United Grand Lodge.

UNITED GRAND LODGE .

THE RECENT ATTEMPT ON THE LIFE OP HER MAJESTY THE QUEEN . IT is with great pleasure we draw attention to the fact that a Special Communication of Grand Lodge has heen summoned for 6 p . m ., on Wednesday next , the 15 th

instant , by command ot ms Royal Highness the Pnnce of Wales Most Worshipful Grand Master , when the following resolution will be submitted by His Royal Highness—we presume in person—namely :

" That an address be respectfully presented to Her Most Gracious Majesty the Queen , expressive of the horror and indignation felt by all Free and Accepted

Masons under this Grand Lodge , at the recent atrocious outrage committed on Her Majesty , and of their deep sense of gratitude at Her Majesty ' s happy escape under Divine Providence . "

This resolution , expressing , as it does in a few lines , the feelings of the whole English Craft as to the dastardl y outrage offered so recentl y to Her Majesty , will certainly commend itself to the unanimous voice of our Masonic Parliament , and , we feel assured , will be passed by the

brethren with every possible demonstration of applause . The Queen is the daughter of a former Grand Master of the Craft , H . R . H . the Dnke of Kent ; the niece of three other illustrious Masons , of whom two were G . Masters , namely , George Prince of Wales , and the Duke of Sussex ,

aud two Grand Patrons , namely , the same George Prince of Wales , afterwards George IV ., and William IV . ; and , above all , the mother of our present Grand Master and his brothers in Masonry as well as in blood , the Dukes of Connanght and Albany , both Past Grand Wardens of

England . But quite apart from these claims on the sympathy of the Craft must be noted the unswerving and inalienable loyalt y of the Craft of Masons , a loyalty which , we anticipate with solid reason , will be expressed with the utmost devotion on Wednesday next . God save the Queen !

Occasional Papers.—No. Viii.

OCCASIONAL PAPERS . —No . VIII .

— : o : — IN CONTINUATION OF " OUR EARLY GRAND MASTERS . "

( Continued from p 98 . ) I will now turn aside from the continuous historic sketch ot the first and chiefest of our English Grand Lodges , in order to tell von , as brieflv as possible , about another

lasomc Body , which during some portion of last century fasted m the North of England , and about certain other jmportanfc . events in the history of the Craft . Though P to the period we have reached our prosperity had e " unexam pled , it must not for one moment be

Occasional Papers.—No. Viii.

imagined that all within the palo of the Society had gone on smoothly and harmoniously . The Masons in London were not the only Masons in England . The Grand Lodge in London was regarded as the supremo controlling body in the greater part of England , but it could not be described

as representing the whole of the Masonic Body in England . During all this time , and indeed for several years anterior to the establishment of the London Grand Lodge , there had existed in the ancient city of York a Lodge of Freemasons , though it had never interfered with the

organisation of Masonry in the South , and even when the London Grand Lodge granted a charter or warrant of constitution to a new Lodge in Durham in the year 1724 , had allowed the matter to pass without objection . Other Lodges had been subsequently constituted in tho North of England

by the Southern Grand Lodge , without provoking any opposition from its Northern sister , though in the year 1725 the York Lodge , whose President had theretofore

rejoiced in the title of Master or President , assumed to itself the title of " Grand Lodge of ALL England , " Bro . Charles Bathurst being the first of its Chiefs who enjoyed the distinction of Grand Master . It is about this York Grand

Lodge I now propose to give you some particulars . As most of you are aware , no English city is so intimately associated with the history and traditions of the Craft of Freemasonry as the City of York . It comes not within my province to inquire what , if any , importance

must be attached to the value of tho Athelstane legend as an historical truth . Let it suffice for my present purpose if I state that just as it is known on the authority of Ashmole that in the first half of the seventeenth century there was a Lodge of Masons in existence at Warrington ,

in Lancashire , and that in the year 1682 , just five-andtbirty years after the date of his inibiation in the said Warrington Lodge , he was summoned to attend a Lodge of Freemasons in London ; and just as , if Dr . Plat's statement in his " History of Staffordshire " is true , there were

Lodges of Freemasons in that counby about the latter year , though unfortunately no record of their existence has been preserved to us ; so in York there was a Lodge whose records from 1712 are still saopdly preserved among the archives of the present " Y & k " Lodge . It is not , of

course , to be supposed that'this old York Lodge sprang into existence all of a sudden . Its earliest records relate , as I have said , to the year 1712 , but it is only reasonable to infer that it had been in active working for many years previously . On reference to " Kenning ' s Masonic

Cyclopaedia , " I find it stated , at pp 652-3 , under the head of " York MSS ., " that in an inventory of 1779 of the " Regalia , Records , & c , belonging to the Grand Lodge of all England " are enumerated the following : No . 1 . A Parliament roll in three slips , containing tho Constitutions ,

and by an endorsement appears to have been found in Pontefract Castle at the demolition , ancl given to the Grand Lodge by Bro . Drake , " who was appointed J . G . Warden on 27 th December 1725 , when the Lodge

constituted itself " Grand Lodge , " and Grand Master on its revival in 1761 ; " No . 2 . Another like roll in three slips , endorsed ' Constitutions of Masonry . ' No . 3 . A parchment roll of charges on Freemasonry , 1630 . No . 4 . A paper roll of charges on Masonry , 1693 , given to the

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