Those who were, nearest
the bailiff were secretly much diverted-with his awkward attempts at
graciousness, which one fair and witty Vaudoise likened to the antics of
one of the celebrated animals that are still fostered in the city which
ruled so much of Switzerland, and from whom, indeed, the town and canton
are both vulgarly supposed to have derived their common name; for, while
the authority of Berne weighed so imperiously and heavily on its
subsidiary countries, as is usual in such cases, the people of the latter
were much addicted to taking an impotent revenge, by whispering the
pleasantest sarcasms they could invent against their masters.
Notwithstanding this and many more criticisms on his performance, the
bailiff enacted his part in the representation to his own entire
satisfaction; and he resumed his seat with a consciousness of having at
least merited the applause of the people, for having entered with so much
spirit into their games, and with the hope that this act of grace might be
the means of causing them to forget some fifty, or a hundred, of his other
acts, which certainly had not possessed the same melodious and
companionable features.
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