nto the flames by the maddened populace. None the less were the
Yankee invaders held responsible.

Every Northern man represented some form or phase of an authority which
these luckless people horribly hated, and to which they submitted only
because, and in so far as, they had to. Fancy such a community, utterly
without the restraints of law and with no means of ascertaining public
opinion--for newspapers were not--denied even the moral advantage of the
pulpit! Considering what human nature has the misfortune to be, it is
wonderful that there was so little of violence and crime.

As the carcass invites the vulture, this prostrate land drew adventurers
from all points of the compass. Many, I am sorry to say, were in the
service of the United States Government. Truth to tell, the special agents
of the Treasury were themselves, as a body, not altogether spotless. I
could name some of them, and some of their assistants, who made large
fortunes by their opportunities. The special agents were allowed
one-fourth of the value of the confiscated cotton for expenses of
collection--none too much, considering the arduous and perilous character
of the service; but the plan opened up such possibilities of fraud as have
seldom been accorded by any system of conducting the public business, and
never without disastrous results to official morality. Against bribery no
provision could have provided an adequate safeguard; the magnitude of the
interests involved was too great, the administration of the trust too
loose and irresponsible. The system as it was, hastily devised in the
storm and stress of a closing war, broke down in the end, and it is
doubtful if the Government might not more profitably have let the
"captured and abandoned property" alone.

As an instance of the temptations to which we were exposed, and of our
tactical dispositions in resistance, I venture to relate a single
experience of my own. During an absence of my chief I got upon the trail
of a lot of cotton--seven hundred bales, as nearly as I now
recollect--which had been hidden with so exceptional ingenuity that I was
unable to trace it. One day there came to my office two well-dressed and
mannerly fellows who suffered me to infer that they knew all about this
cotton and controlled it. When our conference on the subject ended it was
past dinner time and they civilly invited me to dine with them, which, in
hope of eliciting information over the wine, I did. I knew wel