While such precautions were taken, and no doubt proved of vast service in enabling the Order to resist that crusade of the ermined ranks to which we have referred, the leaders of the K. K. K. succeeded in obtaining, from the membership at large, a very important concession in morals affecting this subject, and one which we believe has been hitherto resisted by the draft of secret societies on this continent, viz., an obligation to disregard judicial oaths where they conflicted with the plans and policy of the Order. To illustrate this point, a leading form of the interrogatory propounded to witnesses in these trials was: "Are you aware of the existence of a secret political organization known as the Ku Klux Klan?" and though parties thus addressed were often possessed of the most incontestable evidence of the truth sought to be elicited, 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.