CHAPTER XF
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that evening Jasper had made an engagement to dine with the Tanners Company. The Court, being associated with him in one of his charitable enterprises, had sought to do him honour, and had invited him as the chief outside guest on the annual occasion of their entertaining the Lord Mayor and Sheriffs. He had accepted the invitation under the compulsion of public affairs. At all times he disliked these elaborate banquets. The profusion of food and drink shocked his ascetic habit of mind. The gastronomic talk and the gross feeding around him awakened a physical aversion. He was uninfluenced by the mellow atmosphere of good-fellowship. In this respect he lacked the civic instinct, and could not appreciate the principle that a full stomach maketh a full heart. To him it was no p
