Notes On American Freemasonry.

for several years , has enabled me to form some estimate of the amount of labor required of your Grand Officers in their correspondence with the officers of the subordinate Lodges and other brethren , in furnishing to them the information

sought on the various questions which arise in the Lodges . This labor , I am gratified to find , has been greatly diminished by the publication of the edicts and decisions of the Grand Lodge , together with the Grand Constitution , Rules of the Order ,

Old Constitution and Regulations , Forms of Trial , & c . With this work in the hands of the officers of the subordinate Lodges , they are readily prepared to decide intelligently almost every question that

may arise in their Lodges . " In his exordium he says : — " Forty years ago I first knelt at our sacred altar and received the first light in Masonry . Being deeply impressed with the sublime principles of the Order , and its

excellent teachings , it has been my desire through life to be guided by its landmarks , and with zealous efforts to cultivate and practise those virtues which preserve and adorn the Masonic character . If I have committed errors , they were

of the head , and not of the heart , and I ask that you cover them with the broad mantle of Masonic charity , recollecting that it is human to err , but divine to forgive . "

The Committee on Communications reported the following among others : 1 st . A paper which purports to be a Communication from three persons of the colored race , who designate themselves as a committee of

Eureka Lodge , No . 11 , in the city of Savannah , Working under what they term a charter from the " Prince Hall Grand Lodge of the State of Massachusetts , " commonly called the African Grand Lodge . The object of said communication , as

well as can be gathered from the document itself , is to learn the feeling of this Grand Lodge towards themselves and their so-called Lodge , . and to ask our counsel in reference to the organization of a coloured Grand Lodge in this State .

" Your committee would prefer to treat this Communication with a dignified silence , but as it has been referred to them , they have felt it a duty to give it a passing notice by informing these persons that we cannot now , or ever hereafter ,

acknowledge them to be A . Y . Masons , or hold any Masonic intercourse whatever with them . We know of no such lodge as the " Prince Hall

Grand Lodge of Massachusetts . " We are in . fraternal correspondence with the Grand Lodge of Massachusetts , and know nor recognize any other Grand Lodge in that State , and that grand body , we are confident , would not trespass upon

the jurisdiction of this Grand Lodge by granting a charter to any body of men , white or black , within our bounds , Without referring , in any manner , to what is likely , at no distant day , to be a vexed question with the Masonic fraternity

throughout the United States , viz : Negro Masonry , we close the subject by quoting Section 3 rd . of Article I , of oar Grand Constitutions ,

which is in these words : No lodge can exist , or exercise any Masonic privilege or duty in this State without the sanction of this Grand Lodge , either by warrants or dispensations , duly granted for that purpose . And all convocations or

assemblies of persons , calling themselves Lodges of Free Masons , assuming to exercise the duties , or perform the ceremonies of Free Masonry in this State , of either or all the three Symbolic Degrees , without the sanction of this Grand Lodge first

had and obtained , are hereby declared to be spurious and clandestine , and of no Masonic authority whatever . " Number of Lodges , 266 ; total number of members , 15 , 555 ; initiations , 894 ; passings , 806 ; raisings , 853 ; admissions , 717 .

IDAHO . At the First Annual Communication of the Grand Lodge of Idaho , the Grand Master delivered the annual address . After returning thanks to a kind Providence for the blessings of the past year ,

and invoving like blessings for the future , he proceeded to state in detail the official acts performed j and those which he had been prevented from performing . He regrets that the subordinate lodges were so financially deficient that he could not incur the expense of employing a Grand Lecturer to visit their Lodges and exemplify the Avork .

A resolution was offered and adopted , requiring all the M . W . Grand Masters of this Grand Lodge to have a life-size photograph taken of themselves as soon as practicable after their installation , at the expense of the Grand Lodge .

Number of Lodges up to June 23 , 1868 , 5 j number of Masons up to June 23 , 1868 , 195 ; initiated , 54 ; passed , 58 ; rejected , 66 . From the large number rejected we are glad to see that the subordinate Lodges are beginning ir *