Someone from a balcony nearby interrupted: "In other words, sir, you
break the law in order to uphold the law. What more are the Vigilantes
doing?"

The crowd went wild over this response. The confusion became worse.
Upholders of Law and Order thrust forward Judge Campbell in the hope
that his age and authority on the bench would command respect. He was
unable, however, to utter even two consecutive sentences.

"I once thought," he interrupted himself piteously, "that I was the free
citizen of a free country. But recent occurrences have convinced me that
I am a slave, more a slave than any on a Southern plantation, for they
know their masters, but I know not mine!"

But his auditors refused to be affected by pathos.

"Oh, yes you do," they informed him. "You know your masters as well as
anybody. Two of them were hanged the other day!"

Though this attempt at home to gain coherence failed, the partisans at
Sacramento had better luck. They collected, it was said, five hundred
men hailing from all quarters of the globe, but chiefly from the
Southeast and Texas. All of them were fire-eaters, reckless, and sure to
make trouble. Two pieces of artillery were reported coming down the
Sacramento to aid all prisoners, but especially Billy Mulligan. The
numbers were not in themselves formidable as opposed to the enrollment
of the Vigilance Committee, but it must be remembered that the city was
full of scattered warriors and of cowed members of the underworld
waiting only leaders and a rallying point. Even were the Vigilantes to