ARE YOU AN AYAK?

Auckland Star, Volume LIV, Issue 47, 24 February 1923, Page 19

ARE YOU AN AYAK?

SECRET SIGN'S IX MYSTIC CIRCLE. Usually the very name of the Ku Klux Klan Society strikes only terror into the hearts of those who hear it mentioned, and humour is net at all thought about in connection with it. Nevertheless, Americans are getting some fun out* of the Society's existence, and. Incidentally, adding to the peculiarities of the country's language. Of course, as Is now well known, the Ku Klux Klan have a mystic means of i ommunication all their own. For instance, Quite recently one of its organisers revealed the portentous fact that "Hullo, Cap," which ordinarily is an abbreviation of the familiar "Hullo, Captain," now stands for "Keep America Protestant."

The revelations of these secret signs have led to the discovery by humorous writers that the streets and homes of American cities are reverberating with similar cryptic greetings. For Instance, negroes have been overheard recently using the form ot address "Hullo, Man," thus conveying the message, '■Make American negro." Children, too, are constantly exclaiming, "Maw, maw," or "Make America wet." while servants and shop assistants keep reiterating the word "Mam" In evident admonition "To make America Mormon," or "Make American Methodist." Ridicule, however, is for the moment powerless to diminish the zest with which grown-up men are playing the game of the Ku Klux Klan. For their membership, carrying with it a nightgown embroidered with a cross and a nightcap with eyeholes, tney pay a fee of two guineas, and in return for this they are Initiated into the mysticisms of the Ku Klux vocabulary which makes possible such delightful "klonversations" as the following:— Ayak: Are you a klansman? Kla Klansman: I am. Xykar: Name your Han and realm. Kony: Klan one, New York. Tag: Password and grip (the grip Is a shake of the left hand with the right). Kigy: Klansman, I greet you. Yitsub: Yours is the sacred unfailing bond.