rnal_ appeared, in which she criticised what
she had seen and heard with a free hand, but "'twas pretty Fanny's
way," and no one got angry over her silly twaddle. One of the fair
author's predictions concerning the fate of our polity yet awaits
fulfillment. "It is my conviction," said she, "that America will
be a monarchy before I am a skeleton." Fifty years have passed
since these words were written, and the prophetess has developed
into a portly matron, anything but a skeleton, and very unlike the
slender Miss of Jackson's time.

When Jefferson was President, the agricultural town of Cheshire,
in Western Massachusetts, which had been drilled by its Democratic
pastor, named Leland, into the unanimous support of the Sage of
Monticello, determined to present him with the biggest cheese that
had ever been seen. So on a given day every cow-owner brought his
quota of freshly made curd to a large cider-press, which had been
converted into a cheese-press, and in which a cheese was pressed
that weighted one thousand six hundred pounds. It was brought to
Washington in the following winter on a sled, under the charge of
Parson Leland, and in the name of the people of Cheshire, was
formally presented to President Jefferson in the then unfinished
East Room. Jefferson, of course, returned thanks, and after having
a great wedge cut from the cheese, to send back to the donors, he
invited all present to help themselves. The cheese was variegated
in appearance, owing to so many dairies having contributed the
curd, but the flavor was pronounced the best ever tasted in
Washington.

Jackson's admirers thought that every honor which Jefferson had
ever received should be paid to him, so some of them, residing in
a rural district of New York, got up, under the superintendence of
a Mr. Meacham, a mammoth cheese for "Old Hickory." After having
been exhibited at New York, Philadelphia, and Baltimore, it was
kept for some time in the vestibule at the White House, and was
finally cut at an afternoon reception on the 22d of February, 1837.
For hours did a crowd of men, women, and boys hack at the cheese,
many taking large hunks of it away with them. When they commenced,
the cheese weighted one thousand four hundred pounds, and only a
small piece was saved for the President's use. The air was redolent
with cheese, the carpet was slippery with cheese, and nothing else
was talked about at Washington that day. Even the scandal about
the