Miss Cutts entered into the enjoyment of the wealth and position which her marriage with Stephen A. Douglas gave her, with the regal manner of a princess. Her toilettes were of the richest and at all times were models of taste and picturesqueness. The effect she produced upon strangers was invariably one of instant admiration. Writing to me in 1863, my cousin, Mrs. Paul Hammond (who, before her marriage, had spent a winter with me at Washington), thus recalled her meeting with the noted beauty: “Yesterday, with its green leaves and pearl-white flowers, called to my memory how Mrs. Douglas looked when I first saw her. She was receiving at her own house in a crêpe dress looped with pearls, and her hair was ornamented with green leaves and lilies. She was a beautiful picture!” I had the pleasure, on one occasion, of bringing together Mrs. Douglas and Miss Betty Beirne, the tallest and the shortest belles of their time. They had long desired to meet, and each viewed the other with astonishment and pleasure. Miss Beirne, who afterward became the wife of Porcher Miles of South Carolina, was one of the tiniest of women, as Mrs. Douglas was one of the queenliest, and both were toasted continually in the capital. During the incumbency of Mr. Crampton, he being a bachelor, few functions were given at the British Embassy which ladies attended. Not that the Minister and his suite were eremites. On the contrary, Mr. Crampton was exceedingly fond of “cutting a figure.” His traps were especially conspicuous on the Washington avenues. Always his own reinsman, the Minister’s fast tandem driving and the stiffly upright “tiger” behind him, for several years were one of the sights of the city. In social life the British Embassy was admirably represented by Mr. Lumley, Chargé d’Affaires, an affable young man who entered frankly into the life of the city and won the friendly feeling of all who met him. He was one of the four young men who took each the novel part of the elephant’s leg at a most amusing impromptu affair given by Mrs. George Riggs in honour of the girl _prima donna_, Adelina Patti. It was, I think, the evening of the latter’s début in “la Traviata.” Her appearance was the occasion of one of the most brilliant audiences ever seen in Washington. Everyone of note was present, and the glistening of silk and the flash of jewels no doubt contributed their quota of stimulus to the youthful star. Within a day of the performance, Senator Clay and I received a note from Mrs. Riggs, inviting us informally, not to say secretly, to an after-the-opera supper, to meet the new diva and her supporting artists. We responded cordially and drove to the Riggs residence shortly after the close of the performance.