Here a crowd of friends had gathered to welcome in the new administration. Mr. Madison’s emotions had been a good deal stirred by what had passed at the Capitol, but his manner was affable. His wife was all herself as usual. She was attired in a plain cambric dress with a very long train, and a bonnet of purple velvet and white satin, adorned with white plumes. Jefferson seems to have been, for such time as he stayed, quite as much the lion of the occasion as his successor. Presently he slipped quietly away and went over to the President’s House, where the empty halls echoed to his footsteps; for he had given all the servants a holiday so that they could see the show. But he did not remain long alone; the news spread among his old friends that he had gone back to bid his home of eight years farewell, and they followed him after a little. In the evening he went to the inaugural ball--the first ever held, and the only ball of any sort he had attended since his return from France. From all accounts it was not a highly enjoyable affair. The room was so crowded that it was difficult to elbow one’s way across it; nobody could see what was going on without standing on a chair; the air became stifling, and when an attempt was made to freshen it by letting down the upper sashes of the windows, they would not move, so nothing was left but to smash the glass. Mrs. Madison was almost crushed to death; Madison was so tired that he confessed to a friend that he wished he were abed; and as soon as supper was over, the Presidential party withdrew. The younger set stayed and danced till midnight, when, at the stroke, the music ceased and the attendants began to put out the lights. The social success achieved by Dolly Madison as official hostess through so large a part of Jefferson’s administration did not wane when, with the rise of her husband to the head of the Government, she came into her own by right instead of by courtesy. Her first term as mistress of the President’s House was a continuous blaze of gayety, in which we catch fleeting glimpses of her in a variety of toilets, the most truly typical being a buff velvet gown with pearl ornaments and a Paris turban topped with a bird-of-paradise plume. Then came the second war with Great Britain and the wrecking of the city.