I put a stop to their sport, and
banished them to different parts of the cathedral; and by and by, the old
woman appeared again, and released us from durance. . . . .
While waiting for our dejeuner, we saw the people dining at the regular
table d'hote of the hotel, and the idea was strongly borne in upon me,
that the professional mystery of a male waiter is a very unmanly one. It
is so absurd to see the solemn attentiveness with which they stand behind
the chairs, the earnestness of their watch for any crisis that may demand
their interposition, the gravity of their manner in performing some
little office that the guest might better do for himself, their decorous
and soft steps; in short, as I sat and gazed at them, they seemed to me
not real men, but creatures with a clerical aspect, engendered out of a
very artificial state of society. When they are waiting on myself, they
do not appear so absurd; it is necessary to stand apart in order to see
them properly.
We left Lausanne--which was to us a tedious and weary place--before four
o'clock.
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