The walls are covered with portraits of the Presidents and their wives. All these portraits are interesting.
Mrs. John Adams bewailed the unfinished condition of the house, and used the now famous East Room for drying the family linen.
Of all the noble matrons who have graced the White House, Abigail Adams was the wisest and greatest. Her letters make her the Madam de Sévigné of our land. Her letter (written February, 1797) to her husband, who had just succeeded Washington, sounds like the voice of an oracle. We quote a portion: "You have this day to declare yourself head of a nation. 'And now, O Lord, my God, thou hast made Thy servant ruler over the people; give unto him an understanding heart, that he may know how to go out and come in before this great people; that he may discern between good and bad. For who is able to judge this Thy so great a people?' were the words of a royal sovereign, and not less applicable to him who is invested with the Chief Magistracy of a nation, tho he wear not a crown nor the robes of royalty. My thoughts and my meditations are with you, tho personally absent, and my petitions to heaven are that 'the things which make for peace may not be hidden from your eyes.' My feelings are not those of pride or ostentation upon this occasion. They are solemnized by a sense of the obligations, the important trusts, and numerous duties connected with it. That you may be enabled to discharge them with honor to yourself, with justice and impartiality to your country, and with satisfaction to this great people, shall be the daily prayer of yours—"
The first New-year's reception at the White House was held by President Adams in 1801. Mrs. Adams kept up the stately, ceremonious customs established by President and Mrs. Washington. It was her son, John Quincy Adams, as Monroe's Secretary of State, who was afterward to write out a definite code for almost every public ceremony. This code is largely in force at the present time.
Martha Washington comes into history simply as the wife of a great man, but Abigail Adams was inherently a superior woman. Of all the women who occupied the White House she, only, gave the country a son who became a great man, and occupied the highest position in the gift of his country.
After John Adams came Thomas Jefferson, who had imbibed ultra-democratic ideas in the French Revolution. The ceremonies which prevailed in the Washington and Adams period were temporarily laid aside by this plain Virginia gentleman. He received the formal dames of the land in his riding-suit, covered with dust, riding-whip in hand, and with clanking spurs on his heels. His lovely daughter, Martha Jefferson Randolph, did her best to give the great house the air of a pleasant home. She succeeded well, and Jefferson's accomplished daughter smoothed many of the asperities existing among public men who had lived through the Revolution and suffered from the jealousies, misunderstandings, and injustices of the times.
Mrs. Dolly Madison was probably the greatest social genius that has ever occupied the White House. The papers of that day declare "Mrs. Madison is the most popular person in the United States."
Washington social life yet abounds in pleasing legends of her graceful, courteous kindness, not only to the gentlemen and ladies of the legations, but to the ignorant and socially unskilled who were among her worshipers. James Fenimore Cooper, in a private letter, gives a picture of the White House in the days of James Monroe:
"The evening at the White House, or drawing-room, as it is sometimes pleasantly called, is, in fact, a collection of all classes of people who choose to go to the trouble and expense of appearing in dresses suited to an evening party. I am not sure that even dress is very much regarded, for I certainly saw a good many there in boots.... Squeezing through a crowd, we achieved a passage to a part of the room where Mrs. Monroe was standing, surrounded by a bevy of female friends. After making our bow here, we sought the President. The latter had posted himself at the top of the room, where he remained most of the evening shaking hands with all who approached. Near him stood the Secretaries and a great number of the most distinguished men of the nation. Beside these, one meets here a great variety of people in other conditions of life. I have known a cartman to leave his cart in the street and go into the reception-room to shake hands with the President. He offended the good taste of all present, because it was not thought decent that a laborer should come in a dirty dress on such an occasion; but while he made a mistake in this particular, he proved how well he understood the difference between government and society."
The Monroes came to the White House after it had been restored after the burning in 1814. It was barely furnished at that time, and contained but few conveniences for entertaining. Mrs. Monroe brought furniture directly from Paris, which she used for the East Room. This has been frequently upholstered, and constitutes part of the handsome furniture at the present time.