It seems strange that after this success Irving should have hesitated to adopt literature as his profession.  But for two years, and with leisure, he did nothing.  He had again some hope of political employment in a small way; and at length he entered into a mercantile partnership with his brothers, which was to involve little work for him, and a share of the profits that should assure his support, and leave him free to follow his fitful literary inclinations.  Yet he seems to have been mainly intent upon society and the amusements of the passing hour, and, without the spur of necessity to his literary capacity, he yielded to the temptations of indolence, and settled into the unpromising position of a “man about town.”  Occasionally, the business of his firm and that of other importing merchants being imperiled by some threatened action of Congress, Irving was sent to Washington to look after their interests.  The leisurely progress he always made to the capital through the seductive society of Philadelphia and Baltimore did not promise much business dispatch.  At the seat of government he was certain to be involved in a whirl of gayety.  His letters from Washington are more occupied with the odd characters he met than with the measures of legislation.  These visits greatly extended his acquaintance with the leading men of the country; his political leanings did not prevent an intimacy with the President’s family, and Mrs. Madison and he were sworn friends.

It was of the evening of his first arrival in Washington that he writes:  “I emerged from dirt and darkness into the blazing splendor of Mrs. Madison’s drawing-room.  Here I was most graciously received; found a crowded collection of great and little men, of ugly old women and beautiful young ones, and in ten minutes was hand and glove with half the people in the assemblage.  Mrs. Madison is a fine, portly, buxom dame, who has a smile and a pleasant word for everybody.  Her sisters, Mrs. Cutts and Mrs. Washington, are like two merry wives of Windsor; but as to Jemmy Madison,—­oh, poor Jemmy!—­he is but a withered little apple john.”

Odd characters congregated then in Washington as now.  One honest fellow, who, by faithful fagging at the heels of Congress, had obtained a profitable post under government, shook Irving heartily by the hand, and professed himself always happy to see anybody that came from New York; “somehow or another, it was natteral to him,” being the place where he was first born.  Another fellow-townsman was “endeavoring to obtain a deposit in the Mechanics’ Bank, in case the United States Bank does not obtain a charter.  He is as deep as usual; shakes his head and winks through his spectacles at everybody he meets.  He swore to me the other day that he had not told anybody what his opinion was, whether the bank ought to have a charter or not.  Nobody in Washington knew what his opinion was—­not one—­nobody; he defied any one to say what it was —­anybody—­damn the one!