Switzerland Part 2

The battle of Naefels, establishing as it did on an unquestioned pre-eminence the military virtues of the Swiss, inaugurated, too, that strange system of foreign service on the part of Swiss soldiers which would be shameful if it were not lighted up by so many deeds of high chivalry and n.o.ble fidelity. The Swiss Republic was now safe in its own house against aggression. The terrible prowess of its peasantry had been announced to every possible foe. But it felt the need of a foreign policy to secure an extension of territory, and it was this need which brought it into the orbit of general European diplomacy and into the temptation of mercenary service. By the next century, when the Swiss prowess had won new laurels at the battles of Grandson, Morat, and Nancy, the little patch of mountain and valley which is Switzerland had become a great diplomatic centre for Europe, its Republican leaders courted by France, the Italian States, Hungary, Germany, and England. Internecine trouble between the Swiss themselves was not uncommon, but throughout, despite differences of language, and later differences of religion, a Swiss idea of nationality lived constantly. In 1499 the Swiss League separated definitely from all va.s.salage to the German Empire. In 1513 the "League of the Thirteen Cantons," which represented the Swiss nationality until the days of Napoleon, was const.i.tuted. A severe defeat of the Swiss forces in 1515 by France left the French with the highest opinion of Swiss courage, and eager to take under their patronage the little Republic. An alliance in 1516 between France and Switzerland began a close friendship between the two countries, which continued with but little interruption until the French Revolution, when modern Switzerland may be said to have come into the arena of history.

CHAPTER IV

MODERN SWITZERLAND

There is carved in the face of a great rock at Lucerne a lion, wounded to death, resting upon a broken spear. It is the monument of the Swiss Guard ma.s.sacred in the defence of the Tuileries at Paris in 1792. The close connection between France and Switzerland in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries made it natural that the despotic French kings should employ the faithful and courageous Swiss mercenaries as guardians of their palaces. Louis XIV. in the dark hours of his fate had no reason to regret the trust he had placed in these Swiss mercenaries as the nearest defenders of his person. The mob coming to the Tuileries demanded of the Swiss Guards that they should give up their arms. Sergeant Blaser replied in the mood with which the Helvetii had spoken to Caesar, and with eighteen centuries of records of great bravery to justify the vaunt: "We are Swiss, and the Swiss never surrender their arms but with their lives." The reply cowed the rioters for the time and the king was safe for that day. When the king had left the Tuileries the Swiss Guards were withdrawn. As they went away from the palace they were attacked by the mob and, disdaining to fly, were slaughtered almost to a man. Of 800 officers and men only a handful survived. The incident--showing French patriots furious, cruel, and treacherous, Swiss mercenaries steadfast, brave, and true--gives a good standpoint from which to glance at the evolution of the Switzerland which had grown up in the Middle Ages to the modern Switzerland with its intensely democratic and socialistic Republic.

The brewing of the storm which broke over Paris in August 1792 had been observable in Switzerland as well as in France. Accepting its traditional position as a hostel of refuge for political exiles, Switzerland had sheltered many of the men who had given the first impulse to the Revolution. And there had been a domestic movement in Switzerland working on parallel lines to that of the French reformers.

As far back as 1762 the Helvetic Society was formed by young men aspiring to a political regeneration of Switzerland. By 1792 there had been several peasant risings among the Alpine communities in protest against oligarchic oppression. The cry for Liberty, Fraternity, Equality, found its echo in the mountains as it came in a hoa.r.s.e roar from the French cities. The exiles from aristocratic France to slightly more liberal Switzerland were in time matched by discontented exiles from Switzerland to Paris. The "Helvetic Club" formed at Paris of Swiss refugees had for its purpose the application of the principles of the French Revolution to Switzerland. In 1797 Peter Ochs of Basel was given by Napoleon the task of drafting a const.i.tution for Switzerland which would follow the system of government of the French Directory. In 1798 "the Lemanic Republic" was proclaimed at the instance of France, and, being resisted by some of the Swiss, a French invasion followed. The victorious French abolished the Swiss Confederation and proclaimed "the Helvetic Republic," with a const.i.tution framed on the lines laid down by Peter Ochs.

The new const.i.tution was not in itself altogether suitable to the political circ.u.mstances of the country. And no const.i.tution, however perfect, could have pleased the Swiss if it came to them from the hands of a conquering foreigner. But to make quite sure of antagonising the Swiss the greedy and impoverished Directory of France set to work to rob the national treasuries of the Helvetic Republic in the cause of Republicanism. The Forest Cantons, always to the fore in the cause of independence, entered upon a hopeless campaign of defence in which Reding was the chief hero. Brilliant victories were won.

Tragic defeats were sustained, culminating in the capture of Stanz.

Then, prostrate, Switzerland accepted the French command to be free, and "the one and undivided Helvetic Republic" came into more or less peaceful existence. Later a Franco-Helvetic Alliance was signed, and almost immediately afterwards the little land suffered for its alliance by being invaded by Russia and Austria, then making war upon France. For the first time in history an Austrian invader was welcomed by a part of the Swiss nation. The story of the campaign need not be told in detail; but it had one vivid incident of which any visitor to Switzerland interested in military prowess should seek out the memorials. General Suwarow, commanding a Russian army, marched from Italy to junction with General Korsakow at Zurich. Suwarow forced the Pa.s.s of St. Gothard in the face of a French force and pa.s.sed down the valley of the Reuss to Lake Uri. Here he found his path to Zurich blocked, as no boats for the conveyance of his troops could be found on the lake. Turning up towards the mountains, Suwarow led his army along the Kinzig Pa.s.s to Muotta, and there learned that Korsakow had been defeated and driven out of Switzerland by the French. Suwarow led his army then along the Pragel Pa.s.s, hoping to find in the Canton of Glarus a friendly Austrian force. The hope was vain, and the path to Naefels was blocked by the French army. The old Russian general, indomitable, turned back to the mountains and crossed the Alps again by the Panixer Pa.s.s. This was in October. After terrible hardships the Russian army reached Cranbunden and made its way to Austrian territory and safety. It would be an interesting Alpine holiday for a stout walker to follow in the track of Suwarow's marches.

Switzerland had an evil time under the French Directory, despite its "free and undivided Republic." But when Napoleon felt himself safe in the saddle and could put the curb on the fiery spirits of the Revolution, better days dawned for Switzerland as well as for France.

The great soldier and statesman, being a man of imagination, could not help having a real sympathy with the heroic Swiss. They were people after his own heart. In 1803 he took thought for the vexed condition of the Swiss people and summoned to Paris the "Helvetic Consulta" of sixty-three Swiss representatives to draw up a new system of government. He presided personally at the meetings of this body, and the const.i.tution agreed upon bears the impress of the grand political sagacity which was a.s.sociated with Napoleon's military genius.

Switzerland, under the Napoleonic const.i.tution, became a Federal Republic of nineteen cantons, each of which preserved its local autonomy but yielded full control of national matters to the Federal Diet. This new const.i.tution conferred upon Switzerland internal peace and a reasonable instrument of government, under which the material and moral advancement of the nation was greater than at any previous period of history.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A VILLAGE ON THE ST. GOTHARD RAILWAY.]

The fall of Napoleon in 1813 brought a fresh crop of troubles to the Swiss. The const.i.tution he had granted to them was put aside by the European Powers, not because it was bad but because it was Napoleon's.

A congress at Zurich drew up a new const.i.tution, and this was submitted to the Vienna Congress in 1814, and with some changes approved. It was far inferior to the Napoleonic const.i.tution, and plunged the country into another series of internal troubles. Yet it survived from 1815 to 1848, when, taking advantage of new troubles in Europe, the Swiss settled their system of government anew, and shaped a Federal const.i.tution which exists to this day.

Switzerland now is divided into twenty-two cantons, self-governing as far as their local affairs are concerned, but united into a Federation for national purposes. The system of government is purely democratic and marked by a Republican austerity. All citizens are equal. Most offices are elective. The emoluments of office are scanty. There is no standing army, but every male citizen is trained to the use of arms in his youth. Thus the whole nation can take up arms in defence of the country. The good quality of the citizen troops has been vouched for by many competent judges. Australia has imitated the Swiss system in her military organisation, and it is practically the same system which a powerful party in Great Britain urges as a measure of military reform in this country. The Federal Government has, of course, the control of the army; it has also the management of the railways, posts and telegraphs, universities and schools, and the regulation of the conditions of labour. Full religious liberty is allowed, but the Jesuits are not allowed to come into the country. No spiritual courts are allowed. The Judges of the Supreme Court are elected from amongst the legislators. Neither capital punishment nor arrest for debt is legal (a defaulting tourist's baggage may, however, be put under arrest). Laws pa.s.sed by the Federal legislature must be submitted to the people by direct vote before they become effective. If this Referendum does not give them approval they lapse. There is machinery by which the people can directly initiate legislation, _i.e._ propose measures without the intervention of the legislature.

So wide-world an interest is taken in the Swiss military system (it has its enthusiastic admirers in America as well as in Great Britain), and so great a part does it take in the general life of the Swiss people, that a brief summary of its salient features is worthy of s.p.a.ce here. The system dates from 1874, the Franco-Prussian War on their borders having warned the Swiss of the possibility of their land being invaded. From his earliest days the Swiss citizen is prepared for his country's service. In the public (Cantonal and Communal) schools instruction in gymnastic exercise is regularly given (60 hours yearly), and almost all the boys partic.i.p.ate in this instruction, which is mainly given by the schoolmasters.

Between the ages of 16 and 20, when military service begins, there is preparatory military instruction, comprising physical training, gymnastic exercises, marching, obstacle racing, simple drill, the use of the rifle, and preliminary musketry. In the year before he attains 20 the youth is enrolled by the Cantonal authorities (in his commune or place of domicile) as a recruit--the canton being subdivided into recruiting districts--and is fitted out with uniform and equipment, and in the year in which he attains 20 (the year, too, in which he becomes ent.i.tled to vote at elections) the recruit becomes liable to military service and presents himself for instruction at recruit schools, beginning either about March 15, May 1, or July 1, as directed. All soldiers, whatever the rank they are destined for, pa.s.s through the recruit schools, and the periods of duration of these schools (including musketry) are: for infantry, etc., 60-70 days; cavalry, 80 days. The soldier on completion of recruit school is considered as having entered the Army. As a soldier of the Army he has to attend an annual training camp.

The demands made on a citizen's time by this system are not very great, say 70 days as a recruit, 80 days as a member of the Active Army, and a few days afterwards as a member of the Landwehr or Landsturm. In all the citizen is forced to give about 160 days during his lifetime to the service of his country, an exaction which is very slight in the total compared with the demands of countries where conscription rules, and is almost negligible when allowance is made for the fact that it is so well distributed over the term of the citizen's life.

In ordinary times of peace there is no Commander-in-chief. The Army Corps and Divisional Commanders are the highest appointments. There is a Committee of National Defence, composed of the Minister of War (president), four General Officers (militia), four "Chefs de service"

(staff officers), appointed for three years. This Committee stands at the head of the Army in time of peace, but, when war is imminent and a General is appointed by the Federal a.s.sembly, the Committee drops out of existence, the General taking all its powers.

Under this system the Active Swiss Army on a peace footing numbers about 150,000 men. The trained army that could be called out for service represents practically the total of the male population.

Training for military service is looked upon not as a burden but as a pleasure by the citizens, and many of their voluntary sports are designed so as to a.s.sist the work of military education.

Happy Switzerland that has thought out a system of military service which imposes little burden on the national exchequer and no burden at all on the national content, and which is yet withal highly efficient if the experts are to be believed! I quote from one of them (Lieut.-Col. G. F. Ellison):

Of the Swiss Army, as a war machine, it is impossible to write in terms other than those which, to anyone who has never witnessed its performance, must, I fear, appear somewhat too laudatory. That it is perfect in all its details, or that it is the same highly finished instrument that the French or the German army is, I do not pretend to a.s.sert, but I do unhesitatingly affirm, and in this opinion I am supported by more competent judges than myself, that taken as a whole it is, for war purposes, not unworthy, so far as it goes, to court comparison with the most scientifically organised and most highly trained armies of the Continent. In some respects it even surpa.s.ses all other armies in its readiness for war, for of no other military force in Europe can it be stated that the establishment in personnel is the same both for peace and war, and there is certainly no other country, that I am aware of, a fourth of whose army is annually mobilised for manoeuvres on exactly the same scale of equipment and transport as it would be for actual warfare.

For the Englishman there is certainly no army in the world which can afford more food for serious reflection than that of Switzerland. He will learn, too, to appreciate what, for a sum that appears insignificant when compared with the military expenditure of other States, can be done towards producing for Home defence a really well-trained force under a militia system, provided that the system is based on universal liability to military service, and that all ranks alike bring goodwill and intelligence to bear on their allotted task. While he watches this army there need be no grave misgivings in his mind such as, perhaps, he may experience elsewhere, lest, in spite of all the pomp and splendour, the burden that such military display means to a nation may be crushing it beyond endurance.

And that was written before the revised law of April 12, 1907, which was the subject of a general Referendum. By its acceptance the Swiss people intimated their desire to have the army maintained at such a degree of efficiency as would ensure their independence and neutrality, and agreed to several improvements in the system of training imposing further obligations on the citizen soldiers.

In the present day the Swiss have no navy, and no need of one, and "Admiral of the Swiss Navy" is a t.i.tle equal to that of the Seigneur de Chateau Rien. But once upon a time the "Swiss admiral" did exist.

He was an Englishman named Colonel Williams, who in 1799 was in service with the Zurich government and commandeered a small fleet on Lake Zurich, having orders to oppose with it the French army. When the French, under Ma.s.sena, completely routed the allied armies of Austria and Russia, Colonel Williams calmly watched the battle from the lake.

Then, enraged at his own inaction, he discharged his crews, scuttled his vessels, and took to flight.

CHAPTER V

SOME LITERARY a.s.sOCIATIONS

Switzerland has not produced much native literary genius. The literary a.s.sociations of the land are mostly concerned with strangers who went to it as a land of refuge or as visitors. True, in the thirteenth century Zurich was famous for its poets, for its share in the making of the Nibelungen and the Minnelieder, and for the "Codex Manesse"--the collection of the works of 150 German and Swiss poets of the day. Again in the days of Rousseau--perhaps the most famous of Swiss writers--there was quite a herd of sentimental novelists at Lausanne. But, on the whole, it cannot be said that the Swiss have shown themselves conspicuously a people of imagination. In war they have a magnificent record: in science and in philosophy a record above the average: in poetry and romance they have little to show. But if colonists and visitors who a.s.sociated themselves strongly with Swiss life be taken into account, then Switzerland becomes one of the most interesting literary centres of Europe.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE STATUE OF JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU ON THE ISLAND IN THE RHONE, GENEVA.]

From Madame de Stael and her _salon_ at Coppet (to cite one example) what invitations crowd to literary pilgrimages! Madame de Stael was destined by birth for that literary limelight which she loved so well.

Her mother, Mademoiselle Curchod, afterwards Madame Necker, was the charming young Swiss who inspired a discreet pa.s.sion in the stately bosom of Gibbon, the historian of _The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire_. Gibbon had been sent to Switzerland by his father because he had shown leanings towards the Roman Catholic faith. The robust Protestantism of Lausanne was prescribed as a cure for a religious feeling which was not welcome to his family. The cure was complete, so complete that Gibbon was left with hardly any Christian faith at all.

Whether because that left an empty place in his heart, or in the natural order of things, Gibbon took refuge in a love affair, a very discreet, cold-blooded affair on his part; but, judging by the correspondence which has survived, a more serious matter to the girl whose affections he engaged.

Gibbon tells the story of his early love himself, in a letter which is full of unconscious humour, since he writes of it without a tremor and with all the decorous stateliness which he gave to the narrative of a Diocletian:

I need not blush at recollecting the object of my choice; and though my love was disappointed of success, I am rather proud that I was once capable of feeling such a pure and exalted sentiment. The personal attractions of Mademoiselle Susan Curchod were embellished by the virtues and talents of the mind. Her fortune was humble, but her family was respectable.

Her mother, a native of France, had preferred her religion to her country. The profession of her father did not extinguish the moderation and philosophy of his temper, and he lived content with a small salary and laborious duty in the obscure lot of minister of Cra.s.sy, in the mountains that separate the Pays de Vaud from the county of Burgundy. In the solitude of a sequestered village he bestowed a liberal, and even learned, education on his only daughter. She surpa.s.sed his hopes by her proficiency in the sciences and languages; and in her short visits to some relations at Lausanne, the wit, the beauty, and erudition of Mademoiselle Curchod were the theme of universal applause. The report of such a prodigy awakened my curiosity; I saw and loved. I found her learned without pedantry, lively in conversation, pure in sentiment, and elegant in manners; and the first sudden emotion was fortified by the habits and knowledge of a more familiar acquaintance. She permitted me to make two or three visits at her father's house. I pa.s.sed some happy days there, in the mountains of Burgundy, and her parents honourably encouraged the connection. In a calm retirement the gay vanity of youth no longer fluttered in her bosom, and I might presume to hope that I had made some impression on a virtuous heart. At Cra.s.sy and Lausanne I indulged my dream of felicity; but on my return to England I soon discovered that my father would not hear of this strange alliance, and that without his consent I was myself dest.i.tute and helpless. After a painful struggle I yielded to my fate; I sighed as a lover, I obeyed as a son: my wound was insensibly healed by time, absence, and the habits of a new life. My cure was accelerated by a faithful report of the tranquillity and cheerfulness of the lady herself, and my love subsided in friendship and esteem.

Gibbon was a very pompous gentleman, but a gentleman. He might otherwise, without departing from the truth, have shown that the little Swiss beauty was far more in love with him than he with her, and her tranquillity and cheerfulness in giving him up were of hard earning. She contrived in time to forget the lover who probably would have made her more famous than happy, and married a Mr. Necker, a rich banker of her own country. (Berne at that time was one of the chief financial centres of Europe.) To him she bore the girl who was to be Madame de Stael, as pompous in mind as Gibbon, but somewhat warmer in temperament.

Many years after the romance had died, when Madame Necker was a happy matron, Gibbon, still a bachelor, decided to make Switzerland his permanent home. Motives of economy, not of romance, dictated this choice. In 1783 he moved to Lausanne, where he completed his history, established a literary _salon_, and enjoyed life in spite of somewhat serious attacks of gout. M., Mdme., and Mslle. Necker (the last to become Madame de Stael) were frequent visitors, and he attached himself to Madame Necker by the bonds of a close but strictly Platonic friendship. In 1787 Gibbon completed his famous history, and seems to have contemplated afterwards a marriage "for companionship sake." But he never fixed on a lady, and died a bachelor six years after.

During Gibbon's life the Neckers had established their country-seat at Coppet, near Geneva, which was afterwards the seat of Madame de Stael's court. Though born Swiss, Madame de Stael was altogether French in sympathy, detested Switzerland, and was impatient at any talk of its natural beauties. "I would rather go miles to hear a clever man talk than open the windows of my rooms at Naples to see the beauties of the Gulf," she said once. Napoleon, as the greatest man of the age, of course, attracted her. I suspect that she would have been a most ardent Napoleonist if he had made love to her. "Tell me," she said to Napoleon once, "whom do you think is the greatest woman in France to-day?" And Napoleon answered, "The woman who bears most sons for the army." It was not an ingratiating reply. But Napoleon, who detested the idea of petticoat government and was never inclined to chain himself by any bonds to an interfering and ambitious woman, disliked Madame de Stael: and she in time learned to hate him, and intrigued against the man whom she could not intrigue with. The upshot was exile for her. She was turned out of Paris, much to her rage. On several occasions she sought to return. But Napoleon was inexorable.

She replied to his enmity by industry as a conspirator. Fouche, who speaks of her as "the intriguing daughter of Necker," credits Madame de Stael with having been regarded by Napoleon as "an implacable enemy," of having been the focus of the Senate conspiracy against Napoleon in 1802, and of being "the life and soul" of the opposition to him in 1812. It was certainly a remarkable woman who could thus stand up against Napoleon.

Madame de Stael's _salon_ at Coppet became a centre famous over all Europe. Her powers of intrigue supplemented her literary fame, and that was very great and well deserved. As an essayist she has a clear and warm style, and as a writer she could be betrayed into forgetting her personal rancours. There is, for example, no more true criticism of the literary style of Napoleon (who wrote newspaper "leaders" in his day) than that it was, as de Stael wrote, so vigorous that you could see that the writer "wished to put in blows instead of words."

An American traveller who paid a pilgrimage to the shrine of Madame de Stael at Coppet gives this picture of the lady:

Her features were good, but her complexion bad. She had a certain roundness and amplitude of form. She was never at a loss for the happiest expressions; but _deviated into anecdotes that might be an offence to American ears_!

Baron de Voght, who seemingly had not an American Puritanism of ear, wrote more warmly about the famous lady to a mutual friend, Madame Recamier:

It is to you that I owe my most amiable reception at Coppet. It is no doubt to the favourable expectations aroused by your friendship that I owe my intimate acquaintance with this remarkable woman. I might have met her without your a.s.sistance--some casual acquaintance would no doubt have introduced me--but I should never have penetrated to the intimacy of this sublime and beautiful soul, and should never have known how much better she is than her reputation. _She is an angel sent from heaven to reveal the divine goodness upon earth._ To make her irresistible, a pure ray of celestial light embellishes her spirit and makes her amiable from every point of view.

At once profound and light, whether she is discovering a mysterious secret of the soul or grasping the lightest shadow of a sentiment, her genius shines without dazzling, and when the orb of light has disappeared, it leaves a pleasant twilight to follow it.... No doubt a few faults, a few weaknesses, occasionally veil this celestial apparition; even the initiated must sometimes be troubled by these eclipses, which the Genevan astronomers in vain endeavour to predict.

Still another pen picture of the same lady, from Benjamin Constant, who was her lover for many years and found the burden of maintaining an affection to match hers too great:

Yes, certainly I am more anxious than ever to break it off. She is the most egoistical, the most excitable, the most ungrateful, the most vain, and the most vindictive of women.

Why didn't I break it off long ago? She is odious and intolerable to me. I must have done with her or die. She is more volcanic than all the volcanoes in the world put together.

She is like an old _procureur_, with serpents in her hair, demanding the fulfilment of a contract in Alexandrine verse.