Mother Kilwinning.

Culleland , and Charles Campbell , Officer of Excise , Saltcoats , Stewarts ; and continued John Allison to be Waiting Officer upon the lodge . After passing aud raising Bro . Archibald Stewart in a proper lodge , and distributing the usual charity to the distressed , the Deputy Master signified to the Riht Worshipfull

g , by a letter , the grateful ! sense the lodge had of his Lordship ' s acceptance , Avhich Avoulcl so eminently tend to the good of Masonry in general , and the advantage of this Lodge in particular , and requested to know when his Lordship would be Avaited upon by a select committee appointed for that purpose , to receive their

compliments of congratulation in the chair . . . . . "The Right Worshipfull Master having appointed Wednesday , the 20 th January , 1742 , for meeting the brethren , the committee were regularly convened , when the Right Honourable William , Earl of Kilmarnock , was installed , proclaimed , and acknowledged Right

Worshipfull Master for the year ensuing , and after taking the Chair , and opening the Lodge , he admitted the Right Honourable Alexander , Earl of E glintone , an apprentice , and James Harper , his Lordshi p ' s gentleman ; and by the unanimous consent of the Lodge , the said Earl of Eglintone was passed and raised , and . . . obliges himself by subscription hereto annexed , to abide by the rules of the Lodge . . .

" At Kilwinning , the 20 th December , 1742 : Our late Right Worshipfull Master , the Earl of Kilmarnock , being this year elected Grand Master of Scotland , was necessarily absent at Edinburgh ; on that account it was therefore moved that the Lodge should proceed to the election of a new Master , and they

unanimously agreed upon the Right Honourable Alexander , Earl of Eglintoune , Avho was proclaimed and acknowledged accordingly , and the IIononral > le Archibald Montgomery , JSsar ., his brother , Deputy Master . " The irregularities observed by the

Kilwinning-Lodge in the appointment of their office bearers is further exhibited by their subsequent election of a Master for life , as recorded in the minute of 20 th December , 177 S : — " The brethren present , in consideration of the family of Egliuton being often friendly in protecting and countenancing the ancient

Mother Lodge , and that the present Earl of Eglinton in particular has been long a member of this lodge and often shown his attachment to it , and his inclination to promote the interests of the lodge in particular and Masonry in general . —and that he latel y presented the lodge with a sledding for building a new

lodge upon , for a trifling quit-rent in name of tackduty , —Therefore , in hopes of his further countenance , and in gratitude for his past favours , they have come to the resolution of electing , and they do unanimously elect , Archibald Earl of Eglinton to be Most Worshipful Grand Master of the Mother Lodge for life . "

The noblemen and brother receiving such a mark of the brethren ' s gratitude and esteem is one of the distinguished MasonsrepresentedinBro . Stewart Watson ' s celebrated picture of " The Inauguration of Robert Burns as Poet-Laureate of the Canongate Kilwinning Lodge . " As the Hon , Archibald Montgomerie , he Avas in 1742 initiated in Mother

Kilwinning , acted for several years as the Depute Grand Master of that lodge , and on one or two occasions was elected to the Grand Mastership . He Avas an

early patron of the Burns , and marked his appreciation of the Poet ' s genius by subscribing for a very large number of copies of the second edition of his works . As an officer of a regiment of Highlanders he saw much severe service in America during the Avar that terminated in 1763 , and rose gradually

through the various ranks till he attained the rank of a general in the army . The following anecdote is related of him : —On his return from the wars , he was pressed by his mother to recount 'the dangers lie had "passed' and sufferings he endured : he replied that the chief endurance was from the sting of the vegetable nettle and the animal muskito on his kilted houehs . " He died on the 30 th October , 1796 .

Progressing- with the times , the obtaining of an "Ensign" for the Mother Lodge , necessitates the appointment in 1755 of a " Standard-bearer : " the three " Waiting Officers " of the lodge being in 1764 to be designated " Tylers ; " " Honorary Members " are introduced in ] 7 C 6 ; the " Treasurer " makes his

appearance in 1779 ; followed in 1810 by the " Chaplain ; " but not till 1850 does Mother Kilwinning avail herself of the services of the mystic messengers which modern Masons designate by the name anciently applied to the chief ruler in lodges of the Scottish Craft .

In 1767 the fees for admission are raised to the maximum amount at which they stood during the whole remaining period of Mother Kilwinning ' s independence : "It is this night enacted that in future every apprentice Avho is a real working Mason with stone and lime , shall pay into the Box at his entry ¦

7 s . Qcl . every Wright and Squareman , 10 s . ; and every gentleman Mason , one guinea . " On the office of Secretary becoming finallj- disjoined from that of Warden , the lodge in 1740 procured from Edinburgh , at an expense of 8 s . M ., a jewel to be rvorn by their scribe ; and with this incidental notice we may here correct an error into which we fell in saying that the jewels presented to

Mother Kilwinning by Montgomevie of Bourtreehill in 1736 are those still worn by the three principal office-bearers . Now that Speculative Masonry , with its tinsel and trappings , had usurped the place of the old Craft Lodge of Kilwinning , the gentlemen forming the membership of the re-modelled society , elated

Avith the flourishing condition of their lodge , and from a desire not to be behind in the ornamentation of their " pillars , " agreed to replace the presentation jewels , of which Ave have spoken , by a set of a more modern and costly description . Accordingly these were procured from Edinburgh £ Q 9 . ? . being paid

, for them ; and , with a questionable sort of econom 3 , the brethren are , during the following year ( 1769 ) found deliberately disposing of their old jewels to their daughter of Riccartou for the sum of 39 s . The only redeeming feature of the minute Avhich notes the jiayment into the treasury of this shabbily

acquired sum , is the announcement that on " the same day was taken out of the Box half-a-guinea as the price of a I 'idle from France to Robert Gilmore ' s Blind Son . " Thus showing that notwithstanding their parsimouiousness in selling the jewels gifted to the lodge by a former Grand Master , they yet possessed

the " heart to feel " for the poor blind son of a brother , and that in voting him the price of a " Fidle from France "—thus furnishing him Avith the means oi