"At length thrusting his hand within the side of his coat, he drew forth a roll of manuscript which he opened, and rising, read in a rich, deep, full, sonorous voice his opening address to Congress. His enunciation was deliberate, justly emphasized, very distinct, and accompanied with an air of deep solemnity as being the utterance of a mind conscious of the whole responsibility of its position, but not oppressed by it. There was ever about the man something which impressed one with the conviction that he was exactly and fully equal to what he had to do. He was never hurried; never negligent; but seemed ever prepared for the occasion, be it what it might. In his study, in his parlor, at a levee, before Congress, at the head of the army, he seemed ever to be just what the situation required. He possessed, in a degree never equaled by any human being I ever saw, the strongest, most ever-present sense of propriety." In the early part of Washington's administration, great complaints were made by political opponents of the aristocratic and royal demeanor of the President. Particularly, these complaints were about the manner of his receiving visitors. In a letter Washington gave account of the origin of his levees: "Before the custom was established," he wrote, "which now accommodates foreign characters, strangers, and others, who, from motives of curiosity, respect for the chief magistrate, or other cause, are induced to call upon me, I was unable to attend to any business whatever; for gentlemen, consulting their own convenience rather than mine, were calling after the time I rose from breakfast, and often before, until I sat down to dinner. This, as I resolved not to neglect my public duties, reduced me to the choice of one of these alternatives: either to refuse visits altogether, or to appropriate a time for the reception of them.... To please everybody was impossible. I, therefore, adopted that line of conduct which combined public advantage with private convenience.... These visits are optional, they are made without invitation; between the hours of three and four every Tuesday I am prepared to receive them. Gentlemen, often in great numbers, come and go, chat with each other, and act as they please. A porter shows them into the room, and they retire from it when they choose, without ceremony. At their first entrance they salute me, and I them, and as many as I can talk to."