The wedding followed so closely upon the tragedy as to cause wide criticism, and this, together with her antecedents, condemned Mrs. Eaton to social ostracism. Left to themselves, Eaton’s colleagues of the Cabinet would have ignored the circumstances of his marriage, but the ladies of their families declared that they would have nothing to do with the bride. Van Buren, as a widower with no daughters, felt free to act as he pleased; and Jackson, remembering what his own wife had endured, gallantly espoused the cause of Mrs. Eaton and gave the hostile Secretaries their choice between accepting her or resigning their portfolios, whereupon the Cabinet went promptly to pieces. Being a man of means, Van Buren did a good deal of entertaining for Mrs. Eaton’s benefit, and also inspired those members of the diplomatic corps who were unaccompanied by ladies to join him in “floating” her. The British Minister was a bachelor, so was the Russian Minister; but, though the dinners and balls which they gave attracted many feminine guests who were flattered by being invited, they were not wholly successful. Madam Huygens, wife of the Dutch Minister, for instance, was induced to attend a ball, but when escorted to the supper table found that she was expected to sit next but one to Mrs. Eaton and would have to exchange a few words with that lady. Instantly she placed her arm in that of her husband and withdrew with him from the room. When the story was told to Jackson, he rose in his wrath and declared that he would send Huygens home to Holland; but he never carried out the threat. Viewed in historical perspective, Jackson appears to have been a man of tremendous force, thoroughly patriotic, conscientious in even his most wayward conceptions of duty, unlearned but not illiterate, and above all things hating treachery. He handled the sword with more facility than the pen, and some of his correspondence, reproduced with its crudities of syntax and spelling, would make the better educated angels weep. Conscious of his scholastic shortcomings, he rarely attempted anything original in writing or speaking, except on public questions; and when his autograph was sought in the albums which were the fashionable fad of the day, he borrowed his sentiments from the Presbyterian hymn-book, quoting, as Miss Martineau recalls, “stanzas of the most ominous import from Dr. Watts.”