contributed to its transformation into a band of Regulators. When the meetings first began to be held in the dilapidated house on the hill, passers-by were frequent. Most of them passed the grim and ghostly sentinel on the roadside in silence, but always with a quickened step. Occasionally one would stop and ask: "Who are you?" In awfully sepulchral tones the invariable answer was: "A spirit from the other world. I was killed at Chickamauga."

Such an answer, especially when given to a superstitious negro, was extremely terrifying, and if, in addition, he heard the uproarous noises issuing from the "den" at the moment of a candidate's investiture with the "regal crown," he had the foundation for a most awe-inspiring story. There came from the country similar stories. The belated laborer, passing after nightfall, some lonely and secluded spot, heard horrible noises and saw fearful sights. These stories were repeated with such embellishments as the imagination of the narrator suggested, till the feeling of the negroes and of many of the white people, at mention of the Ku Klux, was one of awe and terror.

In a short time the Lictor of the Pulaski "den" reported that travel along the road on which he had his post had almost entirely stopped. In the country it was noticed that the nocturnal perambulation of the colored population diminished, or entirely ceased, wherever the Ku Klux appeared. In many ways there was a noticeable improvement in the habits of a large class who had hitherto been causing great annoyance. In this way the Klan gradually realized that the most powerful devices ever constructed for controlling the ignorant and superstitious were in their hands. Even the most highly cultured were not able wholly to resist the weird and peculiar feeling which pervaded every community where the Ku Klux appeared. Each week some new incident occurred to illustrate the amazing power of the unknown over the minds of men of all classes.

Circumstances made it evident that the measures and methods employed for sport might be effectually used to subserve the public welfare-to suppress lawlessness and protect property. When propositions to this effect began to be urged, there were many who hesitated, fearing danger.

The majority regarded such fears as groundless. They pointed to the good results which had already been produced. The argument was forcible—almost unanswerable. And the question was decided without formal action. The very force of circumstances had carried the Klan away from its original purpose. So that in the beginning of the summer of 1867 it was virtually, though not yet professedly, a band of regulators, honestly, but in an injudicious and dangerous way, trying to protect property anď preserve. peace and order.1

After all, the most powerful agency in effecting this transformation, the agency which supplied the conditions under which the two causes just mentioned became operative, was the peculiar state of affairs existing at the South at that time.

1 "It originated with returned soldiers for the purpose of punishing those negroes who had become notoriously and offensively insolent to white people, and, in some cases, to chastise those white skinned men who, at that particular time, showed a disposition to affiliate socially with negroes. The impression sought to be made upon these latter was that these white-robed night prowlers were the ghosts of the Confederate dead, who had arisen from their graves in order to wreak vengeance on an undesirable class of both white and black men."-Ryland Randolph.

As every one knows, the condition of things was wholly anomalous, but no one can fully appreciate the circumstances by which the people of the South were surrounded except by personal observation and experience; and no one who is not fully acquainted with all the facts in the case is competent to pronounce a just judgment on their behavior. On this account, not only the Ku Klux, but the mass of the Southern people, have been tried, convicted and condemned at the bar. of public opinion, and have been denied the equity of having the sentence modified by mitigating circumstances, which in justice, they have a right to plead.

At that time the throes of the great revolution were settling down to quiet. The almost universal disposition of the better class of the people was to accept the arbitrament which the sword had accorded them. On this point there was practical unanimity. Those who had opportunity and facilities to do so, engaged at once in agricultural, professional or business pursuits. There was but little disposition to take part in politics.

But there were two causes of vexation and exasperation which the people were in

no good mood to bear. One of these causes related to that class of men who, like scum, had been thrown to the surface in the great upheaval.1

It was not simply that they were Union men from conviction. That would have been readily forgiven then, as can be shown by pointing to hundreds of cases. But the majority of the class referred to had played traitor to both sides, and were Union men now only because that was . the successful side. And worse than all, they were now engaged in keeping alive discord and strife between the sections, as the only means of preventing themselves from sinking back into the obscurity from which they had been upheaved. Their conduct was malicious in the extreme and exceedingly exasperating. These men were a "thorn in the flesh" of the body, politic and social; and the effort to expel it set up an inflammation which for a time awakened the gravest apprehensions as to the result.

The second disturbing element was the negroes. Their transition from slavery to citizenship was sudden. They were

1 The class called "tories" during the Civil War. They should not be confused with the genuine Unionists.-Editor.