"The House People of the walled towns represent as nearly as may be the
middle classes of the ancient civilization. Originally, the family was
the political and social unit, just as with the patriarchs of Holy Writ,
but within the last generation the community idea has been growing
rapidly, and there are perhaps a score of towns and villages scattered
along the banks of the Greater and Lesser rivers.

"The Stockaders, reversing the procedure of their kinsmen of the towns,
live apart from one another, each proprietor depending wholly upon his
own resources for sustenance and defence. Some of the larger estates
contain several hundred acres enclosed by a strong timber stockade and
otherwise defended against the assaults of enemies. The head of the
family, or clan, as it might more properly be termed, is lord paramount
within his own borders, even possessing the rights of life and death.
But this last authority is rarely called in exercise, since these folk
of the free country-side are naturally wholesome, honest,
generous-hearted men, content to lead a simple life and coveting no
man's honor or goods. On the other hand, it must be admitted that the
stockade dweller is both provincial of habit and prejudiced of mind. He
looks down upon the townsman as a huckster in private and a shuffler in
public life, and this feeling of contemptuous enmity is fully returned
by the cit, who regards the free proprietor in the light of a boor and a
bully. Moreover, it rankles in the Houseman's breast that no Stockader
pays a farthing of head-money to the treasure-chest of the Doomsmen. Now
and then some well-to-do proprietor may suffer loss from cattle thieving
and rick burning, but as often as not the marauders pay full price for
all they get. And this leads us to a consideration of the Doomsman
himself, that foul excrescence upon our modern body politic.
Fortunately, history here speaks clearly, and we have only to listen to
her voice.

"It was a natural procedure, upon the coming of the Terror, to throw
open the doors of the jails and other punitive institutions, thereby
giving the wretched inmates an equal chance for life. The great mass of
these degraded beings gravitated inevitably towards the cities, seeking
plunder and opportunities for bestial dissipation that even the dread
presence of the Terror could not restrain. Without hope and without
fear, they rushed to the vulture's feast; here was wine and gold and
soft raiment; let us