Correspondence

of the Craft , such application , with testimonials , to be lodged at Freemasons' Hall , Edinburgh , not later than Saturday , 10 th inst . Tho appointment was thus at the last moment thrown open , to all intents and purposes , to qualified candidates , under the English as well as tho Scotch Constitution , and then only did I consider myself at liberty to enter the field . At some considerable expenditure of time I

procured most powerful testimonials from many friends , some of them brethren holding or having held the highest executive offices in the Grand Lodge of England , and , by advice , I personally visited Edinburgh , on the 10 th inst ., to deposit my testimonials with formal application , naturally imagining that an advertisement issued under authority of the Grand Lodge of Scotland , or its Grand Committee , was bona fide ,

and that , accordingly , every candidate would bo placed at the election upon an equally fair footing . To my surprise , I soon discovered that the appointment was really a foregone conclusion , and had been so for some weeks . That tho two most important of the native candidates had , from the date of the vacancy , enjoyed the advantages of a very powerful organisation , distributing among members of tha

Grand Lodge ( the elective body in Scotland , ) fervid appeals and copies of testimonials , & c , receiving as a result , and by active canvass a large majority of promises j and that even the greater number of the brethren constituting the Grand Committee had actually pledged themselves to one or other of thoso candidates , even before waiting to ascertain the result of the advertisement they themselves had

sanctioned . It was therefore evident , notwithstanding my name was placed as one of the three on the short or reduced list , I had not the slightest prospect of success on the day of election , and , indeed , I was given to understand , that although my qualifications and testimonials were most unexceptionable and important , it was feared they would prove of little avail against personal influence 5 and further , that I was

so very late in the field , although I fail to see how I could well have presented myself before being invited . Now I would not be considered so impertinent as to presume , for one moment , to say a single word as to the choice of Grand Lodge , but I do contend I have a perfect right to complain of the manner by which the result was arrived at . The advertisement was either real or

—may I say delusive ? It can scarcely pretend to have been the former in face of what I have stated , and it is therefore the more to be regretted that it was allowed to appear , seeing that it could only havo one effect—that of misleading . These are the facts which , not only in justice to myself , but for the information of my Masonio friends , I think it well to make known ,

and I shall be mistaken if , in face of these facts , it is not admitted that instead of having suffered what , without this explanation , might be regarded as an overwhelming defeat , I have every reason to be justified at having , as an English Mason , received the support of even BO few independent brethren in Scotland . My experience may , perhaps , enable the brethren in England to estimate the value of such advertisements in future .

Yours fraternally , W . B . HEATH , London , 29 th March 1877 . P . M . 198 , 504 . , & c , & c

THE COMMEMORATIVE LIFEBOATS . To the Editor of THE FREEMASON ' CHRONICLE . DKAR SIR AND BROTHER , —On the motion being recently carried in Grand Lodge relative to the endowment of two lifeboats to celebrate the safe return of our Grand Master from India , I hoped that tho county of Devon might have had the hononr of having one appropriated to it , and , by an Exeter paper , I am sorry to find my hope

will be realised . The expression may seem strange , but it is a true one , for I find that it is proposed to place one at Hope Cove , at the eastern extremity of Bigbury Bay . I am not quite sure that it would be of the slightest use in such a position , for recently " Lucretius , " whose nom de plume is well known to the National Lifeboat Institution and to tbe Board of Trade , when examining the coast , arrived

at the conclusion that Dartmouth waa the only spot between Torbay and Plymouth where a lifeboat , to be of any use , should be placed , a steam tug being always available thero . I fancy such arrangement has been made , and that a lifeboat is projected for Dartmouth , but still such boat would be useless for Hope . The assertion , however , remains the same ( I was going to say the fact , but I do not pledge

myself to its accuracy ) , that the only spot where a lifeboat could be of any use is at Dartmouth . I would , though earnestly desirous of seeing one of the boats appropriated to the county , sooner find that it was stationed at the furthest extremity of the kingdom , or anywhere , where one single life might be saved , than placed where it might prove but a useless luxury . Before the matier is settled , it

would be well to be sure that a boat would be of service at Hope . I know the coast is a very dangerous one , and a lifeboat is a necessity , but do not let one be stationed unless it can be of use when wanted . There is one now at Salcombe , not five miles from the proposed spot as the crow flies , and I should like to know if , during the years it has been established , it has ever saved a

single life , or been off to a single wreck , or been manned in a single storm ? I am not disparaging the valour of the Salcombe men ( I believe there is no fixed crew ) , for they might as well attempt to navigate the boat on land as put out to sea without the aid of a steamer in a storm . What I want is , before tho

establishment of a lifeboat at Hope , that the Craft may be assured that the money so liberally and unanimously voted may be invested to the very best advantage . We shall have no gratification in knowing that We have given and endowed a lifeboat . Our gratification will be that the lifeboat we have given and endowed shall be the means of saving the lives of many cast upon our rock-bound coast . I am , yours fraternally , March 26 . 1877 . A SOUTH DEVON P . M .

Correspondence

CRAFT MASONRY AND THE HIGH GRADES . To the Editor of THE FREEMASON ' S CHRONICLE . DEAR SIR AND BROTHER , —Tho seal of which Bro . Whytehead speaks in his letter of last week is , undoubtedly , a very curious relio of former days . But let me ask him , Is he justified in arriving at the conclusion that it is an official seal ? May it not have been a mere

trinket worn by some brother who was a Craft , Arch , and Templar Mason ? The combination of Craft with Arch is not so surprising , for under the " Ancients" tho Arch degrees wero worked under the warrants of Craft Lodges . Templarism , moreover , was patronised by the most august personages during the last century , as a correspondent

of yours showed indirectly in connection with the late Bro . Dunok . erley . Nor , if he turn to the pages of Bro . Hughan ' s Old Charges of British Freemasons will he have any reason to wonder at the occur , rence on this seal of the Letters I . H . S . In these Charges , the threo persons of the Christian Trinity are invoked severally and in their usual order . Yours fraternally , P . T . T .

ETIQUETTE . To the Editor of THE FREEMASON ' S CHRONICLE . DEAR SIR AND BROTHER , —Kindly inform me what the Masonio etiquette is in the following case : —A brother sued another in the

county court of this town for the value of a work on Masonry , lent and lost . A third brother , who is high in office in the Province , acted as solicitor to the plaintiff . I want to know if it was not his duty as a Mason to refuse to have anything to do with the case .

I am , Dear Sir and Brother , yours truly , A PROVINCIAL OFFICER Stonehouse , Devon , 27 th March .

[ We fear , in this case , that t « mper has been introduced . So trivial a matter should not have been allowed to go to extremes . The solicitor might say , so far as he was concerned , it was a matter of bust ness . —ED . P . O . ]

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