There are two curious legends relating to Aaron Burr. They serve to
show that his reputation became such that he could not enjoy the
society of a woman without having her regarded as his mistress.

When he was United States Senator from New York he lived in
Philadelphia at the lodging-house of a Mrs. Payne, whose daughter,
Dorothy Todd, was the very youthful widow of an officer. This young
woman was rather free in her manners, and Burr was very responsive in
his. At the time, however, nothing was thought of it; but presently
Burr brought to the house the serious and somewhat pedantic James
Madison and introduced him to the hoyden.

Madison was then forty-seven years of age, a stranger to society, but
gradually rising to a prominent position in politics--"the great little
Madison," as Burr rather lightly called him. Before very long he had
proposed marriage to the young widow. She hesitated, and some one
referred the matter to President Washington. The Father of his Country
answered in what was perhaps the only opinion that he ever gave on the
subject of matrimony. It is worth preserving because it shows that he
had a sense of humor:

For my own part, I never did nor do I believe I ever shall give advice
to a woman who is setting out on a matrimonial voyage ... A woman very
rarely asks an opinion or seeks advice on such an occasion till her
mind is wholly made up, and then it is with the hope and expectation of
obtaining a sanction, and not that she means to be governed by your
disapproval.

Afterward when Dolly Madison with, her yellow turban and kittenish ways
was making a sensation in Washington society some one recalled her old
association with Burr. At once the story sprang to light that Burr had
been her lover and that he had brought about the match with Madison as
an easy way of getting rid of her.

There is another curious story which makes Martin Van Buren, eighth
President of the United States, to have been the illegitimate son of
Aaron Burr. There is no earthly reason for believing this, except that
Burr sometimes stopped overnight at the tavern in Kinderhook which was
kept by Van Buren's putative father, and that Van Buren in later life
showed an astuteness equal to that of Aaron Burr himself, so that he
was called by his opponents "the fox of Kinderhook." But, as Van Buren
was born in December of the same year (1782) in which Burr was married
to Theodosia Prevost, the story is utterly improbable when w