The mental agitations of people living in towns and in less remote parts of the country, caused by the work of secession as it progressed, were painfully shared by many older and conservative persons. They could not bear the thought of a dissolution of the Union, and in some instances were moved by it to tears, alternating with anger. As the possibility of so dire an event grew in their apprehensions, they shrank back from witnessing its occurrence, as one might do from looking on at the death of a beloved kinsman.[16] But the dwellers in the more mountainous parts of East Tennessee, “far from the madding crowd,” were comparatively free from all such agitations and griefs. In the autumn of 1860 a Colporteur of the Knoxville Bible Society[17] distributed the Book among the people of Scott County, Tennessee, a very elevated region near the Kentucky border line. On returning home, he made a report of his labors to Mr. C.,--Depositary of the society,--who greatly deplored the possible destruction of the Union. The Colporteur soon afterwards met another Unionist, and said: “Do you know that Mr. C. is going to Scott County to live?” The other, knowing Mr. C. to be a person of wealth, who would by such an exchange lose comfortable surroundings, answered: “No! how is that?” “O,” said the Colporteur, “I told him that I asked the people over in Scott County ‘how were times with them,’ and they said, ‘not very good.’ I inquired if that was because of the troubles in the country? They asked, ‘what troubles?’ I said: ‘Troubles to the Union. Haven’t you heard that South Carolina has seceded?’ They answered, ‘no!’” “Now,” the Colporteur added, “I told this to Mr. C. and he says he is going to Scott County to live: for if the Union should be dissolved, _he will never hear of it over there_.” CHAPTER VI. THE STATE FOR THE UNION--A STRANGER IN TOWN--SECESSION OF TENNESSEE PRE-ARRANGED--BIBLICAL CO-INCIDENCE--UNION ORATORS--AN ASSASSINATION. “Between the acting of a dreadful thing And the first motion, all the interim is Like a phantasma, or a hideous dream; The genius and the mortal instruments Are then in council; and the state of a man, Like to a little kingdom, suffers then The nature of an insurrection.” SHAKS.; _Julius Cæsar_.