Famous American Belles of the Nineteenth Century

by Virginia Tatnall Peacock

When he entered Congress, though he was but twenty-nine years old, the chapter of sentiment had already closed for him, and it was never reopened during a long life, the greater part of which was passed in the gaze of a scrutinizing public. This fact alone is sufficient to render him unique in the estimation of a people who have a primitive love for the story where all ends happily.

There was nothing in Buchanan's appearance nor in his attitude towards life in general that suggested the tragic episode of his youth. It is only in retrospect that we realize the glamour it cast over his subsequent years. Nature reacts through various channels, and in him she sought her outlet in an unabating mental activity. He was a student all his life.

To the world he was a man of somewhat grave appearance, a typical anglo-saxon, immaculate in his dress, conservative in his speech, and yet with a grace and dignity of manner that added much to the distinction with which he represented his country at the court of Russia in 1832, and again twenty-one years later at the court of St. James.

His attitude towards women was that of chivalric regard, and the close relationship he bore to one of the most beautiful women of her period, being both her uncle and guardian, displays one of the most interesting sides of his character. Much of the charm that attaches to the history of the more conspicuous years of his public career emanates from Harriet Lane. No woman has ever presided in the White House who roused so universal an interest, unless it was Mrs. Cleveland, as did Buchanan's niece.

Her countrymen honored her in every conceivable way, and her name was a household word. Vessels of war and of peace bore it to foreign shores. Clubs, streets, houses, and even articles of dress were named after her.

There was a majestic isolation about both Harriet Lane and James Buchanan. Death had stripped them both,—Buchanan in his youth of the woman who might have rounded out his life, and Harriet Lane, one by one, of mother, father, sister, and brothers. She came into the White House bearing the burden of personal loss in the recent death of her only sister. As she came out of it the travail of coming war had already cast its shadow upon the nation.

Yet, socially, the White House was never so brilliant as it was during the administration of Buchanan. "The White House," said Jefferson Davis, referring later to his last days in Washington, "under the administration of Buchanan approached more nearly to my idea of a republican court than the President's house had ever done before, or since the days of Washington."

A picture that the people seemed never to tire of looking upon was of the grave bachelor-President with his beautiful niece beside him doing the honors of the nation. She was at the climax of her glorious womanhood during the period she passed in the White House. Contact with the world, together with her recent touch of sorrow, had worn away the angles of her youthful exuberance. She had attained a golden maturity, and with a perfection of physical development she united a dignity and a confidence in herself restful to behold. "Every motion," Mary Clemmer wrote of her at that time, "was instinct with life, health, and intelligence. Her head and features were cast in noble mould, and her form, which at rest had something of the massive majesty of a marble pillar, in motion was instinct alike with power and grace."

She had a warmth of coloring that further bore out the idea of abundant health. Her hair was of a golden-brown hue, and worn always with that absolute simplicity which best became her well-shaped head. Her eyes were of a deep violet and her mouth was faultlessly beautiful, with its full red lips and upward curve.

She was as discreet, said one of her admiring critics, as she was beautiful, and her uncle's confidence in her was without bounds. Even as a little child, when falling far short in many respects of his somewhat austere ideals of propriety, she had inspired in him a reverence for her absolute truthfulness. "She never told a lie," he once said, in speaking of her childhood; "she had a soul above deceit or fraud. She was too proud for it."