"No Disloyalty."

Cons ' . itutions , after a schism extending over only six years , to meet and unite themselves as one body ? This , wc repeat , is the question which now confronts us—not what these or those did six vears ago , but whether the evils whicii have resulted from

the acts of one or other body cannot be remedied . We say they can , and we have the precedent of 1813 in support of our assertion . If , however , we are wrong in this , then all the

talk we are accustomed to hear about Masonic Charity and the " beautiful" thing it is for brethren "to dwell together in unity , " must be the veriest moonshine imaginable .

Ars Quatuor Coronatorum.*

ARS QUATUOR CORONATORUM . *

In its general character the concluding Part of Volume VIII . of the Transactions of Lodge No . 2076 , will compare very favourably with its predecessors , while two or three of tlie papers it contains will be studied with more than usual interest . Prominent anions' these latter is that whicii was read bv Bro

J LANE , P . A . G . D . C , at the October meeting , on " Thc Early Lodges of Freemasons , their Constitution and Warrants 1717-1760 . " It is the more valuable from the fact that the subject of Lodge Warrants has hitherto attracted no great amount of

attention . As a rule , brethren have been content with knowing that lodges were duly entered in the authorised lists of lodges , while the experts have carefully noted their erasure , any alterations that may from time to time have been made in the order of

their seniority or in their places of meeting , and such other circumstances as they may have regarded as important in estimating the merits or otherwise ofthe work done by them and the justice of their claims to any special privileges or honour that

may have been conferred upon them . But hitherto they do not appear to have troubled themselves very particularly about the precise character of the authority which led to their being included in the Grand Lodge Register . Thus , though it has

long been known that the authority under which our earlier lodges worked was not always the same in point of form , Bro . LANE may be said to have struck new ground and it is needless to say that what he has written on the subject of Lodge

Constitution and Warrants is characterised by his usual neatness , methodical arrangement , and precision of detail . It is not necessary we should accept all his conclusions in order to justify the pleasure we have derived from the perusal of his

important paper . Indeed , more than one brother present at the meeting at which it was read dissented from sundry of the views he enunciated or of llic conclusions he arrived at , and yet there was absolute unanimity of feeling as lo tlie exceeding merit of this valuable contribution to that branch of Masonic Historv

which treats of the origin ol our Grand Lodge and its progress as exemplified by the periodical creation of new lodges . As regards the paper itself and its ample contents , Bro . l . ANE may be said to have treated his subject so exhaustivelv , as to have

left little , if any , room for additions to be made in the way of illustration . But , to judge from ihe long and able discussion which followed , and in which Bros . E . CoSDER , jun ., HAMON LK

STRANGE , G . W . SPETH , H . W . RYLANDS , and others took part , it is by no means improbable that further consideration may be given to the subject of Lodge Constitution and Warrants .

Notable also among ihe contents of Part 111 is the paper which was read at the annual meeiing of the Lodge on the 8 th November liy Bro , E . J . P . AKROX , F . S . A ., P . G . D ., on " Death and the Freemascn-Mus . eus . " In this is given the text , as rendered

into English from the German , of the explanation written b y Mus . Kt'S in 17 8 5 , of that one of ScilKLI . KNUKKG's series of Vignettes , after the manner of H 01 . 11 EIN , in which Death and the Freemason are : associated . The text is accompanied liy a

photograph copy of the Vignette , and , as there is no other instance , that we are aware of , in which the Freemason has figured in the Dance of Death , there can lie . no question as to

Bro . BARRON ' S contribution attracting a large amount of interest . But , apart from this rareness of the association of Deatli and Freemasonry , there are other and stronger reasons why the reader should pay particular attention to this paper . As Bro .

Ars Quatuor Coronatorum.*

SPETH was careful to point out m the remarks he offered subsequently , " the paper before us is not only a literary curiosity , but I think its interest is of even a deeper nature . To my mind the interest centres in the engraving which accompanies it . "

This opinion we most cordially endorse for similar , if not for precisely the same , reasons . This interest is still further enhanced by the discovery recorded by Bro . C . Ki'PFERSCHMiDT in an " Additional Note " appended to the general discussion , to

the effect that Mus . KUS was a Freemason , having been , as hc tells us , initiated in the Amalia Lodge at Weimar at the St . John's Festival in June , 177 6 , the lodge in question working under the Strict Observance . Amoner the other contributions to this Part III . will be found

" a Sketch of the Earlier History of Masonry in Austria ancl Hungary , " by Bro . LADISLAS DE MALCZOVICH , continued from Volume VII . of the Transactions ; " Squaring the Circle , Geometrically , " by Bro . G . W . SPETH ; " the Classic Writers

on the Mysteries , " by Bro . GERALD FlTzGlBBON ; and " Freemasonry in Mexico—III ., " by Bro . R . F . GOULD . As regards the first of these four , while we fully recognise the care which Bro . MALCZOVICH has bestowed upon his work , and the exceeding

patience and thoroughness with which he has carried it out , we susreest with all deference that he should move forward somewhat more rapidly with his main narrative , leaving the minor details more in the background , and dealing with them

summarily in one or two short paragraphs apart as footnotes . As his paper is presented here , it reminds us of a Greek Play with emendations and annotations in Latin by some learned German scholar , but with this important difference in favour of the Greek

Play as thus edited . Each successive page of the latter contains some two or three or more lines of text , while all the rest is emendations and annotations , & c , & c . Still , as Text and Notes are separate , it is possible for the student to

read the one and skip the other ; but in Bro . MALCZOVICH ' S Early History , it is a task of great difficulty to trace the main narrative through the mass of detail which is mixed up with it .

Bro . FrrzGlBiiONS ' s paper would be improved if he were to add a few more translated excerpts from the works of classic writers , while Bro . SPETH ' S is a most ingenious solution of a well-known

difficulty , but we leave it to other and more competent critics to determine its value mathematically . As to thc further paper of Bro . GOULD on " Freemasonry in Mexico , " our readers must be already familiar with a part of its contents . There is ,

however , one passage which appears to us to be worthy of quotation . In what must have been originally the concluding paragraph of his article , Bro . GdiLD says : "Thc loose way in which new and mushroom Grand Lodges arc accorded recognition in

America has long been a reproach to that country . But to acknowledge as regular and legitimate the proceedings of the Gran Dieta of Mexico is going very far indeed , and may well suggest whether any future Grand Lodge—however organised or

conducted—need despair of being rapturously welcomed within the circle of governing Masonic bodies by one or more of thc American Grand Lodges . " We heartily endorse these remarks . It is , indeed , a reproach that a Grand Lodge like that of New

York , which is one of the offending bodies in this case , should have recognised , as being in any way associated with Freemasonrv , a system which forbids the presence of the Bible in

its lodges , and sanctions , or sanctioned till lately , the initiation of women . However , the reader will be in a better position to judge for himself of the character of Mexican Freemasonry after reading Bro . GOULD ' article . As for the other matters contained in this Section of ihe

Transactions of the Lodge in 1895 , they include a report of thc Summer Excursion to Winchester and the hospitable reception of the lodge by Bro . W . W . B . BEACH , M . P ., and his Province

of Hampshire ancl the Isle of Wight , with a brief , but able paper by Bro . H . LOYKGROyE—with Illustrations—on the Cathedral ; the excellent address delivered by Bro . E . MACUEAN after his installation as W . M . in November last ; several able Reviews b y Bros . W . j . HUGHAN , SPKTII , and GOULD , ofthe " Records of the

Alnwick Lodge , 1717-1757 ; HUGHAN ' "Old Charges of British Freemasons " —¦ Second Edition ; and Bro . LANE ' "Masonic Records—( 717-18 94 " —Second Edition—respectivel y . There are also the usual "Notes and Queries" contributed b y