The mountains are nearer him, besides, than they formerly were.  They have been opened to approach.  Once there was no Route Thermale over the cols; no facile pass to Venasque or the Lac de Gaube; no iron bars in the difficult spots en the Pic du Midi d’Ossau.  That day is gone by.  Parts at least of the wild mountains are tamed; danger has been driven back, hardly the daunt of difficulty remains.  D’Etigny and Napoleon and the Midi Railroad have smoothed all the ways; there is no longer reason to dread the lumbering diligence, the rough char-roads, the pioneer cuttings through the pine-brakes.  The buoyant mountain trips we have touched upon, and more, are within almost instant call of every dispirited Pau valetudinary, and of farther travelers as well.  They have but to go forth and meet them.

That this is becoming known is shown by the yearly increasing tide of visitors.  The cultured modern world enjoys reading the book of nature,—­especially so, provided some one has cut the leaves.

IX.

In the evening, we repeat the stroll down the Allee d’Etigny.  The lights twinkle brightly down upon the street; the shops are open, the hotels lit up, the cafes most animated of all.  Here on the sidewalks, around the little iron tables, sits Luchon, sipping its liqueurs and tasting its ices.  It is the cafe-life of Paris in miniature,—­as characteristically French as in the capital.  To “Paris, c’est la France,” one might almost add, “le cafe, c’est Paris.”  France would not be France without it.  It is its hearthstone, its debating-club, the matrix of all its national sentiments.

There is an “etiquette” of Continental drinks.  By the initiate, the code is rigorously observed; each class of beverages has its hour and reason, and your true Frenchman would not dream of calling for one out of place and time.  In the cafe-gardens of the large hotels you will see the waiters’ trays bearing one set of labeled bottles before dinner and another after; one at mid-day, another in the evening.  There is also a ritual of mixing; syrups and liqueurs all have their chosen mates and are never mismated.

From, an intelligent waiter in Lyons, a double fee extracted for me on one occasion some curious if unprofitable lore on the subject, since expanded by further queryings.  The potations in-demand divide themselves, it appears, into two main classes:  aperitifs and digestifs.  The former are simply appetizers, usually of the bitters class, and are taken before meals.  The latter, as their name shows, come after the repast, for some supposed effect in aiding digestion.  These liquors are often, exceedingly strong, but it is to be remembered that the quantities taken are minute; when brought not mixed with water or syrups, a unit portion might hardly fill a walnut shell.

The favorite aperitifs are: 

Price in
centimes.[29]