The Rites Of Adonis.

his departure to the upper hemisphere m winter was mourned as a temporary death ; his return to it , being a new birth , was a season of rejoicing . This idea appears in various forms in the mythology of Egypt , Syria , ancl Asia Minor . Venus stands in the same relation to Adonis as Isis to

Osiris . She is disconsolate in her temporary widowhood , and her female votaries , sympathising with her , lament for Adonis , slain by the boar , the emblem of the rude , ungenial winter . The temple of Aphaca was specially consecrated to the

mourning Venus , ancl she was represented with the air and habit of grief—her head veiled , her countenance sad , her hands wrapped in her robe . In commemoration of his death , the women rushed frantically about , beating their bosoms . This

mourning—which took place at midsummer , from which time the sun begins to descend among the wintry signs—was performed by the Syrians in Lebanon , ancl imitated elsewhere by the votaries of Adonis . ' Women weeping for Jammuz' ( the

Hebrew name for this divinity , also for the months June and July ) were among the abominations wliich Ezekiel in his vision ( viii . 14 ) saw practised by the women of Judah in the northern gate of

the temple at Jerusalem . ( See also " Paradise Lost , I . 455 . ) The mourning concluded with the interment of the iinao-e of the god . On the following day he was supposed to return to life , and his image was brought from its place of

concealment into the open air with every circumstance of rejoicing . The women , who had gone with dishevelled locks during the mourning , cut off their hair , or , if any one refused , she was punished by a stipulated penalty

According- to one account , Cinyras , the father of Adonis was King of Je-bale ( Byblos ); according to another , he was a King of Cyprus , the island 75 miles west of this , and founder of the Temple of Venus at Paphos , and the progenitor of the

race of the Cinyradal , her hereditary priesthood . The name was probably derived from the Semitic kinour , a musical stringed instrument , which , having a mournful sound , was employed in the lament for the lost Adonis . "

It is a singular coincidence that during my three days' stay at Gebal ( Je-bale ) I had several opportunities of hearing musical performances upon an instrument whose native name my dull ears refused to identify , but which I could readily believe was the same as the kinour . Certainly this " musical stringed instrument" was mournful

The Rites Of Adonis.

enough in its utterances , although played with considerable skill , to give vent to the saddest association of Jammuz ! " The Phoenicians , " our author goes on to affirm , " used for this purpose a short pipe , of a

wi ] d and melancholy tone , which was called Gingras , and this name was transferred to the god himself , as the name Linos , properly the string of the lyre' ( employed in the same or a similar lament , of Phoenician origin , practised in Cyprus

and Boeotia ) , was given to the mysterious being whose death the strain so called commemorates . . . . . A close resemblance between the rites

practised at Je-bale and Aphaca and those m vogue at Cyprus is inferred from various conclusive circumstances . " But not to copy further from our author—who , after all , has but little to say of the cultus of

Adonis , the department in which Freemasonry is most interested—I cannot help uttering the wish and the hope that some day a deputation of intelligent brethren of our Order may visit Je-bale and Aphaca , with time and means ( and lore ) , to

make excavations , take measurements and drawings , thoroughly to explore the country over a diameter of fifteen miles ( having Aphaca as the centre ) , and form collections of historical objects upon a scale worthy of our Society and of the

subject . There is a sarcophagus lying in the suburbs of Je-bale , the most elegant piece of sculpture I have yet seen in Phoenicia , which is going to pieces under tourists' hammers , for want of just such protection and preservation as our

fraternity could give it . How readily I could name the dozen " good fellows" who should constitute this mission !

Masonic Worthies Of Jersey.

MASONIC WORTHIES OF JERSEY .

No . 11 .

PAKT II . ( Continued from page 407 . ) At the monthly meeting of La Cesaree Lodge on the 27 th of June , 1867 , Bro . C . Le Sueur was jiresentecl with an elegant Masonic jewel as an

expression of the respect with which the brethren regarded him . The W . M . in making the presentation remarked : — " Whenever we call to mind , the most devoted , the most exemplary of Worshipful Masters naturally my dear brother we shall have remem-