d, it was not
deemed dishonest, nor in any sense immoral, to reply negatively. The oath
of secrecy which members (voluntarily) took upon themselves when they
entered the Klan was supposed to extinguish the guilt of this
transaction, though we are not told precisely in what way the _double
entendres_ and tricks of evasion, practised by such witnesses at
subsequent stages of the trial, were to be construed.

But as we shall have occasion to refer to this topic from time to time, as
the work progresses, we will not at present allude further to the subject
of Ku-Klux trials and their furniture of fiction.

The Klan was thoroughly organized. There were no patch-spots in its system
of government. Its tactics of drill were in some sense peculiar, but it
sufficiently resembled that adopted by the cavalry branch of the United
States army to be mistaken for it in all the leading manoeuvres. The men
were perfect in company drill, and were required to attend all Den
meetings, or be assessed onerous fines or other penalties. Absenteeism was
not, however, one of the strong points of the brotherhood; and a Den
rarely moved towards raiding territory without its full quota of men. The
raids moved with astonishing celerity--a circumstance which was rendered
necessary to the most perfect secrecy of these movements, and was also
imperative in view of the long distances to be traversed. The hours
between twilight in the evening and dawn, according to a Medean law of the
K. K. K., as we have anticipated, could only be appropriated to this
labor; and when it is explained that companies of men frequently left the
Den rendezvous for raiding objectives forty miles distant, and returned
to the former point without dismounting, our conclusion above will be seen
to be authorized.

The Grand Cyclops was not only the chief of the Den Council and an
absolutist in authority as to its domestic affairs, but was also the chief
officer in command of a raid, and must have been looked to for all special
directions regarding its conduct. The Exchequer possessed a similar
prerogative, and became the orderly or adjutant on the march.

The Klan was the bitter enemy of those unorganized parties of ruffians who
made war on their kind in the former's name, and the sum of whose
villanies never failed to be debited in this way. Hardly a week passed,
during the excitement which gave rise to both, and which they, in turn,
converted into a reign of terror whose stron