Lord Ickenham had not filed to observe this, but the discovery did nothing to weaken his resolution. Though fond of Sir Raymond Bastable, he found much to disapprove of in him. He considered the eminent barrister pompous, arrogant, and far too pleased with himself.
Nor in forming this diagnosis was he in error. There may have been men in London who thought more highly of Sir Raymond Bastable than did Sir Raymond Bastable, but they would have been hard to find, and the sense of being someone set apart from and superior to the rest of the world inevitably breeds arrogance. Sir Raymond's attitude toward those about him - his nephew Cosmo, his butler Peasemarch, his partners at bridge, the waiters at the Demosthenes and, in particular, his sister, Phoebe Wisdom, who kept house for him and was reduced by him to a blob or tearful jelly almost daily - was that of an irritable tribal god who intends to stand no nonsense from his worshipers and is prepared, should the smoked offering fall in any way short of the highest standard, to say it with thunderbolts.
(from Cocktail Time, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)
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