Contents.

CONTENTS .

LEADERS 431 Thc "Royal Gloucester" Royal Arch Chapter , Southampton , 1783 . 1 SS 3 431 The Pentalpha and Hexapla 432 Grand Lodgeof South Australia 433 Proceedings of the Grand Lodge of Mark Master Masons of England and Wales , & c 433 Masonic Libraries 433 CORRESPONDENCEArnold Testimonial 43 S The Order of St . John of Jerusalem 435 A Query . ' 43 S St . John ' s Festival 435 The Six-pointed and the Five-pointed

Stars 435 Reviews 436 REPORTS OF MASONIC MEETINGSCraft Masonry 436 Instruction 437 Royal Arch 437 Malta 437 South Africa 437

New Zealand 437 Hampshire and Isle of Wight — Chine Lodge , No . 1 SS 4 438 Annual Summer Excursion of thc Granite Lodge , No . 2028 438 Presentation to Bro . thc Rev . C . W . Arnold , P . G . Chap , of Fngland 438 Masonic " Silver Wedding " Presentation to the Earl and Countess of Lathom ... 43 S Summer Outing of Gravesend Lodges 43 8 Masonic Bazaar at Chacewater 438 Masonic Charity in West Lancashire 43 8 Southampton Masonic Benevolent Association 43 s Roval Masonic Benevolent Institution 439

The West Lancashire Alpass Masonic Institution ., 439 All Honour to thc Foundations 439 A Canadian Masonic Worthy 439 Thc Craft Abroad 439 Obituary 439 Masonic and General Tidings 4 . 10 Lodge Meetings for Next Week Cover .

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BRO . R . MORRIS propounds certain suggestions in the American Masonic papers anent what he terms " The Consolidation of Lodges , " which , though American in idea and aim , have some interest for Masonic readers in the " old country . " The Grand Lodgeof Kentucky is , we understand , considering the question , which has arisen in this way . There are in Kentucky , as

in other jurisdictions , strong lodges and weak lodges , and the bright idea has occurred to some one to endeavour to " level up" the lodges , and to consolidate the lodges by breaking up the weak lodges , or combining them , making" linked battalions , "and , in short , endeavouring to turn weakness into strength . Now , we confess we are struck with two or three points greatly

in such a question and correspondence . First , we note the little account made of lodge " esprit de corps , " reality , and independence ; secondly , the enormous powers of interference and suppression given to a Grand Lodge ; and , thirdly , the inversion , as it seems to us , of the whole tenour and current of Masonic life and history . We have often observed before the little

respect which seems now to prevail on the American Continent in respect of the actuality of lodge individualism , if we may so speak . The Grand Lodge is everything ; the private lodge nothing in comparison . With us it is entirely different ; the private lodge is the unit of life , membership , and existence ; and with it Grand Lodge interferes , by sumptuary laws or

meddlesome provisions , as little as it possibly can . And , considering that the Grand Lodge is , after all , only an organization of units , —for no Grand Lodge is real or true which does not represent a body of lodges , —we arc not surprised that such should be the case . There have been bodies which , as private lodges , declared themselves Grand Lodges ; but they have not

lasted , or , if they still exist , they are really not in any sense properly in the category of Grand Lodges . All Grand Lodges , to be real and true , must rest on the lawful principles of representation and the universal basis of constituting lodges , assembled and organized in a lawful manner . And while no doubt it is the fact , as we said before , that there are weak and

strong lodges , we utterly deny the right of any Grand Lodge , without a gross interference with the normal , and chartered , and contracted right of the lodge , to interfere with its numbers , or to endeavour to affix a needful minimum to lodge membership . The original charter constitutes a contract between two bodies , which henceforth stand in a distinct relationship

to each other , and so long as the terms of that covenant are carried out , there is no right or power for Grand Lodge to intervene , and any such action is "ipso facto , ultra vires , " and cannot be sustained , except on the two adages that " might makes right , " or that " tyranny must be submitted to . " We know a case , as an illustration of how this question works often , where

a worthy brother for many years was almost the sole upholder of a charter , hoping for better times . Those times came , and now that body is a most flourishing one , and numerically strong , and working thoroughly . All lodges have times of " refreshing "and "depression , " of prosperity and adversity , and to lay down any minimum of strength , or to break up a lodge because it is

weak , and consolidate it with another lodge , or to force its members to join some other Iodge , seems to us such an ignoring of Masonic law and life , such a forgetfulness of the enduring principles of Masonic justice , propriety , and reasonability , that before the movement extends in America , we are glad to be able to raise a humble protest in the ever constitutional

pages of the English Freemason . We hope Bro . MORRIS will reconsider the question , and that we shall hear that such a proposition is given up at ° nce . If persevered with or extended , we feel sure it will seriously affect

American Freemasonry . In England many lodges advisedly limit their numbers , and the tendency of late years has been to deprecate overgrown lod ges . What the Kentucky minimum of Iodge membership is to be we know not ; but sure we are of this , that by no such principles of " consolida-

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tion , " which constitute a direct interference with the guaranteed rights of private lodges , can lodge membership be permanentl y increased , or weak lodges rendered strong . * * * THE great difficulty which ever attaches itself to the entirety of thc pure

Guild theory—that is , medkeval Guilds emerging from the Roman Colleges , —• is the actuality of transmission of secret formulx , and the identity of teaching , aim , and general developement . In 1717 we find a Society existing , in England , with secret forms of symbolism , and union , and organization . Whence comes it ? Whither does it hail from ? We reject absolutely and

emphatically the so-called 1717 theory of origin , as utterly unworthy of our real and great Order , and as equally incompatible with all the known facts of the case . We feel it is an utter impossibility , historically and realistically , and that it is utter waste of time to attempt to deal seriously with such an absurd conclusion , such a patent paradox ! But assuming that we can , as we think

we can , throw back breemasonr } ' to seventeenth century and even sixteenth century Guilds , how much farther can we go ? And here begins our Crux . Of even the seventeenth and sixteenth century we know very little indeed so far , —the Guilds were , but we have so far very little traces extant , avowedly and openly , of English lodges so late as 1646 , the date of ASHMOLE '

initiation , nor even of 16 S 2 , when a lodge meeting was held in London . We need hardly remark that of the fourteenth , thirteenth , twelfth , and eleventh centuries we know still less . Lodges and Guilds existed wilh a Norman-French or Latin terminology , as it would seem ; but what they were , what they taught , we know positively next to nothing . We seem to

gather from York and Westminster fabric rolls and MOLASII ' S Register , that they were organized and were divided into Masters , Fellows ( socii ) , and Apprentices , and that they were connected with conventual bodies . Our earliest Masonic witness is quite early fifteenth if not late fourteenth century , and seems to point to a carefully organized body , with a power of

making laws for its own members . But between the fall of the Roman Empire and the twelfth century , three waves of invasion , destruction , and change had passed over England , —Saxon , Danish , and Norman French . And how were the Guilds preserved through these centuries ? The Romans , no doubt , when they left the island left behind them their municipal customs

and colleges , and the Saxons , whether derivatively or indigenously , seem to have taken the Guild system under their active protection . In the seventh century there was , both north and south , in England , a great revival of the building art b y foreign workmen , introduced directly from Gaul , and who no doubt did " Roman work" in the " Roman way , " as taught

to the Gaulish workmen and their fathers by migrating bodies of the old Roman colleges . About the seventh century special privileges seem to have been accorded to the Building Guilds by Kings and others , just as in the ninth century ATHELSTAN did the same in England . Hoi'E seems to opine that the offshoots of the Roman colleges , who settled in Lombardy ,

Germany , and Gaul , took with them certain peculiar forms of the Romish colleges , which certainly run ' * on all fours" with Masonic customs , and objects , and formulae still . And FINDEL thinks and FORT avers that these

bodies were taken up by the Conventual bodies and guided , controlled , and re-organised by them . But here we must stop for to-day . Next week we will seek to show what is now known of the Roman colleges , and then go on to the Conventual regime .

The "Royal Gloucester"Royal Arch Chapter, Southampton, 1783-1883.

THE " ROYAL GLOUCESTER " ROYAL ARCH CHAPTER , SOUTHAMPTON , 1783-1883 .

WILLIAM JAMES HUGHAN . The Royal Gloucester Lodge , No . 130 , then No . 174 , was formally constituted on April 22 , 1772 , at Southampton , by Grand Secretary Dickey , of the " Atholl " Grand Lodge . The regular Grand Lodge , however , had warranted the Lodge of Concord , in the same town , in 177 6 , and through the intervention of the R . W . Bro . Thomas Dunckerley , the members of the Atholl Ancient Lod

or ge decided to join the regular or Modern Grand Lodge , a warrant being issued to them in 1792 as No . 503 . Both lodges were called by the same name (;' . s . 174 and 503 ) , and were each worked according to the fancy of the members , who in 179 S decided to " drop " the " Modern " Constitution , and only to support the " Ancient " warrant . In 1802 , however , two sets of " Returns " were made , so as to conciliate both Grand Lodges ; in June of the following year it was agreed to continue the

"Atholl " Constitution only ; but in September the action was reversed , and so they went on , evidentl y determined to have •' two strings to their bow , " until the consummation of the Union of December 1813 , when it was finally decided to hold fast to the " Atholl" charter of 1772 , by which stroke of policy the lodge was numbered 212 on the roll , whereas the "Modern " warrant would have only obtained the number 537 . The Lodge of Concord was not allowed to work the Royal Arch Degree ,