As the governments were independent of each other so far as their covenants allowed, and of foreign princes also, they called themselves free Swiss.  But within the country districts there was little freedom for the people.  Only in the shepherd cantons—­Uri, Schwyz, and Unterwalden, also Zug, Glarus, and Appenzell—­did the country people possess equal rights, and, in the city cantons, only the burghers of the cities; and often, even among these latter, only a few rich or ancient families.  The rest of the people, dependent on the cities, having been either purchased or conquered, were subjects, often indeed serfs, and enjoyed only the limited rights which they had formerly possessed under the counts and princes.  Even the shepherd cantons held subjects, whom they, like princes, governed by their bailiffs.  And the Confederate cantons and cities would by no means allow their subjects to purchase their freedom, as the old counts and lords had formerly permitted the Confederates themselves to do.

But the people cared little for liberty; made rude and savage by continued wars, they loved only quarrels and combats, revels and debauchery, when there was no war in their own country.  The young men, greedy of booty, followed foreign drums and fought the battles of princes for hire.  There were no good schools in the villages, and the clergy cared little for this.  Indeed, the morals of the clergy were often no less depraved than those of the citizens and country people; even in the convents great disorders frequently prevailed with great wealth.  Many of the priests were very ignorant; many drank, gambled, and blasphemed; many led shameless lives.

In the chief cities of the cantons, debauchery and dissipation were rife.  There was much division between citizens and councillors; envy and distrust between the different professions.  The lords, when once seated in the great and small councils—­legislative and executive—­cared more for themselves and their families than for the welfare of the citizens; they endeavored to advance their sons and relatives, and to procure lucrative offices for them.  In all the cantons there were certainly some great, patriotic souls who preferred the interests of their country to their own, but no one listened to them.

As Switzerland had now no foreign wars to fear, and the neighboring kings and princes were pleased to have in their armies Swiss, for whose life and death they cared much less than for the life and death of their own subjects, the principal families of the city and country cantons took advantage of these circumstances to open fountains of wealth for themselves.  The desire of the kings to enlist valiant Swiss favored the avidity of the council lords, as did the wish of the young men to get booty.  In spite of the positive prohibition of the magistrates, thousands of young men often enlisted in foreign service, where most of them perished miserably, because no one cared for them.  Therefore the governments judged it best to make treaties with the kings for the raising of Swiss regiments, commanded by national officers, subject to their own laws and regularly paid, so that each government could take care of its subjects when abroad.  “Confederates! you require a vent for your energies,” had Rudolf Reding of Schwyz already said, when, years before, he saw the free life of the young men after the Burgundian war.