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1789.]

VIEWS OF ADAMS AND HAMILTON.

11

France and that of the definitive treaty with Great Britain to be added.

The President on levee days to give informal invitations to family dinners; not more than six or eight to be asked at a time, and the civility to be confined essentially to members of the legislature, and other official characters:-the President neve. to remain long at table.

The heads of departments should, of course, have access to the President on business. Foreign ministers of some descriptions should also be entitled to it. "In Europe, I am informed," writes Hamilton, "ambassadors only have direct access to the chief magistrate. Something very near what prevails there would, in my opinion, be right. The distinction of rank between diplomatic characters requires attention, and the door of access ought not to be too wide to that class of persons. I have thought that the members of the Senate should also have a right of individual access on matters relative to the public administration. In England and France peers of the realm have this right. We have none such in this country, but I believe it will be satisfactory to the people to know that there is some body of men in the state who have a right of continual communication with the President. It will be considered a safeguard against secret combinations to deceive him. "*

The reason alleged by Hamilton for giving the Senate this privilege, and not the Representatives, was, that in the constitution "the Senate are coupled with the President in certain executive functions, treaties, and appointments. This makes

*Hamilton's Works, vol. iv., p. 3.

them in a degree his constitutional counsellors, and gives them a peculiar claim to the right of access."

These are the only written replies that we have before us of Washington's advisers on this subject.

Colonel Humphreys, formerly one of Washington's aides-decamp, and recently secretary of Jefferson's legation at Paris, wa at present an inmate in the presidential mansion. General Kno was frequently there; to these Jefferson assures us, on Wash ington's authority, was assigned the task of considering and pre scribing the minor forms and ceremonies, the etiquette, in fact, to be observed on public occasions. Some of the forms proposed by them, he adds, were adopted. Others were so highly strained that Washington absolutely rejected them. Knox was no favorite with Jefferson, who had no sympathies with the veteran soldier, and styles him "a man of parade," and Humphreys, he appears to think captivated by the ceremonials of foreign courts. He gives a whimsical account, which he had at a second or third hand, of the first levee. An ante-chamber and presence room were provided, and, when those who were to pay their court were assembled, the President set out, preceded by Humphreys. After passing through the ante-chamber, the door of the inner room was thrown open, and Humphreys entered first, calling out with a loud voice, "The President of the United States." The President was so much disconcerted with it that he did not recover in the whole time of the levee, and, when the company was gone, he said to Humphreys, “Well, you have taken me in once, but by shall never take me in a

second time."

you

This anecdote is to be taken with caution, for Jefferson was

1789.]

APOCRYPHAL ANECDOTE.

13

disposed to receive any report that placed the forms adopted in a disparaging point of view.

A

He gives in his Ana a still more whimsical account on the authority of "a Mr. Brown," of the ceremonials at an inauguration ball at which Washington and Mrs. Washington presided in almost regal style. As it has been proved to be entirely incorrect, we have not deemed it worthy an insertion. splendid ball was in fact given at the Assembly Rooms, and another by the French Minister, the Count de Moustier, at both of which Washington was present and danced; but Mrs. Washington was not at either of them, not being yet arrived, and on neither occasion were any mock regal ceremonials observed. Washington was the last man that would have tolerated any thing of the kind. Our next chapter will show the almost casual manner in which the simple formalities of his republican court originated.

CHAPTER III.

JOURNEY OF MRS. WASHINGTON TO NEW YORK-HONORS PAID HER IN HER PROGRESS-RECEPTIONS AT THE SEAT OF GOVERNMENT-THE PRESIDENT'S

EQUIPAGE.

On the 17th of May, Mrs. Washington, accompanied by her grandchildren, Eleanor Custis and George Washington Parke Custis, set out from Mount Vernon in her travelling carriage with a small escort of horse, to join her husband at the seat of government; as she had been accustomed to join him at headquarters, in the intervals of his revolutionary campaigns.

Throughout the journey she was greeted with public testimonials of respect and affection. As she approached Philadelphia, the President of Pennsylvania and other of the State functionaries, with a number of the principal inhabitants of both sexes, came forth to meet her, and she was attended into the city by a numerous cavalcade, and welcomed with the ringing of bells and firing of

cannon.

Similar honors were paid her in her progress through New Jersey. At Elizabethtown she alighted at the residence of Governor Livingston, whither Washington came from New York to meet her. They proceeded thence by water, in the same splendid

1789.]

MRS. WASHINGTON IN NEW YORK.

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barge in which the general had been conveyed for his inauguration. It was manned, as on that occasion, by thirteen master pilots, arrayed in white, and had several persons of note on board. There was a salute of thirteen guns as the barge passed the Battery at New York. The landing took place at Peck Slip, not far from the presidential residence, amid the enthusiastic cheers of an immense multitude.

On the following day, Washington gave a demi-official dinner, of which Mr. Wingate, a senator from New Hampshire, who was present, writes as follows: "The guests consisted of the Vice President, the foreign ministers, the heads of departments, the Speaker of the House of Representatives, and the Senators from New Hampshire and Georgia, the then most Northern and Southern States. It was the least showy dinner that I ever saw at the President's table, and the company was not large. As there was no chaplain present, the President himself said a very short grace as he was sitting down. After dinner and dessert were finished, ɔne glass of wine was passed around the table, and no toast. The President rose, and all the company retired to the drawing-room, from which the guests departed, as every one chose, without ceremony."

On the evening of the following day, (Friday, May 29th,) Mrs. Washington had a general reception, which was attended by all that was distinguished in official and fashionable society. Henceforward there were similar receptions every Friday evening, from eight to ten o'clock, to which the families of all persons of respectability, native or foreign, had access, without special invitation; and at which the President was always present. These assemblages were as free from ostentation and restraint as the ordinary receptions of polite society; yet the reader will find they

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