As a matter of fact there never lived a man of greater natural dignity, of finer manners or more courtly grace when he wished than Andrew Jackson, in spite of his violent outbursts of passion at times. In 1858, one of the finest old ladies of New Orleans told this story to James Parton: The new aide-de-camp, Mr. Livingston, as he rode from the parade ground by the General’s side, invited him home to dinner. The General promptly accepted the invitation. It chanced that the beautiful and gay Mrs. Livingston, the leader of society then at New Orleans, both Creole and American, had a little dinner party that day, composed only of ladies, most of whom were young and lively Creole belles. Livingston had sent home word that General Jackson had arrived, and that he should ask him to dinner, a piece of news that threw the hospitable lady into consternation. “What shall we do with this wild General from Tennessee?” whispered the girls to one another, for they had all conceived that General Jackson, however becoming he might comport himself in an Indian fight, would be most distressingly out of place at a fashionable dinner party in the first drawing-room of the most polite city in America. He was announced. The young ladies were seated about the room. Mrs. Livingston sat upon a sofa at the head of the apartment, anxiously awaiting the inroad of the wild fighter into the regions sacred hitherto to elegance and grace. He entered, erect, composed, bronzed with long exposure to the sun, his hair just beginning to turn gray, clad in his uniform of coarse blue cloth and yellow buckskin, his high boots flapping loosely about his slender legs, he looked the very picture of a war-worn noble commander. He bowed to the ladies magnificently, who all arose at his entrance as much in amazement as politeness. Mrs. Livingston advanced to meet him. With a dignity and grace seldom equaled, never surpassed, he went forward to meet her, conducted her back to the sofa and sat by her side. The fair Creoles were dumb with astonishment. In a few minutes dinner was served and the General continued during the progress of the meal to converse in an easy, agreeable manner, in the tone of society, of the sole topic of the time—the coming invasion. He assured the ladies that he felt perfectly confident of defending the city, and begged that they would give themselves no uneasiness in regard to it. He arose soon and left the table with Mr. Livingston. In one chorus the young ladies exclaimed: “Is this your backwoodsman? Why, madam, he is a prince.” Jackson had indeed arrived, but never did a defender find so helpless and utterly unprepared a city. The city was a bickering, divided thing, not a fortification, not a battery mounted, not an idea even, and scarcely any law. And scared stiff.