The Prov. Grand Lodge Of Cumberland And Westmorland.

At the end of six years tenure of office Bro . Blamire expressed a wisfi to retire , and in doing so he recommended as his successor " James Robert George Graham , Esquire , " better known in later years as the Right Hon . Sir James Graham , Bart ., the eminent statesman , many years AI . P . for Carlisle , successively First Lord of the Admiralty ( three

times ) , and Home Secretary in the Governments of Earl Grey , Sir Robert Peel , the Earl of Aberdeen , and Viscount Palmerston . Sir James Graham had succeeded his father in the Netherby baronetcy in 1823 , but it was two years later before any steps were taken to formally designate the new

Provincial Grand Alaster , when a slight hitch occurred through its being discovered that Sir James was onl y an "Entered Apprentice . " In a letter from one of the Grand Secretaries of the period is the interesting intimation that it " was the wish of the Duke of Sussex ( Grand Alaster ) to have conferred the degrees himself , whenever that distinguished

brother ( Sir James Graham ) might visit London . " In the end , however , the Grand Alaster consented to the " passing and raising" being effected in some lodge in the province over which the prospective Grand Alaster should preside . From this time Sir James Graham , in spite of his onerous

Parliamentary and official duties , was an active Provincial Grand Alaster , and in 18 30 he laid the corner stone of the Cumberland Infirmary at Carlisle . He continued in office till i 860 , when the two counties were constituted a united

province . Glancing briefly at the sister Province of Westmorland , as before remarked , there was but one lodge in the county for nearly a century , and yet a Provincial Grand Alaster was appointed as far back as 1788 . The first holder of the office—a mere sinecure it must necessaril y have been , as it is

very questionable whether a single meeting of the province was ever summoned—was Bro . G . C . Braithwaite , who held the appointment for twenty-two years , and is recorded as having attended Grand Lodge in his first year of office . His successor , for a year only , was Bro . W . H . White , by some

said to be identical with one of the two Grand Secretaries , and by others , a Lincolnshire gentleman . Anyhow , he seems to have been a pluralist like Bro . Dunckerley in the latter part of the eighteenth century , as he was about the same lime ruling the Provinces of Wiltshire and Lincolnshire . In

1814 , Edward , third Lord Hawke , a Yorkshire nobleman , and an ancestor of the present day cricketer , became Provincial Grand Alaster ; but all that is known of his lordship as a Mason of high rank'is ( hat he was a frequent attendee at

Grand Lodge . Lord Hawke resigned in 1824 , and from then to the union of the two counties , Westmorland was without a head . De jure this one lodge province may have had a ruler , but de / ado hardly ever . We now arrive at the united Province of Cumberland and Westmorland , presided over by Sir James Graham for a

single year only , as he died in 1861 , full of honours , added to which he had been chief of the Cumberland Craft for thirtythree years . Looking about for a successor , the late Bro . Frecheville Lawson Ballantine Dykes , of Dovenby Hall , Cumberland , with Norman blood in his veins , was eventually

chosen as the successor to Sir James Graham , for whom he had years before acted as Deputy . Bro . Dy kes was a French Mason , initiated in 1824 in a Paris lodge , styled " Des Amis Constans de la Vraie Lumiere" ( Constant Friends of the True Light ) . A long while ago I had the privilege of

inspecting Bro . D ykes ' s Grand Orient certificate , a very elaborate document compared with those used in British Masonry . The body of it is in French , Latin , German , English , and Italian , and the legend at the head "A la Gloire du Grand Architecte de L'Univers" is in p leasing contrast to

the French divergence of the present degenerate clays . Bro . Dykes ' s death , four years after his appointment , it goes without saying was deeply lamented by his brother Alasons in both counties .

In 1867 a new Provincial Grand Alaster was appointed in the late Earl of Bective , who at that time held the title of Lord Kenlis until the death of his grandfather , the Marquis of Headfort , a prominent Irish Craftsman , whilst his father had been a Grand Warden of Ireland . Lord Bective first " saw light" in the Apollo University Lodge whilst a minor .

His lordship was also first Worshipful Alaster of the Underley Lodge , No . 1074 , at Kirkby Lonsdale , under the banner of which , in 1867 , his installation ceremony , by the late Lord de Tabley , P . G . AI . of Cheshire , assisted by the late Earl of Lathom ( then Lord Skelmersclale ) , P . G . AI . of West Lancashire , was associated . This was probably the largest assembly of the Craft ever held in the province , and the dignified character of the ceremonies , not to omit the

sunip-IIRO . W . D . 1 ' . FIELD , P . G . SECRETARY . luous hospitality of the new Provincial Grand Alaster , will not readily be forgotten by the fast diminishing assemblage privileged to be present on so notable and memorable an occasion in the history of the Craft in the two Borcler counties . Some years after his lordship once more entertained the members of his province at Underley Hall . At