Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: IV "the Great Little Madison" The widow of John Todd returned to Philadelphia bowed down by the trouble which had fallen so suddenly upon her young life; but in the fact that her life was young lay the secret of its swift rebound. Her sunny nature could not, if it would, tarry forever in the shadow, and her radiant youth refused to walk long in weeds. She was now twenty-five ; still young in all her feelings and with the added independence of the matron. It was in her widowhood that Dolly Todd found her girlhood, and within a few months after her husband's death we see her the centre of her little social world, and so universally admired that her friend jestingly bids her: " Hide thy face — there are so many staring at thee!" In estimating Dolly Todd's social position and financial condition at this time we pass again into the cloud of obscurity which hangs about all her early life. The biographers of Madison speak of him as marrying a wealthywidow, and sketches of her own life represent her as on the crest of the wave of fortune and fashion. For my own part I find more interesting, as well as more credible, the witnesses who picture her in a humbler sphere, as going hack with her little boy to live with her mother, and like the faithful, devoted daughter she was, to help her in the occupation of keeping boarders which John Payne's loss of property had made necessary for this Virginia lady as a means of support. The seat of Government was now established in Philadelphia, and as the distance of the remoter parts of the country from the capital, combined with the difficulty of travel, kept the families of many public men at home, Representatives, Senators, and other officials were scattered about at taverns, more pretentious hotels, or boarding-houses. Very uncomfortable... --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.