The Story of Switzerland

by Lina Hug; Richard Stead

XXVI.

THE ARISTOCRATIC PERIOD.

(1600-1712.)

In the life of nations no less than of individuals there are vicissitudes, alternations of prosperity and adversity. If the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries witnessed the glorious rise of the Swiss people, the seventeenth and eighteenth saw the political decline of the Republic. Even the Reformation itself led the way to this decline by lodging all power—political, fiscal, moral, and educational—in the Protestant cantons in the hands of the governments. Patriotism was on the wane, and the old mania for foreign service as a means of securing foreign gold was again breaking out. Even Zurich, which for well-nigh a century had steadfastly borne in mind the patriotic maxims of Zwingli, now yielded to the persuasions of France. Indeed the Swiss Commonwealth was rapidly becoming a mere vassalate of that country, under the despotic Louis XIV. Swiss rule was taking that tinge of absolutism which was colouring the governments of almost all European states. Louis, the personification of absolute rule, had stamped the century with his cachet, and aristocracies and oligarchies were taking the place of the old democratic governments. This seems incompatible with the old Swiss republican tenets. Yet, drawn within the influence of the monarchical states, how could Switzerland escape the effects of that influence any more than Venice or Genoa?

The political and religious passions and animosities of the previous century now found vent in the terrible Thirty Years' War, which from 1618 to 1648 convulsed Europe. Thanks to its good fortune and far-sightedness, Switzerland was not drawn into the conflict, save as to its south-eastern corner, close as it was to the theatre of the great struggle. Most anxiously was the neutrality of the country maintained, yet its territory was not unfrequently violated. To give one instance, General Horn led his Swedes into Swiss territory to besiege Constance. Germany and Sweden—Gustavus Adolphus especially[68]—did all they could to draw Switzerland to their side, but the Swiss had the good sense to resist all blandishments, and bear patiently with vexatious intrusions. The terrible scenes that were taking place across the Rhine were enough to quell all intestine disputes in Switzerland itself, and the comparative peace and prosperity found within its borders was the envy of the neighbouring lands. A German traveller chronicles his surprise at finding in Switzerland neither rapine nor murder, but security and content. However rough and rugged its surface, the little republic seemed to him an earthly Paradise.

Different, however, was the experience of Graubünden, then a separate free state, and a connection only of the Confederation. In truth, the history of that old Rhætian land at that time forms a striking pendant as it were to the great drama of the European struggle. The Latin-German inhabitants, combining northern prudence with southern passion, had since the middle of the sixteenth century been steeped in internal dissension, owing to the religious divisions caused by the Reformation. The Protestant party under Von Salis, and the Catholics headed by Von Planta, were at deadly enmity with each other, and sided with France and Venice, and with Austria and Spain respectively. John von Planta, head of his clan, and solicitor-general of the Papal see, was suspected of intending to reintroduce Popery into the Grisons. The mountaineers accordingly descended from their Alps in crowds, and flocked to Chur. There they brought to trial Planta and sentenced him to death, and his fall struck the keynote to the tragedy that followed. With the opening of the seventeenth century the conflict grew fiercer, national interests and foreign policy being now inextricably mixed. Mistress of the beautiful Italian Signory Valtellina, Bormio, Chiavenna, and the Alpine passes commanding the entrance into the Tyrol and Italy, Graubünden became the apple of contention between the southern states of Europe. Austria and Spain possessing Milan were not without hopes of joining hands across Graubünden, and France was sanguine of her success

HIGH ALTAR, CHUR CATHEDRAL.
(From a Photograph.)

in preventing it. This latter state with Venice had effected an alliance with Protestant Bünden, and that party strongly opposed the Spanish union for which the energetic but headstrong Rudolf von Planta was working. Fuentes, a Spaniard, Governor of Milan, furious at the resistance offered, erected a chain of strong forts on Lake Como, with the view of cutting off the Valtellines. Before long, George Jenatsch from the Engadine, Tschusch, and other high-minded and patriotic Protestants, began to decry the Spanish scheme, and tumults arose. An attack on Planta's manor, Zernez (1618), having failed through the escape of Rudolf, Zambra, Landammann in Bregaglia, and Rusca, a priest in the Valtellina, both greyheaded old men, were seized. They were sentenced to death by a new court which had been set up at Thusis, a court which raged against popery and spread terrorism for some months. In the Engadine a strange thing happened. The respective chiefs of the hostile clans were the two brothers Von Travers, and a hand-to-hand fight between the opposing parties having begun, suddenly the wives, daughters, and sisters of the combatants rushed amongst them like the Sabine women of old, and checked them. Foremost amongst these noble women was the spirited Anna Juvalta. The Plantas were now in exile, and were conspiring with Austria. Their cousin Robustello (Valtellina) at a given signal broke into the houses of the Protestants, and, with the help of hired assassins, put the inmates to the sword. This was on the 19th of July, 1620, and throughout the whole valley no quarter was given. Zurich and Bern on hearing of this shocking massacre—the "St. Bartholomew of the Valtellina"—sent troops, but they were defeated at Tirano by the Spanish forces and adherents. The Plantas returned from exile and asked the Forest Cantons to give their countenance to their party, and these were not unwilling; but the plot itself was opposed by the Protestant Grisons with scorn and fury. Jenatsch penetrated to the castle of the Plantas at Rietberg, and Pompejus fell by his hands (1621). The Catholics were defeated at Valendas, and the country was cleared of the troops of the Forest Cantons and of Spaniards. However, Jenatsch failed to take Valtellina.

The Austrians still claimed supremacy over part of the Zehngerichte,[69] and we find them, from 1620 to 1629, twice invading and occupying Graubünden. The most dreadful cruelties marked the passage of their general, Baldiron, and Catholicism was reintroduced by force. In 1629, the Emperor Ferdinand had reached the height of his success and greatness, and Bünden with all its dependencies lay prostrate at his feet. France came to the rescue. Richelieu pursued the policy of Henry IV. to re-establish the balance of power by breaking down the prestige of the Habsburgs. With the view of gaining supremacy for France, he had drawn Sweden into the Thirty Years' War; and on the death of Gustavus Adolphus, when the zeal was somewhat flagging, he revived it by sending French troops into Alsace, South Germany, and the Grisons. The command of the Franco-Grison army was entrusted to Duke Henry de Rohan, godson of Henry IV. of France (and godfather to Charles I. of England), one of the noblest characters of his age. De Rohan was also appointed ambassador to the Eidgenossen states in 1631. He had been leader of the Huguenots, and had supported the Edict of Nantes in opposition to Louis XIII. Becoming obnoxious to the king in consequence, he withdrew to Venice. There he wrote a treatise on the strategical importance of the Grisons, as if he foresaw his future mission.[70] During his residence in Switzerland he watched zealously over its interests, smoothing over difficulties in the Diet to avoid war. Richelieu sent him neither money nor help, but left him to extricate himself as best he could from his position in that isolated mountain fastness; yet Rohan was the idol of his soldiers and of the people of the Grisons, and was always spoken of by them as the "good duke." In 1635, when France was doing its utmost to oust Austria, open war broke out, and Rohan gained four brilliant victories in succession—Jenatsch serving as local guide and combatant in advance, his superior tactics proving too much for the Austro-Spanish forces. Yet the "good duke" was soon to fall a victim to the perfidious policy of Richelieu, and the treachery of Jenatsch. This latter was a strange mixture of the noble and the vile—fierce, and ambitious, a seeker of gain, yet a man of honour, full of a wild patriotism and thirst for freedom. Eager to free his country from the grasp of the stranger, he and the hot-tempered Bündner, at whose head he was, suddenly found that they were but exchanging masters. Sticking at nothing to gain his ends Jenatsch entered into a secret understanding with Austria and Spain, and even turned Catholic to win more favour with them. Then, forgetting the many kindnesses he had received from his friend Rohan, he betrayed him to his enemies. It should be observed, parenthetically, that the question in dispute was that of the Valtellina, and Rohan had had no instructions from Richelieu to return that territory. Suddenly the French general found himself surrounded by hostile troops from the Grisons, and was compelled to capitulate (1637). Unable to bear the sight of France again, he fought for her under the banner of Bernhard von Weimar, and fell at Rheinfelden, in Aargovy, seeking rather than fearing death. Jenatsch, however, did not long enjoy the fruits of his guilty action. Two years later he was stabbed at an officers' banquet, during the carnival, by some masked figure. Rudolf Planta, son of Pompejus, was said by some to have done the deed, whilst another story has it that the avenger was Rudolf's sister, Lucretia, who was burning for vengeance on the slayer of her father.[71] One of the first German novelists of our time, Ferdinand Meyer, of Zurich, has worked these thrilling episodes into his fine story, "Jenatsch." The hero was buried with pomp at Chur, but his murderer remained unpunished. Thus Graubünden, after a struggle of nearly a hundred years, recovered both its independence and its lost territory.