sobriety and
truth I conscientiously affirm, and herein record, that I had lived to
partake of the purer spirit which the great mutations of the age had
conjured into public affairs, and I saw that there was a necessity to
carry into all dealings with the concerns of the community, the same
probity which helps a man to prosperity in the sequestered traffic of
private life.

This serious and religious communing wrought within me to a benign and
pleasant issue, and when I went back in the afternoon to dine with the
corporation in the council-room, and looked around me on the bailies, the
councillors, and the deacons, I felt as if I was indeed elevated above
them all, and that I had a task to perform, in which I could hope for but
little sympathy from many; and the first thing I did was to measure, with
a discreet hand, the festivity of the occasion.

At all former and precedent banquets, it had been the custom to give vent
to muckle wanton and luxurious indulgence, and to galravitch, both at
hack and manger, in a very expensive manner to the funds of the town. I
therefore resolved to set my face against this for the future; and
accordingly, when we had enjoyed a jocose temperance of loyalty and
hilarity, with a decent measure of wine, I filled a glass, and requesting
all present to do the same, without any preliminary reflections on the
gavaulling of past times, I drank good afternoon to each severally, and
then rose from the table, in a way that put an end to all the
expectations of more drink.

But this conduct did not give satisfaction to some of the old hands, who
had been for years in the habit and practice of looking forward to the
provost's dinner as to a feast of fat things. Mr Peevie, one of the very
sickerest of all the former sederunts, came to me next morning, in a
remonstrating disposition, to enquire what had come over me, and to tell
me that every body was much surprised, and many thought it not right of
me to break in upon ancient and wonted customs in such a sudden and
unconcerted manner.

This Mr Peevie was, in his person, a stumpy man, well advanced in years.
He had been, in his origin, a bonnet-maker; but falling heir to a friend
that left him a property, he retired from business about the fiftieth
year of his age, doing nothing but walking about with an ivory-headed
staff, in a suit of dark bluecloth with yellow buttons, wearing a large
cocked hat, and a white three-tiered wig, which was well po