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28th Oct. Bräker writes a note and tells Salome that it is a request from "Herr Z." [probably Zwicky-Stäger] for him to travel to Schmerikon on business. On the 29th he sets out with Jakob. From there he writes to Salome that he must go on to Zürich with his master. The next day he and Jakob go through Stäfa and Küsnacht. In Zürich they stay at The Sword, "...it is the best inn in Zürich, where many foreign gentlemen and ladies often lodge". [Chronik, p 216]


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Zürich:


Even though he was seeing Zürich for the first time, it is not very likely that Bräker was overwhelmed by admiration of the city itself; he had, after all, seen Prague and Berlin. Other travellers of the time, however, tell us that the fame of the city resided in the wealth and intellect of its inhabitants rather than its architectural splendour. The Russian traveller Nikolai Karamzin (1766-1826) was particularly unimpressed; the city was "...not at all pleasing to the eye. Except for the public buildings, for example, the town hall etc., I have noticed no very fine or large buildings. Many of the streets and lanes are not even a sagene [seven feet] wide" [p 121]. An earlier traveller, Chancel, in 1714, found that there were nevertheless: ..."several Things worth a Traveller's View. The Fortifications, which are very pleasant, the Houses, tho' built with Timber and Clay, are lofty, and handsomely painted, the streets, tho' narrow, pav'd, and very clean. [...] They have an Engine to draw Water out of the Lake, and convey it through the City. There is also a large Drinking-Hall, with Tables for the several Trades, where they meet every Day at two a Clock

[sic]
at the Ringing of a great Bell" [p 7]. Louis Simond mentions a wide bridge which served as a market-place, and that Zürich had many good-looking women and fine draught-horses. He also stayed at The Sword, and tells us that "We have passed a good deal of our time at the window of our apartment at The Epée, in full view and hearing of the blue waves of the [river] Limmat, rushing by, even under us, with the noise of a fast-sailing vessel at sea" [p 140].

Though small by modern standards (Coxe [p 77] gives its population as 10,559 in 1780), Zürich was a prosperous city, second only in power to Bern. It was an important point of trade between northern and southern Europe, its wealth deriving mainly from textiles. It was also very well equipped with public institutions. There was an orphanage, an almshouse, a hospital for incurable patients and another which Coxe says [p 83] was "for the sick of all nations, which usually contains between six hundred and seven hundred patients", and a charitable foundation for maintaining apprentices and distributing money, clothes and devotional books to the poor. There were schools for blind and deaf people and an institute for professional training in surgery. The many colleges taught "the learned languages, divinity, natural history, mathematics, and in short every species of polite learning, as well as abstruse science..." [p 84]. Coxe also mentions several important libraries, some being the private libraries of scholars and containing many interesting historical documents, also the cathedral library and a public library of over 25,000 volumes. This was a large library for its time, but it would not have been what we understand by "public", the subscription would have been affordable only by the upper classes. There were several other important publishing houses besides Orell, Gessner and Füssli.

Learning was, of course, what had drawn Bräker to Zürich, and it was indeed the centre of culture for northeast Switzerland, some Swiss writers (such as Reynold and Silber) go so far as to say that it was one of the principal centres of culture for the whole of German-speaking Europe. Strangely enough, this flowering of literature and scholarship was taking place under a thoroughly repressive government, which exercised strict censorship of the press. Perhaps, however, it is significant that many of its scholars, writers and publishers held office in the government. Such offices were the preserve of an oligarchy of a few prominent merchant clans, nepotism, despotism and servility were endemic, though corruption was to some extent counteracted by sumptuary laws against ostentatious wealth, for example, it was forbidden to use a carriage within the city walls. The government had lost touch with its subjects, and scandals of corruption and persecution were not infrequent. The rights of citizenship were very limited even


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