Use Of The Word Freemason.

USE OF THE WORD FREEMASON .

IN my letter to the Freemason , November 26 th , of last year , from want of space I could do no more than give mere extracts of the different documents so often referred to . The most important one , which owing to imperfect references has been so difficult to trace , forms a portion of a series of volumes of collections made by Rymer , but of which no more than the titleo were printed at the end of Vol . XVII of his Foedera , London 1717 , in the Syllabus sen Index Actorum Manuscriptorum quae LIX Voluminibns compacta ( Prater XVII Tomos Typis Vulgatos ) Colligit ac descripsit Thomas Rymer , Quoa in his Voluminibus in Bibliotheca Cottoniana nunc reservatis continentur .

These volumes Ayscough , in his catalogue of the Sloane Manuscripts , informs us , were ordered by the House of Lords to be deposited in the British Museum as an addition to the Cottonian Collection of Manuscripts . In the Syllabus before referred to ( Foedera , Vol . XVII ) , on page 55 , the 25 th article is thus described : —Pro Archiepiscopo Cantuar . de Licentia Lathomos & Operatores pro Collegio suo de Maideston capiendi . In the Sloane CollectionNo 4595 50 is the of the

. , page , following copy original document , dated 14 th June , 19 th Richard IL , or A . D . 1396 . . 14 June . Pro Archiepiscopo Cantuar . ( Pat . 19 R . 2 . p 2 . m . 4 . ) Rex omnibus ad quos & c . Salutem Sciatis quod concessimus Venerabili in Christo Patri Carissimo Consanguineo nostro Archiepiscopo Cantuar . quod ipse pro quibusdam operationibus cujusdam Collegii per ipsnm apud Villain Maidenston faciend . viinti et quatuor

g lathomos vocatos ffre Maceons et viginti et quatuor lathomos vocatos ligiers per deputatos suos in hac parte capere et lathomos illos pro denariis suis eis pro operationibus hujusmodi rationabiliter solveud . quousque dicti operationes plenarie facte et complete existant habere et tenere possit . Ita quod lathomi predict ! durante tempore predicto ad opus vel . operationes nostras per officiarios vel ministros nostras quoscumque minime capiantur .

In cujus & c . Teste Rege apud Westm xiiij die Junii Per breve de Private Si gillo . The following extracts are from Mathcei Parisiensis monachi sancti Albani Chronica Majora , edited by Henry Richards Luard , B . D ., and published under the direction of the Master of the Rolls .

1237 . [ Vol . III . p . 391 . ] " Ad ejusdem quoque spectat prseconium hnmortale , quod ecclesiam Saresbiriensem a loco convexo , arido , et castro comitis vicino , ad locum transtulit competentem . Et consilio nobilium artificium quos et remotis convocaverat , amplum jecit fundamentum , ipso primum lapidem componente . Ad quod opus promovendum , non tantum episcopus , immo rex , et cum eo multi magnates , mannm porrexernnt adjutricem , unde quidam ait : —

Eex largitur opes , fert prcesul opem lapicidas ; Dant operam ; tribus his est opus ut stet opus , These lines , we are informed in a note by the Editor , are by Henry of Avranches , who was a kind of Court poet to Henry III . 1245 . [ Vol . IV . p . 427 ] , Rex jubetecclesia / in Westmonasteriisumptibussuis ampliari