The questions of etiquette had been settled by that time, and she performed her social duties with the ease of a Virginia gentlewoman always used to good society.

She found them irksome, however, as such things had long since lost their novelty.

Writing to a friend she said, "I think I am more like a state prisoner than anything else." She was then a grandmother through her children by her first husband.

Although she preferred plain attire, she is described on one occasion as wearing a velvet gown over a white satin petticoat, her hair smoothed back over a moderately high cushion.

It was the fashion of the times for the ladies to tent their hair up to a great height.