"L'Empereur a senti," said Alexander, May 17, 1817, "se fortifier encore l'estime que lui a toujours inspiré le caractère de la Nation Suisse et l'intérêt invariable qu'il porte à sa paisible indépendance et à son énergique neutralité."

Nor were the Powers in any wise dilatory in an assertion of their views, which were plainly disclosed at the Congress of Aix-la-Chapelle in a Prussian memorial presented by Ancillon, who proposed that in periodical congresses the Alliance should develop a central regulative system touching European affairs-a general protectorate in short-and that states whose existence might depend upon guarantees on the part of the Powers should not be allowed to change their constitutions on penalty of armed intervention.

At Troppau in 1820, at Laibach in 1821, and at Verona in 1822, these sinister conceptions were expanded, and the reactionary policy of Metternich was not slow in seizing upon the age-long Swiss practice of granting asylum to refugees from every species of oppression, as a pretext for active interference. On November 13, 1820, accordingly, a joint Prussian and Austrian note was sent from Troppau to the Diet at Lucerne sharply protesting against the toleration of German and Italian refugees in Switzerland.

These protecting Powers claimed: que plusieurs individus, gravement compliqués dans les différentes procédures intentées aux démagogues allemands ont su se soustraire aux enquêtes et ont porté hors de l'Allemagne leur esprit révolutionnaire. Plusieurs de ces individus avaient cherché à établir à Strasbourg le foyer de leurs intrigues; ils ont fait depuis autres calculs et ont passé en Suisse. J'apprends qu'il est formé à Coire un club composé en partie de ces réfugiés et en partie d'autres mauvaises têtes de différents pays.

So halting, however, was the Diet's attitude that it was not until July 14, 1823, that a conclusum was adopted calling upon the cantons, whose position in many instances had been that of a practical defiance of the Powers to beware of too liberal hospitality toward foreigners, as well as too outspoken utterances on the part of the press; in any case, criminals should not be harbored nor should Swiss soil be a vantage-ground for international plottings.

Thus encouraged, Prussia promptly asked the extradition of

sundry alleged conspirators; its demand was not granted, and Switzerland remained, as it has since been, a shelter for many whose offences do not fall within the proper limits of criminal law. The Prussian and Austrian effort, nevertheless, had specially in view the creation of a supposed duty on the Diet's part to maintain a political police surveillance as an element of its neutrality, whose benevolent guaranty by the Powers obliged the Swiss Government to refuse asylum where interests of its benefactors might be threatened upon its soil. Such a doctrine ignored the continued existence of sovereignty in a neutralized state and assumed that Switzerland could be brought to book for a neglect having no foundation save in an Austro-Prussian assumption, which wilfully sought to trample upon plain treaty provisions and familiar international principles.

For in no event can neutrality, either temporary or permanent, be justly held to diminish the quality of sovereignty, though it may indicate limitations upon all warlike action, save in strict self-defense where resistance is ever justifiable on the neutral's part to the uttermost.

Touching the highly sovereign right to admit or entertain whomsoever a state may please, neutrality, as such, does not in any degree abrogate or qualify sovereignty, although it may and does impose duties as well as beget rights during actual warfare between other governments. But in the matter of internal police, the attitude of the Prussian and Austrian courts could claim no support except in their own arrogance. They studiously, also, overlooked the important truth that they had unqualifiedly declared Swiss independence and neutrality to be in the interest of all Europe. Beyond controversy they had directly guaranteed the new Swiss treaty frontiers, and by necessary implication the country's independence and permanent neutrality. Independence, too, was on more than one occasion most explicitly announced to be freed from external interference. The guaranty of Switzerland's new borders by the Powers constituted, in effect, an international warranty of title, warranty (warandia) and guaranty (guarandia) being similar in derivation and import (cf. Gothic, vasjau; German, Gewere; Engl., seisin, investiture).

For the sake of greater clearness and of repetition, we shall ven

ture to collect here some clauses from leading treaties, beginning with the convention signed at Lunéville, February 9, 1801, between France and the Germanic Empire, which resulted, nevertheless, in a Napoleonic protectorate so far as Switzerland was concerned:

Article XI. Le présent traité de paix. . . est déclaré commun aux Républiques Batave, Helvétique, Cisalpine et Ligurienne. Les parties contractantes se garantissent mutuellement l'indépendance desdites Républiques, et la faculté aux peuples qui les habitent d'adopter telle forme de Gouvernement qu'ils jugeront convenable.

So in the identical offensive and defensive treaties of alliance between Austria, Great Britain, Prussia, and Russia, concluded at Chaumont, March 1, 1814, Article I of the annexed separate articles declared for a Swiss confederation independent and under European guaranty:

La Fédération suisse dans ses anciennes limites et dans une indépendance placée sous la garantie des grandes Puissances de l'Europe la France comprisé.

The first Congress of Paris, May 30, 1814, developed this announcement, as has been seen already, though with a suggestive qualification of allied supervision in the actual framing of the federal constitution:

Article VI. La Suisse, indépendante, continuera de se gouverner par elle-même.-Articles séparés et secrets. Article II. La France reconnaîtra et garantira, conjointement avec les Puissances Alliées et comme elles, l'organisation politique que la Suisse se donnera sous les auspices desdites Puissances et d'après les basses arrêtées avec elles. To this latter clause, foreshadowing a share on the part of the Allies in the framing of a new federal constitution, the instrument of August 7, 1815, was, as has been noticed, fully responsive, since it has been drawn up and finally ratified under allied pressure. Yet no sufficient grounds could be alleged for a continuing supervision. once Switzerland had become politically united under a form of alliance acceptable to the guaranteeing Powers. Nor was it intended that upon a point so vital to the interests of the country any just doubts whatever should remain. This clearly appears in the care

fully drawn fourth clause of the declaration of November 20, 1815, annexed to the identical treaties of the Second Peace of Paris:

Les Puissances signataires de la Déclaration du Mars reconnaissant authentiquement par le présent acte que la neutralité et l'inviolabilité de la Suisse, et son indépendance de toute influence étrangère sont dans les vrais intérêts de l'Europe entière.

Swiss neutrality was not to be held as a gift, nor yet in any sense a temporary self-sufficing aloofness from the contests or misfortunes of others; but, on the contrary, an age-long policy, originally adopted by groups of pastoral mountaineers and now under a strengthened union and with territorial borders, extended and protected by international guarantees, recognized as an element of importance to the peace of Europe. The static quality in neutralization thus illustrated or objectified a new departure in diplomatic practice and of which Switzerland was to exhibit virtually the earliest example, although in the celebrated Recess of 1803 the dying Germanic empire had provided (in Section XXV):

Les Villes de Ratisbonne et de Wetzlar jouiront d'une neutralité absolue, en cas de guerre même d'Empire, attendu qu'elles sont l'une le siège de la Diète Générale, l'autre le siège de la Chambre Impériale.

But inasmuch as both Diet and Supreme Court disappeared three years later, this regulation proved of small practical information.

A more interesting attempt, however, to secure the benefits of neutralization was seen in the nearly contemporary case of Moresnet, a small though valuable mining district lying a short distance southwesterly from Aix-la-Chapelle.

The first Treaty of Paris, May 30, 1814, declared in Article V for the free navigation of the Rhine to the sea "du point où il devient navigable jusqu'à la mer," thus practically making Rotterdam a German port, a feature of grave importance during the present war. The following Article (VI) placed Holland under the sovereignty of the House of Orange-Nassau, and a year later a treaty between Nassau and Prussia, signed May 31, 1815, by Biberstein and Hardenberg, gave Prussia sundry territories belonging to Nassau and comprising the celebrated fortress of Ehrenbreitstein.

In order to more satisfactorily mark the boundaries between Prussia and the new Kingdom of Holland, whose sovereign had, by Articles LXV-LXXIII of the Vienna Final Act, became Grand Duke of Luxemburg and possessor of part of the ancient duchy of Bouillon, a carefully drawn boundary treaty was made by six commissioners representing Holland and Prussia at Aix-la-Chapelle, June 26, 1816. Some difficulty having arisen touching the precise demarcation of frontier lines in the commune of Altenberg or Moresnet, lying a few miles southwest of Aix-la-Chapelle and on the road to Liége in Belgium, a portion of this district was assigned to Holland, another to Prussia, while a joint administration was to preserve the remaining part as common territory not liable to military occupation:

Sera soumise à une administration commune et ne pourra être occupée militairement par aucune des deux Puissances.

While that portion of Holland adjoining Altenberg came subsequently within the limits of Belgium, Altenberg itself, generally known as neutral Moresnet, continued to preserve the status of joint occupation and practical neutrality created by the treaty of June 26, 1816, until, in the opening days of August, 1914, it was occupied by the German army in the advance on Belgium.

From the foregoing, it is clear that the Austro-Prussian claim to a guardianship over Swiss internal affairs was as little to be justified as the invasion and devastation of neutralized territories in 1914. From afar off, indeed, the Diet sensed an element of peril in the paragraph above cited from the First Peace of Paris providing that the Powers should recognize and guarantee the new Swiss political organization. The federal and cantonal delegates were consequently instructed to obtain a guarantee of Swiss military organization and of the new frontiers. At Paris the committee of the Powers was inclined to favor these requests, but in the end nothing was done touching an assurance of military strength, nor did the Holy Alliance in later years favor efforts of the Diet to promote military organization, save the vicious system of cantonal mercenary contingents expressly encouraged in order that these might be employed in repressive measures. To check self-development on any lines of