34 THE UTOPIAN COMMUNIST
many of the watchmakers in the canton had been affected by com
munist propaganda. Zurich was known as a relatively conservative
city, and in 1839 its clergy had demonstrated vigorously when it
was proposed that David Strauss be called to a professorship in the
University. Nevertheless, when Gottfried Keller returned in 1842
from Munich, where he had tried to become a painter, he found
the city in ferment. "The times seize me in their iron arms," he
wrote. "I am storming and seething inside like a volcano."^7
Though he later reacted violently against the new radicalism, he
discussed some of its fundamental problems in his Grime Hein¬
rich.^8
Weitling visited Switzerland in the summer and fall of 1840.
Perhaps it was during that first visit, when he worked as a tailor in
several cantons, that he discovered that the soil of the Alpine
nation was ready for the seeds of communism. It is conceivable
that he already had decided to try his propaganda on the German
workers in Switzerland when the League of the Just in Paris gave
him thirty francs and the promise of additional support and sent
him on his way to propagandize Switzerland. He arrived there
with something of a reputation as a labor leader and with a "sys
tem" which he was ready to demonstrate in practice.
Life in Switzerland was full of activity but it was neither com
fortable nor easy. Weitling had to earn his living at his trade. He
was employed in several establishments, including the ladies' tai
loring shop of Master Konrad Wuhrmann of Zurich. Here he
proved to be the same competent workman he had always been,
and to his earlier accomplishments he now added a touch of
Parisian style and elegance.
Weitling was ready to make every sacrifice for the cause. He
slept in lodgings that were overcrowded and sometimes had three
occupants to a room. He did his writing on a board spread across
(^7) Emil Ermatinger, Gottfried Kellers Leben, Briefe und Tagebücher (Berlin,
1924), I, 129.
(^8) See also Jonas Fränkel, Gottfried Kellers Politische Sendung (Zurich, 1939),
passim; Hans Max Kriesi, Gottfried Kellers Politische Lehrjahre (Frauenfeld,
1917), passim.