The ceremonious days of our first presidents had passed for the democratic time of Jefferson and Jackson; and even under Mr.Van Buren there had been little change from the simplicity which was somewhat our boast.
Washington itself was at that time scarcely more than an overgrown hamlet, not in the least to be compared to the cosmopolitan centers which made the capitals of the Old World.

Formality and stateliness of a certain sort we had, but of luxury we knew little.

There was at that time, as I well knew, no state apartment in the city which in sheer splendor could for a moment compare with this secret abode of a woman practically unknown.

Here certainly was European luxury transferred to our shores.

This in simple Washington, with its vast white unfinished capitol, its piecemeal miles of mixed residences, boarding-houses, hotels, restaurants, and hovels! I fancied stern Andrew Jackson or plain John Calhoun here! The furniture I discovered to be exquisite in detail, of rosewood and mahogany, with many brass chasings and carvings, after the fashion of the Empire, and here and there florid ornamentation following that of the court of the earlier Louis.