He was so far of civic or public character as to be postmaster at Boston, when we were first neighbors, but this Officiality was probably so little in keeping with his nature that it was like a return to his truer self when he ceased to hold the place, and gave his time altogether to his history.
"Entire PG Edition of The Works of William Dean Howells"
William Dean Howells
Each sentence that fell from the retired hosier and the old almond-merchant, who stood on his right and left respectively, fell sweetly on his ears; and, leaning back in the mayor's arm-chair, steeped in the odour of Officiality which pervaded the room, he bowed to the right and to the left, like a royal pretender whom a coup d'etat is about to convert into an emperor.
"The Fortune of the Rougons"
Emile Zola