Unnamed Negroes in Frenchman's Bend

Although in other Yoknapatawpha fictions the population of Frenchman's Bend is almost entirely white, local Negroes appear in "By the People" and again in The Mansion in two ways. The "roistering gang" that Clarence Snopes leads frequently "beats Negroes" (89, 328). When Clarence becomes the Bend's constable, he also hits the "first few Negroes who ran afoul of his new official capacity . . . with the blackjack he carried or the butt of the pistol which he now officially wore" (89, 329).