Still haggard from his recent personal loss, the President-elect set
out for Washington, at the middle of January, 1829. With him went his
nephew, Andrew Jackson Donelson, who was to be his private secretary;
Mrs. Donelson, who was to preside over the executive mansion; an
accomplished niece of Mrs. Jackson, who was to be of social
assistance; an artist by the name of Earl, who resided at the White
House throughout Jackson's two Administrations, engaged continually in
painting portraits of the General; and, finally, the faithful Major
Lewis, whose intention was merely to attend the inauguration and then
return to his plantation. The puffing little steamboat on which the
party traveled down the Cumberland and up the Ohio was saluted and
cheered a hundred times a day; at Louisville, Cincinnati, and
Pittsburgh there were great outpourings of demonstrative citizens.
Duff Green, one of the party managers, proposed that a great cavalcade
should meet the victor at Pittsburgh and escort him by relays to the
capital. On Van Buren's advice the plan was abandoned. But as the
party passed along the National Road toward its destination it was
accorded an ovation which left nothing to be desired as an evidence of
the public favor.

Arrived in Washington, on the 11th of February--the day on which the
electoral votes were counted in the Senate--Jackson and his friends
found temporary lodgings at the Indian Queen Tavern, commonly known as
"the Wigwam." During the next three weeks the old inn was the scene of
unwonted activity. Office seekers besieged it morning, noon, and
night; politicians came to ask favors or give advice; exponents of
every sort of cause watched for opportunities to obtain promises of
presidential support; scores of the curious came with no other purpose
than to see what a backwoods President looked like. "The city is full
of speculation and speculators," wrote Daniel Webster to his