limb the steps. The Mayor sat at his desk, which had been
placed just behind the railing in the court room, and mildly lectured
each applicant as he or she came up. "This state of affairs is terrible,
but it's your own fault. White people were born to rule, and you to
obey. We liberated you and we can re-enslave you. Freedom and Yankee
advice have ruined a good many of you. What's your name, old Aunty?" he
asked an old woman who came limping up. "Maria Tapp'n, marster,"
answered the old woman courtesing. "That's right, you haven't lost your
manners," said the Mayor with a smile, writing out for her an order for
a double portion. "Emulate these old mammies and uncles, who know their
places, and you will have no trouble. Next!" "Ef ther's eny who needs er
double po'tion hits ther widders an' orphans," said a policeman gently,
pushing a little woman in black before the Mayor's desk. "Whose widow
are you?" asked the Mayor. "Was your husband killed in the
riots?--resisting arrest, I suppose." "This is ther widder of Dan
Wright," answered the policeman; "an' ef Wilmin'ton had er had a hundred
niggers like that, we uns would er had er diff'ant tale ter tell. He was
ded game." "Dan Wright," repeated the Mayor slowly. "He's ther darkey
that drawed er bead on an' defied we uns ter the las'," said the
policeman pushing the woman away, and pushing another up to the desk.
But the Mayor neither answered nor looked up. One by one they continued
to come up to receive their orders and pass out; but the executive
looked them no more in the face, nor essayed to speak. The crowd slowly
dwindled away until the last applicant had passed out. The Mayor laid
his pen upon the desk before him, leaned back in his chair, raised his
feet upon the desk, and fell into a reverie. The doings of the past few
days came back to his mind in all their shocking significance. The
curses, the groans, the agonizing cries of the bereaved and the dying
sounded a hundred-fold more voluminous and heart-rending. Then the
bloody form of Dan Wright appeared with hands uplifted, eyes staring at
his murderers, the blood streaming from a hundred wounds.

The Mayor had seen hard service in war, was one of the immortal few who,
under the leadership of Pickett, made that gallant but futile charge at
Gettysburg, to be driven back for a third time, crushed, mangled and
defeated. He doubtless assisted in digging the trenches into which those
ghastly remnants that told of the ca