on
of the Executive Mansion, was somewhat above the medium height,
and of slender figure, with long limbs and great activity of
movement. His thin auburn hair turned white during his term of
office, his nose was large and prominent, his eyes were of a bluish-
gray, his lips were thin, and his cheeks sunken. His manners were
those of the old school of Virginia gentlemen, and he was very
courteous to strangers. The ceremonious etiquette established at
the White House by Van Buren vanished, and the President lived
precisely as he had on his plantation, attended by his old family
slaves. He invariably invited visitors with whom he was acquainted,
or strangers who were introduced to him, to visit the family dining-
room and "take something" from a sideboard well garnished with
decanters of ardent spirits and wines, with a bowl of juleps in
the summer and of egg-nog in the winter. He thus expended nearly
all of his salary, and used to regret that it was not larger, that
he might entertain his guests more liberally.

One day President Tyler joked Mr. Wise about his little one-horse
carriage, which the President styled "a candle-box on wheels," to
which the Representative from the Accomac district retorted by
telling Mr. Tyler that he had been riding for a month in a second-
hand carriage purchased at the sale of the effects of Mr. Paulding,
the Secretary of the Navy under Mr. Van Buren, and having the
Paulding coat-of-arms emblazoned on the door-panels. The President
laughed at the sally, and gave orders at once to have the armorial
bearings of the Pauldings painted over. Economy also prompted the
purchase of some partly worn suits of livery at the sale of the
effects of a foreign Minister, and these were afterward worn by
the colored waiters in state dinners.

"Beau" Hickman, as he called himself, made his appearance at
Washington toward the close of the Tyler Administration. He was
of middle size, with long hair, and an inoffensive, cadaverous
countenance. It was his boast that he was born among the slashes
of Hanover County, Virginia, and he was to be seen lounging about
the hotels, fashionably, yet shabbily, dressed, generally wearing
soiled white kid gloves and a white cravat. It was considered the
proper thing to introduce strangers to the Beau, who thereupon
unblushingly demanded his initiation fee, and his impudence sometimes
secured him a generous sum. He was always ready to pilot his
victims to gamblin