district as a secu- 
 rity. The subjects of the abbot of St. Gall, on receiving their indepen- 
 dence, offered likewise to give him a compensation upon similar grounds. 
 How different from the conduct of the French republicans and their par- 
 tizans ! The country of Thurgau became independent. The Italian 
 bailiwicks, Lugano, Locarno, and Bellinzona, fonned themselves into a 
 separate community, but continued in their connexion with Switzerland 
 as allies, notwithstanding the suggestions of their Itahan neighbours, 
 who wanted to incorporate them with the Cisalpine republic, like' 
 Valtelina. All these changes took place in February, 1798. 
 
 The little cantons, the old democracies of Switzerland, remained un- 
 altered. They could not possibly become more democratic than they 
 were, especially after they had emancipated their subject bailiwicks. 
 The Orisons remained also unchanged for the same reason. 
 
 The town of Mulhausen, an ally of the Swiss, was about this time 
 detached by violence from the confederation. The French, before their 
 
 PERIOD VI.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 235 
 
 open rupture with Switzerland, wishing to avoid an act of undisguised 
 hostility, had repeatedly urged the citizens of Mulhausen to demand 
 their incorporation with France. The citizens refused, and the French 
 blockaded the little territory of Mulhausen, not only causing the ruin of 
 its trade and manufactures, but absolutely reducing the inhabitants to a 
 state of famine. For two years Mulhausen held out, until, pressed by 
 hunger, it surrendered in January, 1198, " requesting to have the 
 honour of joining the French republic." This act was proclaimed at 
 Paris as being a voluntary expression of the sentiments of the people of 
 Mulhausen. In the following April a similar demand was obtained by 
 analogous means from the citizens of Geneva. But here French troops 
 actually urged on the determination of the people. A body of soldiers 
 demanded to pass through the town, and being once admitted took pos- 
 session of the fortifications. The rest followed as a matter of course. 
 
 The French army which occupied the Pays de Vaud had its head- 
 quarters at Payerne, on the high road to Freyburg and Bern. General 
 Brune, a protege of the director Barras, had succeeded Menard in the 
 command. The Bernese troops under general D'Erlach were posted at 
 Morat. Brune began by summoning D'Erlach to give up Morat. "Were 
 I base enough," answered the veteran, " to forget for a moment my 
 duty, the monument I have here before my eyes would be enough to recall 
 me to it." He alluded to the chapel with the bones of the Burgundians 
 who were defeated by the Swiss in 1476. Brune changed his tactics, 
 and sent a conciliatory message to Bern. The party for peace in the 
 councils resumed its ascendency, agents were dispatched to Brune, and 
 this interchange of inconclusive messages lasted for some weeks. Mean- 
 time Brune was waiting for reinforcements which should raise the French 
 forces in Switzerland to 45,000 men. They had as yet only 25,000, 
 including the corps on the northern frontiers, and Bern had an equal 
 number in the field. When the Bernese messengers urged Brune to 
 sign the preliminaries of a treaty by which the French troops should 
 withdraw from the Pays de Vaud, Brune at last acknowledged that he 
 had no power to sign such a convention, but that he would send a 
 courier to Paris, whence he had no doubt he should receive a satisfac- 
 tory answer. And this procrastination succeeded in lulUng the councils 
 of Bern to sleep on the brink of the precipice. The minority of 120 
 members saw the snare, but they could no.t make it visible to their col- 
 leagues; so that a truce was signed with Brune for fifteen days^ which 
 was to expire on the first of March. 
 
 During the armistice, emissaries of the French spread all sorts of in- 
 sidious reports among the Bernese soldiers, that their own government 
 was betraying them, and had sold them to the French. The soldiers, 
 chiefly taken from the simple peasantry of the country, seeing the im- 
 accountable indecision of their government in front of an insolent foe, 
 were inclined to believe that treason lurked somewhere. These ma- 
 
236 
 
 HISTORY OK SWITZERLAND, 
 
 [period VI. 
 
 PERIOD VI.] 
 
 HISTORTt OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 237 
 
 I ( 
 
 nceuvres became known at Bern, a feeling of indignation burst out, and 
 dispositions were made by general D'Erlach to begin hostilities at the 
 expiration of the truce. The 25,000 men of Bern were ranged in three 
 divisions : one under DT.rlach himself was posted between Freyburg 
 and the lake of Morat ; another under Graffenried was posted between 
 Buren and the lake of Bienne ; and the third protected the town of 
 Soleure. The two last divisions were opposed to the French corps under 
 general Schauenburg, which occupied the territory formerly belonging 
 to the bishopric of Basle. About 5,000 men more, being the scanty 
 contingents of several cantons, were kept as a reserve. The towns of 
 Freyburg and Soleure were both garrisoned by their own militia in con- 
 junction with the Bernese. 
 
 General D'Erlach, on the 26th of February, entered the sovereign 
 council, and there tendered his resignation unless they gave him full 
 powers to act immediately upon the expiration of the truce. « It is 
 useless," said he, " to keep so many brave men under arms, waitinrr 
 until the enemy has completed all his preparations, and has succeeded 
 m sowing dissensions in our ranks. Let us determine to save our 
 country, or let us send these poor men to their homes." It was then 
 that the council gave D'Erlach full powers to act according to his judg- 
 ment. A courier arrived at the same time from Brune offering to renew 
 the negotiations, and the council again sent two deputies to him, but 
 confirmed general D'Erlach's powers. Brune insisted as his ultimntum 
 that the councils of Bern should abdicate. The deputies declared such 
 proposals to be inadmissible, and they left him on the 28th, the eve of 
 the expiration of the armistice. On that very day a scene of confusion and 
 rum took place at Bern. The parly in the legislative council which was 
 detennmed to submit to the French rather than try the fortune of arms, 
 availing themselves of the absence of many members,-omcers v.ho had 
 gone to the army with D'Erlach,-carried by a small majority a resolution 
 revoking the powers given to the general, and forbidding him to attack the 
 enemy. They likewise carried another resolution for the abdication of 
 the executive, and the institution of a provisional regency, sending at the 
 same time another deputation to Brune acquainting him with the pro- 
 posed change, and deprecating his hostility. Brune received the ines- 
 sage with contempt, and demanded that the Bernese army should be 
 immediately disbanded. This would have been to surrender at discre- 
 tion ; and the order was again given to D'Erlach to attack after tlie ex- 
 piration of the armistice, namely, in the night between the 1st and oa 
 01 March ; but two hours afterwards another counter order came to his 
 head-quarters informing him that Brune had granted a prolongation of 
 the armistice for thirty hours. Nevertheless, on the morning of the 1st 
 of March before the expiration even of the first armistice, the Fronch 
 army under Schauenburg attacked the castle of Dornach near Soleure, 
 ana m the night surprised a battalion of Oberlanders posted at Lengnau 
 
 cut most of them to pieces after a sharp resistance, and while the report 
 of the new armistice was circulating through the Swiss lines, Schauen- 
 bur"- pushed his columns to the walls of Soleure. He summoned the 
 town to surrender within half an hour, with a threat of burning it and 
 putting the garrison to the sword if any resistance should be made. 
 •' The members of the government of Soleure," he wrote, " shall answer 
 with their heads and their property, if there be a drop of blood shed. 
 Such are the orders of the executive directory of France." The mem- 
 bers of the councils in dismay opened the gates after Schauenburg had 
 promised to respect the persons and property of the inhabitants, which 
 however did not prevent his soldiers from plundering the villages round 
 the town, and killing those who attempted to defend their property or 
 the honour of their women. 
 
 On the following morning (2d of March) Brune likewise began hos- 
 tilities on his side by an attack on Freyburg, after the Bernese deputies 
 had just left his head-quarters at Payerne, under the impression of 
 the armistice being protracted in order to settle matters by negotiation. 
 The Bernese outposts, taken by surprise, fell back on Freyburg, the 
 authorities of which opened the gates to the French, while the Bernese, 
 followed by many of the Freyburg citizens and peasants, took up a 
 position at Guminen, Neuenek, and Laupen, on the frontiers of their own 
 canton. The other division of the Bernese army opposed to Schauen- 
 burg took up a position at Frauenbrunnen, about ten miles north of 
 Bern. The contingents of the forest and other cantons, which had par- 
 tially and slowly come up to the assistance of Bern, remained all this 
 time in the rear, and after the taking of Freyburg and Soleure by the 
 French on the 2d of March, they began a retrograde march towards 
 their homes. Bern was left alone in the struggle, with a few auxiliaries 
 from Freyburg and Soleure. That part of the Bernese troops which 
 came from Aargau, deserted their colours and went home ; so that the 
 army for the defence of Bern was thus reduced to about 15,000 men 
 opposed to more than 30,000 Frenchmen. On the 3d, the Landsturm or 
 general rising of the peasantry was proclaimed, but this only served to 
 increase the general confusion. On that same day the executive 
 council of Bern was dissolved, and a provisional regency hastily formed. 
 This was done in hopes of conciliating the French. On the morning of 
 the 4th, the regency sent messengers to general Brune to inform him of 
 the change that had taken place in the government, and to demand an 
 armistice, offering even to dismiss the army, provided the French re- 
 mained in the positions they occupied at present. Brune peremptorily 
 insisted on placing a French garrison in Bern. This was too much 
 even for the regency. The people and the troops were in a fearful state 
 of excitement at the idea of being betrayed by their governors. A di- 
 vision of the army quitted its post and marched to Bern in a state of 
 mutiny. The soldiers drove away many of their officers, and bayoneted 
 
238 
 
 BISTORT OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period VI. 
 
 PERIOD VI.] 
 
 BISTORT OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 239 
 
 it 
 
 !i 
 
 » 
 
 at the very gates of Bern the two colonels Stettlerand Rhyner notwith 
 standnig the entreaties of a youni? ladv the nier-^ f'^y^er, notwith- 
 who tried, at the risk of her L Ufe, o save he vtoims f^l 7"' 
 
 genera/DErlf^h to Jhe Zpat W„btn:;en"T' ^'m 't '™"'' 
 morning of the 5th Brune attacked "he posts of g1 "' t'^ "" ''' 
 and Laupen. He was repulsed with 1^ !,,, T'"'"' ^""="'5°' 
 .'riven hack for several Jes on ii!^roTJZyTl\T:^^^^^^^^ 
 general Graffenried was preparine to folUw "^^'i'"'^- ^'"= ^"""^^ 
 receivedthenewsofthedefeau D'eIJTp "^ h.s success, when he 
 burg had attacked the Berneit tS ot rl "^ '^'""^"- 
 
 to theirs in number, and espe L 1 „ " ? ^"^^^"^^« ^^^ ^"P^^or 
 Mith which last kind of forThflZsJel' '" ''"'^ """'^^y' 
 
 ^harp resistance, D'Erlach retired „"n 7 r "r,''"'""'^^- After a 
 .ight of Bern, 4ere het„: i edTo h^attf "'^-^ '"""'' 'I' "" 
 again forced, he formed his troops one IreTn ;h. l"- '"f °" *"'"= 
 city of Bern, where the French arXrvT. f ""' ''"'' '" *« 
 
 havoc in his ranks • veJJZ a ^ ^'"^ ''^^^''^ ">«'•« ^Ireadful 
 «uxed with the Tot , Id „?a h^^^^^^^^ armed w,h scythes were 
 Bernese were left killed or JT \a . ^'""^^^^er. Two thousand 
 loss of the Fri."h 1ml ertTfoo" ''l^r'^'.'f^ f ''-'ttle, the 
 division took the road towards Th;n;„d the oT'T.' "^ ^'E^'aeh's 
 now left unprotected, surrendered to Brl. t ™^.- "•^™' "'^'"S 
 
 persons and properties of the ibitl ts ' rt T '? "J""' ""^ 
 "nder general Graffenried. on leari tl T " ""' '°""'' 
 
 massacred two of their colonpUr^ , ^^^ ^''^"''' ""'■"'■«'' and 
 
 disbanded themselv^ t"ow 's^f^ «™:'™ 7 ^t '''' 
 rection of the Oberland n'Prl. T i j^ ^ ™*^' '° ">« di- 
 
 menontheeverngof theShi ffl^ ^'' himself deserted by his 
 -unded. and he hil f 1''^ "in"""?™, ^eing killed or 
 French cavalry, took alone fC f » ""° "'^ ''^•"'s of the 
 
 collect the fugiLrhi eecete;^^^^ '''r "^ ''"P^'^ *" 
 
 made a successful stand, being backed b^ the':* ",'"' '", ""="''* ''»^« 
 forest cantons. At the villaJof m! • . "'^ Population of the 
 
 disbanded soldiers andlXf i^LS" v'/'" '" "'* ^ "-'' °f 
 
 they seized the general^pSla'CnirW^^^^^^ 
 
 pared to take him to Bern Th^v ^ ^^^°^' ^"^ Pre- 
 
 troop, who crying ou^ ,S Bern ^ 717" rT^'"' ""' »"°*- 
 cursing their ma^strates and hel ' "i, f" '^'^^ ^^*"^''' «"'» 
 to their country, fell upon D Erlach ' tb t '^""^ '^ ''"''' '''''"" 
 - left Mm mangled fnd ^:^t:t^'^S^!]^ 
 
 buller, arriving at the time, and endeavouring to intercede for his general, 
 met with the same fate. The late avoyer Steiger, an old man of seventy, 
 on leaving the field of battle, had also taken the road to Thun, accom- 
 panied by a faithful serjeant. He escaped all dangers, and crossing the 
 lake of Thun and the mount Brunig, he reached in safety the forest 
 cantons. Some days after the murder of D'Erlach, his assassins, struck 
 by remorse, acknowledged that they had been shown by emissaries of 
 the French forged letters as evidence of his treachery. These papers 
 were profusely scattered in the Bernese camp previous to the 5th of 
 March. More than 100 officers, including twelve members of the great 
 council, and most of them belonging to the principal families of Bern, 
 were killed on that fatal day. Their names are registered in golden 
 letters upon six black marble slabs placed in one of the aisles of the 
 cathedral of Bern. Such was the fall of Bern, a republic that had ex- 
 isted for nearly 600 years. It fell by the same arts, by the same hands, 
 and nearly about the same time, as Venice and Genoa ; like them, it 
 exhibited weakness and hesitation in its councils, but, unlike them, it 
 showed something of old Swiss determination in the hour of struggle, 
 and it fell neither unhonoured nor unmourned. 
 
 Although the city of Bern was saved from pillage, yet many excesses 
 were committed by the French soldiery, especially in the country round. 
 It was remarked on this occasion that the troops imder Schauenburg, 
 which were drafted from the army "of the Rhine," behaved much 
 worse than the soldiers of Brune, who came chiefly from the army of 
 Italy. Many of the French officers, however, expressed their disappro- 
 bation of this unjust war. The soldiers had been excited against the 
 Swiss by the system of barefaced falsehood which then prevailed and which 
 was countenanced by the French government ; it was gravely asserted 
 in the French papers, Le Redacteui\ Le Journal des Hommes libres^ 
 &c., that Catholic fanaticism supported the aristocracy of Bern (a tho- 
 rough Protestant country), that the latter had ordered processions and 
 invocations to the Virgin, and that the priests had promised plenary in- 
 dulgence for the murder of Frenchmen. So little did the French sol- 
 diers know why and against whom they were fighting, that, on entering 
 Lausanne, they inquired of the inhabitants where their prince resided, 
 that they might go and teach him reason. Brune seized, in the name of 
 the French directory, the treasury of Bern, in which were found above 
 30,000,000 of francs in gold and silver ; he emptied, also, all the chests 
 of the various branches of the administration, as well as those of the va- 
 rious tribes or companies of the burgesses and of the patricians. He 
 cleared the arsenal of 300 pieces of cannon, of arms, accoutrements, 
 and ammunition for 40,000 men. He ransacked the public stores of 
 corn, wine, salt, &c. ; he also disarmed all the people both in town and 
 country. The whole plunder was immediately carried off to France. 
 Some of the Bernese guns were sent to Toulon for the Egyptian expedi- 
 
 -1*1 
 
240 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period VI, 
 
 I'i 
 
 ^on, which was then preparing. In consideration of these services 
 Brune was raised by the directory to the rank of general-in-chief of the 
 army of Italy. Schauenburg remained in command in Switzerland, 
 whither a commissioner of the name of Le Carher was sent as political 
 agent of France. The new agent began his mission by forced requisi- 
 tions of money and provisions for the troops, «»for (so said his procla- 
 mation of the 29th March) it is just that the Swiss should support their 
 liberators." He taxed Freyburg at 300,000 francs and Bern at 800,000. 
 Eleven old councillors of Bern and five of Soleure were seized as host- 
 ages and taken to the citadel of Strasburg until the contribution was 
 paid. So far with regard to Bern and its allies, Soleure and Freyburg ; 
 the rest of the cantons had taken no part in the quarrel between France 
 and Bern. Zurich, the principal one among them, changed its consti- 
 tution, and sent a deputation to the French hcad-quarters to profess its 
 respect for the French republic, and praying at the same time that the 
 canton might be spared the visit of the French soldiers, as every thing 
 had now been made as democratic as they could possibly wish. Soon 
 afterwards, however, the French head-quarters were transferred to Zurich, 
 and the troops spread over the country as far as the Lake of Constance' 
 Zurich was taxed like Bern, although it had made no resistance. At 
 Luzern an msurrection of the peasants against the new modelled go- 
 vernment afforded a pretence for French interference, the peasants were 
 shot, and Luzern was occupied by a French garrison. Similar scenes 
 occurred m the Valais; a body of French troops carried fire and sword 
 mto those hitherto peaceful valleys, plundered the city of Sion, and 
 massacred a great number of the mountaineers, and among them many 
 of the poor idiots called cretins, who are very numerous in the Lower 
 Valais. Fresh contributions, confiscations, and arrests followed these 
 exploits. The French directory issued a decree, declaring that the Hel- 
 vetic confederation had ceased to exist, and that Switzerland was to 
 form a single republic, one and indivisible, under a central government 
 to be established at Aarau. The plan of constitution was sent from 
 Pans on the model of the French constitution of the year 3, consist- 
 ing of two councils and an executive directorv, in whom was vested the 
 appointment of prefects and other authorities for the various cantons 
 which were thus to be transformed into departments, with the loss of 
 their mdependence as separate states. A new division of the country 
 mto twenty-two cantons was likewise made at Paris; the old canton of 
 Bern was parcelled into four cantons, namely, Bern, Vaud, Obcriand 
 and Aargau. The Grisons, being too remote, and bordering upon the 
 Austrian territories, with which France was then at peace, were simply 
 invited to join the new Helvetic republic, which invitation, however, 
 they dechned to accept. 
 
 It is a fact, which serves to show the contempt which the French ex- 
 ecutive directory entertained for the constitution of the French republic, 
 
 PERIOD VI.] 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 241 
 
 that the invasion of Switzerland was undertaken and executed without 
 ever being communicated to the legislative councils. The ex-director 
 Carnot, who had emigrated in consequence of the affairs of Fructidor, 
 and had thus escaped transportation to Guiana, wrote from Germany a 
 pamphlet, in which he exposed the atrocious policy of the directory, and 
 styled the Swiss invasion as " an impious war," which realized to the 
 letter " the well-known fable of the wolf and the lamb." Bonaparte, 
 who was then at Paris, had advised, as he afterwards stated, a remodel- 
 ling of the government of Bern and some of the other aristocratic cantons, 
 but not their destruction as independent states, or the violence with 
 which it was attended. 
 
 Tlie Waldst'atten, or mountain cantons, being now summoned by the 
 French commissioners to send their deputies to Aarau, boldly refused, 
 saying that they were quite satisfied with their old form of government, 
 and their landsgemeinde, or general assemblies of the people. But while 
 the other cantons had appeared too aristocratic to the French directory, 
 the forest cantons on their part were too democratic to please its taste. 
 The French republic, or rather the few unprincipled men who swayed 
 the destinies of France at the time, assuming the tone of the Roman 
 senate of old, wanted uniformity of government all over the world, and 
 obedience to their own dictates. The sturdy shepherds of Schwyz and 
 Uri, unacquainted with either Roman or French senates, entrenched 
 among their lakes and their mountains, refused to submit. Schauenburg 
 marched with 15,000 men to bring the stubborn democrats to reason. 
 It was a singular but deplorable sight to behold the French, calling 
 themselves republicans, and enlisted in the name of liberty and equality, 
 going to attack the oldest and most popular republics in Europe, because 
 they chose to remain free, as they had been from time immemorial. 
 Four battalions of Schwyz militia, and one battalion of Uri, under the 
 command of Aloys Reding, an officer who had lately returned from the 
 Spanish service, were posted at the defiles of Morgarten, St. Jost, and 
 Schindellegi, on the borders of the canton of Schwyz, towards Zug and 
 Zurich. On the 30th April the French routed the men of Glarus, Uz- 
 nach, and other neighbouring districts, before the Schwyzers could come 
 to their assistance. On the 2nd May the French attacked the pass of 
 Schindellegi, where Reding had stationed himself, but were repulsed. 
 They then turned that position by the pass of Mount Etzcl, which was 
 abandoned by the curate of Einsidlen, who had presumptuously under- 
 taken to defend it. Reding immediately fell back to Rothenthurm, 
 where, with only 1,200 men, he waited for the enemy. The French, 
 descending from the mountains, deployed in the plain. Reding com- 
 manded his men to charge, which they effected in admirable order, tra- 
 versing the plain under the fire of the French musketry. The French 
 did not stand the charge, and in half an hour's time the Swiss drove 
 them back beyond the hills with great loss. Another body of Frcnch- 
 
 R 
 
242 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period VI. 
 
 PERIOD VI.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 243 
 
 men, coming from Egeri, advanced at the same time by the pass of Mor- 
 garten, when they were repulsed by a battalion of Schwyzers with some 
 auxiliaries from Uri. On the next day (3rd May) the French advanced 
 in two columns against Arth, at the southern extremity of the lake of 
 Zug. Both columns were repulsed with great loss. In these actions 
 the French lost nearly 4,000 men ; the famous black legion, known for 
 the excesses it had committed in the country, was almost entirely de- 
 stroyed. Schauenbiirg, struck with the spirit of the mountaineers, 
 offered to Reding an honourable convention, by which no French soldier 
 was to enter the canton of Schwyz, no contribution was to be levied on 
 its inhabitants, and the Schwyzers were to remain in possession of their 
 arms ; but they were to send deputies to Aarau to arrange matters con- 
 cerning the new constitution. As the continuation of the contest with 
 such fearful odds could only lead to the extermination of the Schwyzers, 
 Reding accepted the terms of this remarkable capitulation. 
 
 Meantime the exactions of the French over the rest of Switzerland 
 continued. Le Carlier was recalled by the directory, and a new com- 
 missioner was appointed, who, by an ominous coincidence, was called 
 Rapinat, and he fully justified his claim to the name ; for his rapacity 
 became the terror of the unfortunate Swiss. Even the Helvetic execu- 
 tive, installed by French influence at Aarau, were compelled by the loud 
 clamours of their countrymen to complain of Rapinat's conduct, upon 
 which the commissioner unceremoniously dismissed two of the members. 
 The French directory at last recalled Rapinat, and promised to relax 
 the rigour of its demands upon its " good Swiss allies." Schauenburg, 
 the general-in-chief, after having disarmed the people, forbade any one 
 to leave his respective canton without a passport signed by the general. 
 The ingenious invention of passports had been unknown in Switzerland 
 till then : it was first introduced by the French republicans, as another 
 appendage to their curious system of liberty. 
 
 In the month of July the French commissioners and general ordered 
 that the people should assemble in every canton in order to take the oath 
 to the new constitution of the Helvetic republic one and indivisible, which 
 had been proclaimed at Aarau. The small mountain cantons refused : 
 they had sent deputies to Aarau, and had submitted to the new consti- 
 tution by force, after the capitulation of Schwyz, but they would not 
 perjure themselves by swearing perpetual fidelity to an institution which 
 they disliked. Schauenburg threatened to treat them as rebels. The 
 forest cantons replied that '* they would willingly promise never to take 
 up arms against the French republic, nor join its enemies. But our 
 liberty is our only blessing, and the* only thing for which we can ever 
 be induced to grasp our arms." Schauenburg repaired to Luzern with 
 15,000 men ready to invade the forest cantons. Schwyz and Uri 
 wavered in their resolution, and the small canton of Unterwalden was 
 left alone in the struggle. But even in Unterwalden (which is divided 
 
 into two diminutive republics) the Obwalden, or upper one, taken by 
 surprise by the entrance of a French column, did not oppose any resist- 
 ance, and the Nidwalden alone, or lower division of the canton, which 
 stretches along the banks of the Waldstatten lake, stood in arms to 
 repel the aggressors. The whole population of Nidwalden did not much 
 exceed 10,000, of whom about 2,000 were able to bear arms. That 
 such a district should attempt to resist the might of France appears 
 madness : it was, however, a determination produced by a feelmg of 
 right and justice among men secluded from the rest of the world, who 
 knew nothing of politics and its overbearing dictates. They had not 
 injured any one, why should ethers come to injure them ? On the 9th 
 September, 1798, the attack took place. Schauenburg had sent a co- 
 lumn round by the Obwalden to attack the Nidwalders in the rear, while 
 he embarked with another division at Luzern, and landed at Stanzstadt. 
 The dispatch of Schauenburg, written on the evening of that day, fur- 
 nishes a pithy account of the catastrophe. ** After a combat which has 
 lasted from five of the morning till now, we have taken possession of the 
 district of Stanz. I grieve at the consequences of so severe a conflict : 
 it has cost much bloodshed. But they were rebels, whom we must 
 subdue." And the following day, 10th September, he wrote again : 
 " I could succeed only by sending a column round by the Oberwald, 
 while I attacked them at the same time by the lake. At six in the 
 evening we were masters of this unhappy country, which has been pil- 
 laged. The fury of the soldiers could not be restrained ; all that bore 
 arms, including priests, and unfortunately many women also, were put 
 to the sword. Our enemies fought desperately ; it was the warmest en- 
 gagement I ever was in. We have had about 350 wounded ; we have 
 lost several officers; but victory has remained with the republicans. 
 All Unterwalden is now subdued." The unfortunate Midwalders who 
 perished on that day were reckoned at 1500, the rest took refuge in the 
 recesses of the higher Alps. All the cattle were carried off by the 
 French— the houses and cottages were set on fire— fruit trees cut down ; 
 the pretty town of Stanz was burnt, Stanzstadt and Buochs shared the 
 same fate. That district, a few days before so peaceful and happy, now 
 exhibited a scene of horrible desolation. In the churchyard of Stanz a 
 chapel has been built, consecrated to the memory of 414 inhabitants of 
 that town, including 102 women and twenty-five children, murdered on 
 the dreadful 9th September. The priest was saying mass in the church 
 when the French rushed in : a shot struck him dead, and fixed itself in 
 the altar, where the mark is still seen. On the road from Stanz to 
 Sarnen is the chapel of St. Jacob, outside of which eighteen women, 
 armed with scythes, leaning against the walls, defended themselves 
 against a party of French soldiers until they were all killed. Several 
 hundred children remained orphans, wandering about their paternal 
 fields : most of them were collected by the people of the neighbouring 
 
 r2 
 
244 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period VI. 
 
 cantons, and the philanthropic Pestalozzi sheltered and educated many 
 of them in his then newly-founded institution. 
 
 Schauenburg, emboldened by this massacre, entered the canton of 
 Schwyz on the 13th September, in contempt of the former convention, 
 and disarmed the inhabitants. This was the great object of the French, 
 and for this the revolt, as it was called, of Unterwalden had been pro- 
 .voked by overbearing dictation. Carnot, in his '* Apology," already 
 mentioned, stated that it was the policy of the French directory *' to 
 consolidate its strength by the destruction of its neighbours, whom it 
 treated as friends as long as it could extract any thing out of them ; and 
 when the time came to destroy them, there was no want of pretexts to 
 realize the fable of the wolf and the lamb." 
 
 The Orisons had declined the invitation to join the Helvetic republic. 
 The Austrian troops stationed near their frontiers in the Tyrol and the 
 Vorarlberg gave them some degree of confidence, as it was not just then 
 the interest of the French directory to provoke a new rupture with the 
 emperor. The French, however, had partisans among the Grisons ; 
 their envoy at Coire was carrying on intrigues with some of the leaders 
 of the popular assemblies ; and a French division was stationed at Sar- 
 gans, ready to cross the Rhine and enter the Grisons country. But the 
 atrocities committed in the Unterwalden opened the eyes of the Grisons 
 to a sense of their own danger. The people ran to arms to guard the 
 passes on the frontiers ; the French envoy, after intriguing and threat- 
 ening in vain, left Coire ; and on the 17th of October the general diet 
 of the Grisons formally requested the emperor to send them an auxiliary 
 corps, according to former stipulations between the two countries. The 
 Austrian troops came and wintered in the country. 
 
 The war having broken out again in March, 1799, between the em- 
 peror and France, Massena, who now commanded the French army in 
 Switzerland, surprised the Austrian division stationed in the Orisons, 
 and overran the country. The battles of Stockach and Feldkirch, gained 
 by the archduke Charles and general Hotze, obliged the French to eva- 
 cuate the Orisons soon after ; and the Austrians, following up their suc- 
 cess, spread also over eastern Switzerland. After several engagements, 
 Massena left Zurich and fell back on the river Reuss. The small can- 
 tons availed themselves of this opportunity to throw off the yoke. Uri rose 
 and took possession of the pass of the St. Gothard, the people of Upper 
 Valais occupied the Simplon, so as to cut off the communication between 
 the French forces in Switzerland and those in Italy. Schwyz rose also ; 
 but the French came in great numbers in May, 1799, and overpowered 
 and disarmed the inhabitants, many of whom were killed. Insurrections 
 and partial conflicts desolated all the eastern part of Switzerland. In 
 those cantons which had been newly raised to independence and equa 
 lity, such as Thurgau and part of Zurich, the French had partisans, who 
 took up arms for them ', the old cantons, on the contrary, fought despe- 
 
 PERIOD VI.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 245 
 
 rately against them, and the French retahated with their usual ferocity. 
 The Austrians, and a Russian auxiliary division under general Korsa- 
 kow, occupied Zurich, which became the head-quarters of the allies. 
 On the 7th of June the French evacuated Schwyz, and took up a posi- 
 tion on the frontiers of Zug, by the village of Arth. The Austrians then 
 entered Schwyz, where the inhabitants joined them. On the 3rd of 
 July the French attacked the whole Austrian line, but the Schwyzers 
 repulsed them again at Morgarten, and drove them as far as Egeri. 
 Meantime the archduke Charles moved the greater part of his forces 
 into Suabia, to continue his operations in that quarter ; and the Russians, 
 thus weakened, were attacked by Massena in a battle, or rather succes- 
 sion of battles, near Zurich, in September. 1799, and defeated, the 
 French forcing their way into the town of Zurich. At the same time 
 the Russian general, Suwarrow, was crossing the St. Gothard with a 
 strong force to join his countrymen in Switzerland, but he arrived too 
 late : he met the French advanced divisions at Altorf, and drove them 
 back as far as Schwyz. On learning the loss of the battle of Zurich, 
 Suwarrow, after some partial engagements, was obliged to turn, by a 
 most difficult path over Mount Bragel and by the Klonthal, into the can- 
 ton of Olarus, whence he was likewise driven by the French under ge- 
 neral Molitor, and obliged to retire in the night, and by the light of 
 torches, through the pass of the Krauchenthal, into the country of Sar- 
 gans, on the borders of the Grisons. Soon after, the Russians left Swit- 
 zerland altogether. The details of this mountain warfare among the 
 high Alps, in which generals Lecourbe, Soult, and Molitor among the 
 French, and Suwarrow and Hotze among the Russians and Austrians, 
 distinguished themselves, are full of strategic interest. But the unfor- 
 tunate mountain cantons were utterly ruined by this strange immigration 
 of numerous armies of Russians, Austrians, and French, all living at 
 free quarters upon the inhabitants, and committing many acts of vio- 
 lence. At the end of that campaign, one-fourth of the population of 
 the canton of Schwyz was depending on public charity for support. In 
 the valley of Muotta alone between 600 and 700 persons were reduced 
 to a state of utter destitution. In the still poorer canton of Uri the 
 same distress prevailed, in addition to which a fire broke out at Altorf, 
 which destroyed the greater part of that, the chief town of the canton. 
 The canton of Unterwalden had been already devastated the year before. 
 In the valleys of the Grisons similar scenes took place ; in that of the 
 Vorder Rhein the inhabitants rose against the French on the 1st of May, 
 1799, killed a great many of them, and drove the rest as far as Coire. 
 But the French soon received reinforcements, and overpowered that 
 handful of mountaineers, upon whom they broke their vengeance, killing 
 above 3,000 of them, and setting on fire the venerable abbey of Disentis. 
 The inhabitants of the remote valley of Tavetsch, at the foot of the great 
 Alps, were all butchered ; the women were hunted down by the soldiers ; 
 
246 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period vr« 
 
 PERIOD VI. 1 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 247 
 
 I 
 
 four of them, being overtaken, threw themselves into the half frozen 
 lakeof Toma, with their infants in their arms, and were shot at in that 
 situation. This was on the 20th of May. The spot where their bodies 
 were buried is still pointed out by the guides.* During the winter of 
 l^^gg — 1800, the two hostile armies in Switzerland remained inactive ; 
 the Austrians occupying the Orisons and the banks of the lake of Con- 
 stance, and the French, under Lecourbe, having their head-quarters at 
 Zurich, and being in possession of almost the whole of Switzerland. 
 
 The internal administration of Switzerland was during all this time 
 in a state of utter confusion. The semblance of an Helvetic central go- 
 vernment was paraded first at Aarau, then at Luzern, then at Bern, and 
 always under the protection of French bayonets. Even the partisans of 
 the revolution were disgusted with the state of thraldom in which they 
 were held by foreigners. "The Helvetic executive directory (says 
 Zschokke) enjoyed no influence or consideration ; it was in a manner 
 foreign to the greater part of the nation it was appointed to govern, be- 
 ing chiefly composed of men from western or French Switzerland, whom 
 the German Swiss hardly considered as their countrymen. Whilst the 
 government was destitute of the most necessar)^ means, whilst its ofiicers 
 received no salaries, nor the clergy their stipends, the commissaries, the 
 generals, and the soldiers of France revelled in shameful profusion at 
 the expense of the Swiss, or sent home the produce of their plunder." 
 The two Helvetic councils styled legislative, but which in fact could not 
 legislate to any eff"ective purpose, were treated with absolute contempt 
 by the French agents who had set them up. Rapinat told them that 
 ** they were nothing more than a board of administration under the 
 French government ; that Switzerland was a conquered country; that 
 they had no national property but what belonged to the Fren(^h repub- 
 lic.'* And he acted upon this principle, for he tore off the seals of the 
 Helvetic government from the depositories of public property, he 
 emptied the cantonal treasuries of Zurich, Luzern, and other cantons 
 which had made no resistance, just as completely as those of Bern, Frey- 
 burg, and Soleure ; he seized the funds of the public charities, and the 
 private legacies for the poor, the aged, and the infirm. Friends and 
 foes, democrats and aristocrats, were all treated alike. Zeltner, the Hel- 
 vetic chargti d'afi'aires at Paris, who had himself been favourable to a 
 change of institutions in his country, but not by such means, addressed 
 a note of remonstrance to the French minister for foreign affairs, in which 
 he drew the followmg picture of the benefits of revolutionary liberty :— 
 «* When in order to confer freedom on a people, you reduce that people to 
 very rags— when the husbandman must abandon his plough, and the arti- 
 san his workshop— when the honest and the peaceful are stripped of their 
 property, and the rights of every citizen are violated— then, O great na- 
 
 * Dandolo, Uttere iuUa Smzzera, Cantone du Grigioni, Milan, 1829 
 
 tion ' vou have missed your aim, and your enemies have reason to tri- 
 umph You have given us a constitution founded upon the prmciples 
 of liberty and equality, but you have deprived us at the sanae time of all 
 the means of enjoying those blessings. Is our political freedom to be 
 purchased by the endurance of every kind of oppression that can weigh 
 down an unfortunate people?. . . The consequences of such conduct 
 may prove still more lamentable. Our Swiss mountaineers are tenacious 
 of purpose : they are attached to their religion, their democratic forms, 
 and their ancient manners. Bad faith and wanton outrage are revolting 
 to them : if you reduce them to despair, you may at last form a new 
 Vendt^e among the Alps." This was written in 1798, and the events 
 of the following year verified the prediction contained m the concludmg 
 sentence. The Helvetic executive, roused at length from its submissive 
 apathy by the innumerable complaints that poured upon it from every 
 quarter, wrote to Schauenburg, that " the excesses of every kind com- 
 mitted by his troops, and their heavy requisitions and exactions, had 
 occasioned an universal discontent bordering upon despair. Remember, 
 Citizen-general (thus the note concluded), that in former times Switzer- 
 land and Genoa have been indebted for their liberty to the immoderate 
 abuse of power by foreigners." Schauenburg having professed, m an- 
 swer, that he had ordered strict discipline to be enforced among his 
 troops, the Helvetic executive rephed :— " Your soldiers are not satisfied 
 with living in the barracks ; they force themselves into private houses, 
 vexing and insulting the owners, and extorting from them their last pit- 
 tance, while we have no means left to alleviate the distress of the suf- 
 ferers' stripped as we have been by your commissioners of the funds 
 destined for the relief of the destitute." The celebrated Lavater of Zu- 
 rich who was himself at first favourable to popular changes in the insti- 
 tutions of his country, wrote a letter to the French directory, which was 
 printed and published in several languages, and which he dated '' 10th 
 of May, the first year of Helvetic slavery" (1198). " You came (says 
 this letter) under pretence of freeing us from the aristocracy, and you 
 have imposed upon us a yoke more intolerable than any we had before 
 endured. When you entered the Helvetic territory, you proclaimed 
 that your sole object was to chastise the oligarchs of Bern, Freyburg, 
 and Soleure. The other cantons, to their shame be it said, looked on 
 and took no part against you. Zurich voluntarily changed its govern- 
 ment into a democracy, but your general ordered us to accept a new 
 constitution framed by yourselves, and we submitted : a few days after, 
 vou imposed upon us another constitution for all Switzerland, and we 
 submitted likewise to your singular fashion of imparting liberty to other 
 countries. We then thought that we had done enough ; but you came 
 and quartered yourselves in our houses, you drained us by your exac- 
 tions, and you levied a contribution of three millions upon our senatorial 
 families, who had ruled our canton for ages according to our old con- 
 
248 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZEBLAND. 
 
 [period VI. 
 
 m 
 
 (I.I,: 
 fillCf 
 
 stitution, and certainly without incurring any charge of extortion ; wlio 
 had quietly resigned their offices when required to do so by their coun- 
 trymen, and who therefore could not be accused of any political misde- 
 meanour." Lavater, the writer of this epistle, lost his life afterwards, 
 in September, 1799, when the French re-entered Zurich by force. He 
 had stepped out of his house, on hearing of some outrage of the military 
 upon his neighbours, when one of the soldiers killed him in the affray, 
 without knowing him. 
 
 The Helvetic directory or executive was in a position of much diffi- 
 culty : it was unpopular with the country, and not docile enough for the 
 French commanders. One praise it deserves among all its difficulties, 
 —It never resorted to a system of terror, it never enforced proscriptions or 
 confiscations; the blood that was shed in Switzerland was shed by the 
 French military, and not by the guillotine. The revolutionary executions 
 at Geneva in 1794 were the only exception, and Geneva was then hardly 
 considered as Switzerland. The Swiss were too honest and moral, and 
 were, for the most part, too deeply imbued with religious principles, to 
 resort to such foul means for the support of pohtical doctrines. Having 
 attempted to put some restraint on the enormous contributions still levied 
 by the French commanders, the Helvetic directory was suppressed in 
 1800, and an executive commission of seven members was appointed, 
 pro tenipere. Several members of the senate and of the great council 
 being likewise ejected, the rest, jointly with the executive commission, 
 formed themselves into a new legislative body, in order to frame that 
 panacea for all evils, a new constitution. All this of course was done 
 under French influence, and in imitation of the change which had taken 
 place at Paris on the 18-19 Brumaire. Bonaparte was now first 
 consul of France, and his will gave a fresh impulse to the current of 
 political affairs. The new project of a constitution for Switzerland was 
 pubhshed at last in May, 1801 : the framers of it acknowledged in their 
 preamble, that " the constitution of 1798 had been imposed by foreign 
 power and supported by force of arms, and that it could never have 
 secured in more orderly times the real approbation of the Helvetic 
 people." So much for the constitution given by the French directory 
 to Its allies the Swiss, to enforce which the people of Unter^valden had 
 been massacred, and all Switzerland had for years endured the presence 
 of invaders, with their train of rapine, extortion, famine, and bloodshed 
 A general diet was convoked in September, 1801, to give its sanction 
 to the new constitution. Meantime the peace of Luneville between 
 France and Austria had been signed, by which the independence of the 
 Helvetic republic was recognized. The French troops were consequently 
 ordered to evacuate Switzerland. The provisional government of that 
 country, in order to court popularity, had shown itself less docile to 
 !• ranee than its predecessors; it had refused to sanction the dismember- 
 ment of the Valais, which Bonaparte wanted for his projected military 
 
 PERIOD VI.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND, 
 
 249 
 
 road over the Simplon ; and it affected great satisfaction at the recall of 
 the French troops. 
 
 The diet assembled at Bern in October, 1801. The new constitution, 
 which was laid before it, maintained the principle of the unity of the 
 Helvetic republic, of which Bern was to be the capital, whilst it made 
 considerable concessions to the partisans of federalism, by recognising 
 separate local governments for the internal affairs of each canton, distinct 
 from, though subordinate to the central government of the whole re- 
 public. The cantons were to be seventeen, the names of the thirteen 
 old ones were maintained, and the four new cantons were Aargau, Vaud, 
 the Grisons, and the Ticino, consisting of the Italian bailiwicks. The 
 diet adopted the new constitution with some modifications, when all at 
 once several members exclaimed that the diet had not the power of 
 altering the project, but could only approve or reject it ; and they with- 
 drew from the sittings. On the 27th of October some leading members 
 of the provisional legislative body, which had framed the constitution, 
 assembled secretly and assumed the name of legislative council extraor- 
 dinary. A guard posted at the door of the hall kept it close against the 
 other members, who in vain protested against this illegal violence. The 
 council extraordinary appointed a new executive of three of its own 
 members. This self-constituted authority dissolved the diet, which, in a 
 long proclamation signed " by the president," they accused of being 
 the cause of all the mischief. A new project of a constitution was now 
 framed, and was published in February, 1802, to be laid before the 
 assemblies of the respective cantons. The principle of it was nearly the 
 same as that of the year before, but the number of the cantons was in- 
 creased to twenty-one, Thurgau, St. Gall, Baden, and the Valais, being 
 the additional cantons. But the forest cantons, who were still opposed 
 to the principle of unity and centralization, declared themselves inde- 
 pendent of the central government ; Zurich followed their example, and 
 their militia marched against Bern, from which both the legislative and 
 executive councils escaped to Lausanne. A diet was held at Schwyz 
 for the re-establishment of the old confederation of the thirteen cantons. 
 All the factions were now awakened afresh; the towns were for their 
 old privileges and monopolies ; the old cantons wanted to resume their 
 authority over their former subjects ; the abbot of St. Gall attempted 
 to recover his territories ; the partisans of federalism were opposed to 
 those of unity of government, who made a stand in the canton de Vaud. 
 A civil war appeared inevitable. Bonaparte, who did not wish that 
 Switzerland should be again plunged into confusion, or that the parti- 
 sans of the old institutions should predominate, well knowing that they 
 and their leader, Aloys Reding, were averse to French influence, sent 
 Colonel Rapp, in October, 1802, to Berne, with a circular addressed to 
 the cantons, offering his mediation for the settlement of all their difficul- 
 ties ; while at the same time he ordered general Ney to keep himself 
 
250 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period VI. 
 
 ready with a body of troops oh the frontiers of Switzerland, to enforce 
 compliance. The message to the cantons stated that the first consul 
 had intended not to meddle with their internal affairs, in the hope that 
 they would come to some amicable arrangement among themselves ; and 
 as a proof of his disinterested regard for their independence, he had 
 recalled the French troops entirely from their territory. But yet, after 
 passing the last three years in continual disputes, they were as far re- 
 moved from a final adjustment as ever. " If you are left longer to 
 yourselves," the message proceeded to say, " you will go on killing each 
 other for some years, perhaps, without any better chance of coming to 
 an understanding. I must mediate between you, but I expect that my 
 mediation shall be final, and that you will accept it as a new benefit of 
 the Providence which, in the midst of so many vicissitudes, still watches 
 over the existence and the independence of your nation. My mediation 
 is now the only means you have left of preserving both.'' He then 
 directed, as the preliminary conditions of his mediation, that the actual 
 central Helvetic government should return to Bern, that the new govern- 
 ments, councils, and magistrates which had been instituted during the 
 late disturbances, should dissolve themselves, and that the new levies 
 should be disarmed. Deputies were to be sent to Paris by the Helvetic 
 legislative council, and likewise by each separate canton, and all those 
 citizens who during the last three years had filled situations in the cen- 
 tral government might also repair to Paris, in order to suggest their views 
 on the best measures to be adopted for conciliating differences. 
 
 The democratic party readily accepted the proffered mediation, but 
 the partisans of the old aristocracies wished to gain time. Among those 
 who repaired to Paris there was still the great division of " unitaires " 
 or partisans of a single republic, and federalists. Bonaparte inclmed 
 towards the latter, apparently because he believed the federal principle 
 to be the best adapted to the habits and geographical circumstances of 
 the Swiss. The sentiments which he expressed to the Swiss deputies 
 assembled at Paris are marked by a sincerity and disinterestedness the 
 more striking from their singularity. " Switzerland," said he, " is 
 like no other country ; its topography, the varieties in its language and 
 religion, and still more in its manners and social habits, give peculiar 
 features to the land and the people. Nature itself has made your country 
 for a federal state, and it is not wise to oppose nature. Circumstances, 
 and the character of ages gone by, had established amongst you ruling 
 commonwealths and subject districts. New circumstances, and the 
 spirit of a new age, more consistent with justice and reason, have now 
 established political equality over all the parts oi your territory. Several 
 of your cantons have followed for centuries a system of the purest 
 democracy. In others, some families gradually possessed themselves of 
 power, and thus the commonwealth became divided between sovereigns 
 and subjects. The example of the political condition of your neigh- 
 
 PERIOD VI.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 251 
 
 hours of Italy, Savoy, France, and other countries, contributed also to 
 form and to maintain this state of things among you ; but the spirit of 
 those countries is now altered, and a full renunciation of all exclusive 
 privileges is both the wish and the interest of your people in general. 
 The most important affair to begin with is the internal organization of 
 each of your cantons, after which their respective relations with each 
 other will be determined. Your central administration is, in fact, of 
 much less importance than your cantonal one. There can be no uni- 
 formity of administration amongst you ; you have never kept a standing 
 army, your finances are of necessity very limited, you never had perma- 
 nent diplomatic agents at the capitals of the other powers. Placed 
 among the mountains which divide France, Italy, and Germany, you 
 partake of the character of each of those countries. The neutrality of 
 your country, the prosperity of your commerce, and a domestic and 
 family-like administration, these are the things which suit you best. 
 This is the language I have held to all your deputies who have hitherto 
 consulted me about your affairs ; but the very men who seemed best to 
 understand its reasonableness were attached by interest to the old system 
 of privileges, and had therefore a bias unfavourable to France. Never- 
 theless, neither France nor the Italian republic can allow a system to 
 prevail amongst you which would be in opposition to theirs. The po- 
 litics of Switzerland are necessarily allied to those of France."* 
 
 As the Swiss deputies could not agree among themselves concerning 
 the fundamental principles of the cantonal governments, Bonaparte called 
 together five deputies of each party, unitarian and federalist : those of 
 the first were the citizens Stapfer, Sprecher, Monod, Von Flue, and 
 Ustin; and those of the federalists were D*Affry, Jauch, Reinhard, 
 Glutz, and Wattenwyl de Montbenay. A conference took place between 
 them and the first consul on the 28th of January, 1803, which lasted 
 from one till eight o'clock. On this occasion Bonaparte again spoke 
 the language of a friendly and sincere mediator. The unitarian party 
 wanted to interfere with the pure democracies of the little cantons, to 
 reduce the number of the landsgemeinde by putting a qualification on the 
 members attending it, and to give the landrath or executive council the 
 sole right of proposing laws. Bonaparte opposed this : *' The re-esta- 
 blishment of pure democracy in the smaller cantons," said he, " is be- 
 come the most suitable arrangement for them. These little democracies 
 have been the cradle of your liberty ; it is they that distinguish Swit- 
 zerland from the rest of the world, and render your country so very 
 interesting in the eyes of Europe. Without them, you would be like 
 the rest of the continent, you would bear no characteristic sign : mark 
 well the importance of this : it is the peculiar features of your ancient 
 democracies which make you appear unlike any of the modern states, 
 
 * Thibaudeau, Memoires sur le Consuiat, one of the best works concerning Bona- 
 parte's administration. 
 
252 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period VI. 
 
 and which thereby preclude the idea of confounding and incorporating 
 you with the neighbouring countries. Those mountain democracies 
 constitute real Switzerland, to which the cantons of the plain have been 
 annexed at a later period. I know that the system of those little re- 
 publics has its inconveniences, that it does not, perhaps, stand the test 
 of reason ; but, after all, it has been established for centuries ; it has 
 originated in the nature of the country, the climate, the wants, the pri- 
 mitive habits of the people ; it suits the peculiarities of the soil, and 
 we must not pretend to be right in spite of necessity. The institutions 
 of the little cantons may be unreasonable, but they are established by 
 long and still popular customs. When custom and reason are in oppo- 
 sition, the first generally carries the day. You wish to abolish or modify 
 the landsgemeinde, but then you must talk no longer of democracies or 
 republics. A free people does not like to be deprived of its direct exer- 
 cise of sovereignty, it does not know or does not relish those modern 
 inventions of a representative system which destroy the essential attri- 
 bute of a republic. And besides, why would you deprive those shep- 
 herds of the only excitement they can have in their otherwise monotonous 
 existence ? 
 
 " With regard to the town cantons or former aristocracies," resumed 
 he, " every exclusive family privilege being abolished, the members of the 
 great council should be for life, subject, however, to the scrutiny of their 
 conduct every two years. The qualifications of an elector should be his 
 being a citizen of the canton, and being possessed of at least 500 Swiss 
 francs of property. No bachelor should vote before he is thirty years of 
 age. The elections should be direct and not through the electoral bodies. 
 Each tribe or district should choose among the candidates of other dis- 
 tricts. The little council or executive should be renewed by one-third 
 every two years. 
 
 " In the new cantons, formerly subject to the old cantons, the social 
 principle being more popular and democratic, the members of the great 
 council should not be for life. This ought to be the principal difference 
 between the new cantons and the old ones. With regard to other details, 
 the organization of the judicial system, &c.— these," observed the f.rst 
 consul, « ought to be left to the legislature ; the constitution is merely 
 to determine the mode in which the laws are made. If the constitution 
 enters into too many details, it becomes liable sooner or later to be vio- 
 lated. With regard to the institution of the jury," continued he, *' it 
 might prove dangerous in times of political excitement, for then juries 
 are apt to judge through passion. We at least find it so in France." 
 
 Such was the basis of the constitution of the nineteen cantons by the 
 Act of Mediation of 1803. The cantons might be classed in three cate- 
 gories : 1. The pure democracies of Schwyz, Uri, Unterwalden, Glarus, 
 Appenzell, Zug, and the Grisons. 2. The representative republics, in 
 which there was an admixture of the aristocratic element, without, how- 
 
 period VI.] 
 
 history of SWITZERLAND, 
 
 253 
 
 ever, any family privilege : these were the old town cantons of Bern, 
 Zurich, Luzern, Freyburg, Soleure, Basil, and Schaffhausen. 3. The 
 new cantons, Aargau, Thurgau, St. Gall, Vaud, and Ticino, which were 
 representative republics on a democratic principle. 
 
 In discussing the form and attributes of the central government the 
 first consul told the deputies that when he returned from Italy in 1797 
 being consulted by the directory on the affairs of Switzerland, he gave it 
 as his opinion that the Pays de Vaud should be detached from Bern and 
 formed into a separate canton ; that the number of the patrician families 
 of Bern and of the other aristocracies should be quadrupled, in order to 
 secure m the councils a majority favourable to France, as it was for the 
 mterest of France that Switzeriand should be its ally, because it pro- 
 tected a vast line of its frontiers, " but never," added he. « did I mean 
 to make a revolution in your country. I never thought of uniting you 
 to France, for you could not bear the charges which the French are 
 obliged to sustain. This mediation in your affairs has given me, I assure 
 you, a great deal of trouble, and I hesitated long before I embarked in 
 it. It is a difficult task for me to give constitutions to countries which 
 I know but very imperfectly. Should my appearance on your stage 
 prove unsuccessful, I should be hissed, which is a thing I do not like. 
 But now all Europe expects France to settle the affairs of Switzer- 
 land, for it is acknowledged by Europe that Switzerland as well as Italy 
 and Holland are at the disposal of France." In conclusion, Bonaparte 
 observed that the attempt to unite Switzerland into one republic had 
 completely failed; that a federal diet, consisting of deputies named by 
 the various cantons, should assemble every year in one of the principal 
 towns, and decide upon all matters which concern the whole confedera- 
 tion, as well as mediate in all differences between one canton and an- 
 other ; and that there should be no central directing canton, but that the 
 landamman of the canton where the diet meets for the year should 
 transact all federal affairs. 
 
 The Act of Mediation being composed upon these principles, it was 
 solemnly delivered by the first consul at a public audience (19th February 
 1803) to citizen Barthelemy, who gave it afterwards to the citizen 
 D Affry, who was named landamman of Switzeriand for that vear, (1803 ) 
 The Svviss deputies soon afterwards returned home, when all the cantons 
 sent addresses of thanks to the first consul, and the new constitutions 
 being put m force, the few French troops which had entered Switzeriand 
 finally evacuated the country. 
 
 From that time till 1814 Switzerland enjoyed internal peace. There 
 were at first some ebullitions among the peasantry, especially in the 
 canton of Zurich, when some of the country people refused to take the 
 oath to the new constitution, and at last broke out into open revolt. 
 They were, however, soon put down by the militia, their leaders were 
 sentenced to death, and the disorderiy communes were fined a heavy 
 
if 
 
 254 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period VI. 
 
 id 
 
 
 sum. This was like the last heaving of the revolutioDary wave. During 
 the years of confusion that had passed over Switzerland, the peasantry 
 had attempted to free themselves from the payment of tithes, ground- 
 rents, fines on alienations, and other manorial charges, for popular 
 commotions, generally assume, sooner or later, the shape of resist- 
 ance to payment, whether just or unjust. None of the Swiss govern- 
 ments, however, whether aristocratic or democratic, would sanction 
 Buch an infraction of social contracts : they authorized an equitable com- 
 mutation, but nothing more. Even the property belonging to the 
 convents was restored to them. 
 
 Napoleon's mediation in the affairs of Switzerland was perhaps the 
 most liberal act of his whole political life ; it was certainly the one of 
 which he observed the conditions most faithfully. During the eleven 
 momentous years that followed, throughout the headlong career of his 
 ambition, in the midst of the gigantic wars of the empire, he respected 
 his own work, the independence of Switzerland. That little country, 
 surrounded by immense armies, rested in peace amidst the din of 
 battles, and the crash of falling empires. No foreign soldier stepped 
 over its tranquil boundaries. It was the only remaining asylum on the 
 continent where individual security and freedom were still to be found. 
 The Swiss were the only people exempt from the tyrannical code of the 
 conscription : they furnished, however, a body of 16,000 men to the 
 French service, as they had done under the old monarchy, but it was 
 raised and kept effective by means of voluntary enlistment. When the 
 war broke out again in 1805 between France and Austria, Switzerland 
 received from both powers the assurance that its neutrality should be 
 respected, a promise which was scrupulously maintained. After the 
 peace of Tilsit, however, and still more after that of Schoenbrunn in 
 1809, as Napoleon's plan of universal monarchy seemed to develope 
 itself, the more clear-sighted among the Swiss began to fear for the sta- 
 bility of their institutions ; they dreaded some fresh caprice of the great 
 conqueror, whose tone towards them had become gradually more harsh 
 and imperious. He sharply rebuked the agent of the confederation at 
 Paris for certain expressions used by some deputy or ueputies in one of 
 the diets in speaking of himself and his policy, which he considered as 
 too free and disrespectful. He strongly complained of the cantonal 
 governments suffering Swiss regiments to remain in the pay of Great 
 Britain; although it was well known that the cantons had neither 
 authorized those corps to remain in the English service, nor would they 
 have been obeyed by the officers and soldiers had they recalled them, 
 since those regiments had bound themselves by oaths to serve Great 
 Britain till the peace. Napoleon also insisted on the strict observance 
 on the part of the Swiss of his continental system ; and threatened to 
 enforce it himself by means of his troops, were he to ascertain that any 
 English goods found their way into that country. The Valais, a 
 
 PERIOD VI.] 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 255 
 
 country formerly allied to Switzerland, he finally annexed to the French 
 empire ; and there were rumours that he meditated doing the same with 
 the canton de Vaud, according to his recorded maxim, that all countries 
 of which the inhabitants spoke French belonged naturally to France. 
 Neuch^tel he had already taken from Prussia, and given to Berthier, one 
 of the princes of his empire. 
 
 Meantime, and amidst all the gloomy forebodings which weighed on 
 the minds of reflecting men, Switzerland was making considerable pro- 
 gress in the arts of industry, and in the career of intellectual and social 
 improvement. Manufactories were established in the valleys of the 
 Alps, in Appenzell , Glaris, St. Gall, and other cantons, affording em- 
 ployment and subsistence to the redundant population of those districts, 
 the soil and climate of which are little favourable to agricultural pursuits. 
 The great canal of the Linth, between the lakes of Wallenstadt and 
 Zurich, by which a large extent of marshy ground was drained, was 
 completed by subscriptions to the amount of 1,500,000 francs ; agricul- 
 tural meetings were held, and scientific and literary societies were 
 formed all over Switzerland. Industry and commerce, freed from the 
 shackles of monopoly and municipal jealousy, took a wider range. 
 Schools were established in most cantons for the country people, whose 
 education had been theretofore sadly neglected; the events of late 
 years had begun to teach the Swiss that there can be no real liberty for 
 a nation without general instruction, and no general instruction without 
 a system of wise and national education. A new military organization 
 trained all the young men to the exercise of arms, and settled the 
 quota of men which every canton was to furnish in cases of emergency 
 for the common defence of the country. Many ancient laws, partial or 
 cruel, were abrogated or mitigated. Two celebrated establishments for 
 education, that of Pestalozzi at Yverdun and that of Fellenberg at Hofwyl, 
 owed their origin, or at least their maturity, to the period of which we 
 are speaking. Journals, political and literary, were multiplied at the 
 same time in almost every canton of Switzerland. 
 
 The Russian campaign of 1812 took place too far from Switzerland 
 to affect its tranquillity, but when in the following year the armies of all 
 Europe were assembled in Germany, the Swiss saw with alarm that the 
 tide of war was once more approaching their frontiers. After the battle 
 of Leipzig, in October, 1813, the allied armies came in sight of the Rhine* 
 An extraordinary diet was summoned in the month of November, which 
 issued a proclamation asserting the neutrality of the nineteen cantons , 
 and this was communicated both to Napoleon and to the allied sove- 
 reigns. Some militia were ordered at the same time to guard the fron- 
 tiers of Switzerland on the line of the Rhine. But the allied sovereigns, 
 while they offered to guarantee the neutrality of the cantons, insisted on 
 their troops crossing part of the Swiss territory in order to enter France 
 by its eastern and most vulnerable frontier. They urged that the conflict 
 
256 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period VI 
 
 in which they were engaged was no ordinary war for private interests, 
 but was a rising of Europe in arms to free itself from the intolerable am- 
 bition of one man, who would not allow other nations to remain at peace, 
 or to be masters in their respective countries. They admitted that the 
 Swiss, of all the people of Europe, had perhaps the least reason to be 
 dissatisfied with Napoleon, and accordingly were not called on to take 
 up arms against him ; but on the other hand they were required not to 
 oppose the united nations who were advancing in their own defence to 
 obtain peace by force, since it could not be gained from Napoleon in 
 any other way. On the 19th of December a conference took place at 
 the advanced posts of the allies near Basel, at which count Bubna, the 
 Austrian commander, told the Swiss deputies that the allied troops would 
 enter the Swiss territory on the following day, and proceed to France by 
 the most direct road, and that it now depended on the Swiss authorities 
 whether they would oppose them and be treated as enemies, or allow 
 them to pass and be considered as friends, in which last case the 
 soldiers of the allies should maintain the strictest discipline, and the 
 greatest regard would be paid to Swiss property of every kind. The 
 Swiss authorities in this unavoidable emergency entered into a conven- 
 tion with the Austrian commanders, by which the march of the troops 
 was to be regulated. On the 21st of December, the Austrians entered 
 Basel, and marched into Alsace, whilst others of the allies went through 
 Soleure, Bern, and Vaud to Geneva and Lyons. They behaved, accord- 
 ing to their promise, with marked deference towards the inhabitants. 
 This diversion was of the greatest advantage to the allies for the final 
 campaign of 1814. 
 
 Meantime two envoys of Austria and Russia, MM. Lebzeltern and 
 Capo d*Istria, repaired to Zurich, where the diet was sitting, and de- 
 livered a note from their sovereigns, stating that " the Act of Mediation 
 having been the work of a foreign influence inimical to the rest of 
 Europe, was incompatible with the principles of the great European 
 confederation, and that the allied powers, without pretending to inter- 
 fere in the internal affairs of Switzerland, could not allow that country 
 to remain any longer under the tutelage of the French emperor." Upon 
 this, nine of the old cantons, with Zurich at their head, named deputies 
 who met at Zurich on the 29th of December, and after declaring that 
 the Act of Mediation was dissolved, addressed an invitation to all the other 
 cantons, old and new, acknowledging their independence,, and the in- 
 tegrity of their respective territories, and urging them to send deputies 
 without delay in order to constitute a new federal pact. This liberal 
 and disinterested step on the part of Zurich saved Switzerland from 
 new misfortunes. The invitation was acceded to by all the cantons, 
 with the exception of Bern, Freyburg, and Soleure, who demanded that 
 the old federation of the thirteen cantons should be re-established. Bern 
 had alreadjV assumed a tone of authority towards its former subjects of 
 
 PERIOD VI.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 257 
 
 Vaud and Aargau, and by proclamations, dated 22d and 24th of December, 
 had invited them to return to their allegiance. The two cantons instantly 
 refused compliance. The diet assembled at Zurich laid the foundations 
 of a new federal pact on the basis of the independence of the nineteen 
 cantons, and at the same time sent deputies to the emperor Alexander, 
 the emperor of Austria, and the king of Prussia, who had met at Basel 
 in January, 1814. The new cantons had a powerful advocate in the 
 person of Mr. De la Harpe, a native of Vaud, who had been tutor to the 
 emperor Alexander ; and there is no doubt that the support of that sove- 
 reign saved both Vaud and Aargau at that time from falling again under 
 the rule of Bern, and consequently prevented a reaction over all the rest 
 of Switzerland, and a return to the old system of sovereigns and sub- 
 jects, and of exclusive aristocracies. The results of this beneficial in- 
 fluence were soon felt. The ministers of Austria and Russia addressed 
 a note to the diet, dated the 20th of January, in which they urged that 
 assembly to accelerate the new orgamzation of Switzerland, and to press 
 the dissenting cantons to send their deputies to Zurich for that object. 
 But even after this, Bern, Soleure, and Freyburg persisted in their re- 
 fusal, unless the basis of the old thirteen cantons was first acknowledged. 
 After many discussions and delays, the ministers of Austria, Russia, and 
 Prussia, accredited to the diet, signified in March, 1814, " that their 
 sovereigns were ready to acknowledge the new federal constitution on 
 the basis of the nineteen cantons as then existing." This decided the 
 question, and Bern itself now saw the propriety of no longer refusin"- to 
 send its deputies to the diet. Still many claims and cavils were brought 
 forward by several of the old cantons, which gave rise to long altercations, 
 protests, and counter-protests. Months after months were passed in 
 this manner, until August, 1814, when a strong note was presented by 
 the foreign mmisters, who had now been joined by Mr. Stratford Cannino- 
 minister of Great Britain, in which " they expressed their deep regret 
 that the plan of the new federal pact was not yet fixed, owing to the 
 pretensions assumed by certain cantons, which had thrown discord into 
 the councils of the diet. They exhorted those cantons to lay aside for 
 the present the consideration of all questions which were not of a general 
 mterest, and to set to work with national zeal for the common object of 
 the federal organization of their common country ; upon which condi- 
 tion they, the ministers, promised to exert themselves strenuously to 
 obtain equitable compensations for their just claims, and especially for 
 those of the canton of Bern. Should, however, their present recommen- 
 dation not succeed in restoring unanimity to the national councils, the 
 ministers would find themselves unable to continue their relations with 
 the diet." 
 
 The above note produced a most beneficial eff"ect, for it silenced 
 effectually the unreasonable pretensions of the partisans of the old order 
 of things. At the same sime the allied powers gave another proof of 
 
258 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLANB. 
 
 [period Vh 
 
 their favourable disposition toward Switzerland by restoring to it the 
 territories formerly dependent on the bishop of Basel, which had been 
 annexed to France. These territories, which form a natural portion of 
 Switzerland on the line of the Jura, were annexed to the canton of Bern 
 as a compensation for its losses on the side of Aargau and Vaud. The 
 Valais was likewise reunited to Switzerland, of which it became a can- 
 ton. Neuchatel, being restored to the possession of the king of Prussia, 
 as its suzerain prince, was also at its own request admitted as a canton 
 of the Swiss confederation. Lastly, Geneva, having recovered its inde- 
 pendence by means of the allied arms, requested to become an internal 
 part of Switzerland, of which it had been for ages an ally, and was rea- 
 dily received into the confederation as an additional canton. The new 
 federal pact included, therefore, twenty-two cantons, all equally inde- 
 pendent as sovereign states, and all forming integral parts of one confe- 
 deracy : there were no longer partial allies, no longer subjects, or any 
 other of the anomalies which disfigured and weakened the old Helvetic 
 league. Switzerland was now, what it had never before been, a compact 
 body, resting upon its natural frontiers, the Alps, the Jura, and the 
 Rhine. In this respect the decision of the allied powers in 1814 was 
 much more favourable to Switzerland than Bonaparte's act of mediation 
 of 1803, which, by detaching from it the Valais, Geneva, the bishopric 
 of Basel, and Neuchatel, broke into its boundaries and kept it in a con- 
 dition of weakness and of dependence upon France. Still it may be said 
 that Switzerland was remarkably fortunate in both instances. By the 
 act of mediation she obtained the most favourable terms she could pos- 
 sibly have expected from a man who had in all his decisions a latent 
 thought towards liis own supremacy, or at least towards that of France, 
 and whose friendship always partook of the character of bondage ; while 
 m 1814 the allied powers, having no object of the kind in view, acted 
 more liberally and cordially in strengthening Switzerland as an inde- 
 pendent state, which might form a barrier against any future encroach- 
 ments from France. 
 
 The decision of the allied powers was embodied in a solemn declara- 
 tion, which was inserted in the protocol of the congress of Vienna, dated 
 the 19th of March, 1815, and which was signed by the plenipotentiaries 
 of Austria, France, Great Britain, Prussia, Russia, Sweden, Spain, and 
 Portugal. This document contains " the acknowledgment and guarantee, 
 on the part of all the powers, of the perpetual neutrality of Switzerland 
 within her new frontiers." The diet assembled at Zurich, in acceding 
 cordially to this declaration, expressed " their warmest gratitude for the 
 generous and friendly interference of the allies." 
 
 The return of Bonaparte from Elba caused a temporary alarm in 
 Switzerland. The Swiss felt that they had reason to dread his resent- 
 ment were he to reassume his political ascendancy ; Geneva in parti- 
 cular, which had formed part of his empire, was threatened by his arms ; 
 
 period VI.] 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 259 
 
 but the diet sent troops for its defence, and collected a considerable force 
 on the line of the Jura. An Austrian army, under general Frimont, 
 advanced also by the Simplon and the shores of the lake of Geneva, so 
 as to repel the French attacks in that quarter. Meantime the battle of 
 Waterloo defeated all the schemes of Napoleon, and Switzerland was re- 
 stored to tranquillity and to the consideration of its internal arrange- 
 ments. 
 
 On the 7th of August, 1815, the federal compact of the twenty- two 
 cantons was finally signed by all the deputies in the diet assembled at 
 Zurich. The deputies then repaired in procession to the munster or 
 cathedral of Zurich, where they bound themselves by a solemn oath, and 
 in the name of their constituents, to the faithful observance of its enact- 
 ments. Without transcribing here the whole text of the federal pact 
 which forms to this day the general constitution of Switzerland, and 
 which may be found in Martens's Supplement and other collections of 
 diplomatic and historical documents, we may notice some of its most 
 important provisions. "The twenty -two sovereign cantons of Switzer* 
 land, namely, Zurich, Bern, Luzern, Uri, Schwyz, Unterwalden, Glarus, 
 Zug, Freyburg, Solothurn or Soleure, Basel, Schaffhausen, Appenzell, 
 St. Gallen, the Graubundten or Grisons, Aargau, Thurgau, Ticino, Vaud, 
 Valais, Neuchatel and Geneva, unite for the maintenance of their liberty, 
 their independence, and security against any attacks from abroad, as 
 well as for the preservation of order and tranquillity in the interior. 
 They guarantee each other reciprocally their respective territories. For 
 these purposes a contingent of troops shall be furnished by each canton 
 whenever required, in the proportion of one to fifty of its population. 
 A pecuniary quota for defraying the military and other general expenses 
 of the confederacy shall be paid by each canton in proportion to its pro- 
 perty and resources. A war-fund shall also be formed to meet exigen- 
 cies, and for this purpose a federal duty shall be levied on foreign 
 goods imported into Switzerland, which are not articles of first necessity. 
 The diet fixes the tariff as well as the rates to be paid by each canton." 
 The united federal contingents of all the cantons which must be disci- 
 plined, and furnished with clothes and arms, ready to march when re- 
 quired, amount to about 34,000 men, and the reserve in case of need to 
 as many more. Thus, without keeping any standing army, Switzerland 
 can in a few days assemble nearly 70,000 men for its defence. 
 
 The diet consists of the deputies of the twenty-two cantons, who are 
 chosen by their respective governments, and who vote according to the 
 instructions they have received from their constituents. Each canton 
 has only one vote, although it may send more than one deputy to the 
 diet. The diet meets for its ordinary sessions on the first Monday of 
 July every year, in the chief town of one of the three vororts or directing 
 cantons, Zurich, Bern, and Luzern. Each of these three is vorort by 
 turn for two years. The little council or executive of the directing can- 
 
 s2 
 
260 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period VI. 
 
 ton for the time being, with its landamman or burgomaster at the liead, 
 is intrusted with the direction of the federal affairs during the time that 
 the diet is not assembled. The ordinary sessions of the diet last about 
 five weeks, unless the diet sees reason to declare itself permanent. The 
 diet, before closing its yearly session, gives its instructions to the direct- 
 ing canton. The directing canton is assisted in its duties by a federal 
 chancery, consisting of a chancellor and a secretary, both appointed by 
 the diet. Whenever urgent circumstances may require it, or simply on 
 the demand of five cantons, the directing canton convokes an extraordi- 
 nary session of the diet. 
 
 The diet declares war, concludes peace, and makes alliances with 
 foreign powers, and on these occasions three-fourths of the votes are ne- 
 cessary to constitute a majority. -AH other affairs are decided by simple 
 majority. The diet appoints the diplomatic agents of the confederation. 
 Foreign ministers and agents are accredited to the diet, and during the 
 intervals of its sittings they correspond with the directing canton. The 
 diet provides for the internal and external safety of Switzerland, calls 
 out the federal contingents when it thinks it necessary, appoints the 
 commander in chief, the general staff, and the federal colonels, and di- 
 rects the destination and movements of the federal army. In cases of 
 disputes between two cantons which cannot bo amicably arranged be- 
 tween themselves, the diet appoints an arbitrator, who is assisted by 
 umpires chosen by each of the two disputants from among the magis- 
 trates of another canton : these, after trying a compromise, pass final 
 sentence on the matter in question, which sentence the diet sees carried 
 into effect. No canton is allowed to have recourse to arms against ano- 
 ther canton, and the diet may order the occupation by a federal force of 
 any canton which shall infringe this or any other of the fundamental 
 laws of the federal pact. In cases of internal disturbances within a 
 canton, the diet shall act the part of mediator, and meantime put a stop 
 to violence even by means of military occupation, if necessary. 
 
 It will be seen by the above statement that the federal government 
 of Switzerland is less centralized than that of the United States of 
 North America, or than that of the United Provinces of Holland in former 
 times. There is, properly speaking, no permanent federal executive, 
 like the president of the United States, having officers, a treasurv, and 
 forces at its disposal ; and the diet is merely an assembly of delegates of 
 the various cantons, who decide according to the instructions they re- 
 ceive from their respective governments. 
 
 The other provisions of the federal pact are liberal and equitable in 
 their spirit. One of them states that " the enjoyment of political 
 rights can never in future be the exclusive privilege of any one class of 
 citizens in any one canton. Free importation and exportation of pro- 
 visions, or merchandise, or cattle, shall be allowed from one canton to 
 another, without any import or export duties. The property of 
 
 PERIOD VI.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 261 
 
 cc 
 
 chapters and convents, which exist in several cantons, is guaranteed, but 
 at the same time it is liable to the public charges and taxes like any 
 other private property. 
 
 " This federal pact," says Franscini, as well as other liberal writers, 
 cannot be said to have been imposed upon us by foreign influence. 
 Whatever is in it, whether of good or imperfection, has been the work 
 of the Swiss. It contains principles entirely national, some of which 
 date from the oldest times of Swiss independence, whilst others are 
 taken from the act of mediation of 1803, or are improvements upon 
 the latter." 
 
 Whilst the federal pact was under discussion, most of the cantons 
 were also making alterations in their respective constitutions. The 
 ministers of the allied powers, and especially count Capo d'Istria, 
 minister of Russia, and M. von Schraut, the Austrian minister, while 
 corresponding with the diet on the subject of the general constitution, 
 had adverted to the expediency of making some alterations in the can- 
 tonal constitutions, so as to render them more analogous in principle to 
 each other, and more conciliatory to the interests of the various classes 
 and parties existing in Switzerland. It was suggested by the ministers 
 that, leaving the pure democracies untouched, the aristocratic or town 
 cantons, several of which had, in the first moments of reaction, re-esta- 
 blished their former institutions which existed previous to 1198, should 
 recognise the principle of community of political rights between town 
 and country, and that the new cantons on their part should admit 
 modifications in their mode of elections and the formation of their legis- 
 latures, so as to give a greater influence to property, and a greater sta- 
 bility to their governments. Conferences took place between Count 
 Capo d'Istria and the deputies of several of .the new cantons, especially 
 those of Vaud, in which the general principle of the alterations sug- 
 gested was discussed. The various cantons appointed commissions to 
 revise their respective constitutions, and this labour being completed in 
 the course of 1814, the new cantonal constitutions were laid before the 
 diet, by which they were guaranteed, and copies of them were deposited 
 in the federal archives. 
 
 The constitutions of the twenty-two cantons, as established in 1814, 
 might be ranged into three classes, according to the prevailing principle 
 of each. The first class is that of the pure democracies which remained 
 unaltered in their principle. The cantons thus constituted are the old 
 mountain cantons, namely Schwyz, Uri, Unterwalden, Glarus, Zug, and 
 Appenzell. To these may be added two more cantons, the Orisons and 
 the Valais, which were formerly only allies of the Swiss, but are now, as 
 we have seen, integral parts of the confederation. These two states are 
 composed of a number of small democracies, one in each valley, having 
 each its own councils and magistrates, who administer all internal 
 affairs, and who send deputies to a great council or cantonal diet which 
 
262 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period vr. 
 
 exercises the higher legislative powers in matters concerning the whole 
 state. The laws, however, which emanate from this great council are 
 submitted to the approbation of the assemblies of the people of each 
 valley or district. These states, in short, constitute confederations in 
 miniature, similar to the great Swiss confederation of which they form 
 a part. In the Valais the forms are less democratic than in the 
 Grisons, the lower Valais not having an equality of votes with the upper 
 Valais, indeed it will be remembered that previous to 1798 the lower 
 Valaisans were subjects of the upper or German Valais. The bishop of 
 Sion has also a vote in the general diet of the Valais. In the Grisons, 
 on the contrary, a system of perfect equality exists between the inhabit- 
 ants of the numerous vallies or districts of that Alpine region. 
 
 The second class of cantons consists of those in which aristocratic 
 privileges had been enjoyed for centuries by the principal town of the 
 respective canton, or in some instances by a particular or patrician class 
 of the inhabitants of the head town. These cantons are seven in 
 number; namely, Zurich, Bern, Freyburg, Soleure, Luzern, Basel, and 
 Schaffhausen. All these were originally, as it has been already seen, free 
 imperial towns and places of refuge in the middle ages against feudal 
 oppression. We have seen also how, after the declaration of independ- 
 ence by the three Waldstatten or forest cantons, these imperial towns, one 
 after the other, renounced their allegiance to the empire and joined the 
 confederation. In their new condition of sovereign independent states, 
 their municipal administration continued to form the basis of their 
 constitution ; and thus the trades or corporations in one town, or the 
 patrician families in another, furnished the members to the legislative 
 and executive councils. The country districts, being mostly conquered 
 or purchased from the neighbouring barons, transferred their allegiance 
 to their new masters of the towns, and they were decidedly gainers by 
 the exchange. But as, in the course of ages, the country districts grew 
 in wealth, population, and industry, and villages became flourishing 
 little towns, the inhabitants began to murmur at the exclusive privileges 
 of the cities. This led to tumults and insurrections, and this feeling^'of 
 discord mainly contributed to the catastrophe of 1798. By the Act of 
 mediation of 1803 all exclusive privileges were abolished, but the qua- 
 lifications required of the candidates for seats in the councils, joined to 
 the duration for life of the office of councillor, secured a considerable 
 influence to men of property and of old families. In 1814 the towns, 
 or at least a party in each of them, strove to resume their former autho- 
 rity over the country, but owing to the resistance they met with, and 
 still more perhaps to the conciliatory suggestions of the foreign minis- 
 ters, a compromise was entered into, and the towns agreed that the 
 country districts of each canton should return about one-third of the 
 members of the legislature. All monopolies which formerly fettered 
 trade and industry had been abolished, and were not revived. The 
 
 PERIOD VI.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 263 
 
 towns acknowledged the principle of political rights being common to 
 all classes in the state, but at the same time, by retaining the majority 
 of the seats in the councils for themselves, they were enabled to legislate 
 for the rest of the country, and often in spite of it, and they likewise 
 retained the disposal of offices and emoluments in their own hands. 
 The town of Zurich, for instance, returned 130 members to the great 
 council, and the rest of the canton eighty-two. The town of Basel returned 
 ninety members out of 154. That of Schaffhausen forty-eight out of 
 seventy-four. Bern 200 out of 299. Luzern fifty out of 100. Soleure 
 sixty-eight out of 101. Freyburg 108 out of 144. In this last canton alone 
 an aristocracy of patrician families was recognized by the law, and the 
 members for the capital were to be selected from among those families. 
 In all other cantons there was no aristocracy de jure, hut all the cit zens 
 were admissible into the councils. So far the constitutions of 1814, with 
 the exception of that of Freyburg, retained the principle of equality of 
 rights as acknowledged by the Act of mediation, but they circumscribed 
 it materially in practice with regard to the country districts, and also by 
 the mode of the elections. The qualifications for members were likewise 
 considerably high. Still the constitutions of 1814 were more equitable 
 in their principle, in all the town cantons, not excepting Freyburg, 
 than the former exclusive ones which had existed previously to 1798. 
 
 The third class was that of the new cantons formed since 1803 out of 
 the former subject districts or bailiwicks ; namely, Aargau, Thurgau, 
 Vaud, Ticino, and St. Gall. The constitutions of these, as settled by 
 the act of mediation, were popular, and framed on the principle of 
 equality of rights among all classes of the citizens of each canton. The 
 canton was divided into circles, and the electors of each circle sent three 
 members, having certain moderate qualifications, to the legislative 
 council. The duration of their functions, unlike that of the councillors 
 in the town cantons, was limited. The distinction between the three 
 powers, legislative, executive, and judicial, was strictly defined. These 
 constitutions were remodelled in 1814, and a curious system of elections 
 was then established, contrived, as it was said, to give to property a 
 greater influence in the state. The great or legislative council was re- 
 newed one-third at a time, and at fixed periods. The mode of elec- 
 tions was triple : one-third of the new members was elected directly by 
 the assemblies of the circles as heretofore. These assemblies furnished 
 besides a list of four candidates for each circle possessed of a higher 
 qualification than the directly chosen members, and out of these lists 
 the great council itself chose one member for each circle ; and thus 
 another third of the vacant seats was filled. Lastly, an electoral com- 
 mission, composed of the council of state or executive, of the judges of 
 the high court of appeal, and of a certain number of other members of 
 the great council, chose the remaining third chiefly from among the 
 wealthier landed proprietors. The duration of the functions of each 
 
264 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period VI. 
 
 member was in some cantons of twelve years, in some of eight, in others 
 
 of six ; but in all the members could be re-elected. The great council 
 
 chose the members of the executive and of the higher court of appeal 
 
 out of its own body, and the members thus chosen continued to sit as 
 
 legislators. The right of proposing measures belonged exclusively to 
 
 the council of state or executive, whose projects of law could only be 
 
 either accepted or rejected by the great council, but not amended. The 
 
 consequence of this system was that the new cantons, while professing 
 
 to be popular in opposition to the old aristocratic ones, were ruled in 
 
 fact by a certain junto of individuals, who having once secured their 
 
 seats, elected or re-elected their friends as their colleagues, who, in their 
 
 turn, re-elected them, and thus a self-electing majority was perpetuated. 
 
 In the old aristocratic cantons considerable concessions at least had 
 
 been made to the classes previously excluded from all share in the 
 
 government, while the new cantons, created of yesterday in the name of 
 
 the people, were now retrograding into a sort of oligarchic system, for 
 
 which no precedent or prescription could be alleged. 
 
 Two more cantons, completing the number of twenty-two, have not 
 been mentioned in the above sketch. One is Geneva, formerly an ally 
 of Switzerland, afterwards incorporated with France, and at length re- 
 stored to its independence by the allied sovereigns, and received into 
 the bosom of the Swiss confederation. The institutions of this little 
 state, which formerly resembled those of the aristocratic cantons, were 
 modified in 1814 so as to give the elective franchise to all the citizens, 
 but then the nomination of part of the legislature was left to an electoral 
 body composed of the actual and late members of the great council, 
 with the addition of some elders and clergymen. The mode of election 
 and the formation of the councils resembled those of the other new 
 cantons. The last canton which remains to be mentioned is Neuchatel, 
 which being restored in 1814 to the king of Prussia as its prince, was' 
 at the same time, and at its own request, admitted into the Swiss con- 
 federation as one of the Swiss cantons. The constitution of Neuchatel is 
 peculiar, but its main principle is that of a constitutional monarchy. 
 The king of Prussia, as prince of Neuchatel, swears on his accession to 
 maintain the constitutional rights of the country : he cannot appoint 
 any but natives to civil or military offices, with the single exception of 
 the governor, or king's lieutenant, who is generally a Prussian officer. 
 No one can be dismissed from his employment, except for misconduct 
 or incapacity, proved on trial before the proper court. No native of 
 Neuchatel can be tried out of his country, and the persons and pro- 
 perties of all are protected by the laws. ' Commerce is perfectly free: 
 every one can leave the country or return whenever he pleases, or settle 
 anywhere without losing his rights as a citizen. Foreigners may settle 
 in the canton, and enjoy the same protection as natives. No new tax 
 can be levied, and no law can be enacted or abrogated without the ap- 
 
 j^riod VI.] 
 
 history of SWITZERLAND. 
 
 265 
 
 probation of the national representatives assembled in the " General 
 Audiences." This assembly is composed of seventy-five members, 
 sixty-five of whom are elected by the suffrages of the distinct assem- 
 blies of all the people, with the exception of paupers, bankrupts, and 
 condemned criminals. The other ten are appointed by the prince. 
 Formerly the prince appointed forty-five of the members, which con- 
 stituted the majority, but the present king of Prussia, after his restora- 
 tion to the principality, reduced of his own accord the number to ten, 
 giving the nomination of the rest to the people. The sessions of the 
 Audiences are opened and closed by the lieutenant of the prince, but 
 not more than two years must elapse between the closing of one session 
 and the opening of the next. The prince has the executive power, which 
 is exercised in his name by his lieutenant, and a council of state ; and 
 he appoints the judges, mayors, and other public officers. Sentences 
 in criminal matters must be approved by the executive, the prince having 
 the power of mitigating the penalty. The towns of Neuchatel and 
 Valengin have municipal privileges, and they appoint their own 
 councils and magistrates for local matters. 
 
 Such are the outlines of the constitution of this little state or princi- 
 pality, by which it has risen to a remarkable degree of prosperity under 
 the protection of the princes of the house of Brandenburg, who have been 
 its sovereigns for more than a century. When, in 1815, Neuchatel was 
 received into the Swiss confederation as a canton, its institutions as a 
 principality remained unaltered ; it was a constitutional monarchy which 
 became allied by permanent federal bonds to the republican states of 
 Switzerland, retaining like them its independence as a sovereign state, 
 and its peculiar form of government. This ought to be borne in mind 
 whenever any discussions arise in the federal diet concerning the in- 
 ternal affairs of Neuchatel 
 
 The authorities for the 6th period are very numerous : they consist 
 chiefly of extracts from the political pamphlets and newspapers of the 
 times ; among others the French Moiiiteur, the orders of the day, and 
 dispatches of the French generals in Switzerland ; the acts and state 
 documents of the various authorities which succeeded each other in that 
 country ; the correspondence of Mengaud, general Montesquiou, &c., 
 with the executive at Paris ; and for later events, Thibaudeau's Memoires 
 du Consulat ; and for those which followed Napoleon's abdication, the' 
 Memoire Historique sur la Constitution du 4 Aout, avec nn Appergu des 
 autres Constitutions qui ont regi le Canton de Vaud depuis 1798, 
 considerees essentiellement sous le Rapport du Systeme Electoral ; pre- 
 sente par le Conseil d'Etat au Grand Conseil du Canton de Vaud dans 
 
266 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period VI. 
 
 la Semon de 1830, containing a well- written recapitulation of the neffo- 
 tiations between the allied powers and the Swiss cantons in 1814-15 
 Among the professed historical narratives of the calamitous invasion of 
 Switzerland by the French in 1798, two deserve to be mentioned- 
 namely, Geschichte vom Kampf und vniergaiig der Schweilzerischen 
 Berg mid Wald Kantone, hesonders der alien eydgenoss, Kantotu 
 Schwytz; by H. Zschokke; and Mallet du Pan, £..«z i//./anW swr 
 ia Destruction de la Ligue et de la Liberie Helvetique, Londres 1798 
 
 SEVENTH PERIOD, 
 
 PROM THE NEW FEDERAL PACT OF 1815, TO THE INTERNAL CHANGES 
 WHICH HAVE TAKEN PLACE IN THE CONSTITUTIONS OF MOST OF THE 
 CANTONS IN 1830 8. 
 
 During the fifteen years which elapsed from 1815 to 1830, Switzerland 
 enjoyed profound tranquillity. The general condition of the country 
 might be called prosperous ; the anomalies which we have described as 
 existing in the institutions of many of the cantons were felt and com- 
 mented upon as matters of speculative politics ; there were no acts of 
 crying oppression on the part of those who had seized the helm of the 
 government, but there was a want of improvement and a general languor 
 in the administration. The civil and criminal laws, in most cantons, 
 remained as they had been of old, defective and encumbered with the 
 rust of the middle ages. The education was improved in several districts, 
 but not all over the country, no general system of popular instruction 
 being enforced. The press was in most of the cantons under a strict 
 censorship. The sittings of the cantonal councils, and of the federal 
 diet, were kept close, and no report of their discussions was published. 
 In short, most of the Swiss states, although under republican names and 
 forms, were really less popular in their institutions than several of the 
 constitutional monarchies of Europe. The same men remained in power 
 and office, as if they had been appointed for life. Petitions were from 
 time to time presented in several cantons for the revision of the consti- 
 tutions of 1814, but were everywhere rejected by the councils. The 
 first alteration of this state of things took place in the canton of Ticiiio 
 in May and June, 1830. Thus it cannot be said that the reform in 
 Switzerland was altogether a consequence of the French revolution of 
 July of that year, as it had already begun before that event, which, 
 however, hastened its progress in the other cantons. It must be observed, 
 also, that the abuses in the government of Ticino seem to have been 
 of a graver character, or at least to have led to graver consequences, 
 than in the rest of Switzerland. From the statements published at the 
 time, it would appear that great corruption prevailed in the councils ; 
 that offices were openly sold ; that bribery was used to influence the 
 courts of justice ; and that men were kept in prison for years without 
 
268 
 
 niSTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period VII. 
 
 PERIOD VII.] 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 269 
 
 i:.| 
 
 being tried. The canton of Ticino is also one of those in which the intel- 
 lectual and moral condition of the mass of the people stands lowest. 
 
 On the 1st of May, 1830, the commune of Lugano assembled accord- 
 ing to the existing forms, in order to elect its municipal magistrates. 
 Alter the election, the syndic Luvini, in returning thanks, spoke of the 
 general wish of the people for a reform in the constitution. The 
 assembly applauded, and the speech was printed and distributed. The 
 other communal assemblies followed the example of Lugano and ex- 
 pressed similar sentiments. Some members of the executive council 
 proposed measures to repress these manifestations of the popular will 
 but the council refused to adopt them. The legislative council assem- 
 bled according to custom on the 7th of June, and the president, Lotti, 
 spoke m favour of reform. The executive council then, by virtue of its 
 exclusive right of propounding measures, proposed a project of constitu- 
 ion on liberal principles, which, after a long discussion, was adopted by 
 the legislature, and submitted to the general assemblies of the districts 
 Nvho sanctioned it ; after which the new constitutional law was proclaimed! 
 It established the direct system of electing all the members of the legis- 
 lature, the elections to take place every four years. The members of tlie 
 executive, and those of the upper courts of justice, cannot be at the 
 same time members of the legislative council. Members of the lc<rislature 
 are not to fill any situations under the executive. The sittinas of the 
 legislative council are public. The liberty of the press, the inv^iolability 
 of persons, and the right of petition are guaranteed. No tax can be 
 imposed iinless it is sanctioned by a majority of two-thirds in the -reat 
 council. The present constitution cannot be modified until twelve years 
 shall have elapsed from its enactment, and then any alterations proposed 
 Veo^r '""^""'"'^ ^' ^^' W^oval of the primary assemblies of the 
 
 Such are the fundamental principles which were first adopted bv the 
 canton of Ticino, and have been since promulgated in all the other 
 representative cantons of Switzerland. Equality of political rights 
 among all the citizens of the state, direct elections of the member^ of 
 the legislature, duration of their functions limited to a certain number 
 of years separation of the three powers, legislative, executive, and judi- 
 calpubliciy of debates, liberty of the press, subject to fixed laws against 
 ibels, inviolability of person and property, and the right of petLn • 
 these seem all to be essential to the very nature of a republican govern^ 
 ment,altnough no republic, in Europe at least, whether in ancient or 
 modern times ever before acknowledged them or practised them to their 
 full extent In all former republics, whether of antiquity, of the middle 
 ages or of n.odem times, whether in Italy, Switzerland, Germany, or 
 Holland, or m the ephemeral republics raised by the French at the end 
 of the last century, political rights have been the exclusive portion of 
 one ckss or portion of the community, the mode of election has been 
 
 vicious in the extreme, and individual liberty and security have never 
 been the lot of the whole people. The very name of republic was in 
 contradiction to the existing practice of those governments.* 
 
 The example given by the canton of Ticino, being followed by the 
 events of Paris, which partly removed the fears which the Swiss might 
 have entertained of any foreign interference in their internal afi"airs, 
 decided the movements in the other cantons. Towards the end of 1830, 
 the councils of Aargau and Vaud, after some popular tumults, which, 
 however, were unattended by bloodshed, were obliged by the public 
 voice to appoint commissions in order to frame a new constitution ; and 
 this was done on a basis similar to that of the Ticino. Thurgau and St. 
 Gall did the same, but in a more quiet and conciliatory spirit. In the 
 old aristocratic or town cantons the opposition was stronger. The 
 struggle was not only, as of old, for an equality of rights between town 
 and country, but the towns were also divided within themselves, many 
 of the citizens wishing for a system of direct elections, and a more 
 general distribution of offices. At Zurich, a petition from the country 
 districts was addressed to the burgomaster or chief magistrate, demand- 
 ing a revision of the constitution, for the sake of a more equal distribu- 
 tion of rights between town and country. After much debate in the 
 great council, a committee was appointed, which framed a new plan of 
 elections, by which the country should return two-thirds of the mem- 
 bers and the town of Zurich one-third. It was argued that, although 
 the town did not constitute more than one-thirteenth of the population 
 of the whole canton, yet, in consideration of its superior wealth and 
 industry, the large share it bore of the public taxes, of its public institu- 
 tions and benevolent foundations, and lastly, of its decided superiority 
 in intelligence and instruction, it ought, in justice to itself as well as for 
 the general advantage of the country, to have a preponderant share of 
 the representation, without regard to the mere calculation of numerical 
 proportion. To this the country people agreed, and the same principle 
 was also adopted in the new constitutions of the other town cantons, 
 such as Luzern, Basel, Schafi"hausen, &c. It was not thought prudent 
 to leave the towns, in which most of the wealth and resources of the 
 state were centred, entirely at the mercy of the country people, whose 
 ignorance, jealousy, and recollection of former grievances, might be 
 easily inflamed by designing men, and might break forth into measures 
 of violence, by which the property and the very existence of the towns 
 might be endangered. And that this supposition was not unfounded, 
 the example of Basel soon after proved. Basel is the wealthiest town 
 in Switzerland ; large capitalists, merchants, and manufacturers reside 
 in it ; it paid three-fourths of the whole taxation of the canton ; it has 
 
 * The mountain cantons of Switzerland may he considered as an excei)tion from 
 the ahove general remark, but they were pure, and not representative, democracies — 
 a form of government suited only to small districts ; and, besides, they also had their 
 subjects • 
 
270 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period VII. 
 
 a university, library, hospitals, houses for the destitute, &c. By the old 
 constitution of 1814, the city of Basel returned ninety members to the 
 legislature, and the rest of the country sixty-four. A plan of reform, 
 drawn out in 1830 by a commission composed one-half of townsmen 
 and the other half of deputies from the country, proposed to give the 
 country seventy-nine members, and seventy-five to the town; it adopted 
 the direct system of election, it limited the tenure of office, and recog- 
 nized the other chief principles of a truly popular constitution. The 
 deputies of the country, who had concurred in the formation of this plan, 
 highly approved of it, as consonant with justice and the general welfare. 
 But some malcontents at Licchstall summoned a landsgemeinde, or 
 general assembly, of the whole rural population, a thing unknown to the 
 constitution of a representative canton ; and then, having armed a number 
 of partisans, sent a summons to the town, demanding that five-sevenths 
 of the members of the great council should be named by the country, 
 and that a constituent assembly should be formed on this'basis in order 
 to frame a totally new constitution. An answer to this message was 
 demanded in twenty-four hours. Meantime some thousands of peasants 
 drew near the town and compelled several communes to join them. 
 The old councils, and the other constituted authorities, were still in 
 existence, until the plan of reform should be sanctioned by the people 
 assembled in their different communes. The insurrection of Liechstall 
 was therefore considered a rebellion, and the citizens of Basel armed 
 themselves to defend their town and their houses against the armed 
 peasants. The latter having advanced close upon the ramparts were 
 repulsed by the artillery with some loss on their part, and a sortie being 
 made by the town militia, the insurgents soon dispersed themselves ; 
 several of the leaders ran away ; Liechstall was occupied without oppo^ 
 sition ; a few of the insurgents were put in prison, but were soon after 
 sent back to their homes, under the surveillance of the police. No im- 
 portant results ensued. When order was restored throughout the 
 country, the plan of reform was laid before the people assembled in their 
 respective communes, seven-eighths of which voted for its adoption, and 
 the reformed constitution was therefore proclaimed in February, 1831. 
 Some of the insurgents of Liechstall, however, who had fled into Aargau^ 
 Zurich, Luzern, and other cantons, represented to the country people of 
 those districts, who were themselves in a state of agitation, that their 
 cause was all one and the same, that it was the old dispute between 
 town and country, that it was time to put down " the purse-proud citi- 
 zens" by destroying " that rampart of higher aristocracv, Basel," razing 
 Its walls, and bringing its « tartuffes and miliiojinaires'' to their senses 
 Such were the sentiments received with acclamations at several m.eetings 
 which took place in various cantons, among others at AVadenschwyl in 
 the canton of Zurich, and at Sursee in that of Luzern. The old insur- 
 gents of Liechstall, encouraged by these demonstrations, again took up 
 arms, and were joined by some disbanded Swiss soldiers who liad re- 
 
 PERIOD VII.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 2'71 
 
 turned from the French service. The insurgents asserted that the new 
 constitution had been voted by the people under the influence of fear, 
 and they demanded a new convocation of the primary assemblies. The 
 government of Basel sent out its town militia, which marched against 
 Liechstall, but falling into an ambuscade of the insurgents, had several 
 men killed and wounded, and was obliged to retire. The insurgents 
 now obtained the sway over the greater part of the country districts, 
 forced the peaceful inhabitants of several communes to join them, ill- 
 treated those who refused, levied contributions, and then set up a form 
 ofprovisional government at Liechstall. This was in the summer of 
 1831. 
 
 At Bern, after numerous meetings in several parts of the canton had 
 demanded a more popular system of elections, the executive council 
 proposed to appoint a committee to receive petitions from the communes 
 and report thereupon. This was approved of by the legislative council, 
 and a committee of eleven members being appointed, made its report in 
 January, 1831. It embodied the substance of the numerous petitions 
 which the committee had received, praying, among other things, for the 
 total abolition of all remaining privileges of persons and families, exten- 
 sion of the right of election in favour of the country districts, direct 
 nomination of members in town and country, abolition of the censorship, 
 and enactment of a law against the abuses of the press, a municipal 
 organization of the communes, with the right of choosing their own 
 magistrates, the convocation of a synod of the national Protestant church 
 to watch over its discipline and its interests, a revision of the act of 
 annexation of the districts formerly belonging to the bishop of Basel, 
 publicity ofdebates, right of petition, division of the three powers, and 
 the periodical election for the officers of the state. On the 13th of Ja- 
 nuary, the great council resigned its right of discussing the project of a 
 new constitution, and a constituent council ad hoc was appointed in its 
 stead. The labours of this body lasted till the following summer. 
 Meantime the old executive and subordinate authorities remained pro 
 tempore, and everything went on regularly as before. The plan of the 
 new constitution being completed, was submitted to the assemblies of 
 the communes and approved of by great majorities. When the new 
 elections took place, several of the old patricians refused to take the 
 oath to the new constitution, and thus debarred themselves from being 
 elected, and some who were requested to offer themselves as candidates 
 refused. The consequence was their total loss of influence, and a cor- 
 responding predominance of the opposite extreme. Before the old councils 
 were dissolved, they pul)libhed a report of their administration for the 
 preceding seventeen years, from 1814 to 1831. This report, which fills 
 582 octavo pages of text, and 200 pages of appendix, abundantly proves 
 that which few people acquainted with Bern would attempt to question, 
 namely, that whatever might be thought of the political principle on 
 which the government of the country was instituted, the administration 
 
272 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period VII. 
 
 had been carried on in an honourable, economical, and liberal 
 spirit. 
 
 At Freyburg the resistance of the old government was greater than at 
 Bern, and was proportionate to the greater degree of political as well as 
 religious exclusiveness which has long characterized that canton. The 
 roads of Freyburg were proverbially bad, little industry or trade existed 
 in the country, the education was exclusively in the hands of the priests 
 and the Jesuits. A liberal-minded clergyman, Father Girard, had esta- 
 blished elementary schools according to the method of mutual instruction, 
 having previously obtained the consent of the municipal authorities of 
 the town of Freyburg, when the little council issued an order suppressing 
 them. Freyburg was called, among the people of the other cantons, 
 " The little Spain of Switzerland." In November, 1830, a strong spirit 
 of opposition broke out among the country people, to which the councils, 
 after some show of resistance, were obliged to yield ; and a constituent 
 assembly was appointed to frame a new constitution on a plan resem- 
 bling that of Bern, Luzern, and the other town cantons. 
 
 In the midst of all these changes, the meeting of the federal diet for 
 1831 took place at Luzern on the 4th of July. The president of the 
 vorort, avoyer Amrhyn, opened the session by a temperate and guarded 
 speech, in which he stated that the neutrality of Switzerland continued 
 to be respected by all the powers, and that the king of Prussia, among 
 the rest, had expressed a peculiar interest in the welfare of the Swiss 
 nation, with which he was especially connected as prince of Neuchatel. 
 A treaty had been negotiated with France for the payment of the Swiss 
 regiments lately in that service which were disbanded after the events 
 of July, 1830. A correspondence had taken place with the Sardinian 
 and Austrian governments on the subject of the Italian political refugees, 
 and the federal directory had undertaken " to fix the right of asylum 
 within proper bounds." Passing on to the internal changes in the 
 various cantons, the president hoped that copies of all the new cantonal 
 constitutions would be deposited in the federal archives during the 
 session, and thus placed under the guarantee of the federal authority. 
 He briefly adverted to the changes which had taken place at Bern, the 
 Valais, and other cantons, and was happy to see that tranquillity was 
 everywhere restored, except, indeed, at Schwytz, where the contest between 
 old Schwytz and the exterior districts, concerning certain pohtical pre- 
 rogatives not equally enjoyed by all, threatened to end in a separation. 
 
 After the president's speech, the deputies, having saluted each other 
 according to the old federal custom, proceeded to give each in his turn a 
 short declaration of the general sentiments of their constituents : — 
 
 1. Luzern, having already spoken by the organ of its chief magistrate, 
 the president of the diet, 
 
 2. The deputy of Zurich rose and said that he hoped that wisdom and 
 generosity would soon cause all late dissensions to be forgotten. He 
 wished to see the bond between the confederates drawn closer, without. 
 
 PERIOD VII.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 273 
 
 however, infringing on the respective independence of each canton 
 within its own territory. 
 
 3. The deputy of Bern expressed fears lest the spirit of discord should 
 interrupt the former tranquillity and happiness of their common laud. 
 
 4. The deputy of Uri could not help fearing that, amidst so many new 
 governments springing up on every side, peace would be endangered, 
 notwithstanding the assurances of concord which resounded throughout 
 that hall. " Out of two-and-twenty families inhabiting a common man- 
 sion, some have taken to hve and dress after a new fashion, whilst the 
 rest continue faithful to the manners of their forefathers. This does not 
 seem to promise much union amongst them. The licentiousness of the 
 press, secret societies, and a system of slander against all loyal men ; 
 such are the means resorted to, and yet we talk of the union of Switzer- 
 land 1" 
 
 5. Schwytz complained of the many calumnies that had been uttered 
 against the ancient district of Schwytz. 
 
 6. Unterwalden : " The descendants of Winkelried are ever ready to 
 make any sacrifice required by their common country. They have lived 
 free and happy for five centuries, and they ardently wish that all the 
 Swiss may enjoy the same blessings." 
 
 7. Glarus : ** This day used to be once a day of rejoicing, but now 
 we have neither peace nor confidence. In many a foreign country the 
 popular movements have occasioned serious calamities. That which till 
 now appeared certain has become doubtful ; things which were held 
 most sacred have been swept away. May this latter prove useful to our 
 country, and may Providence teach us to discern between those prin- 
 ciples which are durable and those which are only illusory." 
 
 8. Zug: "The Swiss people, notwithstanding some errors, have 
 shown themselves generous and good. We must not forget that Swiss 
 liberty had its birth on a field of battle. The Swiss are little skilled in 
 diplomatic mysteries. May a common interest animate us all, and a 
 closer bond unite us together." 
 
 9. Freyburg : " The existing federal pact is sufficient, and Freyburg 
 will fulfil all its provisions : no more can be demanded. Let us not give 
 way to desponding forebodings, as if all were over with our confedera- 
 tion, as if the diet were now assembled for the last time. Freyburg re- 
 jects the omen ; we shall all be brethren in the hour of danger." 
 
 10. Soleure : " The people of Soleure have shown themselves de- 
 serving of liberty, and they are ready to make any sacrifices to maintain 
 it. Some wish for a greater centralization of the federal power, but the 
 people will not easily part with their newly acquired sovereignty, and 
 the greatest caution is therefore required in urging this point." 
 
 11. Basle congratulated the deputies on their meeting once more for 
 the common interests of their country. 
 
 12. Schaffhausen : " It is a consolation that, on the important ques- 
 
 T 
 
274 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 ^Ml 
 
 * 
 
 [[period VII. 
 
 tion of our independence towards the stranger, but one opinion prevails. 
 Brothers may be divided concerning the internal division of their com- 
 mon dwelling, but they would all unite in defending the building which 
 has protected their infancv." 
 
 13. Appenzell : " Every man of Appenzell is resolved to sacrifice 
 everything for the sake of our common country. Circumstances are 
 critical ; time moves on, and we must move along with it." 
 
 14. St. Gall : " The people want a closer connexion with their 
 governments ; they will no longer have masters. A new career opens for 
 Switzerland ; that which is not yet reformed moves rapidly towards re- 
 form. May this spirit which manifests itself among the people serve to 
 maintain our external independence, and at the same time ameliorate 
 our internal institutions." 
 
 15. The Grisons: "Our canton congratulates the various cantons 
 newly constituted upon their close approximation to the constitution of 
 the Grisons. Discord still rages in some districts; the unbounded 
 licence of the press is a great evil ; but we trust in the firmness and 
 wisdom of the federal assembly. The Grisons are ready to co-operate 
 with their confederates in all that is stipulated by the federal pact." 
 
 16. Aargau: "After some lamentable occurrences, the people of 
 Aargau have accepted a new constitution, and they .are ready to support 
 any measure towards drawing closer the federal bond." 
 
 17. Thurgau: " This canton also has sanctioned a new constitution, 
 wished for, not in consequence of any acts of oppression of the former 
 ?overnment, which was loyal and good, but because the old institutions 
 checked our intellectual developement. The most perfect tranquillity 
 prevails now among us. We shall do everything in our power to defend 
 the independence of our common country." 
 
 18. Ticino: '*Our new institutions have rendered. our country still 
 dearer to our people, who are resolved to do all for its defence." 
 
 19. Vaud expressed wishes for internal peace, and that Switzerland 
 may be united and strong against any attempt of the stranger. 
 
 20. Valais alluded to the past disturbances in the canton, which were 
 terminated. It rejected every idea of centralization, which was suspi- 
 cious and ill-timed. " We will not purchase our regeneration at the ex- 
 pense of our annihilation ; we must be circumspect in amelioratino- our 
 institutions; we must oppose idealism and ultra-liberalism : the former 
 regardless of what exists, traces its fanciful plans with charcoal, the lines 
 of which are soon effaced ; the latter mistrusts all power, and sees 
 nothing but abuses in authority of every kind." 
 
 21. Neuchatel recommended moderation. 
 
 22. Geneva saw ameliorations wanted in the military organization of 
 the countr)', in order not to be taken by surprise. 
 
 The affairs of Basle were among the first to occupv the attention of 
 the diet. The insurgents of Liechstall, joined by turbulent men from 
 
 PERIOD VII.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 275 
 
 Other parts, had occupied the greater part of the canton, and were at 
 open war with the citizens of the town. This state of things could not 
 be allowed to continue, for it disturbed the peace of all Switzerland. The 
 diet sent commissioners, who however obtained no influence over the 
 minds of the insurgents. The diet then ordered several battalions of 
 federal militia to march into the canton of Basle. The insurgents being 
 summoned to disperse, refused, and the troops occupied Liechstall, 
 broke up the insurgent convention, and arrested several of the leaders. 
 Dangerous symptoms, of what has been styled political sympathy mani- 
 fested themselves among the peasantry of other cantons towards the 
 Liechstall insurgents. At Zurich, a battalion of country militia, being 
 ordered to march towards the canton of Basle, declared that they would 
 not fight against their brethren of Liechstall. When the commanding 
 officer tried to check the tumult, which was partly owing to intoxication, 
 the soldiers cried out that they were free men. This took place in 
 September 1831. In the end it was found necessary to divide the 
 canton of Basle into two separate states. 
 
 At Neuchatel also a civil war broke out. A party of men, excited by 
 the movement in the neighbouring cantons, conceived the idea of 
 changing the institutions of that country from a constitutional princi- 
 pality into a democratic republic, and throwing off the allegiance to the 
 king of Prussia. This was a matter of no easy accomplishment. 
 Among their first demands were reforms in the legislative assembly, the 
 abolition of the municipal privileges of the towns and of some remains 
 of feudal usages in the country, and publicity of debates. The king of 
 Prussia, informed of these demands, sent a commissioner. Von Pfuhl, to 
 inquire into the real wants and wishes of the population. The commis- 
 sioner went round the different districts, listened to the various com- 
 plaints, promised, and indeed effected, several alterations in the ad- 
 ministration, and then returned to Berlin to make his report to the 
 king. After his departure a body of country people, principally from the 
 Val de Travers, led by some men of a higher rank, rose in arms, 
 marched upon the town of Neuchatel, took possession of the castle, 
 turned the cannon upon the town, and then demanded a general as- 
 sembly of the people, for the purpose of voting upon the question of 
 separation from Prussia. But there was a strong party at Neuchatel, 
 Valengin, and several of the country districts, such as Les Ponts, Val de 
 Ruz, and La Sagne, who had no wish for a separation ; they armed in 
 their turn, and the civil war began. Commissioners were sent with a 
 body of federal troops to force the insurgents to give up the castle, 
 which they did after some show of resistance : the leaders of the insur- 
 rection then left the country. This was in the summer of 1831. In 
 October of that year, the legislative body rejected by a majority of 16 the 
 motion for convoking the primary assemblies to decide upon the question 
 of the separation. The new elections which took place in November in- 
 
 T 2 
 
276 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period VII. 
 
 creased the majority of the royalist party. In the following December, 
 however, the emigrants implicated in tlie previous insurrection again 
 entered the canton, and summoned several communes to revolt and join 
 them. M. Von Pfuhl, who had been sent back by the king as governor- 
 general, proclaimed martial law, assembled the militia, and marched 
 against the insurgents, who quickly dispersed. A few of them were 
 killed ; others, being taken prisoners, were tried by a council of war, 
 and tliree were condemned to death, but were reprieved by the king. 
 Several acts of cruelty and of party revenge were perpetrated by the 
 peasantry against some of the prisoners. The attempt at a revolution 
 was utterly defeated, and Neuchatel has remained a constitutional prin- 
 cipality, though still forming a canton of the republican confederation of 
 Switzerland. 
 
 A fresh quarrel broke out in anotlier quarter. The canton of Schwytz. 
 one of the three eldest in the confederation, had in the course of ages, by 
 purchase, or cession, or conquest, become possessed of several districts 
 bordering upon its original territory, such as Einsiedlen. the March, 
 Kussnacht, &c. These were incorporated into the canton, and formed 
 what was called the new districts, in contradistinction to the « alte 
 landschaft," or old territory of Schwytz. The whole canton together 
 reckons about 38,000 inhabitants, men, women, and children ; a hardv 
 robust race, especially those in the old territorv, who amount to about 
 one-halt of the whole ; they are proud of their old independence and ex- 
 tremely tenacious of their sovereign rights, all the men who have com- 
 pleted their 18th year having a vote in the sovereign assemblv or 
 " landsgemeinde." The country is rich in pasture-land, and its chief 
 wealth consists in forests and cattle, which is reckoned at above 15,000 
 heads of large cattle in winter and about 20,000 in summer, and 6 000 
 sheep, besides goats and swine. Corn is only partially cultivated, most 
 of the people preferring a pastoral to an agricultural life. Potatoes are 
 a general article of food, and cider the most common drink. There are 
 m the whole canton six burghs or open market towns, 24 parish vil- 
 lages, and 58 hamlets. The houses are chiefly built of wood, many of 
 them large and commodious. The democratic spirit of the people of this 
 as well as of the other mountain cantons, is of a different nature froni 
 that of the democratic party in the town cantons; the latter being 
 active, restless, meddling, and disposed to extend the sphere of its in- 
 fluence, whilst the democracy of the little cantons is stationary and self- 
 satisfied, intolerant and uninformed, but unencroaching and unobtrusive 
 though at the same time extremely jealous of all intrusion or suspicion 
 of intrusion from abroad. The complicated forms of a representative re- 
 public adopted by the town cantons would ill suit the people of the small 
 democracies, who, spending one-half of the year with their cattle on the 
 mountains and shut up daring the winter in their sequestered valleys, could 
 111 afford either time or money to support the machinery of a constitutional 
 
 rERIOD VII.] 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 211 
 
 government with its frequent elections and rotation of office. The 
 magistrates, being scantily paid, or not paid at all, were generally chosen 
 from among the few wealthier families, and remained in office or were 
 re-elected for an indefinite period.* The people knew that they had the 
 power when assembled in landsgemeinde of removing them whenever 
 they became obnoxious. But the greatest dread of these small cantons 
 is that of losing their separate existence as independent and sovereign 
 states, and of being merged into one huge democracy with the rest of 
 Switzerland, a project which they know has been long entertained by a 
 considerable party in the town cantons. They abhor the very idea of 
 centralization, which, however accompanied by republican forms, they 
 consider as tantamount to slavery. Their jealousy of the town cantons 
 dates from the earliest times of the confederation, as we have already ob- 
 served in the course of this work. At the time of the French invasion, 
 in 1798, they stubbornly refused to be incorporated with the rest of 
 Switzerland into a republic, one and indivisible : the men of Schwytz, 
 led by Aloys Reding, actually repelled the invaders for a time, and their 
 brethren of Unterwalden chose to be slaughtered rather than submit to 
 the overbearing dictate. These things are not easily forgotten, and the 
 occurrences in the town cantons in 1830-1 served to revive their recol- 
 lection. The people of the forest cantons instinctively felt that there 
 was some analogy between the revolutionary spirit of 1798 and that of 
 1830, and that the same principle of centralization and unity of admi- 
 nistration, which they detest, was the object of both. If this was liberty, 
 it was not thei?' liberty. They therefore kept aloof from the movement, 
 and showed a stern front of opposition to all attempts at innovation in 
 the federal diet. They exhibited the remarkable phenomenon, worthy of 
 the attention of those who look beyond names and outward forms in 
 modes of society, of the oldest and freest democracies of Europe ranging 
 themselves on the same side with the partisans of the old aristocracy 
 against the movements of modern democracy, with its organized masses 
 and military discipline, which impels all questions towards a final solu- 
 tion by numerical majority and physical force. Had the forest cantons, 
 however, been united among themselves, they would have had nothing 
 to apprehend ; but discord broke out even there. There was an ine- 
 quality of political rights between the old territory of Schwytz and the 
 new or outer districts ; the latter elected only one-third of the landrath, of 
 the executive council, as well as of the tribunal of the canton or judicial 
 court, whilst old Schwytz nominated the other two-thirds ; and the outer 
 districts laboured under some other disadvantages. In 1831 these de- 
 manded to be placed upon a footing of equality, and, on the refusal of old 
 Schwytz, they assembled their own landsgemeinde and sent distinct 
 deputies to the federal diet. The diet endeavoured to bring matters to 
 an arrangement, but did not succeed. 
 
 * See remarks on the same subject at p. 11)8-9. 
 
218 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period VII. 
 
 PERIOD VII.]' 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 279 
 
 In the diet of 1832 the question of the revision of the federal pact was 
 formally brought forward. This has been, and continues to be, the most 
 difficult question in the whole range of Swiss politics. The Swiss con- 
 federation, unlike that of the United States, has no permanent and dis- 
 tinct central government; the ordinary diet sits only for about two 
 months in the year, and during the rest of the time the executive of 
 the vorort or directing canton, which is that where the diet sits for 
 that year,* acts as a federal government in conformity to the directions 
 which it has received from the last diet. Thus the local government of 
 one canton, the equal of the other members of the confederation, acts as 
 the supreme federal authority over all. Should the political views of 
 that canton differ from those of the rest, or most of the rest, it must find 
 itself placed in a very delicate predicament. It is true that the powers 
 of the vorort are very limited, and that in cases of emergency it is bound 
 to convoke an extraordinary diet ; still, in times of pressing necessity, 
 much may depend on the spirit and decision of the directing canton. 
 Again, in the federal diet, the many and small cantons form the majority 
 of votes, whilst five or six large cantons, such as Bern, Zurich, Vaud, 
 St. Gall, Aargau, and Luzern, which together form more than one-half 
 of the population, and possess two-thirds of the whole wealth of Switzer- 
 land, constitute but a small minority of votes in the diet, every canton, 
 large or small, rich or poor, industrious or not, having but one vote. 
 When these and other analogous objections against the actual federal 
 constitution were broached in the diet of 1832, three parties were imme- 
 diately formed. One party, consisting of the forest cantons, Neuchatel, 
 Basle town, and the Valais, would not listen to any proposal of change 
 which might interfere with their rights as sovereign states ; a second 
 party, consisting at first of Bern and Basle county, and joined afterwards 
 by Thurgau and St. Gall, was desirous of unity and centralization of the 
 federal government by means of a diet, the members of which should be 
 returned in numerical proportion to the population of each canton. Ac- 
 cording to this principle, Bern, having thirty times as many inhabitants 
 as Uri, would return thirty members to the one of Uri. This would be 
 in reality swamping at once the political independence of the smaller 
 cantons, who would be obliged to submit to anything decided by the few 
 large ones; it is no wonder, therefore, that the small cantons should 
 determine never to agree to it. Between these two extreme parties there 
 was a third, composed of the majority of the cantons, which admitted the 
 necessity of a revision of the federal pact in order to strengthen the 
 common bond of union, without weakening, however, the sovereignty of 
 each individual canton. A commission was appointed, consisting of 
 several jurists and other well-informed men, among whom was professor 
 Rossi, an Italian civilian naturalized at Geneva, for the purpose of 
 framing a new federal pact which might obtain general approbation. 
 * The diet sits by turua at Bern, Zurich, and Luzern. 
 
 The object, as it was pointedly defined at the time, was to make a new 
 pact for federal Switzerland, and not to make a neiv Switzerland, one 
 and indivisible. The three forest cantons, however, having declined 
 taking any part in the appointment of the commission, recalled their 
 deputies from the diet and formed a separate conclave at Sarnen in the 
 Unterwalden, when their deputies were joined by those of Neuchatel and 
 Basle town, and they issued a protest against all attempts to alter the 
 pact of 1814. This meeting was styled the " League of Sarnen." 
 Three more cantons, the Valais, Zug, and Appenzell, also recalled their 
 deputies, but did not join the league of Sarnen. The majority of the 
 cantons, however, approved of the commission, which entered upon its 
 task, and in the following year made its report to the diet, in July 1833. 
 The report and the project of constitution which it contained was ap- 
 proved by the majority of the deputies ; but, as the deputies of the Swiss 
 cantons are merely delegates, they could but forward copies of the new plan 
 to their respective governments, by whom it was laid before the assemblies 
 of the people in the different cantons and districts. It was adopted by some; 
 but when it was laid before the assembly of the people of Luzern, which 
 was looked upon as one of the leading cantons in the democratic movement, 
 the project was, unexpectedly, rejected by a great majority. In conse- 
 quence of this, the proposed plan was given up, and a feeling of despon- 
 dency came upon those who had till then exalted the wisdom and 
 patriotism of popular assemblies. Passing from one extreme to the 
 other, they began to ridicule the idea of any good being expected from 
 large popular meetings, and they cried out that nothing but the strong 
 arm of power could ever mould Switzerland into a nation ; in short, 
 from being democrats, they became Bonapartists, a transition by no 
 means singular in modern times. But other and more pressing cares 
 came to silence these wailings of disappointment. The aristocratic 
 party, joined by the jealous democracies of the forest cantons, as soon as 
 they heard of the rejection of the new pact by the people of Luzern, fell 
 into another and an opposite delusion. They fancied that the time for a 
 reaction was come, and the canton of Schwytz, intent upon recovering the 
 outer districts, took upon itself to give the signal. Colonel Abyberg, at 
 the head of two hundred men and some field-pieces, took possession of 
 Kussnacht, one of those districts, and arrested several persons, whilst 
 the alarm-bell sounded throughout the territory of old Schwytz, and 
 bodies of peasants, arming themselves in haste, proceeded to reconquer 
 the other districts which had separated themselves from the canton. 
 
 The diet which was sitting at Zurich was struck with amazement at 
 this sudden infraction of the public peace. It was a critical moment ; 
 a day or two more and the other forest cantons might make common 
 cause with Schwytz, and, from the known stubbornness of those moun- 
 taineers, a most deplorable civil war would be the consequence. The 
 diet lost not a moment; it immediately called out the first contingent of 
 
280 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND, 
 
 [period VII. 
 
 the militia of the various cantons, and by the following day 6,000 men 
 of Zurich, which was the nearest, were ready to march, and three days 
 after 20,000 men from various cantons were assembled at Luzern. 
 The diet ordered Schwytz to be occupied by the federal troops ; 8,000 
 men under arms entered that canton without firing a shot. The council 
 of Schwytz, not expecting such prompt [measures, was taken by sur- 
 prise, and, luckily for all parties, it made no appeal to the passions'of 
 the people ; it seemed to feel its error, and took care not to aggravate it. 
 The people of Schwytz returned to their homes, without knowing ex- 
 actly why they had left them. The federal troops of occupation pre- 
 served the strictest discipline, and took care not to hurt the susceptible 
 feelings of the simple and honest, but deluded peasantry. The dissolu- 
 tion of the league of Sarnen was the next step. All Switzeriand was 
 saved from a great danger. These events took place in August 1833. 
 
 Meantime, at the other extremity of Switzeriand, Basle had answered 
 the signal given by Schwytz. The council of the town, provoked by the 
 repeated insults and aggressions of the insurgents of Liechstall, resolved, 
 by a majority of only one vote, to send out an expedition against them. 
 A column of 1,500 militia, officered by some of the first citizens of 
 Basle, with twelve field -pieces, marched upon Liechstall. The insur- 
 gents were prepared for them ; the column from Basle, moving without 
 precaution, fell into* an ambuscade in a wood ; it was fired upon from 
 all sides, its commandant fell, and the men being thrown into confusion, 
 fled, leaving their cannon behind. The insurgents gave no quarter. 
 They put to death the wounded, and murdered with the butt ends of their 
 firelocks a colonel of Basle who had surrendered, and whose son had 
 already been killed. Several hundred men perished in this ill-judged 
 expedition. 
 
 As soon as the diet was apprized of this disaster, it ordered the 
 occupation of the whole canton by a federal corps. The town of Basle, 
 full of mourning for the loss of so many of her citizens, opened its gates 
 to the federal troops ; but the people of Liechstall, elated by their success, 
 made a show of resisting the orders of the diet ; they refused at first to 
 lay down their arms, but they were soon obliged to submit. Meantime 
 the ultra-democratic clubs had again reared their heads at Zurich, 
 Bern, and elsewhere ; they loudly espoused the cause of the Liechstall 
 people; their newspapers broke forth in denunciations against the town 
 of Basle, and called for a general crusade against that " last stronghold 
 of aristocracy," the walls of which were to be pulled down, that its 
 citizens might be left at the mercy of the insurgent peasantry. The 
 time was now come, they said, to put an end to the aristocratic faction all 
 over Switzeriand. In short, in order to regenerate Switzerland, they saw 
 no better means than exterminating or banishing a portion of its citizens. 
 The diet, however, judged otherwise ; it resolved that the existing laws 
 should be respected by all, and it thought that both aristocrats and 
 
 PERIOD VII.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 281 
 
 democrats could be made to obey them without resorting to measures of 
 extermination. The immense majority of the Swiss people agreed in 
 this with the diet. The clubs were noisy, but weak ; they assumed to be, 
 but they were not, the nation. They accused the diet of weakness, of 
 partiality, of incapacity ; they talked openly of a popular 18 BrumairCt* 
 of throwing the diet wholesale into the Limmat, (the river of Zurich,) 
 and assembling a national convention for all Switzerland. On the 25th 
 of August there was at Zurich a meeting of deputations from the various 
 political societies of Switzerland ; about 200 persons were present. They 
 passed the following resolutions, which they embodied in the form of a 
 petition to the diet: 1. to institute a federal tribunal to try the chiefs 
 of the expeditions against Liechstall and Kussnacht ; 2. to declare the 
 members of the late conference of Sarnen unworthy to fill any public 
 office ; 3. to keep Basle town under military occupation, at the expense 
 of its citizens, until they paid a sufficient sum by way of damage and 
 fine ; 4. to remove the federal troops from Basle country as well as 
 from the outer districts of Schwytz, and lay the whole expense of the 
 federal troops of occupation upon old Schwytz and Basle town ; 5. to 
 remove all officers and magistrates who do not enjoy the confidence of 
 the people. :" 
 
 At the same time however that the above petition was presented to 
 the diet, that assembly received two other petitions from several com- 
 munes on the banks of the lake of Zurich, recommending forbearance, 
 conciliation, and forgetfulness of past errors on all sides. " Such," 
 observes an eye-witness of those transactions in some well written letters 
 which appeared in a French journal at the time,t *' such is the difier- 
 ence between the so-called popular clubs, and the real people. Persons 
 who meet in the clubs are men belonging to a party, previously biassed 
 by the same passions and prejudices, and who are attracted together by 
 a similarity of sentiments and views ; their resolutions breathe violence 
 and vengeance ; theirs is the false public opinion. On the other side 
 the communes, the country districts, where the opinions of all the in- 
 habitants at random are collected without jjrevious excitement or pre- 
 meditation, express nothing but wishes for peace and mercy : this is true 
 public opinion." 
 
 The diet ordered the five cantons who had formed the league of 
 Sarnen to send their deputies to Zurich. The three forest cantons and 
 Basle town complied ; and some of the deputies whom they sent were 
 the same who had sat in the conference of Sarnen. The diet, notwith- 
 standing the clamours of some of its members, allowed them to take 
 their seats ; it did not assume the power of rejecting any deputy sent by 
 
 * Ninth of November, 1799, the day on which general Bonaparte, hy means of 
 his grenadiers, dissolved the legislative assembly, and made himself master of 
 France ; a curious precedent for republicans to quote. 
 
 \ Journal des Debats^ 13 and 15 September, 1833. 
 
282 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period VII. 
 
 a sovereign state, as it was no part of the powers of the federal con- 
 gress to dictate to the people of the various cantons what individuals they 
 were to return as deputies. Neuchatel was the only canton who refused 
 to send its deputies to the diet, and the diet at once resolved that Neu- 
 chatel should be occupied by the federal troops, just as Schwytz and 
 Basle had been, if by a certain day it had not complied with the sum- 
 mons of the diet. This show of firmness produced its effect, and the 
 deputies of Neuchatel made their appearance at Zurich before the ex- 
 piration of the prescribed term. About the same time the great council 
 of Bern, swayed by the ultra-democrats, instructed its deputies in the 
 diet to move the following resolutions : « 1. That the deputies who 
 had sat at Sarnen be expelled the diet. 2. That a federal tribunal 
 be formed to try, on the charge of treason, the members of the govern- 
 ments of Schwytz and Basle town, who had taken a part in the affairs 
 of Kussnacht and Liechstall. 3. That the town of Basle be obliged to 
 pay a contribution of forty millions; of francs by way of damage, and to 
 defray the expenses of the occupation ; part of the money to be distri- 
 buted as extra pay among the poorer soldiers of the army. 4. That 
 the walls and ramparts of Basle be>azed to the ground." After moving 
 these startling resolutions in the federal diet, the deputies of Bern pro- 
 ceeded to say, that if that assembly rejected them, they had instructions 
 from their canton to protest in the name of the sovereign people of Bern 
 against their rejection, and then to withdraw from the diet. The diet, 
 having listened to this strange declaration, resolved almost unani- 
 mously, that if Bern withdrew its deputies, a federal corps should im- 
 mediately march and occupy Bern, just as it would have occupied Neu- 
 chatel, had Neuchatel persisted in its disobedience to the federal man- 
 date. The same measure should be dealt to all indiscriminately. 
 The determination of the diet had a salutary effect. The deputies of 
 Bern requested new instructions from their canton ; meantime their 
 motions were laid aside, and the diet proceeded quietly to other business. 
 Such was the triumph of constitutional principles and political justice 
 over both the extreme factions in the memorable session of 1833. The 
 firm attitude of the diet, supported by the opinion and patriotism of the 
 great body of the people, saved Switzerland from incalculable mischief 
 In little more than a week 40,000 militia from different cantons were 
 under arms ready to obey the orders of the federal diet against any re- 
 frACtory canton, no matter which. It was then proved that, notwith- 
 standing the defects of the existing federal pact, there was an authority 
 in Switzeriand superior to party spirit and factions, which could depend 
 upon the support of the people at large, whenever their aid was required 
 by reason and justice. The ultra-democrats, who had been foretelling 
 the event of a collision which would end in the extermination of the 
 opposite party, appeared sorely disappointed at this peaceful result, and 
 they vented their mortification by abusing the diet ; but their sneers 
 
 PERIOD VII.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 283 
 
 had little effect in disturbing Helvetic equanimity. Throughout the 
 whole crisis the canton of Zurich, as the vorort or directing canton, sup- 
 ported by Geneva, Vaud, the Orisons, &c., earnestly supported the 
 federal authority. 
 
 The questions of Basle and Schwytz were settled : Basle was divided 
 into two half cantons or separate states, Basle town and Basle country, 
 independent of each other in their internal governments, but having 
 only one vote between them in the federal diet, after the manner of the 
 two divisions of Appenzell and of Unterwalden.* Old and New Schwytz 
 arranged their intestine dissension without coming to a separation, the 
 former consenting to a more equal distribution of the elective rights. 
 The landsgemeinde assembled in October, 1833, at Rothenthurm, 
 adopted a new constitutional system, by which all the natives of all the 
 districts who have completed their eighteenth year, and who are not 
 bankrupts, or under a sentence disgraceful to their character (infamante), 
 enjoy alike the same political rights, vote in the landsgemeinde, and 
 elect the members of the great and little councils, and of the court of 
 justice ; the members of both councils are elected for six years. The 
 debates are public. The general landsgemeinde meets every other year, 
 in the month of May, under the presidency of the landamman ; it adopts 
 or rejects the bills laid before it by the great council ; it ratifies the 
 treaties concluded with other cantons, or with foreign powers ; it gives 
 instructions to the deputies to the federal diet, and it appoints the lan- 
 damman, the statthatten, or lieutenant, and the treasurer, who remain 
 two years in office. The matters which are to be laid before the general 
 landsgemeinde must be printed and distributed previous to its meeting. 
 The votes are given by show of hands, and the majority decides. There 
 are, besides, district landsgemeinde for the purpose of elections. The 
 convents are subject, in temporal matters, to the civil authority, they 
 cannot purchase or acquire landed property, and they contribute like 
 the rest to defray the cantonal and local expenditure. A general revision 
 of the laws of the canton, which were in a very imperfect state, was 
 
 likewise decreed.t 
 
 The year 1834 seemed to open with prospects of tranquillity for 
 Switzerland, when a fresh source of anxiety suddenly sprang up from a 
 foreign quarter. A considerable number of Polish, Italian, and German 
 political refugees, in consequence of the revolutionary movements which 
 had taken place since 1830 in their respective countries, and which had 
 failed, had found their way to Switzeriand. In April, 1833, a body of 
 about 400 Polish emigrants left France, and took refuge in the canton 
 of Bern, where they were hospitably received ; subscriptions were raised 
 for them, many found employment in various capacities, and several of 
 
 * See p. 199. 
 
 t Leresche, in his Dictionnaire ghgraphique statistique de ia Suisse, Lausanne, 
 1836—7, article Schwytz^ gives a sketch of the new constitution of Schwytz. 
 
284 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period VII. 
 
 them fixed their residence in the little town of Bienne. All at once, in 
 January, 1834, some hundreds of these refugees left their various places 
 of residence proceeded by small parties to the canton of Vaud, which 
 they crossed, and assembled, armed with muskets and other weapons, 
 on the banks of the lake of Geneva, especially at Nyon, where the^ 
 manifested their intention of making an attack on the opposite coast of 
 bavoy, a part of the dominions of the king of Sardinia. This attack 
 was combmed with other attacks and insurrections which were expected 
 to break out m various parts of the Sardinian monarchy. The govern- 
 ment of the canton of Vaud, being informed of this illegal assemblage, 
 issued orders to the local authorities to stop the men and disarm them. 
 But he local authorities had no armed force at their disposal, and were 
 but lukewarmly supported by the citizens, who, from what they had 
 heard or read, sympathized with the Poles as victims of oppression in 
 their own country, without reflecting that the transactions in Poland 
 could afford no apology for attacking the neutral kingdom of Sardinir." 
 This sympathy of the natives of republican states for all those who, no 
 matter why chose to revolt against or to invade any monarchical state 
 the sympathy which, not content with harbouring political refugees of 
 other states, abets them in their acts of armed hostilifv, is of momentous 
 importance to the tranquillity of the world ; for unless the individual mem- 
 bers of repubhcan states choose to abide by the laws of nations, and the 
 international rights expounded by all jurists, not only will it be impossi- 
 ble for republics and monarchies to live at peace with one another, but 
 hey will not even be able to carry on war according to the system of civi- 
 lized nations; and as the world, according to all appearance, will vet long 
 continue to be divided among absolute and limited monarchies and repub- 
 lean governments, the consequence would be a permanent state of hos- 
 tihty and rancour worse than that of the Guelphs and Ghibellines of the 
 middle ages It would be, in fact, the monstrous principle proclaimed 
 by the fanatics of the first French revolution : *^ War of extLinaS 
 against all governments which are not constituted like our own " * 
 
 On the morning of the 5th of February, 150 refugees seized 'at Nyon 
 a barge loaded with timber, threw the timber overboard, and embarked 
 for Savoy, when they landed near Hermance, at one extremity of the 
 canton of Geneva bordering on the Sardinian territory. The Lvem! 
 ment of Geneva, having received timely information, sent a magistrate 
 with some troops of tlie garrison and militia, who arrested the refugee, 
 seized their arms and sent them back in the boat to the canton de Vaud' 
 But another, and the main body of the refugees, under general Romarino,* 
 
 on thlclrntTt^^^^ 'n^ °P^"^^ ^^^"^'^ ^° «--^^ -itings circulated 
 
 ence Ld Hbertv Zl \ ?°v ° *^''' '''^'' " ^" "^^^^'^^ concerning independ- 
 
 rrnttd^^^^^^^^^^ 
 
 per bande. Italia, 1830. ^'^^"^ ^"'^''' '*"'''"''^' <i'insurrez,one 
 
 rERIOD VII.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 285 
 
 a Genoese by birth, but [naturalized in Poland, entered the canton of 
 Geneva in another point, and took their station at Carouge, a small town 
 near Geneva, on the high road to Savoy, where they distributed pro- 
 clamations addressed to the border people, in which they spoke of " the 
 great days of Savoy being arrived,'* and said that they, the refugees, 
 " were marching to overthrow the throne of Charles Albert, and to win 
 liberty, equality, brotherhood," &c. The peasantry of Savoy, however, 
 remained quiet. The refugees then made an incursion into the king's 
 territory, entered Aunemasse, and other villages, disarmed the custom- 
 house officers, and turned towards the town of Thonon, where there was 
 but a feeble garrison. The alarm, however, had spread into the interior, 
 and a body of Piedmontese troops marched on the flank of the refugee 
 column, watching its movements. On the 3d of February, Romarino 
 gave orders to fall back on the territory of Geneva, as the reinforcement 
 he expected had not arrived. It appears that, the day before, another 
 body of refugees, chiefly Italians, who were living in France, sallied out 
 of Grenoble, and entered the village of Echelles, on the high road from 
 Lyons to Chambery, but, being met by the Piedmontese troops, they 
 were driven back again into France, when the French authorities dis- 
 armed them. The Polish expedition, likewise, having re-entered the 
 neutral ground of Geneva, were desired by the authorities to lay down 
 their arms, which they did after some demur. They were then ordered 
 to march through the canton under an escort of militia, and return to the 
 canton de Vaud, from whence they had come ; but a number of the 
 lower class of the inhabitants of Geneva, natives and foreigners, took 
 part with the refugees, made an attempt to recover their arms for them, 
 and even insulted the magistrates in the execution of their duty. The 
 militia of the canton was under arms, and, after much difficulty and con- 
 siderable noise and tumult, the refugees at last left Geneva and returned 
 to Vaud, the government of which canton ordered them to be escorted 
 back to the territory of Bern, from whence they had originally come ; 
 but Bern now refused to receive them again. The matter was referred 
 to Zurich, the vorort ; and, after long and angry negotiations, Bern at 
 last consented to receive back the refugees, on condition that Geneva and 
 Vaud should pay part of the expenses. The whole of this affair occa- 
 sioned much alarm, agitation, and dissension ; and it cost the cantons of 
 Geneva and Vaud, who were wholly innocent of any participation in the 
 insane attempt, a considerable sum ; the share of Vaud alone being 
 said to have amounted to 80,000 livres. But this was not all; the Sar- 
 dinian government made strong remonstrances to Geneva and Vaud, 
 and to the confederation in general, concerning this flagrant violation of 
 the neutrality of the Swiss territory, and on the dangers resulting to 
 other states from assemblages of political outlaws, who, under the pro- 
 tection of the state which harboured them, conspired against the tran- 
 quillity of neighbouring countries ; and it demanded guarantees against 
 
 « 
 
 A 
 
 II 
 
286 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period VII. 
 
 PERIOD VII.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND, 
 
 281 
 
 the recurrence of such an infraction of international law. The courts of 
 Austria, Prussia, and the other German states whose territories border 
 on Switzerland, joined the court of Turin in these remonstrances. The 
 justice of their complaints, supported as they were by the law of nations, 
 could not be disputed ; but some of the diplomatic notes were expressed 
 in too angry and peremptory a tone. They demanded, amongst other 
 things, the dissokition of the '* patriotic societies" or clubs which were 
 said to have favoured the Savoy expedition, the trial of the Swiss who 
 were implicated in it, the expulsion of the refugees, and they threatened, 
 if their demands were not complied with, to stop all communications and 
 commercial intercourse with Switzerland. After much correspondence 
 the more obnoxious demands of the foreign powers were ultimately 
 dropped. The main question remained — how to dispose of those 
 refugees who had formed part of the Savoy expedition, and how to pre- 
 vent similar attempts in future. The council of Zurich, which, as di- 
 recting canton, conducted the whole negotiation with the foreign 
 ministers, displayed considerable skill, united to firmness, self-respect, 
 and moderation. Its ultimate answer, dated 24th June, 1834, after as- 
 serting the principle " that every independent state has the right of ad- 
 mitting fugitives from other countries, and protecting them while they 
 conduct themselves peaceably," acknowledged that " it is the duty of 
 every state to prevent the refugees from abusing the asylum granted to 
 them and disturbing the tranquillity of other countries, and that those 
 who so abuse the hospitality granted to them ought to be deprived of all 
 means of renewing the attempt. Agreeably to this principle, the Swiss 
 governments will in future send away from their territory all those who 
 shall attempt to disturb the peace of other states, and individuals thus 
 expelled shall not again be admitted upon Swiss ground." This note 
 and the promise it contained satisfied the foreign powers, who renewed 
 their usual friendly intercourse with Switzerland. France assisted these 
 negotiations by granting passports to those refugees who were implicated, 
 and allowing them to pass through the French territory to England, 
 America, and other countries whither they chose to repair. 
 
 The ultra-democratic party exclaimed against this arrangement, and 
 taxed the council of Zurich and its burgomaster, M. Hirzel, a man 
 whose patriotism and liberal sentiments had been well tried in the late 
 changes which had taken place in his native canton, with vacillation, 
 weakness, and *' servility towards the foreign despots," and this because 
 those magistrates had not thought proper to place Switzerland out of the 
 pale of the law of nations, as the French convention placed itself in 
 1 *793, and make it the common repair of armed bands from all parts of 
 Europe, ready to pounce upon the neighbouring countries at the first 
 symptom of political discontent, thus renewing the system of the con- 
 dottieri, free companies, and black bands of the middle ages. 
 
 The federal diet for 1834 met at Zurich on the 7th of July. The 
 
 deputies, having first attended divine service in the churches of their 
 respective communions, assembled at the house of the president, the 
 burgomaster Hirzel, and thence proceeded in procession, attended by 
 their ushers, to the gross munster or cathedral, where they found as- 
 sembled the council of state of the canton, the foreign ministers, and a 
 great concourse of spectators. All being seated, the president delivered 
 his opening speech, which was moderate and conciliatory : he recom- 
 mended harmony among the confederates, calmness in their debates, 
 respect for the duties as well as the rights of Swiss neutrality, and at- 
 tention to the real wants of their common country. After this, the 
 chancellor of the confederation read the federal pact, and the deputies 
 took the oath. They then came out of the cathedral and proceeded to 
 the hall of sittings in the town-house. Tribunes or separate pews were 
 for the first time prepared for reporters and strangers, the debates of 
 the diet having until then been private. Each of the twenty- two 
 cantons sends two or three deputies to the diet, the eldest of whom only 
 gives his vote for the canton he represents. Those cantons which are 
 divided into two separate states, namely, Unterwalden, Appenzell, and 
 Basle, send one or two deputies for each division, but the deputies of 
 the two moieties have only one vote between them, so that, if they can- 
 not agree, their vote is null. In the diet of 1834, sixteen cantons had 
 two deputies each ; Zurich, being the vorort, had three ; Geneva and 
 the Grisons also three each ; and Appenzell, Unterwalden, and Basle, 
 four each, two for each division ; making in all fifty-three niembers. 
 
 The president made his report on the proceedings of the vorort since 
 the close of the last diet. After this the members saluted each other ac- 
 cording to the old federal custom, and one deputy for each canton made 
 a kind of general profession of the sentiments and political faith of his 
 constituents. 
 
 The question of the refugees was one of the first that came before the 
 diet. Meantime, a meeting at Zurich of four or five thousand persons 
 from various cantons had passed resolutions disapproving of the conduct 
 of the vorort in this business, and had voted an address inviting the 
 Swiss in general to affix their names to a declaration that the existing 
 federal pact being found insufficient and ineffectual, it was the will of 
 the people that a constituent assembly should be convoked to frame a 
 new federal constitution. This constituent assembly, the idea of which 
 is derived from the not very favourable specimen of that of France in 
 1790, is the great mould on which the ultra-democrats of Switzerland 
 expect to fashion the whole country after their own fancy, and is their 
 panacea for all existing evils. Bern, it was stated by this party as a 
 stringent argument, had taken the lead in demanding a constituent as- 
 sembly, and Bern had a population of 400,000 people, being one-fifth of 
 all Switzerland ; therefore the demand could not be resisted. Similar 
 language was held at a meeting of the federal riflemen assembled also 
 
288 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period VII. 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 289 
 
 at Zurich. At length, on the 22d of July, the refugee question was de- 
 bated in the diet, and after eight hours' discussion, the votes being 
 taken, thirteen cantons approved unconditionally of the conduct of the 
 vorort, three gave a conditional assent to it, and five and a half cantons 
 disapproved of it either partly or absolutely. The outer district of Ap- 
 penzell did not vote. 
 
 In the Swiss diet, as well as in other representative assemblies of 
 Europe, the members are divided into three political parties; there 
 known as the right, left, and centre. The first- named division consists 
 of the statu quo members, or aristocrats, as they are vulgarly called, 
 though, in fact, this party in Switzerland includes the three forest can- 
 tons, the oldest and purest democracies of Switzerland, who, from 
 motives already explained, are averse from all change in the federal 
 pact, and are jealous and suspicious of the city democracies. Tlie 
 Valais, Neuchatel, and Basle town belong also to this division. 2d. 
 The left or radical i)arty (for the word " radical" has become natu- 
 ralized in Switzerland both in the French and German languages) is the 
 party of centralization and unity at the expense of the individual inde- 
 pendence of the cantons ; it wishes for a general representative as- 
 sembly for all Switzerland, elected on the basis of numerical proportion , 
 it is the party of sweeping changes to be effected by numerical majority 
 and physical force ; the party of the absolutism of the multitude, distinct 
 in form though not in principle from the absolutism of one or the few, 
 too often destructive of individual liberty and intolerant of any check but 
 the voice of the favourite demagogue of the day. In such a system, the 
 so-called " sovereignty of the people" is in fact the sovereignty of a few 
 leaders, as it was in the republics of Greece, and in those of Italy 
 during the middle ages ; and it must always be so, unless all classes 
 of the people could be instructed in political science, and rendered 
 moral, temperate, and able and willing to devote their time to poli- 
 tical affnirs. This party was represented in the diet of 1834 bv 
 the cantons of [Bern, Luzern, Thurgau, Basle country, and St. Galf; 
 not that the populations of all those cantons are to be considered as 
 ultra-democratic, but because the ultra-democratic principle prevailed 
 then in their councils, whose function it is to give instructions to the 
 deputies to the diet, which instructions the latter are bound to follow, or 
 ask for further directions. Between the two extreme parties just men- 
 tioned is the centre, which includes the majority of the cantons, some 
 however inclining to the right and others to the left upon particular 
 questions ; but all attached to their cantonal independence, and averse 
 from a general fusion of all Switzerland into a single democracy. The 
 real centre, whose device is moderation, conciliation, justice to all, 
 gradual reforms, respect for the cantonal independence and for existing 
 law and treaties, was represented in the diet of 1834 by Zurich, Geneva, 
 Vaud, the Grisons, Freyburg, and Glurus. 
 
 PERIOO vit J 
 
 On the refugee question the deputy of Vaud inculcated respect for 
 existing treaties with foreign powers, those treaties which guarantee the 
 independence and neutrality of Switzerland. " But," said he, " Switz- 
 erland ought to be honestly and truly neutral, and not tolerate, much 
 less encourage, within its territory, plots, conspiracies, and armaments 
 directed against the established order of any other country whatever. 
 States are placed in this respect toward one another like individuals ; 
 if they wish to be respected, they must respect others ; woe to those 
 who do not respect treaties ! they may triumph awhile, but their 
 triumph will be of short duration. I do not mean, however, that we 
 should submit to every demand for the expulsion of a refugee made by 
 other powers. The cantonal governments must be the judges, the honest 
 judges, as to whether any refugee has offended against our neutrality, 
 but if the charges brought forward against such a person or persons are 
 proved, then it is our duty to remove the disturber from our territory." 
 The majority of the diet followed on the same side and approved of the 
 •conduct of the vorort. Bern and Luzern protested against this decision, 
 jmd without exactly denying the justice of the international principle, 
 ^hey maintained that the notes of the vorort to the foreign powers had 
 Jiot been energetic enough, and they charged the diet with neglecting 
 the interests and the honour of the confederation. This occasioned an 
 angry discussion, and counter protests from most of the other cantons, 
 which, whatever might be their opinion on the refugee question, felt in- 
 dignant at the tone which Bern and Luzern assumed towards their con- 
 federates. 
 
 On the 29th of July the question of Neuchatel came before the diet. 
 The legislative body of Neuchatel, supported by a declaration from the 
 majority of the communes, had petitioned the king of Prussia, as prince 
 ©f Neuchatel, to obtain a separation from the Swiss federal body, and to 
 return to their former condition of a mere ally of Switzerland ; giving 
 foBT a reason the incompatibility of the monarchical principle of govern- 
 ment established at Neuchatel with the democratic principle now pre- 
 vailing over the rest of Switzerland; but Frederic William had dis- 
 countenanced the proposed separation, or at least declined to promote it. 
 Then the legislative body of Neuchatel addressed, in March 1834, to the 
 vorort, a formal demand of separation, which the vorort referred to the 
 •diet. The deputy of Neuchatel to the diet spoke in support of the 
 demand grounded upon this reasoning : " Neuchatel is a constitutional 
 monarchy, and as such it entered the Swiss confederation in 1814, when 
 there was no collision of principles throughout Switzerland ; we fulfilled 
 our duties as a canton, and you left us our constitution undisturbed. 
 But since 1830 a collision has taken place, the cantons which were 
 formerly aristocratic have not only become democratic, but are deter- 
 mined to enforce their new principles upon the rest of Switzerland. 
 They openly avow it, they want to make Neuchatel a republic, but the 
 
290 
 
 HISTORY OF swrrzEaLAND. 
 
 [period VII. 
 
 PERIOD VII.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 291 
 
 majority of the people of Neuchatel do not wish to become a republic. 
 A conflict is thus engendered between our canton and the confederates, 
 and this moreover encourages a conflict among ourselves. The dis- 
 afifected among our citizens, originally few, have made numerous prose- 
 lytes, they are encouraged by the violent spirits among the neighbouring 
 cantons, and they plead their exclusive loyalty to the confederation as 
 a pretext for their disloyalty towards their own government. Thus the 
 federal flag, instead of being to us a token of security and peace, is made 
 a symbol of discord and civil strife. This cannot be borne. Let Neu- 
 chatel be no longer a canton, let it return to the condition of an ally as 
 it was before 1814. Confederates," thus concluded the deputy, ** accept 
 the hand of alliance we ofiier to you. Be unto us what your forefathers 
 were unto ours. As allies we were always faithful to Switzerland, we 
 
 fought its battles Confederates ! if you refuse our ofier, 
 
 if you determine to retain us as a canton in spite of ourselves, we shall 
 still endeavour to fulfil, in perfect good faith, our obligations as such; 
 but remember that confidence and zeal are the offspring of free will ; 
 they may be given, but cannot be commanded.'* 
 
 To the prayer of this petition on the part of Neuchatel all the other 
 cantons, even those of the right, refused assent. They all felt disinclined 
 to dismember and weaken the confederation, and thus estabhsh a dan- 
 gerous precedent ; but several cantons at the same time openly sai^l that 
 Neuchatel should be left in the undisturbed possession of its peculiar 
 constitution, that it should not be interfered with in its internal affairs, 
 and that no suggestions ought to be used to weaken its allegiance to the 
 house of Prussia. " What matters it to us," said the deputy of the 
 Grisons, " that Neuchatel is a principality. Cannot a principaUty and 
 a republic confederate for their mutual protection, without quarrelling 
 about their respective forms of government? The existence of a prin- 
 cipality appears an anomaly in our confederation, and yet we have the 
 canton of Valais, where the bishop of Sion has four votes in the legis- 
 lature. It is better for us that the king of Prussia should be prince of 
 Neuchatel than any other sovereign. The connexion tluis resulting 
 between a powerful monarch and our confederation may prove at times 
 of essential service to us." These words were spoken by the delegate 
 of one of the purest democracies of Switzerland On the other hand, 
 the deputies of the left, with Luzern at their head, not content with 
 giving a negative vote to the demand of Neuchatel, and as if to embroil 
 still more a question already intricate enough, proposed a counter-reso- 
 lution, to the purpose that the diet should induce Neuchatel to renounce 
 its allegiance to the house of Prussia. Zurich having voted like the 
 rest against the petition of Neuchatel, voted likewise against the motion 
 of Luzern. " When Neuchatel," observed the deputy of Zurich, " en- 
 tered the confederation in 1814, in its double quality of canton and 
 principality, then was the time to accept or refuse its admission as such. 
 
 But Switzerland having admitted Neuchatel in its double character, 
 with what face can Switzerland now demand its separation from its 
 prince ? The treaties that bind Neuchatel as a principality to us, bind 
 us likewise to the principality of NeuchateL" The motion of Luzern 
 was rejected. 
 
 The next important question, that of the federal pact, was discussed 
 in the sitting of the 4th of August. Four modes of altering or#raodi- 
 fying the existing federal pact were proposed. 1. By the convocation 
 of a national assembly, elected by the people in a numerical proportion. 
 2. A conference of deputies from each canton elected ad hoc, and with 
 full powers. 3. A total revision of the pact by the diet, or by a com- 
 mittee of the diet. 4. A partial revision of the same. 
 
 The deputy of Bern said that his canton was persuaded of the neces- 
 sity of recasting the whole political system of Switzerland, and of the 
 uselessness of attempting a revision of the present pact ; he said that 
 there were discordant principles in Switzerland that could not be recon- 
 ciled, the deputies of the various cantons were insufficient for the great 
 work of the federal government, and that therefore Bern would appeal 
 to the great body of the people in order to effect a fusion of all the 
 cantons into one nation. " Our conviction," added the deputy of Bern, 
 "is not yet that of the majority of Switzerland; we know it: but 
 meantime the great council of Bern will oppose any partial change in 
 the pact of 1814, because we think it impossible to conciliate the federa- 
 tive principle with the principle of centralization. We will not expose 
 ourselves to be outvoted by the smaller cantons, five or six of which, 
 taken together, do not equal our population. Bern, therefore, will 
 abstain from taking a part in any discussion upon a revision of the 
 present code." This language of Bern appeared so extraordinary, that 
 even the deputy of Luzern felt alarmed at it. " Behold," cried he, " the 
 ground which Bern has taken. Whilst it endeavours to prove the 
 absurdity of the principle of the independent sovereignty of each canton 
 within itself, it carries that very principle in its own case to the extreme. 
 Even in the last sitting, it denied the right of the diet to interfere in 
 case of the violation of a cantonal constitution. Under such attacks the 
 whole fabric of our confederation will at last crumble to pieces." Lu- 
 zern then voted for a total revision of the federal pact by the diet. Uri, 
 SchwytZy Unterwalden, the Valais, Ticino, and Neuchatel, opposed all 
 revision whatever. " The present pact had been sworn to by its 
 twenty-two members, and could not be altered but by the consent of all 
 and each of them." Appenzell approved of a revision, but did not 
 think the present moment favourable to the undertaking. Glarus voted 
 for a partial revision of the pact, whilst it warmly opposed the declara- 
 tion of Bern. " What security," said the deputy of Glarus, " will the 
 smaller cantons have against the encroachments of the larger ones, when 
 we shall be like so many departments of one state ? The habits, th«» 
 
 u2 
 
292 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period VII. 
 
 PERIOD VII.] 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 293 
 
 manners, the feelings of the Swiss are opposed to a general fusion, which 
 nothing but violence could ever effect." Zug followed, and voted in 
 the same sense. Freyburg said, " that there was a necessity for a revi- 
 sion, if not general, at least partial, of the federal pact, but that Freyburg 
 will oppose with all its might the proposition of Bern. Freyburg entered 
 the confederation as a free and independent state, and it will not give up 
 any pawt of its sovereign rights, except in cases connected with the common 
 defence of the country. A national assembly, independent of the cantonal 
 governments, would only effect the destruction of our confederation, sub- 
 stituting for it the principle of centralization, a principle which Freyburg 
 will not admit. We tried it once (1799), and it occasioned us a deficit 
 of two or three millions (of Swiss livres) in as many years." Soleure 
 voted for a partial revision of the pact ; Basle town the same. Basle 
 country voted for a national assembly, like Bern. St. Gall for a total 
 revision of the pact, adopting the principle of numerical proportion. The 
 Grisons for a partial revision by a committee of the diet. Aargau for a 
 total revision by a committee of the diet ; adding, ** if this be not done 
 this year, next year we must have a national assembly." Thurgau 
 voted for a national assembly. Vaud said, " that a revision of the pact 
 was generally admitted to be required, but the canton of Vaud opposes, 
 as it has always opposed, the project of a national assembly. What 
 would be the result of such an assembly .>* A constitution on 
 abstract principles, without consulting local habits, or taking into con- 
 sideration the gradations which exist in the intellectual, moral, and 
 economical condition of the different cantons ; a constitution which 
 would not satisfy any one. Besides, why create a new legislative 
 authority, whilst we have a legal and constitutional one, namely, the 
 diet? By creating a new assembly, to frame a new constitution, you 
 would at once sign the death-warrant of the existing one ; you would 
 prejudge the question ; you would infringe upon the federal pact. The 
 very principle of a new assembly would be to look upon the Swiss as one 
 nation ; a principle contrary to the rights of the cantons, and which, 
 once admitted, would put an end to all cantonal independence. There 
 is no single Switzerland : we are two-and-twenty states, which have 
 united for our mutual protection and defence, but none of these states 
 ever intended, in joining the confederation, to sacrifice any portion of 
 their sovereignty. Vaud certainly never did." In conclusion, the 
 deputy of Vaud voted for a partial revision of some of the most important 
 articles of the present pact, which he specified. Geneva followed on 
 the same side as Vaud, and voted for a partial and gradual revision : 
 " Geneva will have no constituent assembly, no numerical principle, by 
 which the six largest cantons would dictate laws to the other sixteen." 
 Zurich opposed the idea of a national assembly, which would be the 
 ruin of the cantonal sovereignty. It voted for a revision by the diet, in 
 eluding a revision of the system of representation, establishing some 
 
 better proportion between the number of votes and the size and popula- 
 tion of the various cantons, and their respective contributions in men 
 and money for the common protection, but not the principle of numerical 
 proportion, " for Zurich will not establish the tyranny of the large can- 
 tons over the small ones." 
 
 On a division, thirteen and a half cantons voted for a revision of the 
 federal pact by a committee of the diet, one and a half for a national 
 assembly, and the rest either voted against all revision, or abstained from 
 voting. A committee of the diet was accordingly appointed to revise 
 the federal pact, but, after various sittings, the members found that they 
 could not agree upon the subject of the proportional representation. 
 They then proceeded to discuss other points, by way of suggesting im- 
 provements, but without coming to votes. The committee then made 
 its report to the diet, and thus another attempt at revising the federal 
 pact terminated without any result. * 
 
 Several minor matters were settled in an amicable manner. Schwytz 
 had been condemned the year before to pay the expense of the federal 
 army of occupation, which amounted to nearly half a million of Swiss 
 livres, a sum too heavy for a small agricultural and pastoral district. 
 The sum was reduced to one-fourth by the majority of the diet. On this 
 occasion five cantons, namely, Bern, Luzern, Basle country, Thurgau, 
 and St. Gall, voted against any reduction. 
 
 The deputy of the Grisons communicated to the diet the satisfactory 
 intelligence that the Austrian government had recognised the long 
 pending claims of that canton on the administration of Lombardy for 
 the losses sustained by Grison citizens who had property in the Valte- 
 line, which was confiscated when general Bonaparte seized that district 
 in 1797, and united it to Lombardy. The amount of indemnity which 
 the Austrian government agreed to pay was fixed at two millions of 
 Swiss livres. Thus an old act of injustice committed under one govern- 
 ment has been expiated under another : a good moral lesson, like that 
 of the American claims upon France and Naples, for injuries committed 
 under Napoleon, which have been liquidated under the restored dynasties 
 of those realms. 
 
 On the 6th of September, the session of the federal diet of 1834 was 
 closed by burgomaster Hirzel of Zurich, after a speech in which he 
 recapitulated all which the diet had done, and likewise mentioned that 
 which it could not do, namely, the revision of the federal pact : " Some 
 of us who have gone far ahead of the rest, would not slacken their pace, 
 others who have remained behind would not quicken theirs, and the rest 
 were not sufficient for a majority. And what are the causes of this ? 
 the will of the Swiss themselves, their tenacity of the sovereignty of their 
 respective cantons, a feeling as strong now as ever. The smaller the 
 canton, the stronger is this feeUng, and the greater the resistance. 
 Meantime we ought not to neglect those improvements which precord 
 
294 
 
 HISTORY or SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period VII. 
 
 PERIOD VTI.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 295 
 
 gradually. Let us remember that all the cantons are m a progressive 
 state, and that the reforms which they are effecting within themselves 
 will lead them to agree also to improvements in the general system of 
 the confederation. Even in our present state we enjoy many advantages 
 which are envied hy other nations ; let us preserve those blessings, let'us 
 increase them if possible." 
 
 With the 1st of January, 1835, Bern became in its turn the vorort or 
 directing canton. The Austrian minister addressed a note to the new 
 vorort, requesting it to state whether Bern, as directing cantons, meant 
 to abide by the declarations of the last vorort of June 1834, which had 
 been sanctioned by the diet, with regard to those refugees who might 
 endeavour to disturb the peace of the neighbouring countries ; or whether 
 the protest which Bern, as a canton, had entered against those declara- 
 tions, was to be considered as indicative of the line of conduct which 
 Bern,^as vorort, intended to pursue. " In the same manner as Switzer- 
 land," said the Austrian note, " has a right to insist that foreign states 
 do not interfere with her internal politics, so have the neighbouring states 
 a right to expect that there be no interference, proceeding from the 
 territory of the confederation, with their own internal affairs. If ^ve are 
 to respect the institutions and the constituted authorities of Switzerland, 
 and its federal and cantonal colours, Switzerland must likewise main- 
 tain at home a like respect towards her neighbours, as reciprocity forms 
 the basis of international rights. The neighbouring states have no wish 
 to offend, disturb, or annoy Switzerland ; but Switzerland should not 
 permit within its boundaries any overt acts having a hostile bearino- 
 towards the neighbouring states, which, if opportunities should occur^^ 
 might be followed by hostile aggressions, such as have already taken 
 place." The ministers of Bavaria and Baden, whose territories also 
 border on Switzerland, presented notes to the same effect. The executive 
 of Bern, as vorort, replied by some explanatory notes, which gave urn- 
 brage to the ultra-democratic party in its own great council, where a 
 motion was made to examine into the conduct of the vorort in its relations 
 with foreign powers. The avoyer De Tavel, president of the vorort, in a 
 long and able speech, while he opposed the motion as unnecessary, gave 
 full information concerning the actual state of diplomatic relations 
 His explanations proved satisfactory to the majority of the great council* 
 and the motion was negatived by 1 57 to 36. The year 1835 passed quietly 
 for Switzerland, without any very grave occurrences within or without. 
 
 In 1836, the question concerning the foreign refugees was the subject 
 of an unpleasant correspondence between the federal authorities and the 
 French ambassador. It appears that the engagements entered into by 
 the directing canton in 1834, and approved of by the diet, had been 
 evaded by some of the cantons, that certain political refugees who 
 had participated in plots and conspiracies against foreign slates, on being 
 expelled one canton had found refuge in another, and that fresh refugees, 
 
 similarly implicated, had entered the Swiss territory, and were similarly 
 harboured and protected in several cantons. The French and other 
 foreign ministers therefore complained that the engagements entered 
 into by the federal authority, were violated by several of the members 
 of the confederation.* They represented that the geographical situation 
 of Switzerland is peculiarly adapted to make it a convenient place for 
 plotters and agents of sedition, being in the centre of Europe, bordering 
 upon no less than six monarchical states, namely Austria, Sardinia, 
 France, the grand duchy of Baden, Bavaria, and Wurtemberg, with an 
 extensive line of frontiers, most difficult to guard, and numerous moun- 
 tain passes, lakes, and rivers, across which a band of armed men can 
 at any time suddenly pass and repass, there being no military force 
 stationed on the Swiss side of the line to prevent it. It appears that 
 several secret clubs of political emigrants formed in Switzerland, 
 who were designated by the name of " young France," " young Ger- 
 many," " young Italy," &c.,t corresponded with the malcontents of 
 their respective countries, and spread incendiary writings, in which they 
 proclaimed a vast plan of a sweeping, not only political, but social 
 reform, in all western Europe, to begin by upsetting at any cost, by the 
 sword the dagger, and the torch, the existing institutions of the 
 various states. Several of the cantons, and Zurich in particular, col- 
 lected information concerning these secret associations, and made 
 reports to the diet which were published, and left no doubt of the 
 reality of the conspiracies which were going on, on the neutral ground 
 of Switzerland. Dr. Keller, president of the supreme court at Zurich, 
 and deputy to the diet of 1836, exposed the sanguinary statutes of the 
 association known by the name of " young Germany," by which the 
 heads of that society are empowered to issue sentences of death against 
 individuals obnoxious to their cause, which sentences the adepts are 
 bound to execute. On the 22d of June, 1836, the council of state of 
 Bern which was in that year the vorort of the confederation, addressed 
 a note to the French ambassador, duke of Montebello, saying, that 
 " bein<r informed that several political refugees, already expelled from 
 Switzerland for having participated in 1834 in the attempt against Savoy^ 
 had a^ain entered the Swiss territory, and that, latterly also, a certain 
 number of other refugees had been engaged in illegal plots, and even, 
 as it seems, had planned an armed invasion of the territory of the grand 
 duchy of Baden which borders upon Switzerland, the avoyer and council 
 of state of Bern, as federal vorort, have made it their duty to urge in the 
 most pressing manner all the cantonal governments to arrest all the poli- 
 
 * Opinion de M. R'llliet, depute de Geneve a la Diete sur la Conclusion relative aux 
 itrangers, adressce a Messieurs les Memhres des deux Conseils, 14 Aoftt, 1836. 
 
 t Journals under the names of " Jeune France," " Giovine Italia," &c., were pub. 
 lished at the time^ inpulcftting cevplutionary and antisocial principles. 
 
296 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period VII' 
 
 tical refugees who took part in the Savoy attempt, and who have re- 
 entered Switzerland after having been expelled, as well as those who 
 have endangered the interests of Switzerland by intermeddling in the 
 confederation of the cantons, or who are disturbing by revolutionary 
 attempts the good intelligence happily subsisting between Switzerland 
 and the other states. The federal directory is resolved to expel from 
 Switzerland all the refugees of the description above mentioned, but 
 they need for this purpose the assistance of one of the neighbouring 
 powers, and they therefore request his excellency, the ambassador of 
 the king of the French, to apply to his government for leave to admit on 
 the French territory the individuals to be expelled from Switzerland.** 
 To this note was annexed a list of individuals most seriously implicated 
 in the attempts above alluded to. The French ambassador answered 
 this communication of the vorort by a note dated 1 8th July, in which 
 he announced to the vorort that the French government would not only 
 receive the expelled refugees, but furuish them with the means of crossing 
 the territory of France in order to embark in one of its harbours for what- 
 ever destination they might choose, and furnish them with a passport 
 when on board. The ambassador then pressed upon the vorort the 
 necessity of hastening the accomplishment of this necessary measure, 
 which was not, as it was represented by some, an infraction of the right 
 of asylum, as that right, like every other right, had its limitations and 
 conditions, and was accompanied by correspondent duties. Not only 
 Italy and Germany, continued the note, have been threatened by plots 
 hatched on Swiss ground, ** but France also is deeply interested in this 
 question ; for it is ascertained that the refugees in Switzerland are in 
 correspondence with the anarchists in France, that they are acquainted 
 with the atrocious schemes of the French regicides, and that their own 
 designs are connected with the crimes recently attempted in France." 
 It must be remembered in explanation of the last two sentences, that 
 the attempt of Alibaud to assassinate Louis Philippe, and the attempt of 
 the Bonapartists to excite a revolt in the garrison of Strasburg, occurred 
 about this time. Unfortunately the general tone of this note, which 
 ran to a considerable length, was too dogmatic and imperative to con- 
 ciliate, and it rather indisposed many of the Swiss against the demands 
 of France. 
 
 The diet having met in the month of July, the question of the refu- 
 gees was brought before their assembly. After some preliminary con- 
 versations the matter was discussed on the 20th of July ; the deputy of 
 Zurich informed the diet of the discoveries made in that canton of the 
 fanatical association called " young Germany," and its deadly statutes 
 and oaths, of the arrests that had been made in Zurich in consequence, 
 and the papers that had been found, and lastly the mysterious murder 
 in that canton of a foreigner called Lessing, which was still under in- 
 vestigation. The president also comiminicated the note of the French 
 
 PERIOD VII,] 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 291 
 
 ambassador, and the communications of the other foreign ministers con- 
 curring in the sentiments of that note. Ultimately a commission was 
 appointed to prepare a report, which it finished on the 30th. 
 
 On the 5th of August the French ambassador communicated to M. 
 Tscharner, avoyer of Bern, a confidential letter received from the French 
 minister for foreign affairs, threatening an hermetical blockade along 
 the Swiss frontiers, if the diet did not soon come to a decision satisfac- 
 tory to the foreign powers. The next day the ministers of Austria, 
 Prussia, and Baden, called upon the avoyer to support the communi- 
 cation of the French government. 
 
 On the 9th of August an incident connected with this troublesome 
 refugee question gave rise to a warm debate. An address was presented 
 from a popular meeting held at Flawyl in the canton of St. Gall, which 
 address condemned the conduct of the federal diet concerning the 
 refugees, in no measured terms, as anti-national and servile towards 
 foreign states. 
 
 The deputy of Zurich remarked that no class of persons have a right 
 to insult the constituted authorities, and maintained that this address 
 from the Flawyl meeting, although signed by the landammau and other 
 head magistrates of St. Gall, was insulting to the diet, and therefore 
 ought to be rejected by calling the order of the day. 
 
 Luzern endeavoured to justify the boldness and republican tone of 
 the address, though perhaps carried too far. 
 
 Ury, Schwytz, Unterwalden, Glaris, Zug, the Valais, and Neuchatei 
 maintained that the federal diet ought not to admit such unbecoming 
 addresses ; and that those citizens who have complaints to make should 
 address themselves to their respective cantonal governments. 
 
 Freyburg and the Grisons supported the opinion of Zurich. 
 
 Soleure, Basle, Schafi'hausen, and Appenzell condemned also the ex- 
 pressions of the Flawyl address. 
 
 St. Gall maintained that the people have a right to address them- 
 selves to the federal diet as citizens of [Switzerland ; and that the ex- 
 pressions adopted by the popular meeting at Flawyl, although perhaps 
 rude, were the result of the political progress since 1830 of the canton 
 of St. Gall, such meetings having become common there as in America 
 and England. 
 
 Aargau took the same side as St. Gall. " We are not," said the 
 deputy, " the masters of the people, but their servants, and we must 
 listen to their voice, however rude its tones. The people think that the 
 diet has not exhibited sufficient strength in repelling the insinuations of 
 foreign cabinets ; for, at the very time when the diet refuses to listen 
 to the voice of the people, it receives with submission the insults of 
 foreigners. The moment will come when the diet will find its autho- 
 rity neutralized between the attacks of foreigners from without, and the 
 shocks from the popular masses within." 
 
293 
 
 HISTORY OP SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period VII. 
 
 PERIOD VII.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 Thurgau supported the right of petition, but could not approve of 
 the unbecoming tone of the Flawyl address in addressing the first au- 
 thority of the country. 
 
 Vaud fully acknowledged the right of petition, but not that of rude 
 insult. " There is one thing in this Flawyl address which excites a 
 painful feeling, and that is to see men of considerable standing in their 
 canton, men placed at the head of the state, the church, and of public 
 instruction, concluding their petition to other men in authority, whom 
 they insult, by expressing 'the assurance of their profound respect;' 
 there is a want of candour in this, for, if they were consistent, they 
 ought to have written ' the assurance of their profound indignation.' 
 We are told," continues the deputy of Vaud, " that we are the servants of 
 the people. This is one of those vague phrases which it is easier to 
 utter than to define. We are here assembled for the service of the Swiss 
 nation, and for its good ; but are we to be dictated to in all our mea- 
 sures ? We have certain instructions from our constituents upon 
 certain subjects, but upon other points we exercise our judgment, and 
 each of us votes for what he thinks best, and no one has a right to 
 question our good intentions. It was but lately that the deputy of 
 Aargau wanted to give unlimited powers to the vorort, a proposal which the 
 deputy of Vaud opposed with all his force. Both deputies no doubt 
 voted sincerely. But how is it possible that the same deputy of Aargau 
 who yesterday voted against the unbecoming language of a foreign com- 
 munication, should to-day tell the diet that it is at the mercy either of 
 the foreigners from without or of the people from within ? This language 
 is as insulting as that of the foreign note." 
 
 The deputy of Geneva recognised the sacredness of the right of peti- 
 tion for the redress of grievances, but the petitions ought to be expressed 
 in becoming terms. " When the petitions concern political subjects we 
 ought to be on our guard, we ought not to be overawed by long lists of 
 signatures, covering huge rolls of paper ; still more when we see among 
 them the names of magistrates ; for a magistrate might speak in the 
 name of the people without calling the people together in the street; 
 himself elected by the people, he ought to have moral courage enough to 
 speak by himself in the name of the people." The deputy of Geneva 
 voted therefore for the order of the day. « The rejection of resolutions 
 truckling to foreign powers has been attributed to the influence of 
 popular meetings. Geneva denies this assertion ; our canton," said the 
 deputy, *' has acted in full liberty ; if it had approved the resolutions pro- 
 posed, it would have adopted them without minding the popular 
 petitions." 
 
 Bern supported the right of petition, but did not admit that self-called 
 patriotic or popular meetings have a right tfi speak in the name of the 
 nation ; ** this is an abuse which might have the most dangerous con- 
 sequences ; it leads directly to anarchy and civil war. The more a 
 
 299 
 
 people is free, the more it ought to keep itself within constitutional and 
 legal boundaries. The petition before us is not addressed to the proper 
 authority." Bern voted with Zurich and Vaud. 
 
 Zurich approved the sentiments of the deputy of Vaud. " I am," 
 says M. Keller, the deputy of Zurich, " the servant of the nation, but 
 in accepting my commission I have not renounced my honour as a 
 private individual.] We are told that the people are our master, but where 
 is this people, our sovereign ? Men who assemble in self-constituted 
 meetings are not the nation. The great council of Zurich is the repre- 
 sentative of the sovereign canton, and the deputy speaks now in its 
 name." 
 
 On taking the votes, seventeen cantons rejected the address of Flawyl 
 and called for the order of the day. 
 
 These, as well as former extracts of the debates of the Swiss diet, 
 have been inserted in this work as^ndications of the feelings and opi- 
 nions which exist in the various cantons, which may prove not unin- 
 teresting to the reader. 
 
 On the 9th of August the diet adopted the following resolutions : — 
 
 1. Those refugees and other foreigners who have abused the hospi- 
 tality granted to them, and who are proved to have endangered the 
 security, the tranquillity, and the neutrality of Switzerland, and its 
 international relations, shall be expelled the territory of the confedera- 
 tion without delay. 
 
 2. The respective cantons shall make the necessary inquiries and 
 investigations concerning particular cases in their respective territory, in 
 concert with the federal directory. 
 
 3. The federal directory shall see to the faithful, prompt, and uniform 
 execution of the two foregoing articles, and will address the necessary 
 communications and instnictions to the respective cantons. If a differ- 
 ence of opinion arises between the federal directory and one of the 
 cantons concerning some particular case, it shall be referred to the 
 federal diet for its decision. 
 
 4. If a canton refuses or neglects the expulsion of a refugee impli- 
 cated as above, the diet shall enforce its resolution at the expense of the 
 canton. 
 
 5. At the expiration of a month after the present resolutions shall 
 have been adopted by a majority of the states (fifteen is the number re- 
 quired to form a majority in important cases) and communicated to the 
 cantonal governments, the federal directory will make a circumstantial 
 report upon its execution. 
 
 6. These resolutions shall cease to be in force as soon as the federal 
 directory shall have signified that their object has been fully and en- 
 tirely obtained and executed. 
 
 These resolutions encountered much opposition from various cantons. 
 
300 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 [period VII. 
 
 PERIOD VII.] 
 
 HISTORY OF SWITZERLAND. 
 
 301 
 
 sm 
 
 t 
 
 While they were under discussion, a man of the name of Conseil, who 
 passed for a political refugee, was arrested in the canton of Bern, and 
 passports and other papers were found upon him showing that he was an 
 informer sent by the French police to watch the proceedings of the real 
 refugees in that country. This discovery excited a burst of indignation 
 throughout Switzerland, and several members of the councils of the 
 eifferent cantons gave vent to their feelings with much vehemence. 
 However, after angry negotiations and threats of a blockade, which was 
 indeed enforced for a while by France on some parts of the frontier, an 
 arrangement was made ; the Conseil afifair was explained by the French 
 government, and the expulsion against turbulent refugees was enforced 
 by the diet. 
 
 The year 1831 passed comparatively quietly for Switzerland, thanks 
 perhaps in a great measure to the general tranquillity and decline of 
 insurrectionary spirit throughout Europe. But in 1838, a new alterca- 
 tion broke out between France and Switzerland, on account of Louis 
 Bonaparte, son of Louis, formerly king of Holland. This young man, 
 after being arrested in the attempt of Strasburg in 1836, and sent to 
 America, had returned to Europe, and was residing at his estate of 
 Arenenberg in Thurgau. The French government complained that his 
 residence in Switzerland was dangerous to the established order in 
 France, where use was made of his name to encourage the disaffected, 
 between whom and Arenenberg there existed an active correspondence. 
 A repetition of the angry discussions of 1836 took place; until at last 
 the diet of 1838 put the question to the vote whether the confederation 
 would acknowledge and support Louis Bonaparte as a citizen of Thurgau, 
 (in which canton he had acquired the bourgeoisie,) and consequently as 
 a Swiss. There were just eleven votes for the acknowledgment, and 
 twelve against ; one vote more, and Switzerland was on the point of en- 
 during an invasion from France, whose troops were already assembled 
 on its frontiers. The question, however, remained whether Louis Bona- 
 parte, being a foreigner, was to remain in Switzerland, or should be com- 
 pelled to leave it, which question he himself however cut short, by 
 declaring that he should leave that country rather than expose it to 
 further dangers; a resolution which he effected soon after. The 
 closing speech of the president of the diet of 1838, avoyer Kopp of 
 Luzern, exhibits in an impressive manner the delicacy and danger of 
 the position of Switzerland on these and similar questions, for want of 
 a supreme central authority, independent of the popular ebullitions and 
 passions of the various cantonal assemblies. It is chiefly upon inter- 
 national questions that a federal union like that of Switzerland shows 
 the weakness of that form of government, as it has not sufficient gua- 
 rantees to give to its neighbours. 
 
 The last eight years have been years of severe trial for Switzerland ; 
 
 she has however safely passed through them; the new institutions of 
 particular cantons have become consolidated, passions have somewhat 
 subsided, sober reason has again made its voice heard. May Switzer- 
 land maintain both her internal tranquillity and her external inde- 
 pendence, and continue to be what she has hithertoo been— a favoured 
 country in Europe. 
 
 THE END. 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 No. I. (p. 62.) 
 
 The Gugler*s Song, composed at Bern after the victory of the Bernese, and 
 total rout of the invaders, and sung in chorus on the 27th December, 1 376, as 
 the victorious militia re-entered that city, bearing at the head of the column 
 the standard of Bern striped red and yellow, with a black bear painted in 
 the middle. (Tschudi*s Chronidey published by Iselin, Basle, 1 734, under 
 A. D. 1376.) We add a free trtinslation of the song, which is a curious 
 specimen of the language of that time. 
 
 Bemer wapen ist so schnell, 
 
 Mit dryen gfarbten strichen, 
 Die beid sind rot, der mittel giil, 
 
 Darin stat unverblichen 
 Eiii bar, gar schvvarz gemalen, 
 Wol rot sind im die klauen, 
 
 Er it schwertzer daun ein kol, 
 
 Pr3'ss, er er bejagen soil. 
 Bern ist in Burgunden ein houpt, 
 
 Fryen stetten ein krone j 
 Mengklich si billich lobt 
 
 Wcr von inn hcirt den tone ; 
 Dann Bern ist der helden ein sal, 
 Und ein spiegel tiberall, 
 Der sich bildet one fal. 
 
 Alles Tutschland soil si prysen. 
 
 Die jiingen uud die grysen. 
 In weltschen land ward angeleit, 
 Ein mUchtige Reise wit und breit : 
 
 Es ist ein scband der Christenheit, 
 
 Dass inen niemand dorfll tun ze leid, 
 Als si mit bores krafften, 
 Allen herren gross forchte machten ; 
 
 Pabst noch keiser dorfft si bstan, 
 
 Weder herrn noch untertan. 
 Die Gugler, Englisch, and Brittannen, 
 Hin und bar si zesammen kamen, 
 Den herren und stetten si namen, 
 
 GrossmUcbtig hab und gut, 
 
 Und sprachend in irem ubermut: 
 Wir sdUend ziehen in der magten land, 
 Zu Elsass soUend wir bUben, 
 
 Da sind wir sicher von mannenund wyben, 
 
 Dass si uns nit von danntu trybea. 
 
 The banner of Bern is formi- 
 dable, with its three coloured 
 stripes, two of which are red, 
 and the middle is yellow, and 
 its undaunted bear as black as 
 coal, with red paws, and ready 
 to fight for glory and renown. 
 Bern is one of the head towns 
 of Burgundy, and a jewel among 
 free cities ; every one deservedly 
 praises her who is acquainted 
 with her name. Bern is a hall of 
 heroes, and a mirror without 
 stain. Throughout all Germany, 
 young and old shall join in prais- 
 ing her. 
 
 A powerful league was formed 
 in France, and to the shame of 
 Christendom no one dared with- 
 stand it ; it made all princes cower 
 before it ; Pope and emperor, ba- 
 rons and people, dared not oppose 
 it. The Guglers, English, and Bri- 
 tons, and other adventurers ga- 
 thered from every land, invaded 
 lands and castles, robbed people 
 of their property, and in the ar- 
 rogance of their strength thus 
 said boastingly : We shall go to 
 tlie country of the fair maiden, to 
 Alsace, when we shall be safe 
 from men and wives, and shall 
 not l)e expelled from thence. The 
 
304 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 A 
 
 Der Herr Graf Ingram von Guisen 
 
 Wolt stett und burg nemmea inn 
 Er wondt das land war alles sin, 
 Sin schwacher von Engelland halff im 
 
 Mit lib und gut ; 
 Herzog Yffo von Callis mit sim guldineu hut, 
 
 Graf Salver von Brittan, 
 
 Und meng Herr Lobesan. 
 Der von Vienna zu Im sprach : 
 Ich klag uch das mit Ungemach, 
 Helffend mir um das mine, 
 Uwer diener will ich sin^, 
 
 Ich far mit iich gar gem. 
 
 Fur die statt zu Bern. 
 
 Von Oesterrich, von Beierland, 
 
 Von Wirtemberg, und Schwabenland, 
 
 Herren und stett \il, 
 
 Die schiichtend vast der vienden zil. 
 Si lagend ennet dem Rhin, 
 Sicher als in einem schirm. 
 
 Inen was zun vienden nit vast gach, 
 
 Si kamend inen nit ze nach, 
 Und liessend verderben liit und land, 
 Das rich und arm wol empfand. 
 Die Engelschen allgemeine 
 
 Kamend iiber den Lowensteine. 
 In dem land si lagend, 
 Der bar begunt si fragen : 
 
 Warumb si kamind in das land? 
 
 Er berufft zu im gar bald ze hand 
 Sine ey<lguossen 
 Die luffend nie gar blose, 
 
 Zu Biiren an dem Sturm, 
 
 Von einem bdseu Wurm, 
 1st der Graf von Nidow tod ; 
 Herr Motzli nun wear dich es tut dirnot. 
 
 Der gryse, wyse bar gieng ze rat, 
 
 Beyde friiy imd spat, 
 Pryss und eer hab ich bejagt j 
 Min hut gewagt fry unverzagt 
 
 In dem gefecht zu Wangen, 
 
 Da ward mir vil der Gfangnen ; 
 Do ich zu Loupen eerlich facht, 
 Zerstdrt der grossen herren macht: 
 
 Ich ban vil stett und burg brochen. 
 
 An den vienden mich dick gerochen 
 Mag ich, ich riich das laster, 
 Der Gugeler noch vaster. 
 
 Ich soil rain leben daran keren, 
 
 Und im ein teil zerstoren. 
 Der bar begunt von zorn wiitten, 
 Ein liit und land wol bhliten, 
 
 Mit Werffen und mit Schiessen; 
 
 Si begund das spil verdriessen. 
 Mit Mord-Axen und Haleparten, 
 Lag er uff den warten, 
 
 Sine viend er fand zu Inss, 
 
 Do gab er inun den todes-zinss. 
 
 Count Ingram of Guise wanted to 
 take possession of towns, districts, 
 and villages, pretending that the 
 whole laud belonged to him ; his 
 father-in-law of England supplied 
 him with arms and money ; the 
 Duke Yvo of Wales, with his 
 
 golden helmet. Count Salver of 
 iritanny, and many other knights 
 were with him. The Bishop of 
 Basle, John of Vienna, thus spoke 
 to Guise : — " I apply to you to 
 assist me to my own, and I pro- 
 mise to be your faithful servant j 
 I will assist you against the town 
 of Bern." 
 
 From Austria and from Bava- 
 ria, from Wurtemberg and Sua- 
 bia, many lords and towns, fright- 
 ened at the might of the enemy, 
 kept their forces on the right 
 bank of the Rhine, secure as be- 
 hind a screen. 
 
 They did not dare to come near 
 the enemy, and they allowed him 
 to devastate the lands and the 
 property of rich and poor. 
 
 The English came together 
 across the Lowenstein, and en- 
 camped in the plain below. 
 Then the bear asked them gruflBy, 
 " What brings you into this coun- 
 try ?" And then he called to him 
 his allies, who gathered in arms 
 towards Biiren, where the Count 
 of Nidau was killed by an arrow 
 from the Guglers. Ah Sir Motzli, 
 now is the time to fight in thy 
 defence ! 
 
 The old wise bear holds coiiu- 
 cil from morning to night, saying 
 to himself, " I have many « time 
 fought in the field of glory and 
 honour ; I exposed my life freely 
 in the fight of Wangen, where I 
 made many prisoners ; I fought 
 bravely at Laupen, where I over- 
 threw the might of the barons ; 
 I have destroyed in my wrath 
 castles and towns ; now, may be, 
 I shall more severely punish 
 these perverse Guglers, I will risk 
 my life for it.'* 
 
 The bear grew enraged, and he 
 defended his people and his land 
 with sword and arrow ; the Gug- 
 lers began to dislike the game ; 
 the bear met them near Inss, 
 and dealt them deadly blows 
 of the axe and the halbert. 
 The prisoners, who lived to 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 Die gfangnen GuglUre"^ 
 Seitend zu Bern die mUre," 
 
 Dass inen in dryssig iare 
 
 Nie wurd kein fort so schware, 
 Hertzog YflTo von Callis kam gen Frowebrunnen, 
 Der bjir sprach : Du bist nit so wyss dass du 
 
 mir mogst entrinnen, 
 Ich will iich schlagen und trennen, 
 Erstrechen und verbrennen. 
 
 Dass in Engelland und Frauckrich, 
 
 Die wittwen schryend alle glich : 
 A eh iammer und ach wee ! 
 Gen Bern soil niemand reissen mee, 
 
 Viertzig tusend glafen 
 
 Mit iren stiichlin huben, 
 
 Klagtend friind und nefen : 
 Der bUr kan hertlich klubeu, 
 
 Wir hand im ze letze glan, 
 
 UfF driiy tusend gwapneter mann, 
 Er ist ktihn und unverdrossen, 
 Wir hand sin engulten und nit genossen, 
 
 Drum wir wichen miissen, 
 
 Mit hlindeu und rait fiissen. 
 
 305 
 
 tell the tale at Bern, declared 
 that they never, during thirty- 
 years war, had witnessed such a 
 desperate fight. Duke Yvo of 
 Wales came to Frauenbrunmen, 
 and the bear said to him, " Thou 
 art not so clever but I shall over- 
 take thee ; I will pierce thee and 
 thine, and exterminate you all 
 by fire and sword; so that 
 throughout England and France 
 your widows shall bewail and cry 
 out, Oh misery ! oh woe ! Let no 
 one attack Bern any more." 
 Forty thousand warriors, with 
 their steel helmets, will say to 
 their friends and relatives, " That 
 accursed bear gives fearful strokes 
 with his paws ; we left him for his 
 prey more than three thousand 
 of our friends ; he is bold and 
 persevering, and has constrained 
 us to give up our attempt, and 
 to fly for our lives !" 
 
 No. IT. (p. 89.) 
 
 The language of the Grisons is divided into two principal dialects, the 
 Rumonscli and the Lad in ; the latter is the dialect of the Engadin. These 
 dialects are each subdivided into upper and lower. The origin of these dia- 
 lects is certainly Italian, and they are quite distinct from the Teutonic 
 dialects of the surrounding cantons of Switzerland. They are believed to be 
 the remains of the ancient Etruscan language, more ancient than the written 
 Latin, or Roman language, but having probably great affinity to the spoken 
 languages of Latium, Umbria, and other parts of central Italy, before the 
 period of Roman greatness. The Etruscans were at one time in possession 
 of a great part of the plain of the Po, from whence they were expelled by 
 the Gauls in the second century of Rome, or about 600 years before Christ. 
 They then took refuge in the mountains of Rhsetia, where names still remain 
 ■which remind us of Etruria and Latium, such as the river Albula, the 
 towns of Lavin, Ardez, Thusis, Rhcezuns, &c. Several authors, Planta, 
 Conradi, and Father Placidus a Specha, canon of Disentis, have written on 
 the history and peculiarities of the Rumonsch and Ladin dialects. The 
 Ladin bears most affinity to the modern Italian, especially to the dialects of 
 Lombardy. The following specimens of the first part of the parable of the 
 prodigal son in two dialects of the Rumonsch, and two of the Engadin, taken 
 from Stalder's *• Dialektologie," show the shades of difference between them, 
 and, at the same time, their derivation from one common stock. Added to 
 them is a translation of the same text in the dialect of Bellinzona, in the 
 canton Ticino, on the Italian side of the Alps, which seems to form the 
 intermediate step between the Rumonsch and the Milanese or Lombard 
 dialects. 
 
 It is well to observe that the rural dialects of Western Switzerland, called 
 langue Romane or Romaude, such as those of Vaud, Fribourg, Geneva, 
 
306 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 f j 
 
 i^l 
 
 ! 
 
 Neuchatel, &c., have more affinity to the French than to the Italian, and 
 are not so regular in their forms as the Rumonsch and Ladin of the Grisons, 
 which are written languages. The Bible has- long since been published both 
 in Rumonsch and Ladin. Several collections of hymns and other poetry 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 307 
 
 TEXT OF THE VULGATE. 
 
 Luke XV, 11. et seq. 
 
 Homo quidam habuit diios filios : 
 Et dixit adolescentior ex illis patri: 
 Pater, damihiportionemsubstantiae quae 
 me contingit. Et divisit illis substan- 
 tiam. 
 
 Et non post multos dies, congregatis 
 omnibus, adolescentior filius peregre 
 profectus est in longinquam regionemf et 
 ibi dissipavit substantiam suam vivendo 
 luxuriose. 
 
 Et postquam omnia consumasset, facta 
 est fames vaiida in regione ilia, et ipse 
 ccepit egere. 
 
 Et abiit, et adhaesit uni civium regionis 
 illius. Et misit ilium in villam suam ut 
 pasceret porcos. 
 
 Et cupiebat implere ventrem suura de 
 siliquis quas porci manducabaut, et nemo 
 illi (labat. 
 
 In se autem reversus, dixit: quanti 
 mercenarii in domo patris mei abundant 
 panibus, ego autem hie fame pereo. 
 
 Surgam, et ibo ad patrem meum, et 
 dicam ei: Pater, peccavi in coelum, et 
 coram te. 
 
 Jam non sum dignus vocari filius 
 tuus J fac me sicut unura de mercenariis 
 tuis. 
 
 Et surgens venit ad patrem suum. 
 Cum autem adhuc longe esset, vidit 
 ilium pater ipsius, et misericordia motus 
 est, et occurrens cecidit super collum 
 ejus, et osculatus est eum. 
 
 Dixitque ei filius: Pater, peccavi in 
 ccDlura et coram te, jam non sum dignus 
 vocari filius tuus. 
 
 Dixit autem pater ad servos suos: 
 Cito proferte stolam primam, tt induite 
 lUum, et date annulum in manum ejus, 
 et calceamenta in pedes ejus. 
 
 Et adducite vitulum saginatum, et 
 occidite, et manducemus et epuleraur. 
 
 Quia hie filius mens mortuus erat, et 
 revixit: perierat et inventus est. Et 
 coeperunt epulari. 
 
 DIALECT OF LOWER 
 ENGADIN. 
 
 Un tschert omm veva duus filgs : 
 Et il juven de els decheva al bap: 
 Bap da a mei la portiun della substanza 
 quale a mei tocca, Et el ha parti ad els 
 la substanza. 
 
 Et davo brichia bleers dits, ha il juven 
 raspa insembel tot, et eis chiamiua in 
 tin paiais dalontch, et tscha hal Uisfat 
 sea substanza vivond lischiergius. 
 
 Et davo chia el ha consuma tot, eis 
 vengni grande fom in less jaiais, et el 
 ha cumainza a iudurar. 
 
 Et eis i, et s' ha tachia ad un vaschin 
 de lessa regiun, et el il tramettet in sea 
 vilascha, chia el parchura ils porchs. 
 
 Et giavuscheva de umplir il veinter 
 dels mailgiaduoirs quals ils porchs ma- 
 glievan, et ingiin ils deva ad el. 
 
 Mo in seu returna hal dit: quants 
 lavureints in chiasa de mees bap han 
 pang in abundanza, et 6 sto qua peri 
 d' fom ! ^ ^ 
 
 E vo starsu et ir pro mees bap, et dir 
 ad el : Bap, e nha pechia in tschoel et 
 avant tei. 
 
 E nu sun deng da guir nomna tees 
 filg ; fa mei sco un de tees lavureints. 
 
 Et alvond sU, eis el vengni pro sees 
 bap. Ma cura el era am6 dalonsch, 
 schul veset el sees bap, et muainta da 
 comiseratiun he el curri incunter ad el 
 Tha imbrat^cha et l>uscha el. ' 
 
 Et ils filg dschet ad el : Bap ! e nha 
 fat puchia in tschoel et avant tei ; gi6 
 nu sun den;^: de gnir nomna tees filg. 
 
 Ma il bap ha dit a sees servieints: 
 dalunga porteinang il prum buschmaint, 
 trateint el, dat un ann6 in sees mang et 
 schiaipas in sees pees. 
 
 Et manai pro un vadee ingrascha 
 chia no ins possen alegrar et mangiar. 
 
 Perchia quest mees filg era mort et 
 PIS reviou, era peri, et eis chiata. Et els 
 han cumeinza il past d" alegria. 
 
 exist in the same languages, as well as national chronicles. Numerous MSS., 
 some of them eight or nine centuries old, existed in the convent of Disentis. 
 which was burnt by the French on the 6th of May, 1799. A newspaper is 
 now published in Rumonsch. 
 
 UPPER ENGADIN. 
 
 Un hom havaiva duos filgs : 
 Et il juven d' els dschet al bap. Bap, 
 dom la part della facohed, ch' im po 
 tucher. Et el dividet ad els la facolted. 
 
 Pochs dis zieva haviand il filg juven 
 accolt tuot insemel giet in paiais da- 
 lonsch, e disfet lo tuot il sieu, vivand 
 schlaschedamang. 
 
 Ma haviand el trasatu il tuot, rivet 
 una granda fam in quel paiais, et el 
 comauzet a sufrir maungel. 
 
 Giet dimena a s' iffiner tier un con- 
 tadin da quella contrada, i) quel il tra- 
 matet sun sia campagna a parchirar ils 
 pores. 
 
 El bramaiva d' implir sieu vainter con 
 pastriilg, chials pores maglaiven, ma 
 ungun nu '1 daiva. 
 
 Giand dimenna in se dschet : taunts 
 raercenaris in chese de mieu bap haun 
 paun in abondanza, ma eau peresch d' 
 fam. 
 
 Eau volg partir et ir tiers mieus bap, 
 e dscharo : Bap ; eau he pchio center il 
 eel, etavaunt te. 
 
 Ne sum pii deng d' esser nomnd tieu 
 filg, trattam sco un de tieus mercenaris. 
 
 El partit et gnit tiers sieu bap : siand 
 aunchia dalonsch il vezet sieu bap, as 
 compassionand, currit el al brancler et 
 biitscher. 
 
 Co dschet il filg ad el : Bap i eau ho 
 pchi6 eonter il eel et avaunt te, ne sum 
 pii deng d' esser nomno tieu filg. 
 
 Ma il bap dschet a sieus famalgs 
 aporti il pii bel vestimaint et vesti '1 et 
 del un ane in sieu mami, e scharpas in 
 sieus pies. 
 
 Mne tiers un ode ingrascbo, mezzi '1 
 e stain legers, perche quist mieu filg eira 
 mort, ed ais return© in vitta, el eira pers 
 ed ais rechiatto. Usche comauzetten 
 eis a ster legers. 
 
 From the New Testament in the Ru- 
 monsch of the Grey League, llg 
 Nief Testament da Niess Senger Jem 
 Christ, ent ilg Languaig Rumonsch da 
 la Ligia Grischa; Cuera, 1820. 
 
 Un Hum veva dus filgs : 
 
 Ad ilg juven da quels schet alg bab ; 
 Bab, mi dai la part de la rauba c' aud' 
 a mi : ad el parche or ad els la rauba. 
 
 A bucca^bears gis suenter, cur ilg filg 
 juven vet tut mess ensemel, scha tiia '1 
 navent, en Uuna terra dalunsch; a lou 
 sfiget el tut sia rauba cun viver senza 
 sparng. 
 
 A cur el vet tut sfaig, scha vangit ei 
 en quella terra iin groud fumaz j ad el 
 antschavet a ver basengs. 
 
 Ad el ma a sa plide enn uu Burgeis 
 da quella terra ; a quel ilg tarmatet or 
 sin ses beins a parchirar ils pores. 
 
 Ad el grigiava dad amplanir sieu 
 venter cun las eriscas ch' ils pores mal- 
 giavan ; mo nangin Igi deva. 
 
 Mo el ma en sasez a schet j quonts 
 fumelgs da mieu bab han bundonza da 
 paun, a jou mier d' fom I 
 
 Jou vi lavar si, ad ir tier mieu bab, a 
 vi gir a Igi : Bab, jou hai faig puceau 
 ancuuter ilg tschiel ad avont tei. 
 
 A sunt bucca pli vangonts da vangir 
 numnaus tien filg : fai mei esser sco iia 
 de tes fumelgs. 
 
 Ad el lava si, a vangit tier sieu bab : 
 a cur el fo ounc dalunsch, sch' ilg vaset 
 sieu bab, a sa parnet puceau d' el ; ad el 
 curret, a curd^ vi da sieu euliez, ad ilg 
 bitseha. 
 
 Mo ilg filg schet a Igi : Bab, jou hai 
 faig puceau aneunter ilg tschiel, ed 
 avont tei, a sunt bucca pli vangonts de 
 vangir numnaus tien filg. 
 
 Ad ilg bab schet a ses fumelgs : Dei 
 nou ilg pli bi vastcheu, algi targeit ent, 
 a mettie tin ani en sieu maun, a calzers 
 en ses peis. 
 
 A maneit nou quel vidi' angarschau, a 
 mazeit, a mangein a stein da bunna 
 velgia. 
 
 Pareheica quest mieu filg fova mortg, 
 ad ei vangeus vifs ; tl fova pardeus, ad 
 ei vangeus afflaus. Ad els antschavevan 
 ad esser de bunna velgia. 
 
 X 2 
 
308 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 OBERLAND RUMONSCH OF 
 THE CATHOLIC DISTRICT. 
 
 In tschiart omni veva dug filgs : 
 
 Et il pli giuven ha dietg agli bab : 
 Bab da a mi or la part della rauba che 
 auda a rai. Et el ha partigiu or ad els 
 la rauba. 
 
 Paucg diis suenter ha il filg giuven 
 rimnau ensembel tutt, et es ius enten ina 
 iiara dalunsch, et lau ha el fatg ir sia 
 rauba cun se surdar a schliats plischeers. 
 
 Et suenter ch* el veva veuschiu tutt, 
 schi ei vengiu ina gronda fom enten 
 quella tiara, et el ha entschiet a patir 
 muncanza. 
 ^ Et el ei ius et ha priu surveteh tier in 
 vischin da quella tiara. Quel hatermess 
 el sin sia meria a parchiarar il portgs. 
 
 El vess bugen compliu siu venter cun 
 quel fretgs ch' ils portgs migliavau, et 
 ningin dava ad el de quels. 
 
 Mo ius en sesez ha el detg: conts 
 luvreers han buldonza de paun enten la 
 casa de miu bab, et iau mierel cheu 
 della fom. 
 
 Jeu vo leyar si, ir tier miu bab e dir 
 ad el; Bab ieu hai fatg puccau encunter 
 il tscheil e cunter tai. 
 
 Jeu sundel buce vengonz de vengnir 
 nomnaus pli tui figl: tegn mei sco in 
 dils tees luvreers. 
 
 E levont si eis el ius tier sui bab. Mo 
 cura ch' el fuva aunc dalunsch, ha siu 
 bab viu el, e muentaus de compassiuu es 
 el currius vi tier, ha priu ei entuovn 
 culiez e bitschari el. 
 
 Et il filg ha detg ad al : Bab, ieu hai 
 fatg puccau encunter il tscheil e cunter 
 tai. Jeu sundel buce vengonz de vengnir 
 nomnaus pli tui filg. 
 
 Mo il bab ha detgals sees survients ; 
 portei gleiti neutier il pli bial vestigiu et 
 tirei eun adel, mettei in anni enten siu 
 maun, e calzeers euten sees peis. 
 
 Mani neutier in vide grass, e mazei 
 el, sma quei che nus possien far in past 
 de legria. 
 
 Partgei quest miu fegl ei staus morts 
 et ei pusspei vivs, el ei staus piars et 
 vengnui anflau. Et els lian entschiert 
 a migliar. 
 
 DIALECT OF BELLINZONA, south 
 of the Alps, in the Italian canton of 
 
 , Ticino ; that of Locarno differs but 
 very little from it. 
 
 Oum cert uom al gha avii dii fio : ' 
 
 E al pili giovan da lor 1' ha di al pa- 
 dar : Pa, damm la ,part da la sostanza, 
 ca me tocca: E al gha dividll la sos- 
 tanza. 
 
 E dopo migna a tanti di, mettii in- 
 semma tuttcoss, al fiii piu giovan 1' £ 
 parti in paes lontang, e li 1' ha fai na la 
 soua sostanza col vif liisUriosament. 
 
 E dopo che T aveva consiima tuttcoss, 
 ghe venii ouna gran fam in quel paes, a 
 lii r ha comincia a trovass in bisogne. 
 
 E r e an da e '1 se tacca a vUgne de 
 quel paes. E al 1' ha manda fdra in di 
 so fondi a guida i porcei. 
 
 E al desiderava de irapieniss al so 
 ventar di giand che i porcei i mangiavan ; 
 ma nissugne g' an dava. . 
 
 Torna;donca in lu, 1' ha di: quants 
 lavorant in ca dal me pu i abondan de 
 pang, mi mo chi a mori da fam ! 
 
 A staro sii, e audaro dal mi pa, e ga 
 disar.) : Pa, i* ho pecca contr' al ciel e d' 
 annanz' a ti. 
 
 Oraniai a soum piii degne de vess 
 ciama to fid : famm coma viigne di to' 
 lavorant. 
 
 E stand sU '1 e vegnu dal so pa. Ma 
 essend ancamo da lontang, al V ha vedu 
 al so pa, el s' e movil a compassioug, e 
 correndog incontra al g' ha s' e butta al 
 coll, e r ha basa sii. 
 
 E al fid al g' ha di: Pa, j' ho pecca 
 contr' al ciel, e dannanz a ti, oramai a 
 soum piu degne de vess ciama to fiii. 
 
 Ma al padar 1' ha di ai so servitor : 
 prest tie scha al piii bell vesti, i e vestill 
 SU, e deg oun anell in mang, e di scarp 
 ai pe. ^ 
 
 E mene scha oum vedell ingrassa e 
 mazzell, e mangiemm e feinm past, 
 
 Parche stou me fio 1' era mort e T 6 
 nschilschita, 1' era anda perdii, 1' sta 
 trova. E j an comincia a fa past. 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 309 
 
 No. III. (p. 132.) 
 
 In January, 1528, the following theses, after being publicly discussed, 
 were approved of at Bern by the evangelical or reformed preachers : - 
 
 I. The Holy Christian Church, of which Christ is the only Head, is born 
 of the word of God, and continues attached to it, and does not listen to the 
 voice of a stranger. 
 
 II. The Church of Christ does not make laws and ordinances unless 
 grounded upon the word of God. Therefore, all the ordinances of men, 
 which are called by the name of Commandments of the Church, are not 
 binding upon us, unless they be founded upon, and ordained by, the word of 
 God. 
 
 III. Christ alone is our wisdom, our justice, our redemption, and satis- 
 faction for the sins of the whole world. It follows, therefore, that to ac- 
 knowledge other merits as means of salvation, and other satisfaction for sin 
 is to renounce Jesus Christ. 
 
 IV. It cannot be proved from Holy Scripture, that the body and the 
 blood of Christ are contained materially and bodily in the Eucharistic 
 bread. 
 
 V. The mass, ^uch as it is now, in which the sacrifice of Jesus Christ is 
 daily offered to God the Father for the sins of the living and the dead, is 
 contrary to Scripture ; it is a sacrilegious insult against the holy sacrifice, 
 passion, and death of Jesus Christ, and is an abomination before God. 
 
 VI. Jesus Christ, having alone died for us, must be alone invoked as our 
 mediator and intercessor between God the Father and the faithful. It is, 
 therefore, without any foundation on Scripture that we are told to invoke 
 other mediators and intercessors from among the dead. 
 
 VII. There is no scriptural ground for attesting that there is after this 
 life any purgatory, or place in which souls are purified by fire. Therefore, 
 all the services for the dead which have been introduced, as vigils, masses, 
 funeral processions, oblations, anniversaries, lamps, wax tapers, and other 
 such things, are useless and vain. 
 
 VIII. To make and set up images in order to bestow upon them a reli- 
 gious honour or worship, is contrary to the word of God, both in the Old and 
 New Testaments. They ought, therefore, to be abolished, whenever there 
 is danger that the people should bestow upon them a religious honour. 
 
 IX. Holy marriage is not forbidden by Scripture to any class or order of 
 men ; it is, on the contrary, recommended to all, in order to avoid fornica- 
 tion and lewdness. 
 
 X. A public fornicator is excommunicated by the Scripture ; and there is 
 no order of men in whom lewdness is more pernicious than it is in clergy- 
 men, on account of the scandal they give thereby, and of the disorder which 
 is consequent upon it. 
 
 On the 7th of Feoruary of the same year, 1528, the great and little coun- 
 cils of Bern issued the following edict of reformation, in thirteen articles : — • 
 I. The ten theses already discussed are approved and confirmed, and all 
 
310 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 311 
 
 subjects of the state are ordered to conform themselves to them, forbidding 
 all- rectors, curates, and other presbyters, to teach or speak against the above 
 theses, under pain of being deprived. 
 
 II. The four bishops' of Constance, Basel, Lausanne, and Sion, are de- 
 prived of all spiritual jurisdiction over the subjects of our state, as they did 
 not attend the disputation concerning the theses, which, had they been able 
 to support their doctrine by the word of God, they would have done. Their 
 temporal jurisdiction, however, is left to them. 
 
 III. and IV. The deans, and other members of chapters, are freed from 
 the oath which they have tendered to the bishops, and they are instead to 
 take a new oath before their excellencies of the little council. Those deans 
 who may oppose the evangelical doctrine are to be deprived, and others ap- 
 pointed in their places. The clergy of the canton are no longer obliged to 
 attend chapters out of the territory of the state. 
 
 V. The mass and images are abolished for ever at Bern. But as there 
 are in the country various populations and districts which are yet unin- 
 structed and weak in the faith, their excellencies wish not to act harshly 
 towards them ; but pitying them, and praying God that they may become 
 enlightened, they leave them the faculty of abolishing or not the mass and 
 images, according to the vote of the majority. Meantime they enjoin upon 
 either party not to insult or revile the other. 
 
 VI. It is intended generally to abolish all that is contrary to the word of 
 God, and to the peace, union, and welfare of the community. 
 
 VII. Although the ceremonies of the mass, offices for the dead, anniver- 
 saries, &c., are abolished, yet the foundations or legacies bequeathed for 
 these various purposes, the quit rents, census, and other dues, shall continue 
 to be paid as heretofore, in order that the clergymen who have benefices 
 may enjoy their income during their lifetime, and live and die in peace. 
 After their death, we shall dispose of the property according to justice, not 
 for our benefit, but in such a manner as that we may be able to give an ac- 
 count of our management to God and men. Those persons, however, who 
 have given property to convents, or have founded chaplainships and other 
 minor benefices, without cure of souls, may resume it. 
 
 VIII. With regard to those cures or benefices which were annexed to 
 convents, the Vogt or Avoue of the convent shall give an account of their 
 revenue, which shall be afterwards disposed of as may be thought fit. No 
 lord, or patron, or collator of a church, is to appropriate to himself or touch 
 any part of its revenues. 
 
 IX. In order to avoid scandal, the vases and other ornaments of the 
 churches shall remain where they are till further orders, with leave to the 
 companies and corporations commonly called Abbayes, and also to private 
 individuals who have altars and chapels belonging to them, to claim those 
 utensils and ornaments attached thereto, in order that they may remove 
 them, 
 
 X. Marriage is allowed to the clergy. 
 
 XI. Every one shall be allowed to eat of all sorts of meat, without dis- 
 tinction of days, but with thankfulness, and without any excess or drunken- 
 ness. Taverns, and other public places of entertainment, are to be shut up 
 at nine o'clock in the evening, under a penalty of ten livres and upwards. 
 
 XII, Monks and nuns may remain in their convents if they like, but 
 must not admit any more novices or boarders ; those who wish to leave their 
 convents may do so, carrying away that which they brought with them ; 
 and if they choose to marry, and have not enough to support themselves, 
 their excellencies will assist them out of the property of the convents. But, 
 whether they marry or not, they must, on leaving the convent, quit the dress 
 of their order. 
 
 XIII. All clergymen having the cure of souls are to preach four times a 
 week, Sunday, Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, under pain of dismissal, 
 except during the sowing and reaping and vintage periods, when the pea- 
 sants cannot attend church on week days. 
 
 RuCHAT : Histoire de la Reformation en Suisse. 
 
 No. IV. Cp. 142.) 
 
 The Helvetic Confession of Faith, consisting of 30 chapters, was drawn out 
 in Latin by Henry Bullinger, a friend ofZwingh, and other Swiss reformers. 
 It was accepted by all the Swiss Protestant Cantons, and was translated into 
 both French and German. It was also approved of by the Protestant churches 
 of Scotland, Hungary, Poland, and France. The full title of the work 
 is: — *' Confessio et Expositio simplex Orthodoxae Fidei et dogmatum 
 Catholicorum sincerse Religionis Christiana?; concordita ab Ecclesije 
 Christi Ministris qui sunt in Helvetia, Tiguri, Bernee, Glaronso, Basileee, 
 Scaphusii, Abbatiscellse, Sangalli, Curia Rhsetorum, et apud Confederates 
 Mylhusii item ac Biennae; quibus adjunxerunt se Genevensis et Neoco- 
 mensis Ecclesise Ministri, una cum aliis Evangelii Praeconibus, in Polonia, 
 Hungariaet Scotia." 8vo. Tiguri. 1566, and again in 1651. The latest French 
 edition is that of Lausanne, 1 834 : " La Confession de foi Helvetique." But as 
 it forms a volume of 152 octavo pages, we give here an authenticated abstract 
 of it as published at Lausanne two or three years since under the title of 
 " Articles de la foi Chretienne extraits textuellement de la Confession de 
 foi Helvetique." 
 
 I. We believe and confess that the canonical books of the holy prophets 
 and of the holy apostles, which constitute the Old and New Testaments, are 
 truly the word of God. 
 
 . All the members of the Christian Church may find in the Holy Scrip- 
 tures all that is required to render their faith a saving faith, and to regulate 
 their morals in a manner agreeable to God. 
 
 We do not think that the preaching of the word of God is useless, but we 
 are persuaded that a solid knowledge of true religion depends on the illu- 
 mination by the Holy Ghost. 
 
 II. We believe and teach that there is but one God ; that this Being 
 exists necessarily of himself ; that he is sufficient to himself, invisible, imma- 
 terial, immense, and the only Eternal ; that he is all-powerful, and the Creator 
 
312 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 of all things which exist ; that he is living ; that lie'animates' and supports 
 everything; lastly, that he is good, wise, merciful, just, true, faithful, and 
 our supreme good. 
 
 At the same time we believe and teach that this God, which in its essence 
 is one and indivisible, is distinguished in holy writ into persons which must 
 be neither separated nor confounded, namely, the Father, the Son, and the 
 Holy Ghost. The Father has begotten the Son of all eternity, and the Son 
 has been begotten by the Father in an ineffable and to us incomprehensible 
 manner. The Holy Ghost proceeds from both, of all eternity, and ought to 
 be adored with both the other persons. There are not three Gods, but three 
 persons in the same Being, equal and co-eternal, yet distinct in an incom- 
 prehensible manner with regard to their personality, for one of them is not 
 the other, and also with regard to order, for one precedes the other. Still 
 there is no inequality between them, but their essence is united and com- 
 mon to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, so that there is but one 
 and the same God. 
 
 III. We teach that we will adore and invoke God alone ; that we ought to 
 serve God in the manner which he has commanded us, without supersti- 
 tion, in spirit and truth. 
 
 We invoke, therefore, God alone in all our ills, in all our dangers, and in 
 all our wants ; we invoke him through the sole mediation of Jesus Christ 
 our only intercessor. 
 
 r IV. We believe that all >hich is in the heavens and upon earth is 
 maintained and governed by the providence of a wise, good, powerful, and 
 eternal God. We do not, however, consider as useless the means employed 
 by Providence, and those which we ought to employ ourselves after the 
 manner prescribed in the divine word. God, who has known and deter- 
 mined the end of everything, has also foreseen and ordained the beginning 
 of it ; the end is connected with the means in his prescience as well as in 
 the nature of things. 
 
 V. This God, infinitely good and all-powerful, whom we adore, has created 
 all the things which exist, visible as well as invisible, through his co-eternal 
 Word, and he maintains them all through his co-eternal holy Spirit. 
 
 All which God created " was good" in its origin. (Genesis i) 
 
 Man particularly had the use of all which was necessary to him. 
 
 The most excellent of creatures are the celestial intelligences, and man. 
 
 We teach that some of the celestial intelligences have persevered with 
 firmness in their obedience, and these are the angels which are ordered to 
 ser\'e God and assist the faithful. Other spirits did not remain steadfast in 
 obedience, but fell voluntarily into sin : God hurled them into perdition, and 
 they became the enemies of all good, and consequently the enemies of the 
 faithful. 
 
 With regard to man. Holy Scripture also teaches us that he was created 
 in righteousness, and formed after God's image. He was placed in the 
 earthly paradise, and everything was made subject to him. 
 
 We teach that man is composed of two difl*erent substances or natures. 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 313 
 
 which form but one person, namely, of an organic body and an' immortal 
 soul, which soul when separated from the body by death does not sleep or 
 perish. The mortal body will be resuscitated at the last day, in order that 
 the whole man may remain for ever in the abode of happiness or in that of 
 punishment. 
 
 " VI. God at first created man after his own image, in righteousness and 
 innocence. But man, through an abuse of his liberty, allowed himself to 
 be seduced by the serpent, and thus forsook his original righteousness. 
 Consequently he became subject to sin and death and all sorts of miseries, 
 and such as the first man became through his fall, such also are all those 
 who have issued from him. 
 
 When we say that man is subject to sin, we mean thereby that corrup- 
 tion or depravity of man which is born with him, and which is transmitted 
 (since the first man) from father to son ; vicious passions and propensities, 
 a dislike of virtue, and inclination, to all evil, a disposition to malice and 
 mistrust, and to the contempt and hatred of God ; these are the unhappy 
 effects of that corruption which renders us incapable of any good. As man 
 advances in age, he bears corrupt fruit, worthy of an evil tree : thoughts, 
 words, and actions are those evil fruits. Exposed thereby to the wrath of 
 God, we have to expect from Him nothing but a just punishment; and he 
 would even have rejected us altogether, if Jesus Christ, our Saviour, had not 
 led us back to him. 
 
 By the death to which sin has made us subject, we mean not only the 
 death of the body which we must all bear once in consequence of sin, but 
 also the separation from God, and the eternal punishment which our sins 
 
 deserve. 
 
 We acknowledge, therefore, that there is an original sin in all men. We 
 confess also that all transgressions of the Divine law which emanate from 
 this" original corruption, are true sins, by whatever name they may be 
 
 designated. 
 
 We acknowledge also that all sins are not equally criminal, although 
 thev be-all derived from the same source of corruption and want of faith; 
 some of them are more enormous than others ; and therefore it is the Lord 
 tells us that there will be various degrees of punishment proportionate to 
 them. 
 
 VII. Those questions which concern the liberty or free will of man have 
 in all times been the cause of unhappy disputes in the church. We teach 
 upon this subject as follows :— Man ought to be considered in three aspects. 
 1st. In his former state of innocence. 2dly. In his fallen state. 3dly. In 
 his recovered or redeemed state. 
 
 1st. State of man before his fall. 
 
 At the first, Man came forth innocent from the hands of his Creator, and 
 was free ; he could remain steady in uprightness, but he could also turn to 
 evil, and by taking unfortunately the latter course, he abused his liberty, 
 and has drawn upon himself and his posterity a load of evils. 
 
314 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 315 
 
 ; ' 
 
 ^y. State of man after Ms fall. 
 We must now consider what man has become since his fall. He has not 
 been deprived of his judgment, or of his will; he has not been reduced to 
 the state of a tree or stone ; but his faculties have been so much altered and 
 weakened that he cannot do now what he could have done before his fall ■ 
 his intellect has become darkened, and his will, which was once free, has be- 
 come a Slave, He has been made subject to sin, not tlirough constraint but 
 through inclination ; and his will, although in a state of subjection to the 
 senses and the imagination, is still called will, and not coercion. Thus 
 man continues to sin without external constraint from the devil, much less 
 isTee """ ^'"""'^' """^ ^Pon'^xeously, and in this respect he 
 
 Since the fall of man, his intellect, abandoned to itself, can no longer 
 judge rightly of divine things, and of those which concern virtue. The 
 Holy Scriptures teach us that now. in order to be saved, man must be 
 regenerated. Therefore our first birth which we derive from Adam is of 
 no avail for our salvation. 
 
 nnfir":,"'""'' 'r^"''f *''' *'"^' °^ '^' '^°'^^' "'^"- "'""gh «<"^"Pt. has 
 noUost all capacity for knowing and judging for himself. He is still, thinks 
 
 to Divine mercy, gifted with intelligence, though of a less perfect kind than 
 .t was at the beginning. God wishes that man should cultivate his mind 
 and enrich It with useful knowledge, and he grants him talents for this pu': 
 pose, and blesses the efforts of man directed thereto. 
 
 3d. State of regenerated man. 
 The understanding of the regenerated faithful is enlightened by the Holv 
 Orhost, so that It knows the mysteries and the will of God : their will is 
 likewise changed by the Holy Ghost, and supplied with strength to turn 
 willingly unto good and to do it. ° 
 
 There we must well notice two things ; the first is, that regenerated man 
 
 one at rntrr"^ V'^'' T''' '"^ '"' ""'^ ^^I*"^"- -*'" ^ms "t'e 
 operat on of God inclining him towards it, but he feels also that he acts of 
 
 himself, of his own accord, and with pleasure. 
 
 Another fact, which is not less deserving of remark, is. that there are 
 always remains of weakness even in regenerated man. Tie traces of sn 
 are stil in us. and the flesh resists the spirit till the end of oui Tife so th t 
 Uie faithful cannot execute with perfection all which they propos^ to do 
 But as the pasMons have no longer sufficient power to extinguish the flames' 
 ofthe Holy Ghost, the regenerated are looked upon as free tho„!irrr 
 tTetublj!^' ^""^'''""^ '•>eirweaknes..;and Lt pW^theretf o^^ 
 
 Besides no one denies that both the regererate<l and the unregenerated 
 are fi-ee with regard to things which concern only the present life mTu at 
 well as he animals inclines towards certain things and feels aversion from 
 others; he wills or wills not. he can speak or be silent; eaeTs house o^ 
 
 ^hXpleX ^^ '^° ''' °"^'' '" ^'""""'^^^^ '•'^ -'^^^ 
 
 VIII. God, out of his wisdom, has predestined or chosen, from all eter- 
 nity, freely, of his own mere grace, and without regard for persons, the 
 righteous whom he intends to save through Jesus Christ. 
 
 Therefore God has chosen us, not without reason, but without any merit 
 on our part; he has chosen us in Jesus Christ and for the sake of Jesus 
 Christ, so that those who are united to the Saviour by faith are the elected of 
 God, and those, on the contrary, who are not thus united to Jesus, are con- 
 demned. 
 
 We ought to notice also that the faithful have been elected by God in 
 Jesus Christ for a certain object which the apostle explains to us when he 
 says, " He has chosen us in Jesus Christ, that we should be holy and with- 
 out blame, before him in love, having predestinated us unto the adoption of 
 children by Jesus Christ to himself, to the praise of the glory of his grace.'» 
 
 Ephes. i. 4, 5, 6. 
 
 Although God alone "knows those whom he has chosen," (John xiii. 18.) 
 and although it is said in the Scripture that " many be called but few are 
 chosen," (Matthew xx. 16.) we must hope, nevertheless, favourably of every 
 one, and not rashly class any one among the number of the condemned. 
 
 We must here consider above all things how great is the charity which 
 God the Father has manifested to us in Christ. We ought to consider the 
 Saviour himself teaching us perpetually in his Gospel, and calling us to him. 
 
 Therefore Jesus Christ must be for us the mirror in which we ought to 
 contemplate our predestination and our election ; if we hold communion with 
 Christ, and that by means of a true faith he be ours and we his, we then have 
 a clear and tolerably certain proof that our names are written in the book 
 of life. 
 
 IX. We believe and teach that the Son of God, Jesus Christ our Lord, 
 has been, from all eternity, destined and established by God his Father to 
 be the Saviour of the world. AVe are also persuaded that he has been be- 
 gotten of the Father, in an ineffable manner, not only before the creation of 
 the world, or at the time of his conception in the womb of the Holy Virgin, 
 but from all eternity. Therefore the Son of God is equal to his Father as 
 to his divinity ; he is of the same essence and a true God. He is not Son 
 by adoption onlv, nor by any grace, but he is true God by his nature. We 
 believe also and teach that the eternal Son of the eternal God is become the 
 son of man, being issued out ofthe posterity of Abraham and of the family 
 of David. He has not been begotten by man. - He has been conceived of the 
 Holy Ghost, and born of the Virgin Mary. 
 
 Our Lord has also had a true soul as other men have, and a feeling body 
 
 like our own. , t j * j-.^. 
 
 We confess then that there are in Jesus Christ our only Lord two dif- 
 ferent natures, the divine and the human, and that these two natures are united 
 with their respective properties into one person in such a manner that they 
 are neither absorbed one by the other, nor confounded one in the other. We 
 honour therefore a single Lord, who is true God and true man, equal to the 
 Father by his divine nature, but also of the same substance with us m his 
 human nature, similar to us in all, except in him. 
 
316 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 X. We believe, moreover, that our Lord Jesus truly suffered in his body 
 for us and that he died. We believe also that our Lord was resuscitated 
 from the dead with the same body in which he was crucified, and not with 
 another body instead of that which had been buried, and that he did not 
 assume a ghostly appearance instead of a real body. 
 
 We believe also that our Lord has ascended with the same glorified body 
 to the heavens, into the mansions of the blessed, in the palace of God, and 
 that he sits at the right hand of God. 
 
 As Jesus ascended to heaven, so he will come again to judge mankind, 
 wiien wickedness shall have reached its full measure, and when the anti- 
 cnrist, havmg corrupted the true religion, shall have filled the earth with 
 superstition and impiety, and shall have ravaged the church by fire and 
 sword; the Lord will come then to liberate his own, to destroy the antichrist, 
 and to judge the quick and the dead. 
 
 The dead shall then come to life, and all those who shall be alive that 
 day, a day which is unknown to all mortals, will undergo a sudden chan-e. 
 and all the righteous shall be lifted up to heaven in the presence of Jes'us 
 Christ to enter with him into the kingdom of happiness, and live for ever 
 there, but the unbelievers and the wicked shall be hurled into hell with the 
 devils, to suffer there eternally, in torments without end.' 
 
 Our Lord, by his passion,:his death, and all that he had done and suffered 
 for the love of us since he manifested himself in the flesh, has reconciled 
 his heavenly Father with all the faithful ; he has expiated sin, stripped 
 death of Its power, and annihilated condemnation and hell, and by his resur- 
 rection he has conquered for the righteous life and immortality. He is 
 therefore our justification, our life, and our resurrection; in one word in 
 him are found the perfection and redemption of all the faithful, their sal'va- 
 tion, and the fulness of all heavenly good. 
 
 We believe therefore that Jesus Christ our Lord is the only and eternal • 
 Saviour of mankind, and that in him have been saved by faith all those who 
 have obtained salvation, before the old law, under the old law. and under 
 the new dispensation of the Gospel, as well as all those who shall be saved 
 until the end of the world. 
 
 We declare and teach therefore that Jesus Christ is the only Saviour of 
 the world, our King and Sovereign Pontiff; in a word, the true Messiah; 
 we acknowledge that his holy person is the fountain of all blessings which 
 was expected from the beginning of the world ; that he is the Messiah repre- 
 sented in all the emblems of the old law, promised by the oracles of the 
 prophets and whom God has sent to us, so that we must not expect anv 
 other. We are therefore bound to give to Jesus all the glory which is du'e 
 o him; we must beheve in him. confide in him alone, renouncing and 
 rejectmg all other means of help, consolation, and happiness. AH those 
 who seek their salvation in any other than through Jesus Christ alone are 
 fallen from grace, and render the Saviour useless to them. 
 
 XL We teach that the law of God places his will before our eyes • it tells 
 us what the Supreme Lawgiver wills or does not will that we should do • it 
 discrimmates between that which is good and righteous and that which is 
 bad and wicked. We acknowledge that this divine law is just and holy • il 
 
 APPENDIX. 1317 
 
 has been written by the hand of God in the hearts of men, and this is what 
 we call the natural law ; it has also been engraved by the finger of God upon 
 the two tables of the ten commandments, and has been explained by Moses 
 in his holy books. We distinguish in the Mosaic law, 1st, the moral law 
 which is contained in substance in the ten commandments ; 2d. the cere- 
 monial law, which regulates the sacred ceremonies and religious worship ; 
 and 3d, the judicial law, which refers to the civil and domestic government 
 of the Hebrews. 
 
 We believe that this divine law teaches us perfectly the will of God, and 
 gives us all the necessary precepts for every circumstance of this life. 
 
 We teach also that this law has not been given to men that they should 
 be justified or declared innocent through its observance, but rather in order 
 that by itsj precepts we may acknowledge our weakness, our sins, and our 
 state of condemnation, and that, despairing of our own strength, we may 
 turn in faith towards Jesus Christ to obtain salvation through him. 
 
 There is no man who ever could or ever can fulfil the law of God, on 
 account of the weakness which is in us, and which will remain in us until 
 our last breath. 
 
 The law of God has been abolished in as much as it does not condemn us 
 any more, and does not threaten us with its wrath. In this sense we are no 
 longer under the rule of the law, but under that of grace. Jesus Christ has 
 accomplished the figures and the types of the law. The shadow has disap- 
 peared in the presence of the body, so that we have now in the Saviour the 
 truth and the fulness of grace. 
 
 We do not, however, despise the old law, for we remember the words of 
 the Lord: " I am not come to destroy the law or the prophets, but to fulfil 
 them," (Matthew v. 17.) We know that the law gives excellent rules con- 
 cerning virtue and vice. We know that all the Old Testament is useful to 
 the church, if it is explained by the New. 
 
 XII. People often put the Law in opposition to the Gospel, because the 
 law threatens malediction and wrath, whilst the Gospel preaches grace and 
 blessing. It is, however, certain that those who have lived before the law 
 or under the law, have not been deprived of the comfort of the promises of 
 the Gospel. 
 
 We acknowledge that the faithful of the olden times have had two kinds 
 of promises revealed to them as well as to us, one concerning the actual age 
 in which they lived, and the earthly blessings which God bestowed upon them 
 and their race, such as the possession of the land of Canaan and the victory 
 over their enemies, and such is also the promise we have of having our daily 
 bread given to us. But the other promises were for them as they are for us. 
 promises of heavenly and eternal goods, such as the grace of God, the for- 
 giveness of sins, and the eternal life through faith in Jesus Christ. There- 
 fore the righteous under the old law had not only earthly promises, but also 
 promises of spiritual and heavenly blessings through Jesus Christ. 
 
 But though our forefathers have had in the writings of the prophets a 
 Gospel of promise by means of which they have obtained salvation in Jesus 
 Christ through faith, yet, properly speaking, we call Gospel that happy mes- 
 sage which was brought to the world, first by the preaching of John the 
 
3)8 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 I 
 
 Baptist, afterwards by the Son of God himself, and after him by his apostles 
 and all their successors ; which Gospel reveals to us that God has fulfilled 
 the promise which he had made from the beginning of the world, by sending 
 at the appointed time and giving to us his only Son, and securing to us 
 through him reconciliation, remission of sins, fulness of grace, and eternal 
 life. The history which has been written by the four evangelists of all which 
 Jesus Christ has done and taught in order to ensure the fulness of his 
 grace to those who believe in him, that history is called the Gospel. For 
 the same reason, the writings of the apostles, in which they explain to us 
 how the Son has been given us by the Father, and with the Son all which 
 concerns life and salvation, these writings are called the evangelical doc- 
 trines, and the same dogmata, preached and expounded in their purity at 
 the present day, deserves also a like appellation. 
 
 This preaching of the Gospel is called by the apostle Paul " the Spirit," 
 and " the ministry of the Spirit," because it is rendered efficacious on the 
 faithful by the illumination of the Holy Ghost which produces faith. The 
 " letter," which is opposed to the " spirit," designates in general all which 
 is external, and more particularly the doctrine of the law without the agency 
 of the Spirit, and therefore without that living faith of the heart which is 
 the gift of the Holy Spirit ; it designates the doctrine of the law which en- 
 genders sin and worketh wrath, and for this the apostle calls it a " ministry 
 of death," and says that " the letter killeth,'" but " the spirit giveth life." 
 
 Although the doctrine of the Gospel, compared with that of the law, as 
 taught by the Pharisees, may have appeared new when Jesus Christ first'taught 
 it, that doctrine is, however, the oldest in the world. God had decreed from 
 all eternity to save the human race through Jesus Christ, and it is by the 
 Gospel that he has manifested to men his eternal intention. It follows from 
 this that the evangelical doctrine is the most ancient of doctrines that have 
 been, are, or shall be. It would be a great error, offensive to the eternal 
 wisdom of God, to look upon this evangelical doctrine as a noveltv, and to 
 say that the Christian faith has only begun recently. 
 
 XIII. The doctrine of Repentance is also a part of the evangelical doctrine. 
 By repentance we mean that grief of the soul which is excited by the word 
 and the Spirit of God, and accompanied by a true faith ; when, in this feeling, 
 the sinner acknowledges at first his natural corruption and all his actual sins 
 which the word of God unravels to him, and his heart is affected with sin- 
 cere grief at the recollection of them ; he deplores them before God • he 
 confesses them to him sincerely and with all humility, he detests them with 
 shame and indignation ; he thinks henceforth seriously to correct himself, 
 and to devote himself permanently to righteous practices and all virtue to 
 practise them in holiness for the rest of his life. Such is true repentance • 
 It consists m turning sincerely towards God, and towards all which is good 
 and virtuous, and to shun the devil and all which is evil. 
 
 But we say expressly that this repentance is a pure gift of God, and not 
 the work of our own strength. 
 
 The sinful woman of the Gospel who bathed with her tears the feet of the 
 Lord, and St. Peter who deplored with bitter tears his own baseness in de- 
 nymg his Master, show clearly by their example what ought to be the con- 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 319 
 
 dition of a repentant heart, of a heart which sincerely deplores the sins which 
 it has committed. On the other side, the prodigal son and the publican of 
 the parable, placed in opposition to the Pharisee, exhibit to us clearly the 
 proper manner of confessing our sins to God. 
 
 It is therefore necessary to confess our sins to God, and also to become 
 reconciled to our fellow-creatures when we have offended them, and to 
 acknowledge to them that we have done wrong. 
 
 The examples which the Gospel gives ought to teach us how much care 
 and vigilance are required of the repentant sinner in order to lead a new 
 Hfe, by mortifying the old man and quickening the new. It is for this that 
 we preach that reparation, charity, and, generally speaking, all good works, 
 are necessary to those who truly repent. 
 
 XIV. The word Justification, in the writings of the Apostle Paul, means 
 the forgiveness of sins, the remission of both guilt and penalty, the re- 
 ceiving of Grace, and being reckoned among the righteous. 
 
 It is very certain that we are all naturally wicked sinners, convicted of 
 wickedness before the tribunal of God. It is not the less certain that we 
 are justified, that is to say, absolved of our sins, and delivered from death, 
 by God our judge, through the love of Jesus Christ alone, and without any 
 merit on our part. 
 
 Our Saviour has taken upon himself the sins of the world ; he has can- 
 celled them ; he has satisfied divine justice. It is thferefore only on account 
 of Jesus Christ dead, and risen again from the dead, that God, reconciled 
 with us, does not impute to us our sins, but transfers to us the justice or 
 innocence of his Son as if it were our own ; so that we are thereby not only 
 cleansed of our sins, but covered as it were with the righteousness of Christ, 
 and absolved from the penalty of sin, from death and condemnation, having 
 been made righteous and heirs to eternal life. Thus, properly speaking, it 
 is God alone who justifies us, and he does it solely on account of Jesus 
 Christ. 
 
 We are sharers in this justification, not by any work of ours, but by faith 
 in the mercy of God, and in Christ. We beheve, therefore, that sinful man 
 is justified by faith alone in Jesus Christ, and not by the law, or by any 
 work of his. We do not share in the benefit of Justification, by attributing 
 it pai-tly to the grace of God, or to Jesus Christ, and partly to ourselves, to 
 our zeali or our works, in short to our own merits ; but we must attribute it 
 entirely to the grace of God in Jesus Christ by faith. Our charity and our 
 works could not be agreeable to God from men in a state of unrighteousness ; 
 we must therefore be justified before we can love God or do any good works, 
 and we can be made truly righteous only by faith in Jesus, by the pure 
 grace of God, who ascribes to us, not our sins, but the justice of his Son, 
 and our faith in Jesus Christ. 
 
 We do not speak here of a mere semblance of faith, vain, ineffectual, and 
 dead, but of a living efficacious faith, which manifests its efficacy by holy 
 works. 
 
 XV. Christian Faith is not, therefore, an opinion or human persuasion, but 
 it is the state of a soul fully convinced of the truth of that faith, which com- 
 
320 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 321 
 
 prebends clearly and embraces witb an entire trust and confidence tbe 
 trutb imparted to us from God tbrougb tbe Holy Scriptures and tbrough 
 the symbol of tbe apostles. By tbis conviction tbe soul attaches itself *to 
 God as to its only eternal and sovereign good, and to Jesus Christ, who is 
 tbe centre of all promises. 
 
 Tbis faith is a gift of God, which God alone grants to his elect, in what- 
 ever measure he pleases, when be pleases, to whom he pleases, and as much 
 as he pleases. He grants it by virtue of tbe Holy Ghost, and by means of 
 tbe preaching of tbe gospel and the prayers of tbe faithful. 
 
 The Apostle Paul expresses tbe efficacy of true faith when he says that 
 it works through charity. It restores peace to tbe conscience ; it procures a 
 free access to God, that we may approach him with confidence to obtain of 
 him those things which are necessary to us ; it retains us within the bounds 
 of our duties that we may acquit ourselves of what we owe to God and our 
 neighbours ; it supports our patience in adversity, and it disposes us to make 
 a sincere confession of our belief; in one word, it produces all sorts of good 
 fruits, and of good works. 
 
 XVI. We teach, therefore, that Good Works are tbe offspring of a livint^ 
 faith through tbe Holy Gliost ; and that tbe faithful do them according to 
 the will of God, or according to tbe rules which He has given us in bis 
 word. We have already said that tbe law of God, which is bis revealed will 
 prescribes to us tbe rufe of good works. We must not do good works with 
 the pretension of deserving thereby eternal life, because eternal life or sal- 
 vation is a gift of God; neither must we do them out of ostentation, or for 
 gain, which God condemns ; but for the glory of God, to do honour to our 
 vocation, to show our gratitude to God, and to be useful to our fellow 
 creatures. 
 
 Therefore, although we teach with tbe apostle that man is justified gra- 
 tuitously by faith in Jesus Christ, and not by his own good works, yet we 
 do not contemn good works, and we are far from neglecting them, as we 
 know that man is not regenerated by faith for tbe purpose of remaining 
 idle, but 'rather in order to apply himself to do that which is good and 
 useful. 
 
 Tbe good works which we do tbrough faith are agreeable to God, who 
 approves of them, inasmuch as those who do them are agreeable to him on 
 account of their faith in Jesus Christ, and because they are done by tbe 
 agency of tbe Holy Ghost, and by tbe divine grace. 
 
 Therefore we earnestly recommend tbe necessity of practising tbe true 
 virtues, and not tbe false and philosophical ones ;— the necessity of works 
 truly good, and of the duties which become a true Christian. We inculcate 
 this necessity witb all the care and earnestness of which we are' capable, 
 while we reprove tbe neglect and hypocrisy of all those who preach and 
 profess tbe Gospel with their mouths, while they disgrace it by their bad 
 conduct. We place before tbe eyes of men on one side tbe fearful denun- 
 ciations of God, and on the other his splendid promises, and tbe rich reward 
 which be has in store for his children, that we may exhort, reprove, console, 
 and support each other through our earthly pilgrimage. 
 
 We say that God rewards richly those who do good works, but we attri- 
 
 bute tbis reward which God grants us, not to tbe merit of the man who re- 
 ceives it. but to the goodness, the freewill, and tbe faithfulness of God who 
 promises and gives it, and who, although he is under no obligation to do so, 
 yet has promised to reward those who faithfully serve him, while at the 
 saiim time be grants them strength to serve him so. For even in tbe works 
 of tbe sainU there are many things which are not worthy of God, and there 
 are always many imperfections. But as God receives in bis grace those who 
 do good works, and loves them for the love of Jesus Christ, he does not with- 
 hold tbe rewards which he has promised to them. Therefore our works, 
 considered in this point of view, are as "filthy rags, and an unclean thing." 
 (Isaiah Ixiv. 5). 
 
 Although we teach that God rewards our good works, we say at tbe same 
 time that he rewards in us not our own merit but bis own gifts. All that 
 we receive from him as a reward is at tbe same time, and more properly, a 
 grace and favour, because tbe good works we do, we are enabled to do by 
 the assistance of God, and not through our own strength. 
 
 The *• Confession de Foi des Eglises refer m^es de France:' one of the 
 latest editions of which is that of Montpelier, 1825, is essentially the same 
 as that of tbe Helvetic Churches, and by referring to the Confession of 
 Augsburg, and to tbe thirty-nine Articles of the Church of England, it will 
 be found that in nearly every essential point they also agree witb tbe 
 doctrine of the Helvetic Confession of Faith. 
 
CHRONOLOGICAL INDEX. 
 
 500 
 
 514 
 
 A. D. Pa;,'e 
 
 State of Helvetia in the decline of the Western Empire , . 1 
 
 Irruption of the Burgundians ib. 
 
 The Burp^undians become settled in Western Helvetia . . 2 
 
 Being defeated by the Huns, they ally themselves to the Visigoths ib. 
 Social relations of the Burgundians with the indigenous inha- 
 bitants . . . . . . . . . .3 
 
 Royal dynasty of Burgundy, Gundioch and his sons. • . ib, 
 
 Gundobald, sole king of the Burgundians .... 4 
 
 The laws of the Burgundians are collected ; spirit of them . 5 
 
 Gundobald favours his Roman subjects . . . . , ib. 
 
 His son Sigismund acknowledged as his successor . , . ib. 
 
 Discipline of the clergy of Burgundy ..... 6 
 
 The Alemanni overrun Eastern Helvetia .... ib. 
 
 Are defeated by Clovis, and Eastern Helvetia becomes subject to 
 
 the Merovingians ........ 7 
 
 Rhsetia subject to Theodoric, King of Italy .... ib. 
 
 War between the Franks and Burgundians— Sigismund taken 
 
 and put to death — the Franks possess all Helvetia . . 8 
 
 Burgundians remain distinct as a nation .... ib. 
 
 Ten thousand Burgundians march into Italy, join the Goths, and 
 
 assist in the siege, plunder, and destruction of Milan . . ib. 
 Division of the Frankish Monarchy, and consequent division of 
 Helvetia ; the Helvetia of the Alemanni belongs to the king- 
 dom of Metz, and Burgundian Helvetia to that of Orleans . 9 
 The nobles of Burgundy possess their grants or beneficia for life ib. 
 Administration of justice in Burgundy ..... 10 
 
 Clotarius II. assembles the nobles of Burgundy in council at Paris ; 
 
 new laws made there . . . , , . .11 
 
 Dagobert succeeds Clotarius as King of France and Burgundy ] 12 
 The Helvetia of the Alemanni less civilized than Burgundian 
 
 Helvetia j^, 
 
 Columbanus, Gall, and other Irish monks preach Christianity 
 
 among the Alemanni of Helvetia . . . . . 13 
 
 First convents built in Helvetia in the Vllth century . , 14 
 
 638 Death of Dagobert— Decline of the Merovingian dynasty . . 15 
 Pepin founds a new dynasty in France— he abolishes the ducal 
 
 dignity in Helvetia, and sends Counts to govern the country ib. 
 
 The dignity of Count, at first for life, becomes hereditary . . 16 
 
 534 
 
 538 
 
 587 
 
 615 
 
 CHRONOLOGICAL INDEX, 
 
 323 
 
 A.D. 
 
 Establishment of the feudal system under the Carlovingian 
 dynasty . . . . * . . .... 
 
 Social and civil condition of Helvetia in that epoch . 
 
 Division of the empire of Charlemagne ; the Helvetia of the 
 Alemanni becomes part of the Duchy of Suabia ; while Bur- 
 gundian Helvetia is dependent on France .... 
 879 States of Burgundy choose Boson, Count ofVienne, king 
 
 After Boson's death the kingdom of Burgundy divided ; Rudolph 
 is crowned King of Upper Burgundy, including Western Hel- 
 vetia 
 
 German Helvetia, how governed" 
 
 Dukes of Alemannia or Suabia, and their quarrels with the Kings 
 
 of Upper Burgundy 
 
 937 Rudolphll. of Burgundy; his death .....' 
 Improvements in Helvetia under his son Conrad 
 Gontram, Count of Alsace, retires to his estates in the Aargau 
 1020 His grandson Radbod builds the castle of Habsburg 
 
 Town of Zurich becomes important 
 
 Its institutions, and that of the other chartered towns under 
 
 Henry I 
 
 Abbeys of St. Gall, Einsiedlen, and others, favour the serfs on 
 
 their estates 
 
 Glarus a domain of the Abbey of Seckingen .... 
 993 Conrad, King of Upper Burgundy, dies ; is succeeded by Ru- 
 dolph III., a weak prince 
 
 101 6 Rudolph gives up his kingdom to the Emperor Henry II. . 
 1032 Conrad the Salic, Henry's successor, is crowned King of Bur- 
 gundy at Geneva ........ 
 
 All Helvetia is united under the sway of Henry III. of Germany, 
 and it thrives in peace ....... 
 
 1075 War of the investitures, between Henry IV. and the Pope 
 
 Berthold of Ziiringen, Imperial Warden over part of Helvetia . 
 1125 His son Conrad Landgraf of Burgundy . .... 
 
 1152 Frederic I. ofHohenstauflfen appoints Berthold IV., of Ziiringen, 
 Imperial Warden to the Bishopricks of Lausanne, Geneva, and 
 bion •.•.....•, 
 
 State of the Valais and of Geneva . , , 
 
 1178 Bertholdl^V., of Zaringen, builds Freyburg .... 
 
 1 185 Wise and prosperous administration of the Dukes of Zaringen . 
 1191 Berthold V. encloses the town of Bern ..... 
 
 1218 Berthold dies, the last of his^house ..... 
 
 1218 Frederic II. gives a charter of privileges to Bern . , . 
 Soleure, Basle, and Schaffhausen, three imperial towns . 
 The house of Savoy extends its dominions in Southern Helvetia 
 Counts of Gruyere and of Neuchdtel in Western Helvetia 
 Counts of Toggenburg, Werdenberg and Kyburg in North 
 
 Helvetia 
 
 Page 
 
 16 
 17 
 
 18 
 ib. 
 
 19 
 
 ib, 
 
 20 
 ib. 
 21 
 ib, 
 
 22 
 23 
 
 ib. 
 
 24 
 25 
 
 ib. 
 ib. 
 
 26 
 
 ib. 
 ib. 
 28 
 ib. 
 
 29 
 ib. 
 30 
 31 
 32 
 ib, 
 ib, 
 33 
 ib. 
 34 
 
 ib. 
 
 y2 
 
324 
 
 CHRONOLOGICAL INDEX. 
 
 CHRONOLOGICAL INDEX. 
 
 325 
 
 A.D. Page 
 
 1264 Rudolph of Habsburg becomes one of the most powerful lords 
 
 of Helvetia .......•• 35 
 
 1273 Rudolph is elected Emperor; his disposition and abilities . • 36 
 
 He favours the towns of Helvetia . . . , , , ib, 
 
 1288 He quarrels with Bern; he makes peace with it • • .37 
 
 A. D. 
 
 ra;e 
 
 1291 
 1298 
 
 1300 
 1304 
 1307 
 
 1307 
 1308 
 1308 
 1308 
 
 1315 
 
 1315 
 
 1318 
 1318 
 1332 
 
 1339 
 
 1343 
 
 PERIOD II. 
 
 Origin of the Waldstiitten or Forest Cantons ; their ancient in 
 dependence ........ 
 
 They acknowledge the supremacy of the Emperor of Germany 
 Their quarrel with the Abbot of Einsiedlen ", 
 They are acknowledged by the Emperor as freemen, and voluntary 
 lieges of the empire .....•• 
 
 Death of Rudolph of Habsburg . . . . 
 
 His son Albert, Duke of Austria, becomes Emperor 
 
 Various classes of states and governments existing then in 
 
 Helvetia . . 
 
 Albert attacks Bern, and is defeated at Donnerbuhl 
 He next attacks Zurich, but makes peace with it , . 
 Fails in soothing the Waldstiitten into submission to him 
 Albert sends them two imperial bailiffs, Gessler and Beringer 
 Werner Stauffacher, of Schwytz, Walter Furst, of Uri, and 
 Arnold Melchthal, of Unierwalden, conspire to free their 
 
 country 
 
 Gessler's treatment of Wilhelm Tell 
 
 Tell escapes from the boat and kills Gessler . . . • 
 (November) Meeting on the Riitli ; oath taken by the patriots 
 (January) Breaking out of the revolt throughout the Waldstiitten 
 (April) Albert comes to Helvetia to chastise the Waldstiitten . 
 (1st May) Albert is murdered by his nephew and others 
 Leopold of Austria, his son, marches against the Waldstiitten . 
 (15th November) Battle of Morgarten; Leopold defeated by 
 
 OWISS .•(•.••*•* 
 
 (8th December) First federal pact at Brunnen among the three 
 cantons, Schwytz, Uri, and Unterwalden . . . 
 Frederic, Duke of Austria, makes a truce with the cantons 
 Leopold besieges free town of Soleure, and is repulsed . • 
 LuzERN enters into the Confederation as the Fourth Canton . 
 Conspiracy of the Austrian party at Luzern discovered . 
 Bern quarrels with the Emperor, Louis of Bavaria , . • 
 League of the feudal nobles against Bern .... 
 (21st June) Battle of Laupex between the Bernese under 
 DErlach, and the nobles, who are defeated . • . , 
 Truce between Bern and the nobles 
 
 39 
 40 
 t*. 
 
 41 
 42 
 ib, 
 
 ib, 
 ib. 
 43 
 ib, 
 44 
 
 45 
 46 
 47 
 ib. 
 48 
 ib. 
 49 
 50 
 
 51 
 
 52 
 ib. 
 53 
 ib. 
 54 
 ib. 
 ib. 
 
 55 
 56 
 
 Freyburg enters into an alliance with Bern . . . • 
 Murder of Rudolph D'Erlach, the conqueror of Laupen (note) 
 Disturbances at Zurich ; Rudolph Braun reforms the government 
 Trades or guilds established at Zurich 
 
 1350 Braun takes and destroys Rapperschwyl . . . • 
 
 1351.ZuRiCH enters the Confederation . ... 
 
 Claris becomes the Sixth Canton ..... 
 The Zurichers defeat the Austrians under Duke Albert . 
 
 1352 The town of Zug besieged by the Swiss, and joins the Confede- 
 ration as the Seventh Canton ,,.... 
 
 Bern becomes the Eighth Canton 
 
 Federal Diet of deputies from each of the Cantons . 
 
 1354 Empr. Charles IV. assists the Duke of Austria against the Swiss 
 
 1358 Rudolph, Albert's son, makes peace with the Swiss 
 
 1367 War between Bern and the Bishop of Basle concerning Bienne 
 
 1369 Peace between the Bishop and the Bernese .... 
 
 1375 Enguerrand de Coucy, with an army'of adventurers, French and 
 English, called Guglers, defeated by the Bernese. 
 
 1383 The Count of Kyburg, assisted by Leopold of Austria, attempts 
 to surprise Soleure ........ 
 
 1 386 Leopold marches an army against Luzern .... 
 
 1386 (9th July) Battle of Sempach; the Austrians defeated by the 
 Swiss, and Leopold killed — Winkelried .... 
 
 1388 The Austrians invade Claris, and are defeated at Niifels . • 
 
 1389 Truce of twenty years between Austria and the Swiss 
 1393 Seinpacher brief j or regulations of Sempach concerning military 
 
 discipline, agreed to by the eight Cantons .... 
 Bern and Zurich extend their territories by purchase 
 
 1393 Duke of Austria strives to win over Zurich .... 
 
 1394 Renews the truce with the Swiss till 1415, and loses all influence 
 Zurich acquires several districts from the neighbouring Lords . 
 Various civil conditions of the inhabitants of the Swiss Cantons 
 Dispute between the town of Zug and the rural districts • . 
 Schwytz takes part with the rural districts .... 
 Jealousy between the rural and pastoral Cantons and the towns 
 Decision of the Confederates on the affair of Zug 
 
 1405 Luzern purchases of the Duke of Austria his seignorial rights 
 over the Entlibuch and other districts .... 
 
 The Emperors Wenceslas and Sigismund favour the total emanci- 
 pation of the Swiss from the imperial jurisdiction. 
 1405 Great fire at Bern, which destroys the greater part of the town . 
 
 Bern is rebuilt upon an improved plan ..... 
 
 The Jews are banished from Zurich ..... 
 
 Disputes of Soleure with the Lords of Kyburg, whose attempt to 
 surprise the town is foiled ...... 
 
 Account of the origin of the temporal dominions of the Bishops 
 of Basle* • • • • ♦ • ♦ * 77,78 
 
 56 
 ib, 
 ib. 
 57 
 ib. 
 58 
 ib. 
 59 
 
 ib. 
 ib. 
 60 
 ib. 
 ib. 
 61 
 ib. 
 
 62 
 
 ib. 
 63 
 
 ib, 
 65 
 ib. 
 
 ib. 
 66 
 67 
 68 
 69 
 ib. 
 ib. 
 70 
 ib. 
 71 
 
 72 
 
 73 
 
 74 
 75 
 ib. 
 
 76 
 
 I 
 
326 
 
 CHRONOLOGICAL INDEX* 
 
 CHRONOLOGICAL INDEX. 
 
 327 
 
 PERIOD III. 
 
 A.D. 
 
 1468 
 
 A.D. 
 
 Ifi 
 
 to 
 
 1403 Revolt of Appenzell aj^ainst the Abbot of St. Gall . . . 
 
 Appenzellers defeat the troops of the imperial towns of Suabia . 
 1405 And the array of Frederic of Austria ..... 
 They enter the Rhernthal and the Tyrol .... 
 
 1408 The independence of Appenzell is recojirnizcd 
 1415 Council of Constance deposes John XXIII., and elects Martin V. 
 Frederic of Austria is excommunicated for favourint^ John XXIII. 
 and put to the ban of the empire, and the Emperor Sigisraund 
 invites the Swiss Cantons to seize upon his territories 
 The Cantons, excepting Uri, invade the Aargau, and divide it 
 
 among them 
 
 1418 Duke Frederic renounces all his rights on the Aargau, Lenzburg, 
 and Baden. End of the war of Constance .... 
 
 The VValdstatten invade the Val Levantina, and other valleys . 
 1422 Swiss defeated by Milanese in the battle of Arbedo, and restore 
 their Italian conquests, excepting Val Levantina 
 The Valais revolts against the Lord of Raron, and, assisted by 
 Bern, becomes an independent state ..... 
 
 Emancipation of the mountaineers of Rhsetia from their feudal 
 Lords .......... 
 
 1424 The Grey League (Graubundten, Grisons) formed at Trons, and 
 gives its name to the whole country of Rhirtia 
 Revolt of the En gadin . ....... 
 
 1436 Death of Count Frederic of Toggenburg— League of the Ten 
 Jurisdictions ......... 
 
 1440 Zurich commences war with the other Cantons concerning the 
 Toggenburg inheritance ....... 
 
 1442 Allies itself with the Emperor Frederic III 
 
 1443 The Zurichers and Austrians are defeated by the Cantons 
 
 1444 Siege of Zurich by the Confederates 
 
 The Annagnacs, instisated by Frederic III., invade Basle, under 
 
 the Dauphin of France, afterwards Louis XI. 
 1444 (Auff.) Destroy a small body of Swiss in the battle of St. Jacob. 
 
 The Dauphin makes peace with the Swiss and retires 
 1446 Peace concluded between Zurich and the Cantons . 
 
 Toggenburg sold by Count of Raron to the Abbot of St. Gall. 
 
 1452 War between Austria and the Cantons; Austria loses the town 
 
 of Freyburg, which becomes subject to the Duke of Savoy . 
 
 The county of Rapperschwyl, which gives itself up to the three 
 
 Forest Cantons and Glaris ...... 
 
 1460 And the Landgrdviate of Thurgau, which is reduced to a 
 
 Bailiwick of the Eight Cantons 
 
 1467 Duke Sigismund mortgages to the citizens of Zurich Winterthur, 
 the House of Austria's last remaining possession in Helvetia 
 Mulhausen, an imperial city in Alsace, contracts alliance with 
 the Swiss 
 
 Paj»e 
 80 
 81 
 82 
 ib. 
 
 83 
 lb. 
 
 ib. 
 
 84 
 
 85 
 ib. 
 
 ib. 
 
 86 
 
 87 
 
 88 
 89 
 
 90 
 
 91 
 
 ib. 
 92 
 
 ib. 
 
 93 
 94 
 ib. 
 ib. 
 
 95 
 
 ib. 
 
 ib. 
 
 ib. 
 
 ib. 
 
 1474 
 
 1475, 
 
 1476 
 
 1477 
 
 1478 
 
 1478 
 1481 
 
 1495 
 
 1499 
 
 1499 
 
 1501 
 l.'>i3 
 
 Sigismund makes a formal cession of Thurgau . . 
 Charles the Rash of Burgimdy purchases several districts of 
 
 Alsace and the Brisgau from Sigismund of Austria 
 His governors oppress the Swiss ....*. 
 Louis XL and Sigismund of Austria conclude an alliance with 
 
 the Swiss against Charles . . 
 
 Charles negotiates with the Cantons in order to gain time 
 Execution of his governor Ilagenbach — Swiss Cantons declare 
 war against Charles, and invade the Pays de Vaud 
 1476 Charles, having made peace with France and the Emperor, 
 
 crosses the Jura with 60,000 men, takes Granson, and puts to 
 
 death the Swiss garrison ....... 
 
 (March) Battle of Granson, and defeat of the Burgundians . 
 (June) Battle of MoRAT ; Burgundians completely routed 
 Savoy, by the mediation of Louis XL, recovers the Pays de Vaud 
 And renounces Freyburg, which again becomes a free town 
 
 allied to Bern ......••• 
 
 Defeat and death of Charles the Rash near Nancy, in Lorraine 
 Evil effects of the Burgundian war upon the morals of the Swiss 
 Fresh disputes between the Swiss and the Milanese, and the Val 
 
 Levantina ......... 
 
 (Dec.) Battle of Giornico— Swiss defeat the troops of Milan • 
 Conspiracy at Luzern discovered ...... 
 
 Congress of Stanz— strife between Town Cantons and Forest 
 
 Cantons ,.....••• 
 
 Nicholas Von Flue, the hermit— his address to the Congress • 
 SoLEURE and Freyburg admitted as Cantons 
 Convention of Stanz — the standing law of the Confederation . 
 Swiss volunteers enlist in service of several foreign countries . 
 The Emperor Maximilian attempts to enforce the ordinances of 
 
 the Imperial Chamber of Germany upon the Swiss, and he 
 
 commands them to furnish a contingent of troops. 
 The Swiss refuse, pleading their alliance with France . . 
 Hostilities— Imperial troops defeated near Bregentz , • 
 
 Louis XII. of France renews the alliance with the Swiss . 
 Defeat of the imperial troops at Frastenz, in the Tyrol 
 Maximilian himself takes the field against the Swiss . • 
 His troops are defeated in Thurgau and near Soleuie 
 The Gr sons defeat the Tyrolese at Malsheraida 
 Maximilian invades Engadin, and detaches another corps to 
 
 invade Basle ....••••• 
 The Swiss surprise and defeat these at Dornach, near Basle 
 (September) Peace of Basle between Maximilian and the 
 
 Cantons, which ended the Suabian war, the last war of Swiss 
 
 independence . . . . . • • • • 
 Basle and Schaffhausen are admitted as Cantons 
 Appenzell likewise, which completes the number of thirteen 
 
 Cantons • • • 
 
 Page 
 95 
 
 96 
 ib, 
 
 ib, 
 97 
 
 ib. 
 
 98 
 ib, 
 99 
 
 ib, 
 
 100 
 101 
 102 
 
 ib. 
 ib. 
 
 103 
 
 ib. 
 
 104 
 
 I*. 
 
 ib. 
 
 105 
 
 ib. 
 106 
 
 ib, 
 
 ib. 
 107 
 
 ib. 
 
 ib. 
 108 
 
 ib, 
 
 109 
 
 ib. 
 
 ib. 
 
S2S 
 
 A. D. 
 
 CHRONOLOGICAL INDEX. 
 
 Socit\ or associates and Confederates or allies of the Swiss 
 league . . . . 
 
 City and Abbot of St. Gall, and the cities of Mulhausen 
 andBiENNE 
 
 Geneva, Neuchatel, the Grisons, and the Valais 
 
 Boundaries of the Swiss Confederation 
 
 Wars of the Swiss in Italy * .. 
 
 The Swiss reconquer the Duchy of Milan for the House of Sforza, 
 against the French— Siege of Dijon by the Swiss 
 
 1515 Francis I. again invades Lombardy 
 
 Dissension among the Swiss; fight at Marignano against the 
 
 French 
 
 1516 Perpetual peace between France and the Swiss, who retain the 
 
 Italian bailiwicks .... 
 
 PERIOD IV. 
 
 Corruption of the Clergy in Switzerland at the beginninir of the 
 
 X V Ith Century . . . . , 
 
 The obligatory celibacy of clergy one of the causes oV this* 
 Wars of the Swiss in Italy weaken their respect for the Church 
 
 of Rome 
 
 • • % 
 
 1 522 Intrigues of Cardinal Schinner ; battle of La *Bicocca '. 
 
 Impostures of the Dominican monks at Bern ; their punishment 
 Livings m Switzerland bestowed upon foreigners, chiefly Italians 
 iiale of indulgences immediate cause of Reformation 
 Indulgences, originally intended to remit canonical penalties 
 Are abused-Leo X.'s bull for sale of them in Germany . 
 Luther opposes the sale 
 
 1518 Samson, a Franciscan monk, sells indulgences in Switzerland 
 Is opposed by Zwingli at Einsiedlen ; account of Zwincrli 
 Zwingh preaches against the sale of indulcrences ^ 
 
 1519 Samson sells his indulgences at Bern and Baden ^ is o'pposed 
 
 at Bremgarten by Bullinger, and at last is recalled . 
 Zvvmgh, Bullinger. Wittenbach, (Ecolampadius, and other 
 Reformers, question the right of Rome to decide in matters of 
 laitn ••••... 
 
 1522 ZwingU is accused of impiety and sedition ; he writes his 'apoloc^y 
 Conferences are held at Zurich between the champions of both 
 
 parties • . . . , 
 
 , .0, ?"'^^<''■"'^'"«f^ of Switzerland assume the name of Evangelicals 
 
 1523 Legislature of Zurich abolishes images, the mass, and mo- 
 
 nastic vows 
 
 Zurich first reformed Canton ; followcd'by St'. Gall* (city) \ 
 Sern tempomes ; albwi cleigy and nuns to marry . . 
 
 Page 
 119 
 
 ib, 
 111 
 
 ib. 
 112 
 
 113 
 
 114 
 
 115 
 116 
 
 118 
 ib. 
 
 119 
 
 ib. 
 120 
 
 ib. 
 
 ib. 
 121 
 122 
 123 
 
 ib. 
 124 
 125 
 
 126 
 
 127 
 ib. 
 
 ib, 
 
 ib. 
 
 128 
 
 ib. 
 
 120 
 
 CHRONOLOGICAL INDEX, 329 
 
 A. D. pagg 
 
 1526 Conferences of Baden between theologians of both parties . 129 
 
 Intolerance especially in subject Bailiwicks ; persecutions • 130 
 Anabaptists ; Catholic and Reformed Cantons unite to suppress 
 
 them 131 
 
 1528 The Council of Bern convoke a final conference . . . ib. 
 Bishops of Basle, Lausanne, Sion, and Constance refuse to attend ib. 
 Result of Conference is favourable to the Evangelicals . .132 
 The Legislature of Bern issues an edict of Reformation in 
 
 Thirteen Articles ib. 
 
 The Waldstiitten, Zug, Luzern, and the Valais, with Freyburg, 
 form a Catholic League 133 
 
 1529 Zurich and Bern, and the towns of Bienne, St. Gall, Mulhausen, 
 
 and Constance, form a Christian coburghership in defence of 
 
 the Reformation ib. 
 
 1530 Schaflfhausen and Basle proclaim the Reformation . , , ib. 
 Claris and Appenzell remain between the two Communions . 134 
 
 1533 At Soleure the Evangelicals are obliged to emigrate . , ib. 
 
 In the Grisons full toleration is allowed ..... 135 
 
 " Bernese suppress revolt of people of Basle and the Oberland, who 
 
 resume Catholic Communion, after embracing the Reformation 136. 
 Disputes in the Common Bailiwicks on account of Religion . ib. 
 Zurich, joined by Bern, St. Gall, andothers, declares war against 
 the five Catholic Cantons, on account of their persecution of 
 the Evangelicals . . . . . . . . ib. 
 
 The neutral Cantons, Claris, Appenzell, Soleure, Basle, and 
 Schaff hausen, interpose to make peace .... ib. 
 
 First religious peace concluded in June, 1529 . . .137 
 
 Swiss Evangelicals disagree with Luther about Eucharist . 138 
 
 Farel preaches the Reformation in Western Switzerland . . ib, 
 Neuchatel adopts the Reformation . . . , .139 
 
 Diet of Augsburg in April, 1530 ; Luther's Confession of Faith 
 read there . . . . . . . , .140 
 
 Zwingli's Confession of Faith is forwarded to the Emperor 
 
 Charles V. by Bern, Zurich, and Basle . , , .141 
 Swiss Evangelicals remain separate from the Lutherans of Ger- 
 many .......... t^, 
 
 1532 Synod of Bern proclaims the ** Helvetic Confession of Faith" . 142 
 Disputes between Catholic and Evangelical Cantons about the 
 
 Abbey of St. Gall f^. 
 
 Zurich defeated by the Waldstiitten at the battle of Cappel , 143 
 Zwingli, who attends as Chaplain, is killed . . . .144 
 
 Results of the Battle of Cappel ; the Bernese are defeated . ib. 
 
 1531 (November) Peace of Baar — Abbot of St. Gall restored . . 145 
 Recapitulationof the early History of Geneva . . 146,147 
 Parties, political and religious, in that city . , . .148 
 Freyburg and Bern defend Geneva against Duke of Savoy « 1^, 
 Knights of the Spoon i i «•«••• 14{) 
 
330 
 
 CHRONOLOGICAL INDEX. 
 
 CHRONOLOGICAL INDEX. 
 
 331 
 
 A.D. 
 1533 
 1534 
 
 1535 
 153t> 
 
 1537 
 
 1538 
 1541 
 
 1543 
 
 15G4 
 1564 
 
 1602 
 1603 
 
 Farel preaches at Geneva ...••,. 
 
 Geneva loses alliance of Freyburg, but retains Bern, and pro- 
 claims the Reformation .....,, 
 
 Bern, as ally of Geneva, declares war against Duke of Savoy . 
 
 Conquers the Pays de Vaud, and annexes it to its own territory 
 
 Geneva proclaims its independence as a Republic allied to Bern 
 
 John Calvin makes his appearance at Geneva . . • 
 
 Administrative regulations of the Bernese in the Pays de Vaud 
 
 Franchises of the town of Lausanne ..... 
 
 Farel attends religious disputation there— Catholic Communion 
 abolished .... ..... 
 
 Reformation in Italian Bailiwicks, suppressed by the Catholic 
 Cantons ......... 
 
 Early history of John Calvin ...... 
 
 Calvin and Farel expelled from Geneva .... 
 
 Calvin recalled ; regulates religious, moral, and social polity in 
 Geneva .......,., 
 
 His code of civil law approved by the General Council of Geneva 
 
 Establishes the academy or college ; his character . 
 
 Execution of Servetus, the anti-trinitarian .... 
 
 Calvin's death ; obligations of Geneva to him 
 
 Treaty of Lausanne between Bern and Emmanuel Philibert, 
 Duke of Savoy ; Bern restores the Chablais, and the Duke 
 yields to Bern and Freyburg his claims on the Pays de Vaud 
 
 Charles Emmanuel, successor of Eml. Phil, violates the treaty 
 
 Attempts to surprise Geneva ...... 
 
 New treaty between Geneva and Bern, and the Duke of Savoy, 
 in which the latter engages to respect the independence of 
 Geneva ....... ... 
 
 Zurich, as well as Bern, contracts a perpetual alliance with 
 Geneva . 
 
 PERIOD V. 
 
 Origin of the religious disturbances of Valtelhna 
 Spanish, Austrian, and Venetian agents in the Grisons . 
 1618 Synod of Bergun; the Protestants rise in arms against the 
 Catholics ........ 
 
 Arrest of the archpriest Rusca ..... 
 
 1620 Catholics of Valtellina revolt ; massacre of Protestants . 
 The Austrians and Spaniards support the insurgents 
 Robustelli, one of their leaders, made President of Valtellina 
 
 1621 Duke of Savoy, King of France, and the Pope mediate . 
 War continues ; Austrians invade the Grisons 
 
 Page 
 
 150 
 
 151 
 
 ib. 
 152 
 
 ib. 
 
 ib. 
 153 
 
 ib. 
 
 ib. 
 
 154 
 
 155 
 
 ib, 
 
 ib. 
 ib. 
 156 
 ib. 
 ib. 
 
 157 
 ib. 
 ib. 
 
 ib. 
 158 
 
 159 
 160 
 
 ib. 
 
 ib. 
 161 
 162 
 163 
 164 
 165 
 
 A.D. Page 
 
 1622 Who rise in mass; Austrians devastate the country . • 165 
 The Grisons submit . . . . . . , .166 
 
 1624 Louis XIII. sends troops, who drive away the Austrians . . ib. 
 
 1626 The treaty of Mon9on between France and Spain . . ib. 
 
 1628 The War of Mantua brings again the Austrians into the Grisons ib. 
 
 They carry the plague along with them ib. 
 
 1630 Peace of Chevasco — Austrians \vithdraw from the Grisons . ib. 
 
 1635 The French reconquer Valtellina from the Spaniards , . ib. 
 
 1636 The Grisons drive out the French 107 
 
 1637 Spain makes peace with the Grisons, who remain in possession 
 
 of Valtellina, granting amnesty to the inhabitants . . ib. 
 
 1641 Austria makes a treaty with the Grisons .... ib. 
 
 Thirty Years' War in Germany; its beginning and progress 168, 169 
 Extraordinary career of Wallenstein . . . . . 1 70 
 
 Emperor Ferdinand II. persecutes the Protestants of Germany 
 and Bohemia . . . . . . . .171, 172 
 
 Gustavus of Sweden at the head of the Protestants . . .173 
 Horrors of Magdeburg, battles of Leipzig and Lutzen ; death of 
 Gustavus. The Swedes continue the war . . . .174 
 
 Death of Wallenstein . . . . . . , ,175 
 
 1648 Peace of Westphalia ........ 2*6. 
 
 Effects of the Thirty Years' War upon the Swiss . . .176 
 
 The treaty of Westphalia, and the Emperor, acknowledge the 
 
 Swiss Confederation as an independent state in Europe , ib. 
 
 Disturbances in Switzerland by bands of adventurers . . ib. 
 
 Complaints of the peasantry of various Cantons . . . 177 
 
 1653 Peasant war in Switzerland . . . . . , .178 
 
 The forces of the Cantons defeat the insurgents . . .179 
 
 1653 Beginning of a new religious war in Switzerland . . . ib. 
 
 1656 Battle of Willmergen ; the Luzerners defeat the Bernese . .180 
 Peace between the Catholics and Protestants .... ib, 
 
 1682 French Protestants take refuge in Switzerland, from persecution 
 
 of Louis XIV. .,,,.,,, ib. 
 
 1683 and 1694 The Waldenses from Piedmont do the like fiom the 
 
 persecution of the Duke of Savoy . . . , .181 
 
 1699 Emigrants, aided by the Cantons, settle in Germany . . ib, 
 1710 Toggenburg, ^upportca by Protestant Cantons, revolts against 
 
 the Abbot of St. Gall 182 
 
 1712 Anew religious war — Siege of Baden — Second battle of Will- 
 mergen - Peace of A ar an ,,...,, ib. 
 1718 The Abbot of St. Gall recognizes the franchises of Toggenburg 1-83 
 A long peace follows throughout Switzerland, which lasts tdlthe 
 
 French Revolution .,,...,, ib. 
 
 Forms of government existing in Svyitzerland — Bern . ib. 
 
 Disputes between patricians and burghers .... 184 
 A new aristocracy formed by the burghers . . . .185 
 
 Sovereign council or legislature— senate or executive . • ib. 
 
332 
 
 CHRONOLOGICAL INDEX. 
 
 CHRONOLOGICAL INDEX. 
 
 333 
 
 A. D. Page 
 
 Avoycrs and other magistrates . • • • • • ] 86 
 Bailiwicks of the canton of Bern . . . • • ,187 
 Exterior state or mock legislature — Finances. . . .188 
 Militia, clergy, communes, and other departments , • .189 
 Character of the aristocracy of Bern . , , • .190 
 Its defects — Is beloved by the country population • . .191 
 Jealousy of the body of burghers against the councils • .192 
 
 1749 Conspiracy of Henzi ........ t6. 
 
 Freyburg, its aristocracy closer than the Bernese . • . ib. 
 Mode of election . . . . . , . ,193 
 
 1781 Conspiracy of Chenaux, Raccaud, and Castellaz . . . ib, 
 
 1782 Modifications introduced into the government at the recommen- 
 
 dation of Bern, Luzern, and Soleure . , . , » ib, 
 SoLEURE, its government ...... 193,194 
 
 Government of Luzern , • . . , , .194 
 
 Spirit of the aristocratic Cantons ; reflections thereon . . ib. 
 Municipal Cantons, Zurich, Basle, and Schalfhausen . .195 
 Constitution of Zurich ; its various changes * . . , , ib. 
 
 Execution of burgomaster Waldmann in 1489 • . . 19G 
 
 Public spirit of the citizens of Zurich . . • . , ib. 
 Constitution of Basle . . . . • • ■ , ib. 
 
 Singular mode of choosing professors for the University . , ib. 
 Annual assembly of the whole body of citizens . . . 197 
 
 Constitution of Schaffhauskn . . . . , , ib. 
 
 In all these Cantons the chief town ruled over the country, the 
 
 rural population having no share in the government . . f^. 
 Administration and pubhc spirit of the ruling towns. , .198 
 
 Third class of Cantons, or democracies, namely, the Wald- 
 
 STATTEX, ZuG, Glarus, and Appenzell ... ib. 
 
 Their landsgemeinde, or assemblies of the whole male adult popu- 
 lation .......... t6. 
 
 Distribution of offices ; leading families in each Canton . .199 
 Allies of the Swiss, the Grisons, their form of government . ib. 
 The Valais ; its constitution, inequality of rights . , , 200 
 
 Bishop of SiON— The Abbot of St. Gall ; his territories . ib, 
 
 Ci7y o/*/S/. Gall independent of tho Abbot . . , , 201 
 Town of Bienne—Mulhausen in Alsace .... j^. 
 
 Principality of Neuchatel and Valengin subject to the King of 
 Prussia — its complicated constitution, and prosperity . 
 
 Republic of Geneva; history of its constitution . , 
 Conspiracies at Geneva, various parties, and^ disturbances- 
 
 terference of Bern and Zurich, and of France • , 
 
 Pacification of 1 768 ; fresh disturbances in 1 782 . , 
 
 The aristocratic party gains the ascendancy • . , 
 
 Many of the popular party propose to settle in Ireland 
 
 1 763 New Geneva ii built for them, but is abandoned • « 
 
 201,202 
 . 203 
 -In- 
 
 . ib, 
 
 . 204 
 ib, 
 
 • .205 
 
 • ibt 
 
 A.D. 
 
 1 789 Fresh insurrection at Geneva ; the exiles are recalled 
 
 Bishop of Basle, his territories, is partially allied to some of the 
 
 Cantons .«.....•. 
 The Abbot of Engklberg— Republic of Gersau . 
 Population of the thirteen Swiss Cantons and their allies. 
 Subjects of the Swiss ; table of them . . • • 
 Their government by bailiflfs . . . . . 
 
 The Italian bailiwicks subject to the democratic Cantons the 
 
 worst governed . 
 
 1775 Revolt in the Val Levantina against Uri . . . " 
 Nature of federal pact between Cantons of the old Helvetic 
 
 Confederation ....... 
 
 No permanent federal body, or central government . 
 
 The Cantons were not each allied to all the others . • 
 
 Distinction between the eight old Cantons, and the five junior 
 
 Cantons ....«..•. 
 General Diets— Ordinary Diets at Frauenfeld 
 Extraordinary Diets— Partial Diets of Roman Catholics or Pro 
 
 lesianis .«..•*... 
 The Defensional agreed to at Baden in 1668 . • , 
 Militia — Swiss regiments in foreign service • . • 
 Expediency of foreign enlistments discussed . • • 
 Instance of Zug, the family of Zurlauben . . • 
 A civil war at Zug in consequence of these practices • 
 Schumacher's conviction and sentence .... 
 Criminal laws of Switzerland veiy defective . . • 
 Men of science and letters in Switzerland in the XVIIIth cen 
 
 tury ••••*..•. 
 J. J. Rousseau ....•••• 
 Helvetic society .....••. 
 Comparative happiness of Switzerland in the XVIIIth century 
 
 PERIOD VI. 
 
 Peculiar character of the French revolution, and the wars re- 
 sulting from it ..••.••• 
 
 Revolutionists destroy the independence of the republics and 
 free towns of Europe ....... 
 
 Jacobins endeavour to corrupt the Swiss regiments . . . 
 
 (August 10) Massacre of the Swiss guards . . . . 
 
 1792 The Swiss resolve to remain neutral . . . . . 
 
 1793 The French annex the bishopric of Bale to their republic 
 Threaten Geneva— their principles of international law . 
 Robespierre and the terrorists leave Switzerland in peace . 
 
 Page 
 
 205 
 
 206 
 ib, 
 ib, 
 
 207 
 ib. 
 
 208 
 ib, 
 
 209 
 ib, 
 ib, 
 
 ib, 
 ib. 
 
 210 
 ib 
 ib, 
 
 211 
 
 212 
 I*. 
 
 213 
 ib, 
 
 ib, 
 
 214 
 I*. 
 ib. 
 
 215 
 
 216 
 217 
 218 
 219 
 220 
 ib, 
 221 
 
334 
 
 CHRONOLOGICAL INDEX. 
 
 CHRONOLOGICAL INDEX. 
 
 335 
 
 AD. 
 
 Insurrection of Geneva encouraged by French agent 
 
 1 794 A number of citizens executed at Geneva by the mob 
 
 1795 Abuses in Zurich and St. Gall, and consequent disturbances 
 
 The French Executive Directory pursues a system of annoyance 
 
 against the Swiss 
 
 Its views upon Switzerland .,..., 
 The Pays de Vaud furnishes a pretext for interference 
 Retrospect of its constitution under the dukes of Savoy . 
 Laharpe and others demand a meeting of the three estates 
 
 They petition French Directory 
 
 Its declaration to Bern and Freyburg . ^ . . 
 
 Its troops occupy the Erguel and Bienne . . . 
 
 Mengaud, its agent, demands the expulsion of Mr. Wickham. 
 
 the English envoy, and of all emigrants and political refugees 
 
 1797 General Bonaparte occupies the Valtellina, Chiavenna, and 
 
 Bormio, and seizes the property of Grison citizens there 
 
 Revolution in Bale effected by country people 
 
 General diet at Aarau — Insurrection there . . , 
 
 A French array enters the Pays de Vaud 
 
 The Bernese colonel Weiss withdraws his troops 
 
 Affray at French out- posts construed by them into declaration 
 
 of war — Hesitation in councils of Bern • . . . 
 
 The Sovereign Council of Bern invites the country people to 
 
 send deputies ...•.,., 
 Commission appointed to prepare new constitution . 
 Changes of constitution in several other Cantons . 
 The subject bailiwicks are emancipated by common consent 
 The French take possession of Mulhausen ; and of Geneva 
 Truce between Brune (French) and D'Erlach (Swiss general) 
 Bernese troops dissatisfied with indecision of their government 
 D'Erlach remonstrates with the Great Council 
 (March 1st) French under Schauenburg take Soleure . 
 Brune takes Freyburg— Executive Council resigns 
 Bernese soldiers mutiny, and kill several officers . 
 (March 5th) Brune repulsed by Bernese at Laupen, under 
 Graffenried— Subsequent defeat and mutiny of Bernese armies 
 
 — D'Erlach murdered 
 
 The Avoyer Steiger escapes— Fall of the old republic of Bern . 
 
 Brune seizes the treasury, arsenal, public stores, &c. 
 
 French tax Freyburg and Bern, occupy Zurich and all northern 
 
 Switzerland — Resistance in Luzern and the Valais 
 
 Decree of French Directory that the Helvetic Confederation 
 
 had ceased to exist, and forming Switzerland into a sin«'le 
 
 republic, with a central government . . . , , 
 
 The Grisons decline to join— Carnot's pamphlet— The Wald- 
 
 stiitten refuse to change their institutions .... 
 
 Militia of Schwyz defeat Schauenburg 
 
 Page 
 
 221 
 222 
 
 223 
 
 224 
 225 
 
 ib. 
 22G 
 
 ib, 
 
 ib. 
 ib. 
 
 228 
 
 ib, 
 229 
 230 
 231 
 
 ib. 
 
 232 
 
 ib. 
 233 
 
 ib. 
 234 
 235 
 
 ib. 
 236 
 
 ib. 
 237 
 
 ib. 
 238 
 
 lb. 
 
 239 
 
 ib. 
 
 240 
 
 ib. 
 
 241 
 ib. 
 
 A.D. 
 
 1799 
 
 1800 
 1801 
 
 1802 
 
 1803 
 
 1813 
 
 1814 
 
 1815 
 
 French defeated at Morgarten ...*.• 
 
 (May) Convention frees Schwyz from the French . 
 
 Schauenburg, with 1 5,000 men, attacks Unterwalden 
 
 (Sept. 9th) Battle of Stanz, 1500 Unterwalders perish 
 
 Atrocities of the French ....... 
 
 Schwyz and Uri submit and are disarmed — Pestalozzi . 
 
 The Grisons refuse to join the new republic, and call in the 
 Austrians — War between the Emperor of Germany and France 
 — Massena overruns the Grisons — The Waldstiitten revolt . 
 
 Austrians and Russians occupy Zurich ; enter Schwyz ; ulti- 
 mately abandon Switzerland ...... 
 
 Devastations committed by the various armies . . 
 
 Confusion in the internal administration of Switzerland . 
 
 French treat Ssvitzerland as a conquered country . . . 
 
 Helvetic Directory suppressed — New project of constitution 
 
 Peace of Luneville between Austria and France; French eva- 
 cuate Switzerland ........ 
 
 (October) A Diet assembled at Bern . . . . 
 
 Confederation of seventeen Cantons is proclaimed, with a 
 central federal government at Bern ..... 
 
 A third constitution proclaimed and rejected by Cantons . 
 
 Bonaparte (First Consul) summons deputies from all parts and 
 parties of Switzerland to Paris — his address to them . 
 
 Conferences at Paris — Bonaparte acts as mediator . . • 
 
 His remarkable expressions in favour of the forest Cantons 
 
 His Act of Mediation, constituting Switzerland into a Confe- 
 deration of nineteen Cantons, with separate local governments, 
 and a federal Diet for the whole 
 
 Switzerland recovers tranquillity, and retains it during his reign 
 
 Bonaparte annexes the Valais to France .... 
 
 After the battle of Leipzig, an extraordinary Diet proclaims the 
 neutrality of Switzerland 
 
 Allied Sovereigns demand a passage for their troops 
 
 Conferences at Basle between Swiss deputies and Austrian com- 
 mander— 21st Dec. the Austrian troops enter Basle 
 
 Russia and Austria refuse to acknowledge the Act of Mediation 
 
 Bern and Freyburg wish to recover subject bailiwicks of Vaud 
 and Aargau .....•••• 
 
 The deputies of the majority of the Cantons assembled at 
 Zurich proclaim the independence of the nineteen Cantons as 
 then existing— Intervention of allied powers 
 
 Bern subnuts,"and receives the territory formerly of the Bishop 
 of Basel as a compensation ...... 
 
 The Valais, Neuchatel, and Geneva, are made three new 
 Cantons (in all 22) . 
 
 Allied powers, at the Congress of Vienna, acknowledge the in- 
 dependence and perpetual neutrality of Switzerland , 
 
 Page 
 242 
 
 ib. 
 243 
 
 ib. 
 
 ib. 
 244 
 
 ib. 
 
 245 
 246 
 247 
 ib. 
 248 
 
 ib. 
 
 249 
 
 ib. 
 
 ib. 
 
 250 
 251 
 252 
 
 253 
 
 254 
 255 
 
 ib. 
 
 256 
 
 ib. 
 ib, 
 
 257 
 
 ib. 
 
 258 
 ib. 
 ib. 
 
336 
 
 A.D. 
 
 CHRONOLOGICAL INDEX, 
 
 (August) Federal Compact of the twenty-two Cantons sworn in 
 the Diet at Zurich, August, 1815 
 
 Clauses of the Federal Pact, its advantages . . 
 
 Cantonal constitutions, modifications made in them in 181*4 
 
 The pure democracies of the small Cantons remain untouched .' 
 
 The old town Cantons admit the countiT people to a share in the 
 legislature . . . . ' 
 
 The new Cantons formed out of the subject bailiwicks give 
 greater influence to property in the elections 
 
 Reaction towards an oligarchy in those Cantons 
 
 CHRONOLOGICAL INDEX. 
 
 Constitutions of the Cantons of Geneva and Neuchatel 
 
 Page 
 
 259 
 260 
 261 
 
 262 
 
 263 
 264 
 
 A.D. 
 
 2C4, 265 
 
 N 
 
 
 
 PERIOD VII. 
 
 General condition of Switzerland from 1815 to 1830 
 1830 (May and June) Ticino effects a reform in its constitution, 
 
 agreeably to the popular wish 
 
 Principles of the reformed constitutions of the Swiss Cantons ! 
 Aargau, Vaud, Thurgau and St. Gall, Luzern. and Schaff hausen 
 
 follow the example of Ticino 
 
 In Zurich, the towns return one-third and the country two-thirds 
 
 of the legislature ' 
 
 Basel adopts a plan somewhat more in favour of the town electors 
 Rural population revolt ; form provisional government at Liech- 
 
 s^all 
 
 In Bern the old patricians give up their influence . 
 Freyburg changes its constitution . . . ,* 
 
 1831 (July) Federal Diet— Speech of the President 
 
 Abstract of the speeches of the deputies of the various Cantons 
 
 * 279 to 
 Basle divided into two states, Basle town and Basle country "' 
 
 Civil war in NeuchStel 
 
 The Commissioner of the King of Prussia, Prince of NeuchateL 
 disperses the insurgents 
 
 Disturbances in the Canton of Schwyz , [ ' ' 
 
 , oon ^""^'-'^^^ ^^fy^ '"^ ^'^'''*>'^ ^"^ ^^'^ ^^^^^r P^re deiiiocracies .' 
 
 1832 Revision of the federal pact mooted in the Diet, and commission 
 
 appointed to revise it , , . 
 Forest Cantons. Neuchatel and Basle town, withdraw their de- 
 puties, and form the ♦ League of Sarnen ' . 
 
 1833 Report of the commission to the Federal Diet— its reception 
 Old Schwyz occupies by force the outer districts 
 
 Armed force sent by Basle town against Liechstall is cut to'pieces 
 Federal militia occupies Schwyz and Canton of Basle 
 
 267 
 
 268 
 ib. 
 
 269 
 
 ib. 
 
 270 
 
 271 
 ib. 
 
 272 
 ib. 
 
 274 
 
 275 
 
 ib. 
 
 276 
 ib. 
 
 277 
 
 278 
 
 279 
 ib. 
 ib. 
 
 280 
 ib. 
 
 League of Sarnen dissolved, the forest" Cantons, Basle town, and 
 
 afterwards Neuchatel, submit to the Federal Diet 
 Dispute of Bern with the Diet .... 
 The differences of Schwyz are settled . 
 
 1834 Polish and other refugees in Switzerland attack Savoy 
 Are repulsed— effects of their outrage . 
 Remonstrances of Austria, Prussia, and Sardinia . 
 Federal Diet at Zurich — Discuss the question of the Refugees — 
 
 Parties, aristocratic, radical, and moderate . 
 Speech of the deputy of Vaud on the refugee question 
 
 Question of Neuchatel 
 
 Neuchatel remains a Canton, and a principality 
 
 Federal pact discussed , . . . 
 
 A committee of the Diet appointed to revise it; reports 
 
 Austria pays the Grisons for their losses in the Valtellina 
 
 Closing of the Federal Diet of 1834 ; speech of its president 
 
 1835 Bern becomes Vorort, or directing Canton 
 Austrian minister's note concerning refugees . . . 
 
 1836 French minister's complaints ..... 
 
 Resolutions of the Vorort to expel the offenders— (July) Diet 
 French minister's demand ...... 
 
 Address to the Diet from meeting held at Flawyl in St. Gall 
 Disapproved by almost all the Cantons, and rejected by the Diet 
 Resolutions of the Diet concerning refugees and other foreigners 
 Affair of Conseil causes a temporary rupture with France 
 
 1838 French demand expulsion of Louis Bonaparte— He quits Swit 
 
 zerland 
 
 Closing speech of the President .... 
 Weakness of federal governments on questions with foreign states 
 
 337 
 
 Page 
 
 282 
 ib. 
 
 283 
 284 
 
 285 
 286 
 
 288 
 289 
 290 
 291 
 
 ib. 
 293 
 
 ib. 
 
 ib. 
 294 
 
 ib. 
 295 
 296 
 297 
 
 ib. 
 298 
 299 
 300 
 
 ib. 
 ib. 
 
 ib. 
 
i:|. 
 
 ALPHABETICAL INDEX. 
 
 Aarau, peace of, in 1 712, terminates the 
 wars of religion between the Swiss, 
 182; diets occasionally held at Aarau, 
 210, 230; executive directory of the 
 Helvetic republic established there, 
 24-2, 246. 
 
 Aargau, a fine province subject to the 
 dukes of Austria, 84 ; is uivaded by 
 the troops of Bern, and the other 
 cantons, and is divided into subject 
 bailiwicks, li.; duke Frederic of Aus- 
 tria gives up his rights over it, 85 ; it 
 becomes independent after the over- 
 throw of the old Swiss Confederation 
 by the French, 240 ; forms one of the 
 new cantons by the Act of Mediation, 
 253 ; natuie of its constitution, 263 ; 
 changes in 1830, 269. 
 
 Affiy, d', of Fribourg, first landamman 
 of Switzerland under the Act of Me» 
 diation, 353. 
 
 Agnes of Hungary, daughte;: of the 
 Emperor Albert, her cruel revenge of 
 her father's death, 49 ; founds the 
 monastery of Kdnigsfelden, and retires 
 thither, ih. ; mediates a truce between 
 Bern and the feudal nobles, 56. 
 
 Albert, duke of Austria, son of the em- 
 peror Rudolf, his character, 41 ; as- 
 pires to the Imperial crown against 
 Adolphus of Nassau, 42 ; becomes 
 emperor, ib. ; attacks the free town of 
 Bern, and is defeated at Donnerbuhl, 
 ih.] is likewise unsuccessful against 
 Zurich, 43 ; tries to obtain possession 
 of the forest cantons, ib. ; is resisted 
 by the people, 44 ^ sends them two 
 harsh noblemtn as imperial bailiffs, 
 ib.\ being informed of the revolt of 
 the forest cantons, he repairs to Baden 
 to collect his troops, 48 ; is murdered 
 by his nephew John, and other con- 
 spirators, 49. 
 
 Albert II., duke of Austria, loses the 
 canton of Qlarus, 58 ; his troops are 
 defeated by the ZUrichers and the 
 people of Glarus, 59 ; loses the canton 
 of Zug, ib. ; agrees to a truce, ib. ; 
 lays siege to Zlirich, 60; dies at 
 Vienna, ib. 
 
 Alemanni, or Allemanni, a nomadic 
 
 people, invade and devastate Eastern 
 Helvetia, 6 ; are defeated and subju- 
 gated by Clovis, king of the Franks, 
 7 ; Clovis' successors ajipoint a duke to 
 rule over them, 8; a party of Ale- 
 manni make an irruption into Italy, 
 and are defeated by Narses, 9 ; man- 
 ners of the Alemanni of Helvetia, 12; 
 their laws, 13; Columbanus, Gall, 
 and other monks preach Christianity 
 
 • among them, tb. 
 
 Anabaptists, a fanatical sect risen in 
 Germany, 130; they spread into 
 Switzerland, and make proselytes, ib. ; 
 refuse obedience to the laws, and 
 commit many excesses, 131 ; are put 
 down by an armed force, ib. 
 
 Appenzell, Abten zelle (Abbatis cella), 
 origin of the name, 27 ; a district sub- 
 ject to the abbot of St. Gall, 80 ; the 
 people being oppressed by the abbot's 
 bailiffs revolt, ib. ; they are assisted 
 by Schwytz and Glaris, and defeat 
 the troops of the abbot and his allies, 
 81 ; they next defeat the Austrians, 
 82 ; they invade the Tyrol, ib. ; and 
 make the abbot of St. Gall prisoner, 
 83 ; make peace, their independence 
 being acknowledged, ib. 
 
 Arbedo, battle of, between the Swiss and 
 the Milanese, 85. 
 
 Armagnacs, predatory bands, irruption 
 of into Switzerland, 92 ; their battle 
 with the Swiss near Basle, 93 ; they 
 retire, 94. 
 
 Austria, house of, or of Habsburg, ori- 
 ginary from the Aargau, 34 ; its ex- 
 traordinary fortunes, 36 ; loses gra- 
 dually all its ancestral dominions in 
 Switzerland, 66, 68, 95 ; makes a 
 treaty of alliance with the cantons, 
 96 ; its last attempt at recovering its 
 former power in Switzerland defeated, 
 107, 109; its war against France in 
 1799, extends to Switzerland, 244, 5; 
 and temiinates by the peace of Lune- 
 ville, 248 ; Austrian troops cross 
 Switzerland as friends, to march 
 against Napoleon, 256 ; Austrian 
 minister urges the formation of a new 
 Helvetic confederation, 257, 8, 261. 
 
 z2 
 
340 
 
 ALPHABETICAL INDEX. 
 
 Baden, in Aargau,is taken by the Ber- 
 nese, 84 ; becomes a subject bailiwick, 
 85; being occupied by the catholic 
 cantons during the religious war of 
 1712. is taken by the troops of Bern 
 and Zurich, 182 ; is given up to Zurich 
 and Bern by the peace of Aarau, ib. 
 
 Baillis, bailiffs, two sorts of, 207 ; 
 governors of districts, in the canton 
 of Bern, their jurisdiction and per- 
 quisites, 187; their character justified, 
 190; bailiffs sent by the various 
 cantons in turn to administer the sub- 
 ject bailiwicks, absolute and often 
 rapacious, t7>. and 207 ; especially those 
 sent by the forest cantons to the 
 Italian valleys, 208 ; list of subject 
 bailiwicks, 207. 
 
 Basel, Basle, town of, its original con- 
 stitution, 33 ; is besieged by Rudolf 
 of Habsburg, 36 ; its prospierity and 
 quarrels with the dukes of Austria, 
 78 ; is attacked by the Armagnacs, 
 92 ; is received as a canton into the 
 Swiss confederation, 109 ; embraces 
 the doctrines of the reformation, 133 ; 
 nature of its old constitution, 196, 7; 
 is the first canton which adopts the 
 French democratic principles, 229 ; 
 its constitution under the Act of Media- 
 tion^ 253; modified in 1814, 263; 
 new modifications proposed in 1830, 
 270 ; civil war between the rural dis- 
 tricts and the town of Basle, ib. ; the 
 federal diet interferes and puts down 
 the distnrbances, 275 ; the war breaks 
 out again, and the citizens of Basle 
 are defeated by the peasantry, 280 ; 
 the federal diet sends troops to occupy 
 both town and country, ib. ; the canton 
 of Basle is divided into two indepen- 
 dent states or half cantons, Basle town 
 and Basle country, 283. 
 
 Basle, bishops of, their quarrel with 
 Bern on account of Bienue, 61 ; their 
 authority within the city of Basle 
 very much circumscribed, and at last 
 obliterated by the imperial franchises, 
 77; sell the suburb of little Basle to 
 the dukes of Austria, 78 ; greatly ex- 
 tend their dominion over the valleys of 
 the Jura, and are made princes of the 
 German empire, ib. ; the bishop and 
 his clergy finally quit the town of 
 Basle at the time of the reformation, 
 133 ; and the prince bishop enters 
 into alliance with the catholic cantons, 
 179 and 206; his territories are in- 
 vaded by the French, 219; and are 
 annexed to France, 220; are given 
 by the allied sovereigns to the canton 
 of Bern, 258, 
 
 Beda, the good abbot of St. Gall, gives a 
 charter to his subjects, 223. 
 
 Bellinzona, a town and district on the 
 Italian side of the Alps, taken and 
 lost again by the forest cantons, 85 ; 
 is given up to them by Louis XII. as 
 duke of Milan, 112; is numbered 
 among the subject bailiwicks, 207 ; 
 asserts its independence together with 
 Locarno and Lugano, 234 ; forms 
 part of the new canton of Ticino, 
 249 ; specimen of its dialect, Appen- 
 ditt, 307. 
 
 Berthold of Ziiringen, his contest with 
 Frederic of HohenstaufFen, 28 ; is 
 made imperial warden over part of 
 Eastern Helvetia, ib. ; Berthold IV., 
 duke of Ziiringen, is appointed impe- 
 rial warden over Western Helvetia, 
 29 ; builds the town of Freyburg, 30 ; 
 encloses the towns of Moudon and 
 Berthoud, 31 ; Berthold V., his wise 
 administration, ib. ; founds the city of 
 Bern, 32 ; declines the ofier of the 
 Imperial crown, ib. ; dies, and his 
 fumily becomes extinct with him^ 33. 
 
 Bern, built by Berthold of ZUringen, 
 32 ; origin of its name, ib. ; its first 
 constitution and imperial charter 
 granted to it, ib. ; iis importance and 
 quarrels with the neighbouring feudal 
 nobles, 37 ; defeats Albert of Austria, 
 and makes peace with him, ib. ; is at- 
 tacked again by Albert, now emperor, 
 and defeats him at Donnerbuhl, 42 ; 
 reduces into subjection the vassals of 
 Albert, 43 ; league of the nobles 
 against Bern, 54 ; the nobles defeated 
 at Laupen, 53 ; Bern becomes one of 
 the confederate cantons, 59 ; defeats 
 the Guglers, 62 ; assists its neighbours 
 of Soleure, ib, ; its remarkable policy 
 and gradual increase of territory, ib. ; 
 does not send its contingent to Sem- 
 pach, 64 and 67 ; obtains possession 
 of the Oberland, the Enimenthal, and 
 other districts, 66 ; changes in its 
 constitution in favour of aristocracy, 
 74 ; Bern is nearly destroyed by fiie, 
 ib. ; is rebuilt upon an improved plan, 
 75 ; the troops of Bern invade the 
 Aargau, the greater part of which re- 
 mains subject to Bern, 84 ; Bern acts 
 a principal part in the war against 
 Charles of Burgundy, 97 — 100; al- 
 lows churchmen to maiy;y, 129 ; con- 
 ference at Bern between the Evange- 
 licals and the Roman Catholics, 131 ; 
 Bern adopts the reformation, 132; 
 temperate measures of the council of 
 Bern, ib. ; edict of reformation issued 
 by them, Appcndijc,^^^ — 10 ; especial 
 
 ALPHABETICAL INDEX. 
 
 341 
 
 alliance of Bern with Zurich," and 
 other towns for the defence of the re- 
 formation, 133; Synod of Bern, in 
 which the confession of faith is agreed 
 upon, 142 ; Bernese defeated at Baar 
 by the troops of the Catholic cantons, 
 145 ; make peace with the latter, e7>. ; 
 alliance of Bern with Geneva, 148; 
 a Bernese army marches to the assist- 
 ance of Geneva, 149 ; treaty of St. 
 Julien with the duke of Savoy, 150 ; 
 the duke having broken the treaty, 
 Bern sends another army, and takes 
 possession of the Pays de Vaud, 
 151, 2; form of administration given 
 to that country, 153 ; Bern by far the 
 most extensive and popidous canton of 
 Switzerland, 154; Bernese defeated 
 at Willmergen by the troops of Lu- 
 zern, 180; second battle of Willmer- 
 gen won by the Bernese, 182 ; account 
 of the constitution and administration 
 of Bern,183, and following ; its burgher 
 aristocracy, 185; its bailiwicks, 187; 
 external state, 188 ; good qualities of 
 its government, 190, 1 ; its weak 
 side- and civil disturbances, 191, 2; 
 the French directory sends insulting 
 messages to Bern, 227, 8 ; the French 
 seize upon the Pays de Vaud, 231; 
 and afterwards declare war against 
 Bern, 232; hesitation and half mea- 
 sures of the] councils of Bern, 232, 
 3, 235, 6; French attack upon 
 Bern, 237 ; the Bernese fight bravely, 
 but without accord or confidence, and 
 are defeated with great slaughter, 
 
 238 ; fall of the old republic of Bern, 
 
 239 ; the French plunder Bern, ib. ; 
 new constitution of Bern by the Act 
 of Mediation, 252, 3 ; modified in 
 1814, 263 ; radical change in its con- 
 stitution in 1831, 271 ; report of the 
 former administration published, ib. ; 
 the new councils of Bern show them- 
 selves ultra democratic, 282; are 
 checked by the federal diet, 282, 3 ; 
 advocate a general fusion of all Swit- 
 zerland into one state, 291. 
 
 Beromunster, or simply Munster, a cele- 
 brated monastery in the canton of 
 Luzern, founded by Count Bero, 17. 
 
 Berthelier, a citizen of Geneva, con- 
 cludes a treaty of alliance between 
 Geneva and Freyburg, 148 ; is arrested 
 and executed by the duke of Savoy, ib. 
 
 Bienne, Biel in German, a free imperial 
 town under the wardenship of the 
 bishops of Basle, 61 ; allied to the 
 cantons, and a member of the old 
 confederation, 201 ; its constitution, 
 ih. J seized by the French,'^ 227 ; is 
 
 now included in the canton of Bern 
 with the other districts once de- 
 pendent upon the bishop of Basle, 
 258. 
 Bonaparte, General, seizes upon Valtel- 
 lina, Chiavenna,and Bormio, annexes 
 them to the Cisalpine republic, 228 ; 
 after becoming first consul of France, 
 he offers his mediation to the Swiss, 
 249 ; his message to the cantons, 250 ; 
 convokes an assembly of deputies 
 from every canton, and of all parties, 
 ib.', his pithy and sensible speech to 
 them, 251 ; defends the maintenance 
 of the small democracies of the forest 
 cantons, 251, 2; his suggestions con- 
 cerniiig the constitution of the town 
 or aristocratic cantons, 252 ; and of 
 the new cantons or former subjects of 
 the old cantons, ib. ; his reflexions 
 upon the calamities and anarchy 
 which had befallen Switzerland, 253 ; 
 his Act of Mediation is solemnly ac- 
 cepted by all the cantons, and the 
 French troops evacuate Switzerland, 
 ib. ; Bonaparte's mediation in the af- 
 fairs of Switzerland, the most liberal 
 and disinterested act of his political 
 life, 254. 
 Bonnivard, prior of St. Victor at Geneva, 
 preaches in favour of the reformation, 
 149 ; is seized by the duke of Savoy, 
 and confined in the dungeons of the 
 Castle of Chillon, 150 ; is released 
 by the Bernese after six years' con- 
 finement, 153. 
 Bonstetfen, Charles, a patrician of Bern, 
 his remarks upon the government of 
 his country, 190, 
 Braun, Rudolf, a popular leader at 
 Zurich, effects a cTiange in the govenr- 
 ment, 56 ; becomes burgomaster for 
 life, 57; discovers a conspiracy, and 
 puts to death the chief conspirators, 
 ib. 
 Brune, a French General, his captious 
 conduct towards Bern, 235, 6 ; at- 
 tacks the Bernese at Laupen, and is 
 repulsed, 238; but his colleague 
 Schauenburg having defeated the other 
 division of the Bernese, Bern is obliged 
 to surrender, ih. ; Brune seizes upon 
 the treasury, the arsenal, stores, and 
 other public jiroperty, 329 ; he is then 
 promoted to the command of the army 
 of Italy, 330. 
 Brunehaut, Regent of Burgundy, an 
 imprincipled woman, makes Protadius 
 governor of the province of Scodingen, 
 in Western Helvetia, 10; Protadius 
 attempts to depress the nobles, and is 
 killed, ib, ; Brunehaut takes refuge in 
 
342 
 
 ALPHABETICAL INDEX. 
 
 the castle of Orbe, but is delivered 
 inta the hands of her enemv Clotarius, 
 who sentent-fs her to a cruel death, 11. 
 
 Bubenberg, au autient Bernese family, 
 Cunu of Bubenberg, encloses Bern 
 by order of the duke of ZUringen, 32 ; 
 John von Bubenberg, Avoyer of Bern, 
 bravely defends Laupen against the 
 nobles, 55 ; is banished with all his 
 family by a sentence of the popular 
 assembly, but is recalled after fourteen 
 years, and dies in his native city, 74 ; 
 Afhian von Bubenberg bravely de- 
 fends Morat against Charles of Bur- 
 gundy, 99. 
 
 BuUinger, a friend of Zwingli, and 
 rector of Bremgarten, opposes the 
 sale of the indulgences, 126; preaches 
 the reformation, 127 ; together with 
 other reformers, frames the Helvetic 
 confession of faith. Appendix, 310. 
 
 Burgundiaus, a Teutonic people, cross 
 the Rhine, and settle in Western Hel- 
 vetia, 2 ; they extend their dominion 
 ■west of the Jura, as far as the Saone, 
 ib. ; less rude than other northern 
 tribes, they apply themselves to agri- 
 culture, ib. ; their partition of the 
 land with the conquered people, 3; 
 their institutions, ib. ; their king Gun- 
 dioch, a Visigoth chief, 2 and 3 ; di- 
 vision of the kingdom between his 
 foursons,3; Gundobald,one of them, 
 having killed two of his brothers, 
 seizes upon their territories, 4 ; orders 
 a revision and compilation of the laws 
 of the Burgundians, ib. ; spirit of 
 those laws, 5 ; Gundobald is siic- 
 ceeded by his son Sigismund, ib. ; 
 discipline of the Burgundian clergy, 
 6 ; Sigismund is attacked by the 
 Franks, defeated and put to death, 7 ; 
 his brother Gondemar continues to 
 fight against the Franks ior eight 
 years, but is at last defeated, ib.; end 
 of the kingdom of Burguncly, which 
 is annexed to the Frankish monarchy, 
 8 ; Eurgun<liaus, however, retain their 
 usages and privileges as a separate 
 people, ib. ; nobles of Burgundy retain 
 their fiefs for life, 9; states of Bur- 
 gundy clicse Boson, Count of Vienne, 
 as their kmg, 18 ; after Boson's death, 
 Burgundy becomes divided, 19; Ru- 
 dolf is elected king of Upper Bur- 
 gundy, ib. ; extinction of the second 
 kingdom of Burgundy, 25 ; is unhed 
 to the German empire, 26 ; Laud- 
 graviate of Burgundy. 28 ; duchy of 
 Burgundy, see Charles the Rash, 
 Burgundian war, 102, and follow- 
 
 Caddea, Casa Dei, one of the leagues 
 of the Grisons, 87, 8. 
 
 Calvin, the French reformer, comes to 
 Geneva, 152; his early history, 155 ; 
 is expelled from Geneva, ib. ; but is 
 recalled honourably, and becomes the 
 chief moderator and lawgiver of that 
 city, ib. ; he establishes the college, 
 156 ; his activity, ib. ; his intolerance 
 with regard to Servetus, ib. ; his death 
 and retrospect of his services to his 
 adoptive county, ib. 
 
 Canipo Formio, peace of, between Aus- 
 tria and France, 228. 
 
 Camogask, Theresa of, occasions the 
 emancipation of Eugadiu, 89. 
 
 Cantons, the three forest cantons, or 
 Waldstiltten, 52 ; the eight old can- 
 tons, 59, 60 ; confederation of the 
 thirteen cantons, 109 ; jealousy be- 
 tween town cantons and rural cantons, 
 103 ; new cantons formed after the 
 French invasion, 253; three more 
 cantons added in 1814, 258; actual 
 confederation of twenty-two cantons, 
 259. 
 
 Capitulations between various cantons 
 and foreign powers for supplying 
 them with regiments raised in 
 Switzerland, 210; discussion upon 
 the policy of this system, 211, 
 212. 
 
 Capo d'lstria, Count, envoy of Russia to 
 the Swiss Diet, 256. 
 
 Carnot, his censure of the conduct of 
 the French Directory towards Swit- 
 zerland, 241. 
 
 Chabluis, a province in Savoy, taken by 
 the Bernese, 152; restored to the 
 duke of Savoy, 156. 
 
 Charlemagne, his administration, 15 : 
 division of his empire, 18. 
 
 Charles the Rash, iluke of Burgundy, 
 his chaiacter, 96; liis ill will against 
 the Swiss, ib. ; his bad faith. 97 ; at- 
 tacks the Swiss, 98 ; is defeated at 
 Granson, ib. ; attacks them a second 
 time, and is totally routed at Morat, 
 99 ; his death in Lorraine, 101. 
 
 Charles IV., emperor, joins the duke of 
 Austria against the Swiss, but soon 
 after withdraws his troops from before 
 Zurich, 60. 
 
 Charles V.. emperor, assembles the Diet 
 at Augsburg, 140 ; his conduct to- 
 wards the German Reformers, 141, 
 
 Charles Emmanuel, duke of Savoy, an- 
 noys the Genevans, 157 ; attempts to 
 surprise the town, ib. 
 
 Charles, archduke of Austria, defeats 
 the French at Stockach, 244; eva 
 cuates Switzerland, 245. 
 
 ALPHABETICAL INDEX. 
 
 343 
 
 Chenaud's conspiracy at Freyburg, de- 
 feated, 193. 
 Cherasco, peace of, by which the Aus- 
 
 trians evacuate the Grisons, 166. 
 Clotarius II. assembles the Burgundian 
 nobles at Paris to frame new laws, 11. 
 Clotilda, niece of Gundobald, king of 
 the Burgundians, marries Clovis, king 
 of the Franks, 4 ; her revenge of her 
 father's death, 7. 
 Clovis defeats the Alemanni at Tolbiac, 
 
 and becomes Christian, 7. 
 Coire, Cuera in Romansch, Chur in 
 German, bishops of, 87 ; assist in the 
 emancipation of their country, 83. 
 
 Columbanus, an Irish monk in the 
 seventh century, passes into France, 
 and from thence into Helvetia, 13 ; 
 preaches Christianity in the valley of 
 Tuggen, and breaks the idols, i6.; is 
 sent away, and passes into Rhaetia, 
 where he founds the monastery of 
 Disentis, 14. 
 
 Confederates or allies of the Swiss, dis- 
 tinction between them and the Socii, 
 110, 111. 
 
 Confederation, Helvetic, see *' Cantons." 
 
 Confession of failh, of Augsburg, 141 ; 
 Zwingli's confession of faith, ib. ; 
 Helvetic confession established at the 
 Synod of Bern, 142; printed at Zu- 
 rich in 30 articles in 1566, Appendix^ 
 311; abstract of its principal dog- 
 mata, 311— 21. 
 
 Conrad, son of Rudolf II., king of 
 Upper Burgundy, is left imder the 
 guardianship of Otho I., emperor of 
 Germany, 20 ; assumes the reins of 
 government, his peaceful reign, 21 ; 
 but weak administration, 22 ; Conrad 
 dies, A. D. 993, 25. 
 
 Conrad the Salic, emperor of Germany, 
 is crowned king of Upper Burgundy, 
 at Geneva, 26. 
 
 Conrad, of Zariugen, appointed land- 
 grave and imperial rector of Bur- 
 gundy, 28 ; defeats Renaud, count of 
 Burgundy, ib. 
 
 Conrad, of Hohenstauffen, elected em- 
 peror, 28 ; confirms the duke of Zii- 
 ringen in his jurisdiction over Hel- 
 vetia, ib. 
 
 Constance, bishop of, opposes the Refor- 
 mation, 127 — 131. 
 
 Constance, council of, deposes John 
 XXllL, and elects Martin V. in his 
 place, 83; excommunicates Frederic, 
 duke of Austria, ib, 
 
 Constance, war of, between the duke of 
 Austria and the Swiss, 84 ; ends 
 favourably to the latter, 85. 
 
 Convents^ their first establishment in 
 
 Helvetia,' 14 ; their ^beneficial influ- 
 ence, 17; suppressed by ZUrich,128 ; 
 gradually suppressed at Bern, 129 — 
 32. 
 
 Constitutions of the various cantons 
 under the old confederation, account 
 of, 134—99; of the allies of the 
 Swiss, 199—204. 
 
 Cuuats appointed in Helvetia by the 
 Carlo vingian dynasty, 15 ; their office 
 becomes hereditary under Charle- 
 
 magne s successors. 
 
 16. 
 
 Coucy, Euguerrand de, invades Western 
 Helvetia, 61 ; is defeated by the Ber- 
 nese, and obliged to retire, 62. 
 
 Cuno, abbot of St. Gall, applies to the 
 Imperial towns of Suabia for assist- 
 ance against his revolted subjects of 
 Appenzell, 80; is 'defeated by the 
 Appeuzellers, and driven out of his 
 own territories, 82, 83. 
 
 Daqobert, ** the good king,'* succeeds 
 Clotarius II. as king of France and 
 of Burgundy, 12 ; collects the laws of 
 the Alemanni, ib.; his death, 14. 
 
 Defensional, a regulation agreed upon 
 by the Swiss cantons for their common 
 defence, 210. 
 
 Diets, federal, when first established, 60 ; 
 general diets of the whole confedera- 
 tion, their ordinary meetings, 209 ; 
 extraordinary diets, 210; partial diets 
 of the Catholic or Protestant cantons, 
 ib. ; last general diet of the old con- 
 federation, meets at Aarau in January 
 1798, 230; breaks up without effect- 
 ing anything, ib. ; diet held at Bern 
 in October 1801, 249 ; is dissolved by 
 violence, ib. ; annual diets resumed 
 under Bonaparte's Act of Mediation, 
 253 ; diet assembles at Zurich in 18 14, 
 to frame a new federal pact, 257 ; 
 annual ordinary diets meet in July, in 
 one of the three chief central towns, 
 Bern, Zurich, and Luzern, by turns, 
 259 ; prerogatives of the diet, 260 ; 
 diet of 1831, account of its opening, 
 and abstract of the speeches of the 
 deputies, 272 — 4; various political 
 parties in it, 278 ; its firm and pru- 
 dent conduct, 280 ; diet of 1833, saves 
 Switzerland from anarchy, 283 ; diet 
 of 1834, meets at Zurich with great 
 solemnity, 287 ; abstract of speeches 
 and questions debated, 289 — 93 ; diet 
 of 1836, 296; animated debate in on 
 the occasion of an address, 297 — 9 ; 
 diet of 1838, debate in, 300 ; closing 
 speech of its president, ib. 
 
 Dijon, siege of, by the Swiss, 1 13, 
 
 Directory, French Executive, its insidi- 
 
344 
 
 ALPHABETICAL INDEX. 
 
 ALPHABETICAL INDEX. 
 
 345 
 
 ous and dishonest conduct towards 
 Switzerland, 2"2'4, 5; its insolent 
 message to Bern, 227 ; sends troops 
 to invade the countr}', 231, and fol- 
 lowing. 
 
 Disontis, abbey of, in the Grisons, its 
 foundation, 14 ; abbot of Disentis as- 
 sents to the emancipation of his coun- 
 trymen, 88 ; the abbey is burnt by the 
 French in 1799,245; numerous old 
 MSS. lost in the conflagration, Ap- 
 pejidix, 308. 
 
 Dornach, battle of, bet\^en the Swiss 
 and the troops of the emperor Maxi- 
 milian, 109. 
 
 EiNSiEDLEN, abbey and sanctuary of, its 
 serfs are partially emancipated, 24 ; 
 its abbot quarrels with the shepherds 
 of Schwytz concerning the right of 
 ])asture, 40 j Samson is repulsed at 
 Einsiedlen, ' by Zwingli, 125; curate 
 of Einsitdlen abandons his post, 241. 
 
 Emmenthal, a fine valley, purchased by 
 Bern. 66. 
 
 Engelberg, a mountain district, under 
 the government of the abbot, allied to 
 the forest cantons, 206. 
 
 Eullibuch, a fertile district, west of 
 Luzern, its seignorial right purchased 
 by Luzeri), 72; conspiracy of Entli- 
 buch against the town of Luzern dis- 
 covered and punished, 102, 3. 
 
 Engadin, valley of the Inn, revolts 
 against its feudal lords, 89 ; joins the 
 Caddea league of tb.e Grisons, ib. ; is 
 invaded by the troops of the emperor 
 Maximilian, 108 ; the people oi En- 
 gadin fight bravely against them, /6. ; 
 dialects of Upper and Lower Engadin, 
 Appendix, 306, 7. 
 
 En^rland, minister of, quits Switzerland, 
 227 ; his message to the council of 
 Bern, 228. 
 
 English envoy supports the freedom of 
 the new cantons, 257. 
 
 Erlach, an antient and illustrious family 
 of Bern, Ulrich von Erlach defeats 
 the forces of Albert of Austria at 
 Donnerbuhl, 42 ; Rudolf von Erlach, 
 his son, defeats the league ot the 
 uobles at the battle of Laupen, 55 ; 
 his tragical death, ih. {note) ; John 
 von Erlach, general of the Bernese 
 army, marches through the Pays de 
 Vaud to the assistance of Geneva, 
 149 ; Erlach of Hindelbank, general 
 in chief of the Bernese army against 
 the French in 1798, his answtr to 
 General Brune, 235 ; his entreaties to 
 the council of Bern to adopt decisive 
 measures, 236 ; is surprised and beaten 
 
 by the French at Frauenbrunnen, 238 ; 
 is killed by his own mutinous soldiers, 
 ih. 
 
 Escalade, or attempt of the duke of 
 Savoy to surprise Geneva, defeated, 
 157; its anniversary kept at Geneva 
 to the j)resent day, ib. 
 
 Euler, a distinguished mathematician of 
 Basel, 213. 
 
 Evangelicals, the name assumed by the 
 Swiss reformers, 127; remain sepa- 
 rated from the Lutherans, 141. 
 
 Faber, vicar of the bishop of Constance, 
 forbids Samson to sell the indulgences, 
 126 ; acknowledges his inferiority to 
 Zwingli in classical and oriental learn- 
 ing, 127. 
 
 Farel, the first reformer in Western 
 Switzerland, is ill-treated at Orbe, 
 138; preaches with success at Neu- 
 chatel, 139 ; and at the Val St. Imier, 
 ib.; also at Moutier, 140 ; comes to 
 Geneva, and is driven away by the 
 Catholics, 150 ; returns to Geneva, 
 and makes numerous proselytes, 151 ; 
 attends the disputation of Lausanne, 
 153 ; invites Calvin to stop at Geneva, 
 155 ; is again expelled from Geneva, 
 and fixes himself at Neuchatel, where 
 he nmains till his death, ib. 
 
 Federal pact of the old Swiss confede- 
 ration, 209 ; new federal pact of 
 1815, 259; its provisions, 259, 60; 
 its proposed revisal, 278, 287 ; ques- 
 tion dropped, 293. 
 
 Fellenberg, his institution for education 
 at Hofwyl, near Bern, 255. 
 
 Ferdinand IL, emperor of Germany, a 
 bigoted prince, begins the^thirty years' 
 war, 168; persecutes the Protestants 
 in Bohemia, 169 ; invades the Grisons, 
 ib.', abolishes the Protestant worship 
 in Austria, 172; endeavours to sup- 
 press Protestantism in Germany, ib. ; 
 is opposed by Gustavus of Sweden, 
 173; recalls Waldstein, 174; and 
 soon after orders him to be put to 
 death, 175 ; dies at Vienna in 1647, t6. 
 
 Feudal system established in Helve- 
 tia under the Carlovingian dynasty, 
 16; its abuses, 22; opposed by the 
 people of Thurgau, 24 ; checked by 
 the dukes of ZUringen, 31. 
 
 Flue, Nicolas von, the hermit, his early 
 history, 103; appears unexpectedly 
 at the congress of Stanz, and restores 
 concord among the Swiss, ib. ; his im- 
 pressive address to the assembled de- 
 puties, 104; returns to his cell, ih. 
 
 Franks, a German tribe, cross the Rhine^ 
 and settle in Belgic Gaul, 2; their 
 
 king Chlodowig or [Clovis is invested 
 with the kingly purple by the eastern 
 emperor, 3, {note)) the Franks defeat 
 the Alemanni, 7 ; and embrace Chris- 
 tianity, ib. ; they conquer Burgundy, 
 and rule over all Helvetia, 8 ; division 
 of the Prankish monarchy into several 
 kingdoms, 9. 
 
 France, Pepin assumes the title of king 
 of France, 15. 
 
 Francis I., king of France, invades 
 Lombardy, 114; fights the Swiss at 
 Marignano, 115; makes peace, and 
 contracts an alliance with them, 116; 
 Swiss auxiliaries fight for him at 
 Pavia, ib. 
 
 Frastenz in the Tyrol, battle of, won by 
 the Swiss, 1 07. 
 
 Frauenfeld, the head town of Thurgau, 
 diets formerly held there, 209. 
 
 Fratienbrunnen, near Bern, Guglers de- 
 feated at, 62 ; Bernese routed by the 
 French at, 238. 
 
 Frederic I., tmperor, confirms the juris- 
 diction of the dukes of Zuringen in 
 Helvetia, 29. 
 
 Frederic II. , emperor, bestows a charter 
 on the city of Bern, 32 ; his journey 
 through Helvetia, .S5 ; acknowledges 
 by a charter the freedom of the forest 
 cantons, 41. 
 
 Fredeiic, dukeof Austria, makes a truce 
 with the forest cantons, 52. 
 
 Frederic II., of Prussia, confirms the 
 franchises of his subjects of Keu- 
 chatel, 202. 
 
 French government complains against 
 the refugees in Switzerland, 295 ; its 
 imperious demands, 297 ; temporary 
 rupture between it and Switzerland, 
 300. 
 
 French revolution, its peculiar character, 
 215; strange notions it introduces 
 concerning international questions, 
 ih. and 220 ; the wars waged by the 
 French revolutionists marked by 
 fanatical spirit, 216 ; they destroy all 
 former republics existing in Europe, 
 ih. 
 
 French troops invade the territories of 
 the bishop of Basle, 219; occujiy the 
 Pa} s de Vaud, 231 ; take Bern, 239 ; 
 are' repulsed by the men of Schwyz, 
 241, 2; attack and devastate the 
 Nidwalden, 243 ; are obliged to eva- 
 cuate the Grisons, 244 ; defeat the 
 Russians at Zurich, 245 ; ravage the 
 valleys of the Grisons, 245, 6 ; eva- 
 cuate Switzerland after the peace of 
 Luneville, 248 ; appear again on its 
 frontiers, 249 — 50 ; finally evacuate 
 the country altogether, 253. 
 
 Freyburg, Fribourg, built by Berthold 
 of Zaringen, 30 ; aristocratic spirit of 
 its institutions, ih. (note) ; enters into 
 an alliance with Bern, 56; pays alle- 
 giance to the dukes of Savoy, 95 ; re- 
 covers its independence, 100 ; is ad- 
 mitted as a canton into the confede- 
 ration, 104 ; joins the league of the 
 Catholic cantons, 133 ; forms an alli- 
 ance with Geneva, 148; marches its 
 troops with those of Bern to the assist- 
 ance of Geneva, 149; withdraws its 
 alliance from Geneva on account of 
 the reformation, 151 ; sketch of its 
 former government, 192, 3; is taken 
 by the French, 237 ; its constitution 
 after 1814,263; subsequent changes, 
 272. 
 
 Furst, Walter, of Uri, one of the three 
 patriotsj^f the forest cantons, 45. 
 
 Gall, a companion of Columbanus, 
 preaches Christianity to the Alemanni, 
 13 ; builds a cell, which was the 
 origin of the abbey of St. Gall, 14. 
 
 Gall, St., abbey of, its splendour in the 
 tenth century, 24; reputation of its 
 school, ib. ; Abbot defeated by the 
 people of Appenzell, 80, 1 ; acquires 
 Toggenburg, 94 ; becomes associate 
 of the Swiss cantons, 110; disputes 
 concerning the election of the abbot 
 occasion a war between the Catliolic 
 and the Protestant cantons, 142 ; the 
 abbot is restored to his dominions, 
 145 ; disputes between the abbot and 
 his subjects of Toggenburg occasion a 
 fresh war, 181 ; abbot obli^jed to es- 
 cape across the lake of Constance, 
 182 ; the abbot acknowledges the 
 franchises of Toggenburg, 183 ; ac- 
 count of his dominions, 200. 
 
 Gall, St., the town of, put to the ban of 
 the empire, 106; becomes associate 
 of the Swiss, 110; adopts the refor- 
 mation, 127 ; its political state, 201 ; 
 becomes a canton, including the ter- 
 ritories of the abbot, 249 ; its consti- 
 tution, 253, 263; changes effected 
 since, 269. 
 
 Geneva, its walls restored by Gundo- 
 bald, 4 ; see of Geneva, 29 ; city of 
 Geneva allied to Freyburg and Bern, 
 111; its early history, 146, 7; and 
 political parties, 148; progress of the 
 reformed doctrines, 149 — 50 ; is as- 
 sisted by Bern, 151 ; proclaims its 
 total independence of the dukes of 
 Savoy, 152; is attacked by the Savoy- 
 ards, and repels the attack, 157 ; his- 
 tory of its constitution, 203 ; repeated 
 political disturbances, 204, 5; the 
 
346 
 
 ALPHABETICAL INDEX. 
 
 ALPHABETICAL INDEX. 
 
 347 
 
 popular leaders emigrate to Ireland, 
 and found New Geneva, 205 ; revolu- 
 tions at Geneva, and summary exe- 
 cutions by the mob, 222; Geneva 
 is taken by the French, 235 ; re- 
 covers its independence bv means of 
 the allied troops in 1814, 25S ; and is 
 received as a canton in the confede- 
 ration, ib. ', its new constitution, 264 ; 
 disturbed by the Polish and other re- 
 fugees, 284 ; sends them away with 
 much difficulty, 285. 
 
 Gessler, imperial bailiff in the canton of 
 Uri, 44 ; his oppressive conduct, 4G ; 
 account of his death, 47. 
 
 Gersau, on the lake of the four cantons, 
 the smallest republic in Europe, now 
 united to the canton of Schwyz, 20G. 
 
 Giornico, battle of, won by the Swiss 
 against the Milanese, 102. 
 
 Glarus, canton of, origin of its name, 
 14 ; once a domain of the abbey of 
 Seckingen, 25 ; refuses to join the 
 duke of Austria against Zurich, 58 j 
 is admitted into the confederation, ib. ; 
 people of Glarus defeat the Austrians 
 at Naefels, 65 ; become divided be- 
 tween Catholics and Protestants, 133; 
 who manage to live together in good 
 harmony, 134. 
 
 Gontram, king of Orleans and of Bur- 
 gundy, 9. 
 
 Gontram, count of Alsace, retires to his 
 estate in the Aargau, 21 ; is the pro- 
 genitor of the house of Habsburg, 
 22, 23. 
 
 Graffenried, a Bernese commander, re- 
 pels the^ French at Lauj)eu, 238. 
 
 Granson, battle of, won by the Swiss 
 against Charles of Burgundy, 98. 
 
 Gregory VII., Hildebrand, effects a total 
 separation of the clergy from the 
 laity, and enforces celibacy upon the 
 former, 2G ; assumes the right of de- 
 posing sovereigns, ib, ; begins the war 
 of the investitures, 27. 
 
 Grey league, its formation, gives its name 
 to the whole of Rbactia, 88. 
 
 Grisons, Graublindten, their three 
 leagues, how formed, 87 — 90 ; defeat 
 the troops of the emperor Maximilian 
 at Malsheraida, 108; become allied 
 to the Swiss cantons, 111 ; take pos- 
 session of Valtellina, Chiavenna, and 
 Borraio, south of the Alps, 1 13 ; the 
 reformation penetrates among the 
 Grisons, and both parties remain in 
 } eace, 135 ; disturbances concerning 
 Valtellina, 160, and following ; Aus- 
 trians invade the Grisons, 165; their 
 oppressive conduct towards the inha- 
 bitants, ib. ; the Grisons are obliged 
 
 to submit, 166 ; assisted by the French, 
 they drive away the Austrians, ib.; 
 the Grisons, tired of the French, drive 
 them away also, 167; Austria and 
 Spain make peace with the Grisons, 
 i6. ; form of government of the Grison 
 leagues, 199; Grisons are deprived 
 by Bonaparte, of Valtellina, and of 
 the property they possessed there, 
 228 ; they decline joining the new 
 Helvetic republic formed by the 
 French, 240 ; being threatened by 
 the French, they call in the Austrians, 
 244 ; the French enter the Grisons, 
 and commit great excesses, 245 ; by 
 the Act of Mediation, the Grisons be- 
 come a canton of Switzerland, 251; 
 sketch of their constitution, 261 ; 
 moderate tone of their representatives 
 in the ftderal diet, 288. 
 
 Griitli, or Riitli, solemn meeting of the 
 three patriots of the forest cantons, 
 and oath taken there, 47. 
 
 Gruyeres, counts of, an old feudal family 
 in Western Helvetia, 34. 
 
 Guelph, or Welf, duke of Bavaria, 27. 
 
 Gumoens, a Bernese colonel, massacred 
 by his own mutinous men, 238. 
 
 Gundioch, first king of the Burguii- 
 dians, 3. 
 
 Gundobald, son of Gundioch, strips his 
 brothers of their share of the Bur- 
 gundian territory, and unites it all 
 under his sway, 4 ; encourages learn- 
 ing among his people, 5 ; his death, 
 lb, 
 
 Guglers, irruption of into Switzerlaiul, 
 6 1 ; defeated by the Bernese, 62 ; 
 song composed on the occasion, Ap- 
 pendix, 303. 
 
 Gustavus Adolphus, king of Sweden, 
 lands in Germany to support the Pro- 
 testants against the emperor Ferdi- 
 nand II., 173; defeats Tilly at the 
 battle of Leipzig, 174; is killed at 
 the battle of Lutzen, ib. 
 
 Habsbuuq, castle of, built by Radbod, 
 count of Altenburg, a grandson of 
 Gontram, 23. 
 
 Habsburg, house of, see Austria. 
 
 Hagenbach, governor of Brisach for 
 Charles of Burgundy, tried and put 
 to death for his oppressions, 92. 
 
 Husli, a valk-y among the high Alps of 
 Bern, revolts against the Bernese, and 
 is subdued,135. 
 
 Helvetia, its condition under the Roman 
 empire, 1 ; the Burgundiaas settle in 
 its western part, 2 ; Kastern Helvetia 
 invaded by the Alemanni, 6 ; distinc- 
 tion of the Helvetia of the Ale- 
 
 manni from Burgundian Helvetia, 9, 
 12; their condition under the Carlo- 
 vingians, 17 ; the Helvetia of the 
 Alemanni becomes part of the great 
 duchy of Suabia, whilst Burgiuulian 
 Helvetia remains dependent on France, 
 18 ; the latter forms part of the new 
 kingdom of Burgundy, 19; Eastern 
 or German Helvetia, its government, 
 ib.; the condition of Helvetia im- 
 proves under the emperor Conrad, 21 ; 
 all Helvetia united again under the 
 sway of Henry III. of Germany, 26 ; 
 condition of the various towns and 
 districts of Helvetia, at the death of 
 Rudolf of Habsburg, 42. 
 
 Helvetic republic proclaimed by the 
 French, 240; its state of weakness 
 and anarchy, ib. 
 
 Henry I., of Germany, gives charters 
 to many towns, 23. 
 
 Henzi, conspiracy of, against the govern- 
 ment of Bern, 192. 
 
 Huns, a tribe of hunters, desolate the 
 countries through which they pass, 2 ; 
 defeat the Burgundians, i6. ; are de- 
 feated by ^tius, the Roman General, 
 lb. 
 
 Huguenots, origin of the name, 148. 
 
 Indulgences, sale of, 120; origin and 
 history of the indulgences, 121, 2 ; 
 their sale opposed by Luther, 122, 3 ; 
 and by Zwingli and others in Swit- 
 zerland, 125, 6. 
 
 Investitures, war of, between the popes 
 and the emperor, 26 ; extends into 
 Helvetia, 27, 
 
 • 
 
 Jacob, St., near Basle, battle of, 93. 
 
 Jacob, St., chapel of, ia Unterwalden, 
 fight between women and the French 
 soldiers, 243. 
 
 Jenatsch, colonel, a leader in the Grisons 
 against the Spanish and Austrian 
 party, 164 ; kills Pompey Planta, ib. ; 
 returns to his own country with 
 French troops, 166 ; drives away the 
 French, 167; is murdered at a festi- 
 val, ib. 
 
 Jetzler, imposture of, discovered at Bern, 
 120. 
 
 Jews banished from Zurich, 75. 
 
 Julius II. takes 6000 Swiss into his pay, 
 112. 
 
 Kyburq, counts of, 34 ; attack Soleure, 
 62 ; attempt to surprise the town, 76 ; 
 lose all their possessions, and become 
 citizens of Soleure, 77. 
 
 Lauarpe, a citizen of the Pays de Vaud, 
 
 becomes preceptor to the grand dukes 
 Alexander and Constantine of Russia, 
 
 226 ; writes from Petersburg an Es- 
 say on the Constitution of the Pays 
 de Vaud, ib. ; presents a petition to 
 the French Directory, claiming the 
 guarantee of France for the recovery 
 of the franchises of his native country, 
 
 227 ; in 1814, he advocates with the 
 Emperor Alexander the cause of the 
 independence of Vaud, and the other 
 new cantons, 257 ; his influence 
 proves successful, ib. 
 
 Landsgemeinde, or general assemblies 
 of the whole male adult population in 
 the smaller cantons, account of, 198. 
 
 Lausanne, bishop of, is driven away at 
 the reformation, 153. 
 
 Lausanne, head town of the Pays de 
 Vaud, its franchises under Bern, 153 ; 
 embraces the reformation, ib. 
 
 Leipzig, battle of, won by Gustavus, 
 174. 
 
 Leipzig, battle of, lost by Napoleon, 
 225. 
 
 Leopold of Austria, sou of the emperor 
 Albert, marches against the Wald- 
 stjitten, 50; is defeated at Morgarten, 
 51 ; besieges Soleure, and is repulsed, 
 53. 
 
 Leopold II., of Austria, marches against 
 Luzern, 63 ; ia defeated and killed at 
 Sempach, 66. 
 
 Leo X., his btdl for the sale of indul- 
 gences in Germany, 122. 
 
 Levantina, valley, invaded by the forest 
 cantons, 85, 102; revolts against 
 Uri, and is subjugated, 208. 
 
 Lieclistall, head quarters of the Basle 
 insurgents, 270 ; provisional govern- 
 ment established there, 271; expedi- 
 tion against, 280 ; becomes the capital 
 of Basle country, 283. 
 
 Locarno, once a subject bailiwick, forms 
 part of the new canton Ticino, 234. 
 
 Louis XI. of France, makes an alliance 
 with the Swiss, and pays them a sub- 
 sidy, 96. 
 
 Louis XII. renews the alliance, and 
 gives up Belliuzona and the other 
 Italian valleys to the Swiss, 112. 
 
 Louis XIII. sends troops to assist the 
 Grisons against Austria, 166, 
 
 Louis XIV. drives his Protestant sub- 
 jects to seek refuge in Switzerland, 
 180. 
 
 Lugano, a subject bailiwickj" becomes 
 independent, 234. 
 
 Luneville, peace of, between Atistria 
 and France, 248. 
 
 Luther opposes the sale of indidgeuces, 
 123 ; disagrees with the Swiss evaa- 
 
348 
 
 ALPHABETICAL INDEX. 
 
 ALPHABETICAL INDEX. 
 
 349 
 
 r 
 'I 
 
 gelicals on the subject of the Eucha- 
 rist, 138; meets Zwingli at Mar- 
 burg, ib. 
 
 Lutzen, battle of, 174. 
 
 Luzern, origin of its name, 14 ; enters 
 the confederation as the fourth can- 
 ton, 53 ; conspiracy discovered, 54 ; 
 purchases the Enthbuch, 72 ; another 
 conspiracy discovered, 103; form of 
 its government, 194; late changes, 
 269. 
 
 Massena commands the French in 
 Switzerland, 244 ; defeats the Russians 
 at Zurich, 245. 
 
 Magdeburg, taking of, a horrid mas- 
 
 S^rsacre of the inhabitants, 174. 
 
 Mamelukes, a party name at Geneva, 
 148. 
 
 Mantua, war of, 166. 
 
 Marignano, battle of, between the French 
 and the Swiss, 115. 
 
 Maximilian I., Emperor, attempts to 
 enforce the authority of the Imperial 
 Chamber over the Swiss, 103 ; is re- 
 sisted, 106; his troops defeated, 
 106,7,8; makes peace with the 
 Swiss at Basle, 109. 
 
 Merovingian dynasty, its decline, 15. 
 
 Melchthal, Arnold, of Unterwalden, one 
 of the founders of Swiss liberty, 45. 
 
 Mengaud, Commissioner of the French 
 Directory, his overbearing tone, 227, 8 ; 
 his vulgar pamphlets, 234. 
 
 Mon^on, treaty of, between France and 
 Spain, settles for a time the affairs of 
 the Grisons, 166. 
 
 Morat, battle of, 99. 
 
 MulhausHu, free town of Alsace, allied to 
 the Swiss, 93 — 110 ; its political 
 state, 201 ; taken possession of by 
 the French, 235. 
 
 NiEFELS, battle of, between the people 
 of Glaris and the Austrians, 65. 
 
 JN'euchatel, counts of, 34; principality 
 of, 110; ally of the Swiss, 111; 
 adopts the reformation, 139 ; its po- 
 litical institutions, 201 ; its prosperity 
 under the house of Brandenburg, 202 ; 
 is given by Bonaparte to Berthier, 
 255 ; is restored to the King of Prus- 
 sia, and becomes at the same time 
 one of the cantons, 258: its consti- 
 tution as such, 265 ; civil war in, 275 ; 
 insurgents wish to detach Neuchiitel 
 from Prussia, ib. ; are put down, 276 ; 
 Neuchatel joins the league of Sarnen, 
 279 ; submits to the authority of the 
 Federal Diet, 282 ; question of Neu- 
 chatel warmly debated in the Diet, 
 290, 1. 
 
 Otiio'I., Emi>eror of Germany, 20. 
 
 Peasant war in Switzerland, 178 ; put 
 down, 179. 
 
 Pestalozzi, origin of his institution, 244; 
 its progress, 255. 
 
 Planta, a powerful family "of the Gri- 
 sons, 159; favour the Catholic or 
 Spanish party, 161 ; are banished, 
 160; Rudolf Planta joins the Aus- 
 trians, who invade Engadin, 163 ; his 
 brother Pompey is killed by Colonel 
 Jenatsch, 1G4 ; Rudolph is suspected 
 of having avenged his death by the 
 munler of Jenatsch, 167. 
 
 Poj)ulatiou of the old Swiss confedera- 
 tion and its allies, 206 ; of the subject 
 bailiwicks, 207 ; actual population. 
 Introduction. 
 
 Radbod, Count of Altcnburg, builds the 
 castle of Habsburg, 22, 
 
 Rapinat, French commissioner in Swit- 
 zerland, 242 ; his rapacity, 246. 
 
 Rapperschwyl, town of, is lost by Aus- 
 tria, places itself under the protection 
 of the forest cantons, 95. 
 
 Rauracia, ephemeral republic of, 220. 
 
 Reding, Ital, a warrior of Schwytz, his 
 ferocity, 92. 
 
 Reding, Aloys, repels the French at 
 Rothenthurm, 241. 
 
 Reformation, see Zwingli ; edict of 
 reformation issued by Bern, 132, and 
 Appendix, 309. 
 
 Refugees, religious, harboured and as- 
 sisted by the Swiss, 180, 1. 
 
 Refugees, political, their strange notions 
 of international law, 284 ; debates in 
 the Diet concerning them, 288, 9, 
 294,5; resolutions of the Diet on 
 their sxibject, 299. 
 
 Religion, war of, in Switzerland, 143 ; 
 ditto in Valtellina, 161 ; second war 
 of religion in Switzerland, 179,80; 
 third and last war of reliy:ion, 182.* 
 
 Revolution, see French Revolution. 
 
 Revolution of July 1830, French, deter- 
 mines the revolution in most Swiss 
 cantons, 269. 
 
 Rhajtia under Theodoric, 7 ; its emanci- 
 pation from the feudal lords, 87; 
 takes the name of Grisons, 88. 
 
 Robespierre and Terrorists do not meddle 
 with Switzerland, 221. 
 
 Robustelli, leader of the Catholics of 
 Valtellina, appointed president, 163. 
 
 Romansch, or Rumonsch, language, Ap- 
 pendix, 305 ; specimens of, 307, 8. 
 
 Rudolf I., of Burgundy, rules Western 
 Helvetia, 19. 
 
 Rudolf II., his unsuccessful expedition 
 into Italy, 20. 
 
 Rudolf III., a weak prince, 25; gives 
 up his kingdo;n to the Emperor 
 Henry II., ib. 
 
 Rudolf of Habsburg, his greatness, 35 ; 
 is elected emperor, 36 ; favours the 
 towns of Helvetia, ib. ; his death, 42. 
 
 Rudolf, Duke of Austria, son of Albert 
 II., a mild prince, makes peace with 
 the Swiss, 60. 
 
 Rusca, archpriest of Sondrio, arrested by 
 the Grisons, 160; is put to the tor- 
 ture and dies, 61. 
 
 Russian army in Switzerland, 245 ; oc- 
 cupies Zurich and is driven away, ib. 
 See Suwarrow. 
 
 Russian envoy to the Swiss Diet, his 
 official note, 256 ; his conferences 
 with the deputies of several cantons, 
 261. 
 
 Salis, a powerful family of the Grisons, 
 their rivalry with the Plantas, 159; 
 Rudolf de Salis, general of the patriots 
 against the Austrians, 165. 
 
 Sardinia, court of, its interference with 
 the internal party feuds at Geneva, 
 204 ; its remonstrances to the Swiss 
 Diet concerning the refugees, 286. 
 
 Sarnen, league of, in opposition to the 
 majority of the cantons, 279; is dis- 
 solved, 281. 
 
 Savoy, house of, its dominions in West- 
 ern Helvetia, 33 ; makes peace with 
 the Swiss and recovers the Pays de 
 Vaud, 99; origin of its greatness, 
 146, 7 ; its connexion with Geneva, 
 147-; quarrels with Bern, 148; loses 
 the Pays de Vaud, 152 ; makes peace 
 with Bern and Geneva, 157. 
 
 Schaff'hausen, origin of its name, 13 ; 
 becomes a free town, 33 ; is received 
 as a canton into the confederation, 
 109; adopts the reformation, 133; 
 its constitution, 197. 
 
 Schauenburg, French general, attacks 
 and defeats the BerneSe, 238 ; remains 
 
 :. in command in Switzerland after 
 Brune's departure, 240 ; marches 
 against Schwytz, and is repulsed, 241 ; 
 
 r^ makes a convention with Aloys 
 Reding, 242; invades Unterwalden, 
 243; his pithy dispatch to the di- 
 rectory, ib, 
 
 Schinner, Cardinal, Bishop of Sion, his 
 intrigues with the cantons, 119. 
 
 Schumacher, a magistrate of Zug, his 
 condemnation, 213. 
 
 Schwytz, canton of, its disputes with 
 the Abbot of Einsiedlen, 40 ; the most 
 fertile and populous of the three Wald- 
 
 statten, 50; gives its name to Tthe 
 
 ■ rest, and by degrees to the whole con- 
 federation, 51 (jiote) ; submits to 
 the decision of the other cantons con- 
 cerning Zug, 71 ; form of its govern- 
 ment, see JValdstdtten, 
 
 Schwytz resists the French and makes 
 an honourable truce, 242 ; is obliged 
 to submit at last, 244 ; rises again 
 supported by the Austrians, 245; 
 disturbances between old and new 
 Schwytz, 276 ; political feeling of the 
 people, 277 ; rise in arras, 279 ; the 
 canton is occupied by the federal 
 troops, 280 ; its differences settled, 
 283 ; pays an indemnity to the fede- 
 ral treasury, 293. 
 
 Sempach, battle of, 63. 
 
 Sempacher Brief, or regulations of mili- 
 tary discipline, 65. 
 
 Sigismund, son and successor of Gon- 
 debald,,King of the Burgundians, 5 ; 
 is seized and put to death by the 
 Franks, 8. 
 
 Sigismund, Emperor, invites the Swiss 
 to invade the domains of the house 
 of Austria, 83. 
 
 Simmenthal, district of, purchased by 
 Bern, 66. 
 
 Sion, head town of the Valais, bishop 
 of, 29 ; his political rights, 200. 
 
 Socii, or associates of the Swiss cantons, 
 distinction between them and the con- 
 federate or allied states, 110 — 201 
 Qwtc.^ 
 
 Soleure, Solothurn, imperial town, 33 ; 
 
 old ally of Bern, ib. ; its quarrels 
 
 with the Counts of Kyburg, 62 — 76 ; 
 
 is admitted as one of the cantons, 1 04 ; 
 
 drives away its reformed citizens, 134 ; 
 
 its form of government, 193.4; taken 
 
 by the French, 237. 
 Spoon, Knights of the, 149. 
 Stanz in Unterwalden, congress of, 103 ; 
 
 convention of, becomes the rule in 
 
 federal matters, 104 ; battle of Stanz, 
 
 243 ; Stanz and Stanzstadt burnt by 
 
 the French, ib. ; monument of it iu 
 
 the churchyard, ib. 
 Stauffacher, Werner, of Schwytz, one of 
 
 the three founders of Swiss liberty, 
 
 45. 
 Steiger, last avoyer of the old republic 
 
 of Bern, joins the camp of General 
 
 Erlach, 238 ; after the battle retiics 
 
 into the forest cantons, 239. 
 StUssi, burgomaster of Zurich, concludes 
 
 an alliance with Austria, 91 : is killed 
 
 in fight, 92. 
 Suabia, war of, the last which the Swiss 
 
 sustained for their independence, 109. 
 Subjects of the Swiss, see Baiiiuivks, 
 
a5o 
 
 ALPHABETICAL INDEX. 
 
 ALPHABETICAL INDEX. 
 
 351 
 
 Suwarrow, Russian general, crosses the 
 St. Gothard from Italy into Switzer- 
 land, 24a ; 18 obliijed to retire by 
 night through the Alps of Glaris, ib. 
 
 Swedes, their wars in Germany, 173 — 5. 
 
 Swiss, origin of the name, 51 (note), see 
 Cantons. The Swiss enlist in foreign 
 service, 105 ; their wars in Italy, 112 ; 
 they conquer the duchy of Milan over 
 the French and restore it to the Duke 
 Sforza, 113; fight against one another 
 at La Bicocca, 119 ; Swiss regiments 
 in foreign service, 211 ; question dis- 
 cussed, 212 ; Swiss regiments in 
 France, their conduct at the revolu- 
 tion, 217,8. 
 
 Switzerland, its independence as a state 
 
 • acknowledged by the Emperor Maxi- 
 milian, 109 ; st»lemnly recognized bv 
 the peace of Westphalia. 17(); ac- 
 kuowlea<»ed again by Bonaparte, 253 ; 
 its perpetual neutrality proclaimed at 
 the congress of Vienna, 258 ; general 
 condition of Switzerland under the 
 new federal pact, 267. 
 
 TelLj William, history of, 46, 7 ; doubts 
 concerning its truth, 47 (note.) 
 
 Ten jurisdictions, 79 ; and league of, 
 90. 
 
 Theodoric, King of Italy and of Rhwtia, 
 
 ITiirty years' war, its beginning, 168; 
 its progress, 167 — 75 : the Swiss 
 escape being involved in it, 176 ; 
 moral and political effects of this long 
 war upon the Swiss, 176, 7. 
 
 Thurgau,' or district of the Thur, con- 
 quered by the Swiss upon Austria, 95 ; 
 becomes a bailiwick subject to the 
 eight old cantons, ib, and 207 ; be- 
 comes independent, 234 ; is one of 
 the new cantons under the Act of 
 Mediation, 253 ; principle of its con- 
 stitution, 263 ; change in 1831 effected 
 quietly, 269. 
 
 Ticino, canton of, formed of the four 
 subject bailiwicks Lugano, Locarno, 
 Bellinzona, and Val Levantina, 234 ; 
 changes its constitution, 268. 
 
 Toggeuburg, county of, 34; death of 
 last count, 90 ; war for his succession 
 between Zurich and the cantons, 91 ; 
 is adjudged to the Count of Raron, 
 who cedes it to the Abbot of St. Gall, 
 94 ; rises against the Abbot, 182 ; its 
 franchises recognized by the Abbot, 
 183. 
 
 Unterwai.den, one of the three forest 
 
 cantons, 40 ; revolts against the im- 
 
 ;. perial baihff, 47 ; divided into two 
 
 distinct states or half cantons, Obwal- 
 den and Nidwalden, 199 ; heroic re- 
 sistance and slaughter of the Nid- 
 walders, 243 ; their villages burnt, ih, 
 Uri, another of the three forest cantons, 
 40 ; revolts against the imperial 
 bailiff, 48 ; honourably refuses to 
 break its truce with Austria, 84 ; 
 takes possession of the Val Levantina, 
 85 ; re-conquers it upon the insur- 
 gents, 208. 
 
 Valais colonized by Burgundians, 29; 
 its lawless barons, i^. ; revolts against 
 the Lord of Raron, 86 ; becomes ally 
 of the Swiss, 111 ; its constitution, 
 200 ; is ravaged by the French, 240 ; 
 is annexed by Napoleon to his em- 
 pire, 255 ; becomes one of the new 
 Swiss cantons, 258. 
 
 Valtelliua, religious disturbances in, 
 159; its revolt against the Grisons, 
 and massacre of the Protestants, 161 ; 
 assisted by Spain and Austria, 162; 
 is restored to the Grisons, 167; is 
 seized by Bonaparte and annexed to 
 the Cisalpine republic, 228. 
 
 Vaud, Pays de, invaded by the Swiss, 
 because its nobles had taken the part 
 of Charles of Burgundy, 97 ; is re- 
 stored to the House of Savoy, 99 ; 
 invaded by Bern and Freyburg, 152; 
 Bernese administration, 153 ; fur- 
 nished a pretext to the French for 
 entering Switzerland, 225 ; retrospect 
 of its history, 226 ; is occupied by the 
 French troops, 231 ; forms one of the 
 new cantons under the Act of Media- 
 tion, 253 ; maintains its independence 
 against the pretensions of Bern, 257 ; 
 character of its constitution, 263; 
 changes in 1830, 1, 269. 
 
 Vienna, Congress of, acknowledges the 
 independence of Switzerland, 258. 
 
 Vorort, or Federal Directory, its replies 
 to the foreign ministers, 286 — 94. 
 
 Waldenses, persecuted for their religion 
 by the Duke of Savoy, take shelter in 
 Switzerland, 181. 
 
 WaldstUtten, or Forest Cantons, their 
 first inhabitants, 39 ; their early in- 
 dependence, 40 J acknowledgment of 
 their freedom by the emperors, 41 ; 
 refuse to place themselves under the 
 allegiance of Austria, 43 ; revolt 
 against the ^ imperial bailiffs, 48; 
 refuse to give shelter to the murderers 
 of the Emperor Albert, 49; form a 
 federal pact amongst themselves, 52 ; 
 remain attached to the Roman Ca- 
 tholic faith, 135; their form of 
 
 government, 198, 9 ; refuse to join the 
 Helvetic republic, 241,2; are sub- 
 jugated by the French, 244; their 
 separate independence warmly sup- 
 ported by Bonaparte, 251,2; their 
 political feelings, 277 ; they submit 
 to the Federal Diet, 281. 
 
 Waldmann, burgomaster of Zurich, exe- 
 cuted, 196. 
 
 Wallenstein, his character, 1 70 ; his 
 death, 175. 
 
 Weiss, Colonel, opposes no resistance 
 to the French invader)*, 231. 
 
 Wenceslas, Emperor, favours the eman- 
 cipation of the Swiss, 73. 
 
 Westphalia, peiice of, recognizes the 
 indepi^ndence of the Swiss as a nation, 
 176. 
 
 Wickham, English minister to the Diet, 
 withdraws from Switzerland, 228. 
 
 Willmergen, first battle of, won by the 
 Catholics, 180 ; second battle of, won 
 by the Protestants, 182. 
 
 Winkelried, Arnold von, of Unterwal- 
 dcn, his heroic death at Sempach, 64. 
 
 Winteithur, the last possession of the 
 House of Austria in Helvetia, mort- 
 giged by Duke Sigismund to Zurich, 
 98. 
 
 Zaringen, see BeHhohl of Zih^ingcn. 
 
 Zschokke, his account of the state of 
 Switzerland under the French, 246. 
 
 Zug, town of, is lost to Austria, and 
 becomes one of the Swiss cantons, 59 ; 
 dispute between the town and the 
 rural population, 69; decided by the 
 confederates, 71 ; civil dissensions at 
 Zug relative to foreign enlistment, 2 12. 
 
 Ziiiich, an imperial town, early prospe- 
 rity of, 23 ; change in its government, 
 56 ; conspiracy defeated, 57 ; enters 
 the confederation as the first canton 
 
 in rank, 58; is attacked by the Aus- 
 trians and repels them, 59 ; besieged 
 by the Emperor Charles IV., who is 
 obliged to raise the siege, 60 ; Zurich 
 extends its territory, 66 — 9 ; war of 
 Zurich against the other cantons on 
 account of Toggenburg, 90, 1 ; siege 
 of Zurich by the confederates, 92; 
 make peace, 94; Zurich adopts the 
 reformation, 128 ; makes war against 
 Catholic cantons, 136 — 43 ; contracts 
 an alliance with Geneva, 158; sketch 
 of its constitution, 195; its public 
 spirit, 196; disturbances in the rural 
 districts, 223 ; is occupied by the 
 French, 240 ; battle of Zurich between 
 French and Russians, 245 ; Zurich 
 takes the lead in framing a new fede- 
 ral pact in 1814, 256; its new consti- 
 tution, 202; changes in 1831, 209; 
 its moderate tone in the Diet, 288. 
 Zwingli, Uliich, his early life, 124; 
 opposes the sale of indulgences at 
 Einsiedlen, ih. ; preaches against the 
 practice, 125 ; questions the supre- 
 macy assumed by^ Rome in matters 
 of faith, 127 ; is accused of impiety 
 and sedition — ^\vrites his apology, ib. ; 
 is protected by the council of Zurich, 
 128 ; repairs to the conference held at 
 Baden, 129; attends the great theo- 
 logical conference at Bern, 131 ; 
 Zwingirs opinions concerning the 
 Eucharist, 133 ; he meets Luther at 
 Marburg, tb. ; Zwingli's followers 
 styled Evangelicals, ib. ; Zwingli 
 ])ublishes his Confession of Faith, 
 141; is ordered to attend the 'troops 
 of Zurich in the field as chaplain, 
 1 43 ; is killed at the battle of Cappel, 
 144; indignities done to his remains 
 by the Catholics, ib. ; Zwingli's cha- 
 racter and works, ib. 
 
 THE END. 
 
 LONDON: PBINTKD BY W, CLOWKS AND SONS, STAMFORD STREET, LAMBETH. 
 
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