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Yasari says that Cossarinus was reputed an able geometrician and a skilful architect , and in consequence of his connection with the Cathedral , had favourable opportunities of testing the principles on which it was built . Csesarinus informs us that the following plan was adopted by the German architects of the building :

In the first place a design or drawing , to scale , was made ; then a model ( which is still preserved at Milan ) of the principal parts was constructed ; the ground was afterwards staked out at the corners of intended buildings ; other stakes were interposed between wall and wall to show the separation across .

Ropes were then stretched from stake , ancl the foundations dug out . One of the titles of plans given by Ctesar will bear the following curious translation : — " The Plan of the foundation of a sacred building , with columns at a distance asunderconstructed after the German

, manner by means of a triangle and square , like that now to be seen at Milan . " Eig . 67 is a plan of Milan Cathedral , and lor the sake of comparison , is annexed a plan ( Eig . 68 ) , of Cologne Cathedral , the largest in Northern Europe ^

242 . The Chapel of St . Mary ' s ( Abbey of St . Stephen , Caen ) frequently called the Duke's Chapel , stands behind the hig h altar , and was built by Duke William at the same time that the foundations of the Abbey Church were laid ( 1074 ) . Within this chapel the architect of the church lies buried , without any tomb ; his memory is , however ,

preserved by an inscrip tion still legible on the exterior part of the building , and of which the annexed drawing is an exact copy , which may be read as follows : Guillelmus Jacet Petrarius Summus In Area , Iste Novum Per Eecit Opus Dat premia Christus Amen . —Du Caret ' s Normandy , p . 57 .

BLUE-STOCKING is a name given to a female who gives herself up to learning and literature , to the neglect of her womanly duties , and makes a show of her acquirements in a pedantic manner . The name originated in London ahoat 17 S 0 . It was much tho fashion at that time for ladies to have evening asseinhlies , where they might mingle in conversation with literary and other distinguished men . An eminent memher of those societies was a MrStillingfleetwho always wore hlue stockings and

. , ; such was the excellence of his conveersation that , when absent , the ladies were wont to say , " Wo can do nothing without the hlue stockings . " Hence these societies came to he called Bluestocking Clubs . —Ref . " Boswell ' s Life of Johnson . "—Peeton's Dictionary of Universal Information in Science , Art and Literature . BIACJK ASSIZE is the name iven to an assize held in tho old

g town-hall of . Oxford in 1577 , on account of an extraordinary ancl fatal pestilence which broke out during it . It is said that judgment had just been passed upon ono Jeneks , a bookbinder , for sedition , who was sentenced to lose his ears , when there arose such an infectious damp or breath among the people , that many were then smothered , and others so deeply infected , that- they lived not many hours after . Above 600 sickened in . one night ;

and , from the 6 th of July to the 12 th of August , 510 persons are said to have died in Oxford and the neighbouring villages . It was popularly regarded as a Diyine judgment on the cruelty of the sentence ; but it was probably owing to the filthy condition of the neighbouring gaol where the prisoners had been kept . A similar pestilence is said to have broken out at Cambridge during an assize held there in 1521 . —Ref . Anthony a Wood's " History ancl Antiquities of tho University of Oxford . "— Hid ,

Freemasonry In France.

FREEMASONRY IN FRANCE .

( From tiie Paris Correspondent of the Times . ) Civil war is raging among the Ereemasons of France . Some short time since Marshal Magnan was appointed Grand Master of tho Grand Orient , not by election of tho brethren , as is the usual practice , but by direct nomination of the Emperor , who is anxious to introduce into that bodthe centralization which prevails in

dey every partment of State . Marshal Magnan was initiated in the mysteries of the Craft only a few weeks before his appointment , and passed through the various grades of Apprentice , Fellow-Craft , and Master-Mason with unexampled rapidity , to be qualified for the post of of head of the Grand Orient , which is itself composed of the representatives of the various lodges of France . The

various sects or sections , or , as thoy aro technically called , Bites , were hitherto independent ; each was governed by its own laws and regulations ; ancl the nomination of the Marshal , who would represent the Emperor in the Grand Orient somewhat as the President of the ^ Synod of St . Petcrsburgh represents tho Czar , was for the express of breakin that independence . The Marshal

purpose g up has since his nomination made several efforts to bring the independent Masonic authorities to recognise the supremacy of the Grand Orient—that is , of the Emperor -, but these efforts were vain , in consequence of the resistance of the Grand Master of the Supreme Council . The

Marshal has made a last attempt ; he has published an order addressed to all the lodges in a style truly Imperial , and somewhat imperious . This important document sets forth that in virtue of the Imperial decree which named him to the high position of head of the Masonic body the Government recognized no other Masonic power than that of the Grand Orient of France ;

that all the different lodges have had due notice and been called on to conform to the law by ranging themselves under the banner of the Grand Orient ; that the different Masonic powers being named neither by the Chief of the State , nor regularly by the Masons under it , constitute an authority contrary to the fundamental principles of Freemasonry ; ancl that , nothwithstanding his appeals ,

the chiefs of the dissident orders , and particularly those who have directed the Supreme Council , have not signified their adhesion . The Grand Master , therefore , has to announce that the Masonic power , known by the name of the Supreme Council , and all others are dissolved , as well as all the lodges which havo not formally declared that they admit the Graud Orient of France to be the

solo Masonic power in France . The Grand Master of the section of Masonry known as the Hit Ecossais is M . Viennet , member of the French Academy , and Peer of France under Louis Phillippe . M . Yiennet persists in upholding the independence of his section , and is deaf to blandishments or intimidations . When the son of

the Duke cle Broglie was elected to the Academy , it became M . Yiennet's duty as director for the month to present him to the Emperor in the usual form , ancl His Majesty took that opportunity of introducing the subject of Freemasonry , and the necessity of centralising it , but without any effect . In answer to the summons of Marshal Magnan , M . Yiennet published an exposition

addressed to the Military Grand Master , whose pretensions , he said , were like those of an Arehbishop _ of Paris who should order Protestant ministers and Jewish rabbis to officiate with him at Notre Dame . He denied the right of the Grand Master of the Grand Orient to give him orders ; he appealed to the statutes of the Bit Ecossais " promulgatedbFrederick II" he maintained

y ; the independence of his Bit , while pledging himself to conform to all legal prescriptions , even the dissolution of the Order by Imperial decree ; but he disputed the right of Marshal Magnan to speak as a Field-Marshal or a public functionary at the same time that he spoke as Grand Master of the Orient , or to appeal to the laws