COMMERCIAL SYSTEM OF SWITZERLAND.

DR. BOWRING'S " Report on the Commerce and Manufactures of Switzerland," published a few days before the close of the session, contains a mass of information respecting the trade, the social and moral condition, and the political institutions of the Swiss. These subjects deserve separate notice, which we propose to give to each; beginning with that to which Dr. ROWRI NG'S attention was chiefly directed—the Commerce and Manufactures.

The principles of free trade have been reduced to practice by the Swiss. Surrounded by powerful nations, whose policy is to defend themselves from the competition of Swiss manufacturers

by prohibitory laws and armies of customhouse officers,—with no sea-port in their own territory, and with a deficiency of capital,— the mountaineers have nevertheless succeeded in establishing flourishing manufactures and a very considerable foreign com- merce. They owe their success in a great measure to the perse- verance with which they have adhered to the fundamental prin- ciple of prosperous barter — that of selling in the dearest and buying in the cheapest markets, without let or hindrance from their laws. True, they can only make their own code. The Prussian Commercial League and the French prohibitory system are barriers against the extension of their commerce ; and these barriers would answer the purpose of the Governments which have raised them, were the Swiss so unwise as to follow the ex- ample of France and Prussia, and impose retaliatory duties on the produce of those countries. But, by admitting free of duty what- ever they require themselves, from all parts of the globe, the Swiss have insured the sala of their own manufactures, either legally or by the aid of the smuggler. For instance, one of the largest branches of Swiss industry is the watchmaking trade. Till very lately, the French endeavoured to exclude Swiss watches ; but with so little effect, that M. ARAGO informed Dr. ROWR1 NG, that not ten watches were made in Paris in the course of the year; the im- mense consumption being supplied by Switzerland, and the busi- ness of the French watchmakers being confined to the examina- tion and correction of the works. The following description is given by Dr. ROWE I NG of the mode of smuggling watches through the triple line of French douaniers.

"The manner of smuggling watches was to sew in from a hundred and twenty to a hundred and fifty in the smuggler's waistcoat ; and a gild t de montres (under-waistcoat of watches) so prepared, was considered a fair charge for the adventurer. The insurances varied from 5 to 10 per cent. ; and, perhaps, the helplessness arid carelessness of a protecting and prohibitory system were never noire strikingly exhibited than in this attempt to shut out the Swiss watches from the French markets. In France, not a shadow of benefit resulted ; not an additional watch was manufactured in the country ; neither producer DOC consumer reaped the slightest advantage. The smuggling trade was as regular and just as extensive as the legitimate trade could become: but, meanwhile, the whole frontier had become infested with bands of revenue defrauders, bold and

reckless spirits, whose habit and profession are the violation of the lawn, and whose existence is both an opprobrium to legislation and a warning to the framers and defenders of foolish, pernicious, and impracticable statutes."

Of course smuggling is not confined to watches—it is a regular trade in other prohibited articles; and, as appears from the fol- lowing extract, by no means a disreputable employment.

" The present charge for smuggling through the three lines of French custom- houses is from 25 to 30 per cent. I had an opportunity of conversing with per- sons actively engaged in it along the Swiss frontier, from the Verrieres Suisses to la Chaux de Fond. They informed me that the risk was not very great ; though the profits went to the entrepreneur, who is the person responsible to the party with whom be undertakes for the safe delivery of the goods, and he either deposits the value or gives a bill of exchange for the amount when he takes them into his hands. Bloodshed is not very common of late years' as the art is rather to evade than to overpower the customhouse offici rs ; but an old smuggler related to me with great self-applause the instances in which he and Li, party had mutilated or shot the officers who had endeavoured to obstruct their passage. I am assured that the presence of the superordinates in consi- derable numbers among the customhouse officers, and the punishment of the 1ot9ne, with which some cases of transgression have been visited, have much diminished the corruption among the customhouse agents, and that it is not considered safe to offer them bribes. But the amount of smuggling has not at all decreased ; and in one district I passed through' I was informed there was not a single inhabitant who was not either a smuggler or a customhouse- officer. The active smugglers receive six francs per night ; and they generally pass two nights in their excursions, depositing their burdens, which weigh from thirty to fifty pounds, before the break of day, and taking charge of them again at night-fall. They are also paid by the entrepreneur the expenses of their living, but they get no compensation in cases of capture : they take the personal punishment as their portion of the misfortune, their master being responsible for the value of the property. They say that the peasantry are always willing to harbour and to help them : they are, in fact, popular, from their courageous daring, and the services they are considered to render to the community. They carry on their profession in bands of from ten to twenty, and sometimes many mole, and are always preceded by an i:claireur, who warns them of any danger by whistling or other understood signs ; the Maireur never having on his per- son the smallest quantity of contraband. They say that juries are very unwil- ling to convict them ; that they ate constantly acquitted on flaws and techni- calities; and witnesses against them are so tormented that nobody willingly undertakes a task which is deemed so odious. As far as I could see or bear, no man thought himself at all the less worthy for having been engaged in smuggling transactions. There is no sense of wrong either perpetrated or in- tended.-The public opinion tribunal rather seems to recompense than to con- demn. The evil does not stop here : the whole force of laws all the opera-. C' Cons of legislation are weakened in their highest sanction and best security when any portion becomes the object of habitual disregard and disobedience. Most of the smugglers on the Swiss frontier are Frenchmen. The use of dog., so common along the Belgian limits, is unknown in Switzerland ; and horses, which are so frequently employed among the Pyrenees, appear never to take a part in the smuggling transactions of the Jura frontier. The customhouse- officers are posted in bodies of from six to twenty; and remain out all night; con- cealed in the different mountain passes or the outskirts of woods, into the thick of which, the smugglers told me, the officers never venture to enter. They converse in a low tone, or not at all. They are apprehensive lest v noise or rustling should announce their presence. They dare not separate from one another, lest they should be overpowered ; but as the smuggler chooses the darkest nights, the most appropriate spots, and takes invariably the precaution of send • jug onwards a forerunner to ascertain that the way is clear, the number of cap- tures is inconsiderable ; added to which, the smugglers are, as they assured me, the bravest men,' and seldom engage in the profession unless distinguished by patience to endure and boldness to confront dangers and difficulties.'

But it is not merely as contrabandists that the Swiss have established a flourishing commerce. The advantage of pur- chasing their raw materials in the cheapest markets has enabled them to overcome the difficulties arising from their geographical position, and to extend their commerce in silk, wool, and cotton goods, watches, jewellery, and musical boxes, to the transatlantic states. Dr. BOWRING says- " In travelling through the different districts, I constantly found merchants and manufacturers who had established connexions with the remotest countries of the globe. They assured me that the anxieties had now ceased which they Earl felt for some time in consequence of the lines of customhouses with which France and Germany and Italy, their circumjacent neighbours, had girdled

their frontiers ; that i

they were, n fact, independent of that narrow and selfish policy which had created the tariffs of so many European nations ; that they had been pressed into a wider and more profitable field, which they could successfully explore to the extent of their capitals and their means of produc- tion.'

One of the principal cotton-manufacturers wrote triumphantly to Dr. B °WRING- " In every warehouse in every shop in the land, English and French goods are exhibited by the side of ours. They have paid no duties ; ours have had no protection. Insignificant as were our early attempts, and confined as were our matkets, our Government thought right to deny us a helping hand, and to force us to shift for ourselves; and, in spite of the tremendous rivalry of British capital and French taste, we have succeeded. The history of the last century is a history of our progress. Spite of every obstacle, weak as we are, without a single port or means of outlet, except such as are held at the good pleasure of our neighbours, our articles have found their way, and meet with a ready sale in the four quarters of the globe."

There seems to be little danger of any change in a system which has worked so well for those who have adopted it. Practical ex- perience of its benefit has made all classes advocates of free trade. Indeed, such is the democratical constitution of the Cantons, that tin unpopular system could scarcely be maintained for six months together.

"In 1830-31, no less than thil teen cantons remodified their constitutions by giving further extension to the. popular power. It is true that the change brought into greater action the Ignorance and prejudices as well as the know- ledge and interests of the people. But the change rather strengthened than weakened the free-trade principle. The labouring classes form a large majority in the manufacturing cantons, where the democratic power is the least con- trolled. They might, if they pleased, protect, as it is called, their labour, ex- clude foreign competition, settle wages by legal enactments, and subvert all those axioms of political economy which are often held up to opprobrium as hostile to the happiness of the many. But they are living witnesses, living evidences of the truth and value of those fundamental principles of economical science to which they owe their wellbeing and constantly- increasing prosperity. It has been again and again my lot to hold intercourse with intelligent Swiss workmen, who considered their freedom from commercial trammels as the greatest and best of their privileges. The late insurrection at Lyons forced a number of silk-weavers to settle on the banks of the Lake of Zurich. They gain less wages, it is true, but they enjoy incomparably greater comforts than they left behind them ; and I shall not easily forget the observation of one of theni—' Sir, the floor on which I tread in Switzerland is cleaner than the table from which I ate my food in France !' " Dr. BOWR1NG gives a satisfactory account of the failure of the Prussian Commercial League to injure materially the manufac- tures and commerce of Switzerland.

"I was anxious to ascertain the state of Swiss opinion as to the German Zoll Verein, or Commercial League. That confederation caused in its origin a con- siderable alarm, and appeared to menace Switzerland with a serious reduction of exports to Germany. Time and experience have diminished the apprehen- sions and anxieties of both merchants and manufacturers. If there has been some diminution in the trade with Germany, there has been more than a coun- terbalancing increase in the trade with other nations. Switzerland has, in fact, triumphed in her competition with Germany to the whole extent to which the Prussian League has raised the price of labour, of produce, or manufactures. The cantons adjacent to Germany feel some inconvenience from the impedi- ments which the German customhouses throw in the way of the exportation of their articles. These itnpediments affect more particularly the canton of Schaff- hausen, whose wines and cattle supplied a part of the consumption of the Southern German states. In Thurgovia, also, trade has been somewhat af- fected, but not seriously. The influence of the Prussian League, as a whole, upon Switzerland, will not be pernicious. Her capitals being directed by the natural force of supply and demand—without any protection or interference— towards the production of articles whose cheapness of cost creates a universal market for consumption—she will, in her competition with Germany, possess many advantages, from which the fiscal imposts of the commercial league will exclude the German confederated states."

But though the Prussian policy has proved comparatively harm- less to the nations against whom it was directed, (we believe that the English export trade to Germany has not been diminished by its operation,) the subjects of Prussia herself are suffering from it. Tho German newspapers received in the beginning of the present week give, under the head of Berlin, a distressing ac- count of the decay of the corn and timber trade in East and West Prussia, and the consequent misery of the people. In Elbing, a town containing 16,000 inhabitants, there is not revenue sufficient to light the Rtreets; and in Paderborn, the peasants are reduced to such a state of poverty, that they have been exempted from the payment of taxes for three years. Meanwhile, as we have seen, Switzerland—without a sea-port—some of whose manufacturing towns are situated 3000 feet above the level of the sea—whose com- merce was to be crushed by its overgrown and domineering neigh- bours—is extending its trade and augmenting its wealth. The Swiss Diet may be browbeaten and insulted in matters of politics, but the Duke DE MONTEBELLO himself would scarcely demand that a duty should be imposed on the importation of French raw and thrown silk. As long as the Swiss make their country the market for the products of other nations free of duty, their trade must prosper, in spite of the prohibitory laws of their neighbours.

There is a large class in England whom the evidence furnished by the partial changes in our own commercial code have not yet satisfied of the soundness of the principles of free trade : let such turn to Switzerland, and, if they are really the "practical" men they pretend to be, their doubts will be removed by observing the results of the Huskissonian system there.