This ceaseless dwelling on a danger which no thoughtful man thinks impending leads to attacks of popular hysteria in the South. A few months ago in the town of Madison, Ga., it was reported: "Last night great excitement prevailed in Madison caused by the appearance on the electric-light poles in the city of a yellow flag about two feet long, with the word 'Surrender' printed in large letters in the center of it. Women became hysterical and thought it was the sign of a negro uprising. Extra police was installed and it was thought of calling out the military company. At the height of the excitement, it was learned that the signs had been posted as an advertisement by a firm here. Cases have been made against the members of the firm." The real point with regard to social equality is not that the Negro is inferior, but that his inferiority must be made evident at every turn. You may ride beside a negro driver on the front seat of a carriage, because any passerby sees that he is doing your bidding; but you must not sit on the back seat with a Negro who might be a fellow-passenger; you may stop at a Negro's house, if there is absolutely no other place to stay, sit at his table, eat of his food, but he must stand while you sit; else, as one of the richest Negroes in the South said, "the neighbors would burn our house over our heads." The whole South is full of evidence, not so much that the Whites think the Negroes inferior, as that they think it necessary to fix upon him some public evidence of inferiority, lest mistakes be made. It was against such confusion of the character and the color that Governor Andrew protested when he said: "I have never despised a man because he was poor, or because he was ignorant, or because he was black." CHAPTER XIII RACE SEPARATION