* Cologne, 24 November. In the comedies of the last century, particularly the French ones, there is never any lack of a servant who diverts the public by being cudgelled every moment, and receiving kicks in scenes where special effect was intended. The part of these servants is certainly not a rewarding one, but it is still enviable compared with the part of the Reich Minister of Foreign Affairs standing on our Frankfurt Reich theatre. The servants in the comedy have at least one means of revenge: they have wit. But the Reich Minister!

Let us be fair. The year 1848 brings no roses to any ministers of foreign affairs. Palmerston and Nesselrode have so far been glad to be left in peace. The high-flown Lamartine, whose manifestos moved even German old maids and widows to tears, has had to slink shamefacedly aside, his wings bruised and plucked. His successor, Bastide, who a year ago was still blowing the official trumpet of war in the *National* and the obscure *Revue nationale*, pouring out the most virtuous indignation over Guizot’s cowardly policy, now sheds silent tears every evening over the reading of his *Œuvres complètes* of the previous day and over the bitter thought that he sinks daily more and more into the Guizot of the honourable republic. All these ministers, however, have one consolation: if things have gone badly for them on the major stage, they have been able to obtain their revenge on the minor one, in Danish, Sicilian, Argentine, Wallachian and other remote questions. Even the Prussian Foreign Minister, Herr Arnim, when he concluded the lamentable Danish armistice, had the satisfaction of not merely being the one who was tricked, but also of tricking someone else – and that someone else was – the Reich Minister!

The German Central Authority and Switzerland

In fact, the Reich Minister of Foreign Affairs is the only one of them all who has played a purely passive part, who has received blows but not dealt a single one. From the first days of his entry into office he has been the chosen scapegoat upon whom all his colleagues of the neighbouring states poured out their gall, on whom they took revenge for all the petty vexations of diplomatic life which they too had to bear in their own share. Since he was struck and tormented, he opened not his mouth, like a lamb that is led to the slaughter. Where is there one who can say that the Reich Minister has harmed a hair of his head? Verily, the German nation will never forget that Herr Schmerling was bold enough to take up again the traditions of the old Holy Roman Empire with such determination and consistency.

Should we further confirm the patient courage displayed by Herr von Schmerling by compiling a register of his diplomatic successes? Should we revert to Herr Max Gagern’s journey from Frankfurt to Schleswig, that worthy counterpart to the once famous journey of Sophie from Memel to Saxony? Should we dig up again the whole edifying story of the Danish armistice? Should we go into the abortive offer of mediation in Piedmont and Herr Heckscher’s diplomatic study tour on Reich stipends? There is no need. The facts are too recent and too striking for them even to require mentioning.

But everything has its limits, and in the end even the most patient man must show once that he has teeth, as the German philistine says. True to this maxim of a class which our gentlemen statesmen declare to be the great well-disposed majority in Germany, Herr von Schmerling himself at last felt the need to show that he has teeth. The scape-lamb sought a scapegoat, and at last believed it had found one in Switzerland.

Switzerland – scarcely two and a half million inhabitants, republicans into the bargain, the refuge from which Hecker and Struve invaded Germany and severely perturbed the new Holy Roman Empire – can one find a better and also less dangerous opportunity to prove that “great Germany” has teeth?

At once an “energetic” note was addressed to the Vorort of Berne concerning the machinations of the refugees. The Vorort of Berne, however, answered “great Germany” in the name of “little Switzerland” equally energetically, conscious of its good right. But this by no means intimidated Herr Schmerling. His teeth grew with astonishing rapidity

Friedrich Engels
and as early as the 23rd of October a new, even “more energetic” note was drafted and delivered to the Vorort on the 2nd of November. Here Herr Schmerling already threatened naughty Switzerland with the rod. The Vorort, even quicker off the mark than the Reich Minister, replied only two days later with the same calm and decisiveness as before, and Herr Schmerling will now consequently bring his “precautions and measures” against Switzerland into effect. He is already busily engaged upon this, as he declared in the Frankfurt Assembly.

If this threat were an ordinary Reich farce, such as we have already seen so many of this year, we should not waste a word on it. But since our Reich Don Quixotes, or rather Reich Sanchos, in the administration of foreign affairs are never to be credited with too little unwisdom on their island of Barataria, it may easily come about that through this Swiss difference we become involved in all sorts of new complications. *Quidquid delirant reges*, etc.

Let us, therefore, take a somewhat closer look at the Reich note to Switzerland.

It is known that the Swiss speak German badly and write it not much better. But the reply note of the Vorort is, as regards style, a Goethe-like rounded masterpiece compared with the schoolboyish, clumsy German of the Reich Ministry, which is always at a loss for expression. The Swiss diplomat (as it is said, the Federal Chancellor Schiess) seems intentionally to have kept his language particularly pure, fluent and cultivated, in order to form an ironic contrast in this respect too with the note of the Imperial Vicar, which certainly would not have been worse styled by one of Jellachich’s red-cloaked men. There are sentences in the Reich note which are quite unintelligible, and others of consummate awkwardness, as will be seen below. But are not these sentences written precisely “in the language of straightforwardness which the government of the Imperial Vicar will always make its duty in intercourse between nations”?

Herr Schmerling fares no better as regards the content. In the very first paragraph he recalls “the fact that the German note of 30 June of this year was debated in the Federal Diet for several weeks before any reply was given, in a tone which at that time would have made it impossible for a representative of Germany to remain in Switzerland”. (Here is a stylistic specimen at once.)

The Vorort is good-natured enough to prove to the “government of the Imperial Vicar” from the minutes of the Federal Diet that these “several weeks of debate” were confined to a single brief deliberation on

The German Central Authority and Switzerland
a single day. One can see how our Reich Minister, instead of looking up the documents, prefers to trust the treasure of his confused memory. We shall find still more proofs of this.

In this obligingness of the Vorort, moreover, in the readiness with which it assists his weak memory, the government of the Imperial Vicar can find a proof of the “friendly neighbourly sentiments” of Switzerland. In truth, had it presumed to speak in a note in a similar fashion of the English parliamentary debates, Palmerston’s dry insolence would have shown it the door in quite another manner! The Prussian and Austrian envoys in London could tell it what was publicly debated concerning their respective states and notes, without anyone supposing that their stay in London had thereby been made impossible. These schoolboys want to teach Switzerland international law and do not even know that, of the proceedings of sovereign assemblies, they are only affected by what is *resolved*, not by what is *said*! These logicians assert in the same note that “Switzerland will know that attacks on the freedom of the press could not emanate from Germany” (to reprint these lines in the *Neue Rheinische Zeitung* is enough to subject them to bitter irony) – and even want to interfere with the freedom of debate of what was then the highest Swiss authority!

“There is no dispute over principles. It is not a question of the right of asylum, nor of the freedom of the press. Switzerland will know that attacks on these rights cannot emanate from Germany. It has repeatedly declared that it will not tolerate the abuse of them, it has acknowledged that the right of asylum must not become a trade for Switzerland (what is that supposed to mean?), a state of war for Germany (the right of asylum a state of war, what German!), that a distinction must be made between a shelter for the persecuted and a hiding-place for highwaymen.”

“Hiding-places for highwaymen!” Have Rinaldo Rinaldini and all the robber chieftains from the Abruzzi – published by Gottfried Basse in Quedlinburg – moved with their bands to the Rhine in order, when opportunity offers, to plunder the Upper Baden country? Is Karl Moor approaching from the Bohemian woods? Has Schinderhannes also left behind a brother’s son who, as “his uncle’s nephew”, is to continue the dynasty from Switzerland? Far from it! Struve, who is sitting in a Baden prison, Frau Struve and the pair of workers who crossed the border unarmed – these are the “highwaymen” who had, or are still supposed to have, their “hiding-places” in Switzerland. The Reich authority, not

Friedrich Engels

contented with the prisoners on whom it can wreak its revenge, so completely sheds all decency that it hurls abuse across the Rhine at those who have happily escaped.

“Switzerland knows that no press prosecutions are being expected of it, that it is not a question of the newspapers and leaflets, but of their authors, who, close to the border, day and night, by the mass importation of inflammatory writings, are waging a base smuggling war against Germany.”

“Importation!” “Inflammatory writings!” “Base smuggling war!” The expressions become ever more cultured, ever more diplomatic – but has not the government of the Imperial Regent “made the language of straightforwardness its duty”?

And indeed, its language is of singular “straightforwardness”! It expects no press prosecutions of Switzerland; it does not speak of “newspapers and leaflets”, but of “their authors”. Their trade is to be stopped. But, honest “government of the Imperial Regent”, when a paper is prosecuted in Germany, for example the Neue Rheinische Zeitung, is it a matter of the paper, which is in the hands of the whole world and can no longer be withdrawn from circulation, or of the “authors”, who are locked up and brought before the court? This worthy government demands no persecutions against the press, only against the authors of the press. Honest soul! Wonderful “language of straightforwardness”!

These authors “by the mass importation of inflammatory writings are waging a base smuggling war against Germany.” This crime of “highwaymen” is truly unforgivable, all the more so since “it happens day and night”, and that Switzerland tolerates this is an outrageous violation of international law.

From Gibraltar whole shiploads of English goods are smuggled into Spain, and the Spanish priests declare that the English from there, “by the importation of evangelical inflammatory writings,” e.g., Spanish Bibles of the Bible Society, are waging a base smuggling war against the Catholic Church. The manufacturers of Barcelona curse just as much about the base smuggling war that is waged by the importation of English calicos from there against Spanish industry. But the Spanish ambassador should only complain about it once, and Palmerston would answer him: thou blockhead, that is precisely why we took Gibraltar! All other governments have hitherto possessed too much tact, taste and deliberation to complain in notes about smuggling. But the naive government of the Imperial Regent so strongly speaks

The German Central Authority and Switzerland
the “language of straightforwardness” that it declares with the utmost artlessness that Switzerland has violated international law if the Baden border guards do not keep proper watch.

“Switzerland can finally also be under no illusion that the right of foreign countries to guard against such injustice cannot depend on whether the Swiss authorities lack the power or the will to prevent them.”

The government of the Imperial Regent appears to be completely “under no illusion as to the fact” that the right of Switzerland to leave everyone in peace who submits to the laws of the country, even if he were to wage a base smuggling war etc. by importation etc., “cannot depend on whether the German authorities lack the power or the will” to “prevent” this smuggling. Let the government of the Imperial Regent take to heart Heine’s reply to the Hamburger who lamented the great fire to him:

Get yourselves better laws,
And better fire-engines. –
and it will no longer need to make itself ridiculous further by the straightforwardness of its language.

“Only as to the facts is there any dispute,” it continues, and so we shall at last, apart from the base smuggling war, hear some other, significant facts. We are eager.

“The High Federal Council demands, pleading its ignorance, to be given specific proof of events capable of substantiating the charges raised against the Swiss authorities.”

Obviously a very reasonable demand on the part of the High Federal Council. And the government of the Imperial Regent will readily comply with this reasonable demand?

Not at all. Just listen:
“But an adversarial procedure between governments concerning matters of universal notoriety is not in the custom of nations.”

There you have a blunt lesson in international law for the arrogant little Switzerland, which believes it may treat the government of the Imperial Regent of great Germany with the same pertness as formerly little Denmark. Let it take a warning from the Danish armistice and become more modest. Otherwise it might fare the same.

When the extradition of a common criminal is demanded from a neighbouring state, one enters into an adversarial procedure, no matter how “notorious” the crime may be. But the

Friedrich Engels
adversarial procedure, or rather the mere proof of guilt which Switzerland demands before it takes action – not against common criminals who have crossed over, nor even against refugees, no, against its own officials elected by democratic popular vote – this proof “is not in the custom of nations”! Truly, the “language of straightforwardness” does not belie itself for a moment. One cannot confess more bluntly that one has no evidence to produce.

And now follows a hail of questions in which all these notorious facts are enumerated.

“Does anyone doubt the doings of the German agitators in Switzerland?”

Certainly no one, any more than they doubt the doings of Herr Schmerling in Frankfurt. That the German refugees in Switzerland are for the most part “up to” something is clear. The only question is what they are up to, and that Herr Schmerling himself obviously does not know, otherwise he would say it.

“Does anyone doubt the refugee press?”

Certainly no one. But Herr Schmerling himself declares that attacks on press freedom could not come from Germany. And if they did, Switzerland would certainly know how to repel them. What, then, is the meaning of this question? If we translate it from the “language of straightforwardness” into German, it means nothing other than: Switzerland should abolish the freedom of the press for the refugees. À un autre, Monsieur de Schmerling!

“Is Germany to prove before Europe the pilgrimages to Muttenz?”

Certainly not, cunning “government of the Imperial Regent”. But to prove that these pilgrimages were the cause of Struve’s incursion or possibly some other undertaking which gives more grounds for complaint against Switzerland – that would bring the government of the Imperial Regent no disgrace, but all the more difficulties.

The Federal Council is once again so obliging as to do more than “is in the custom of nations” and to remind Herr Schmerling that the pilgrimages to Muttenz were precisely for Hecker, that Hecker was opposed to the second incursion, that he even went to America to dispel all doubts about his intentions, that among the pilgrims were prominent members of the German National Assembly. The Federal Council is delicate enough, even in the face of Herr Schmerling’s indelicate note, not to mention the last and most telling reason: namely, that the “pilgrims” went back to Germany again and there

The German Central Authority and Switzerland
could at any moment have been called to account by the government of the Imperial Regent for some punishable act, for all their “doings” in Muttenz. That this did not happen proves best that the government of the Imperial Regent has no data incriminating the pilgrims, and that it is therefore still less able to reproach the Swiss authorities in this respect.

“Or the assemblies on the Birsfeld?”

The “language of straightforwardness” is a fine thing. Whoever, like the government of the Imperial Regent, has made this language “his duty in international intercourse”, need only demonstrate that assemblies in general, or assemblies of refugees on the Birsfeld, have taken place, in order to be able to accuse the Swiss authorities of a gross violation of international law. Other mortals, to be sure, would first have to prove what occurred at these assemblies that was contrary to international law. But these, after all, are “notorious facts”, so notorious that, I wager, there are not three readers of the Neue Rheinische Zeitung who even know which assemblies Herr Schmerling is talking about.

“Or the armaments of the mischief-makers who are allowed to ply their doings along the border, in Rheinfelden, Zurzach, Gottlieben and Laufen?”

Thank God! At last we learn something more definite about the “doings” of the refugees. We did Herr von Schmerling an injustice when we thought he did not know what the refugees were up to. He knows not only what they are up to, but also where they are up to it. Where are they up to it? In Rheinfelden, Zurzach, Gottlieben and Laufen along the border. What are they up to? “Their doings!”

“They are plying their doings!” Colossal violation of all international law – their doings! What then does the government of the Imperial Regent ply, so that it does not violate international law – perhaps “their nuisance”?

But Herr von Schmerling speaks of “armaments”. And since among the towns where the refugees, to the terror of the whole Reich, ply their doings, there are several belonging to the Canton of Aargau, the Federal Council takes that as an example. It once again does more, it once again goes beyond what “is in the custom of nations” and offers to prove by an “adversarial procedure” that at that time only 25 refugees were living in the Canton of Aargau, that only 10 of them took part in Struve’s second free corps, and that these, too, crossed over into Germany unarmed. That was the whole of the “armaments”. But what does that mean? The remaining 15 who stayed behind were precisely the most dangerous. They obviously stayed behind only to continue “plying their doings” without interruption!

Friedrich Engels
These are the weighty charges of the “government of the Imperial Regent” against Switzerland. It has nothing further to adduce, nor does it need to, since it “is not in the custom of nations”, etc. If Switzerland is shameless enough not yet to be crushed by these charges, then the “decisions” and “precautions” of the government of the Imperial Regent will not fail to have a crushing effect. The world is eager to learn what these decisions and precautions will be like, all the more eager since Herr Schmerling surrounds them with the greatest secrecy and does not even intend to give the Frankfurt Assembly any details. The Swiss press, however, has already shown that all reprisals Herr Schmerling can take are bound to have a far more damaging effect on Germany than on Switzerland, and according to all reports the Swiss are looking forward to the “precautions and decisions” of the Imperial Regent’s government with the greatest humour. Whether the ministerial gentlemen in Frankfurt will maintain the same humour, especially when English and French notes interpose themselves, we must wait and see. Only one thing is certain: the affair will end like the Danish war – with a new disgrace, which this time, however, will only hit official Germany.