From “Letters” published in 1850.

WHOEVER should visit the principal countries of Europe at the present moment might take them for conquered provinces held in subjection by their victorious masters at the point of the sword. Such was the aspect which France presented when I came to Paris a few weeks since. The city was then in what is called, by a convenient fiction, a state of siege; soldiers filled the streets, were posted in every public square, and at every corner; were seen marching before the churches, the cornices of which bore the inscription of Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity,—keeping their brethren quiet by the bayonet. I have since made a journey to Bavaria and Switzerland, and on returning I find the siege raised, and these demonstrations of fraternity less formal, but the show and the menace of military force are scarcely less apparent. Those who maintain that France is not fit for liberty need not afflict themselves with the idea that there is at present more liberty in France than her people know how to enjoy.

  On my journey, I found the cities along the Rhine crowded with soldiers; the sound of the drum was heard among the hills covered with vines; women were trundling loaded wheelbarrows and carrying panniers like asses, to earn the taxes which are extorted to support the men who stalk about in uniform. I entered Heidelberg with anticipations of pleasure; they were dashed in a moment; the city was in a state of siege, occupied by Prussian troops which had been sent to take the part of the Grand Duke of Baden against his people. I could hardly believe that this was the same peaceful and friendly city which I had known in better times. Every other man in the streets was a soldier; the beautiful walks about the old castle were full of soldiers; in the evening they were reeling through the streets. “This invention,” said a German who had been a member of the Diet of the Confederation lately broken up, “this invention of declaring a city, which has unconditionally submitted, to be still in a state of siege, is but a device to practice the most unbounded oppression. Any man who is suspected, or feared, or disliked, or supposed not to approve of the proceedings of the victorious party, is arrested and imprisoned at pleasure. He may be guiltless of any offense which could be made a pretext for condemning him, but his trial is arbitrarily postponed, and when at last he is released he has suffered the penalty of a long confinement, and is taught how dangerous it is to become obnoxious to the government.”

  At Heilbronn we took the railway for Stuttgart, the capital of Würtemberg. There was considerable proportion of men in military trappings among the passengers, but at one of the stations they came upon us like a cloud, and we entered Stuttgart with a little army. That city, too, looked as if in a state of siege, so numerous were the soldiery, though the vine-covered hills, among which it is situated, could have given them a better occupation. The railway beyond Stuttgart wound through a deep valley and ended at Geisslingen, an ancient Swabian town, in a gorge of the mountains, with tall old houses, not one of which, I might safely affirm, had been built within the last two hundred years. From this place to Ulm, on the Danube, the road was fairly lined with soldiers walking or resting by the wayside, or closely packed in the peasants’ wagons, which they had hired to carry them short distances. At Ulm we were obliged to content ourselves with straitened accommodations, the hotels being occupied by the gentry in epaulets.

  I hoped to see fewer of this class at the capital of Bavaria, but it was not so; they were everywhere placed in sight as if to keep the people in awe. “These fellows,” said a German to me, “are always too numerous, but in ordinary times they are kept in the capitals and barracks, and the nuisance is out of sight. Now, however, the occasion is supposed to make their presence necessary in the midst of the people, and they swarm everywhere.” Another, it was our host of the “Goldener Hirsch,” said to my friend, “I think I shall emigrate to America, I am tired of living under the bayonet.”