“The dance was opened by Gen. Jackson and the beautiful Miss McNairy. It was difficult to tell which was most to admire, the beauty and sylph-like grace of Miss McNairy, or the stately step and courtly manners of Gen. Jackson.” Mrs. Thomas Martin, whose narrative is quoted by Guild, in describing the ball said: “The old and the young were there, and the scene was one of beauty, fashion, and smiles. On a dais at one end of the hall were the guests and the old ladies—Gen. Lafayette with Mrs. Rachel Jackson, Gov. Carroll, with Mrs. Shelby, Gen. Jackson, with Mrs. Priestly and Mrs. Carroll, George W. Lafayette with Mrs. Stewart and Mrs. McNairy, and Mr. Shelby with Mrs. Minnick and myself....” Stories of the ball are still recounted with delight in Nashville, and in many of the old families are fans, combs, dresses, and the gay little slippers of belles who “danced with Lafayette.” But most interesting of all is the description of Lafayette’s reception at the Hermitage, from the pen of his secretary, M. Levasseur: “At one o’clock we embarked with a numerous company to proceed to dine with General Jackson, whose residence is a few miles up the river. We there found numbers of ladies and farmers from the neighborhood, whom Mrs. Jackson had invited to partake of the entertainment she had prepared for General Lafayette. The first thing that struck me on arriving at the General’s was the simplicity of his house. Still somewhat influenced by my European habits, I asked myself if this could really be the dwelling of the most popular man in the United States, of him whom the country proclaimed one of her most illustrious defenders; of him, finally, who by the will of the people was on the point of becoming her Chief Magistrate.... “General Jackson,” Levasseur continues, “successively showed us his garden and farm, which appeared to be well cultivated. We everywhere remarked the greatest order and most perfect neatness; and we might have believed ourselves on the property of one of the richest and most skillful German farmers, if, at every step, our eyes had not been afflicted by the sad spectacle of slavery. Everybody told us that General Jackson’s slaves were treated with the greatest humanity....”