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Contents . PAGE FREEMASONS' MAGAZINE : — The Girls' School Festival 301 The Parisian Masons and the Civil AVar 361 Masonic Reform 362 The Clergy and Masonry 365

Masonic Jottings , No . 08 365 Masonic Significance 366 Masonic Liberty 366 Masonic Notes and Queries 367 Correspondence 368 Obituary 368 Masonic Sayings and Doings Abroad 369 Festival of the Royal Masonic Institution for Girls 371

MASONIC MIRROR : — Masonic Mems 371 CRAPT LODGE MEETINGS : — Metropolitan 373 Provincial 374 < Royal Arch 378 Mark Masonry 378 Poetry 379

List of Lodge , & c , Meetings for ensuing week 380 LONDON , SATURDAY , MAY 13 , 1871 .

The Girl's School Festival.

THE GIRL'S SCHOOL FESTIVAL .

The eighty-third Festival of the Royal Masonic Institution for Girls may be pi'onounced a decided success , as under the Presidency of Past Grand Master might have been expected . The list of SteAvards displayed such an array

of distinguished Masons , both from London and the Provinces , as has seldom been witnessed , and the result of their efforts is manifested in the ] arge amount of £ 5 , 000 , Avith forty more lists to come in .

H . R . H . the Prince of Wales , we are informed , during the evening , subscribed the liberal donation of £ 100 towai-ds the funds of this noble Charity , Avith twenty-five guineas from the Princess , who , he announced , had consented to become Patroness of this Institution .

The Parisian Masons And The Civil War.

THE PARISIAN MASONS AND THE CIVIL WAR .

As we anticipated , the ridiculous proceedings of a fraction of the Parisian Masons o have already evoked a disavoAval of official support . "We learn from the correspondence of a contemporary that , " Bro- M . Malapert , who signs

himself ' ' Orator of the Supreme Council of Masons and chief of the Craft / disavoAvs the whole of the proceedings ; and . at a meeting which was held at the Grand Orient Hotel , in the Rue Cadet , the great majority decided that the conduct of certain

brethren of the Order was altogether personal , and in direct opposition to the genuine principles of Freemasonry ; that in the absence of any formal

decision , either of the Grand Orient of France or of the Supreme Council , the proposed manifestations were alike irregular , and the responsibility of whatever incidents might occur was perfectly individual . A notice to this effect has been

published in various journals . The ' Siecle' publishes a letter from Bro . Ernest Hamel , Ex-Venerable ( P . M ) , of the Lodge Avenir , expressing his surprise and affliction that any body of Freemasons should have presumed to declare that ' Masonry

would plant its banner on the Avails of Paris , and in case of its being pierced by a bullet , they would , in a body , take part in the struggle . Such a declaration , he affirms , is in entire opposition to the tenets of the Order , the mission of Avhich is always

to forward conciliation and peace . The conduct of Bro . General Montaudon , an officer high in command in the Versailles Army , is spoken of in terms of the highest praise with regard to the Masonic flag of truce , which he forwarded to

beadquarters without delay , even lending his own carriage for that purpose . " Apropos of this subject , and of Freemasonry in Catholic countries , Bro . Henry Jeffs , of Gloucester , thus writes to a local journal : —

"I enjoyed the friendship of the late Rev . Canon Calderbank , of this city , and had a long evening Avith him on the night of his lamented decease . Some of the more pleasant hours of my life have been spent in the society of Catholic

Priests , and six years ago , when on a holiday visit to Paris , I saw and conversed with ecclesiastics of that Church . A facetious Catholic invariably introduced me as 'a heretic and a Freemason . '

Avoiding religious discussion , indeed , which was never courted on either side , I found other and congenial subjects on which to agree . M y Arminian belief Avas never in danger from such intercourse , nor do I give credence to that

oftrepeated allegation against Catholics that they ' will compass land and sea to make one proselyte / I had to submit certainly to some very hard hits against Freemasonry , and to quotations from the famous Allocution of the present Pope

that the Craft is ' leagued together for the common ruin of religion and of human society . ' In France it was said that the Catholic priesthood had not greater enemies than were to be found in the ranks of Freemasons . I could only reply that whatever

the Craft might be in other countries , in England we knew naught of disaffection to legally constituted authority , and thafc the Catholics had not