n Swiss politics, and ordered the federal
authorities and troops to disperse, and the cantons to send deputies
to Paris for the regulation of their affairs under his mediation.
Meanwhile he bade the Swiss live once more in hope: their land was on
the brink of a precipice, but it would soon be saved! Rapp carried
analogous orders to Lausanne and Berne, while Ney marched in with a
large force of French troops that had been assembled near the Swiss
frontiers.

So glaring a violation of Swiss independence and of the guaranteeing
Treaty of Luneville aroused indignation throughout Europe. But Austria
was too alarmed at Prussian aggrandizement in Germany to offer any
protest; and, indeed, procured some trifling gains by giving France a
free hand in Switzerland.[224] The Court of Berlin, then content to
play the jackal to the French lion, revealed to the First Consul the
appeals for help privately made to Prussia by the Swiss federals:[225]
the Czar, influenced doubtless by his compact with France concerning
German affairs, and by the advice of his former tutor, the Swiss
Laharpe, offered no encouragement; and it was left to Great Britain to
make the sole effort then attempted for the cause of Swiss
independence. For some time past the cantons had made appeals to
the British Government, which now, in response, sent an English agent,
Moore, to confer with their chiefs, and to advance money and promise
active support if he judged that a successful resistance could be
attempted.[226] The British Ministry undoubtedly prepared for an open
rupture with France on this question. Orders were immediately sent
from London that no more French or Dutch colonies were to be handed
back; and, as we have seen, the Cape of Good Hope and the French
settlements in India were refused to the Dutch and French officers who
claimed their surrender.

Hostilities, however, were for the present avoided. In face of the
overwhelming force which Ney had close at hand, the chiefs of the
central cantons shrank from any active opposition; and Moore, finding
on his arrival at Constance that they had decided to submit, speedily
returned to England. Ministers beheld with anger and dismay the
perpetuation of French supremacy in that land; but they lacked the
courage openly to oppose the First Consul's action, and gave orders
that the stipulated cessions of French and Dutch colonies should take
effect.

The submission of the Swiss and the weakness of all the Pow