money bears the stain of the blood of starving people. They are ready to give up, or to spring some desperate scheme of resistance"
The old man lifted his massive head and his great jaws came together with a snap:
"Resistance to the authority of the National Government?"
"No; resistance to the travesty of government and the mockery of civilisation under which we are being throttled! The bayonet is now in the hands of a brutal Negro militia. The tyranny of military martinets was child's play to this. As I answered your call this morning, I was stopped and turned back in the street by the drill of a company of negroes under the command of a vicious scoundrel named Gus who was my former slave. He is the captain of this company. Eighty thousand armed Negro troops, answerable to no authority save the savage instincts of their officers, terrorise the state. Every white company has been disarmed and disbanded by our scalawag Governor. I tell you, sir, we are walking on the crust of a volcano!"
Old Stoneman scowled, as the doctor rose and walked nervously to the window and back.
"An appeal from you to the conscience of the North might save us," he went on, eagerly. "Black hordes of former slaves, with the intelligence of children and the instincts of savages, armed with modern rifles, parade daily in front of their unarmed former masters. A white man has no right a negro need respect. The children of the breed of men who speak the tongue of Burns and Shakespeare, Drake and Raleigh, have been disarmed and made
