Auto-da-fé, to hear his final sentence. He there met with his friend and brother Mouton, who had been already put to the torture, and being a Catholic was released, while Coustos was condemned to become a galley slave for four years. He would here have infallibly succumbed under severe labour, if Lord Harrington and the Duke of Newcastle had not interceded for him, and obtained his liberty upon the plea of his being an English subject.

Of the operations of any other Lodges no intelligence. has been received, but in 1776 Major d'Alincourt and Don Ayres de Orvellas Peracao, a noble Portuguese, was seized at Lisbon for being a Freemason, and imprisoned for fourteen months.

AMERICA.

The first reliable historical announcement of the existence of Freemasonry in America is to be found in Boston, although there are intimations1 that a Lodge existed before. this time in New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania. It is asserted that as early as the year 1732 a Lodge in Philadelphia held its meetings in the "Tun Tavern" on the east side of Water Street. The Fraternity in Savannah, Georgia, are of opinion that at that period, if not earlier, Freemasonry had found entrance there. The first authority to establish Lodges in the Colonies of New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania was accorded in 1730 by the English Grand Master Th. Howard, Duke of Norfolk, to Br. Daniel Cox; yet nowhere can reliable testimony be found that Lodges were originated by him.

A few years later the Fraternity were firmly established in Boston, which town may be regarded as the mother of American Freemasonry.

1 See "Triangel". Ed. by E. Röhr. 7th Year. No. 2. page 10.

2 L. c. and Mitchell, History of Freem. Vol. I. page 477, &c.

April 30, 1733, Br. Henry Price received a warrant, signed by Lord Viscount Montague, Grand Master of Masons in England, appointing him Provincial Grand Master of New-England, with full power and authority to nominate his Deputies, and to unite those brethren residing in America into one or several Lodges as he should consider expedient, or wherever opportunity offered. July 30th of that same year, the new Grand Master summoned the Brethren to the "Bunch of Grapes Tavern" and proceeded to open a Provincial Grand Lodge in Boston, under the title of St. John's Grand Lodge, appointing Br. W. Andr. Belcher Deputy Grand Master, and Thomas Kennelly and John Quann Grand Wardens. On this evening he approved the petition of some Brethren, for a charter in Boston, who without doubt had worked long before "on authority of immemorial right". From the Provincial Grand Lodge, through the exertions of the above-named Brother and his successor, Br. Tomlinson, several Lodges originated in Massachusetts, New-Hampshire, Pennsylvania, North and South Carolina, Antigua, &c. It is of course understood that all these Lodges adopted the Rite of the Grand Lodge of England.

One year after the appointment of Br. Price, and when his authority had met with recognition throughout America, he constituted a Lodge in Philadelphia, the first Master of which was the subsequently so celebrated Benjamin Franklin. From his printing press was sent forth, in 1734, the first book ever published in America on Freemasonry, viz, a reprint of Anderson's Book of Constitu

3, L. c. and Mitchell, History, Vol. I. p. 482, as also Morris "History of Freemasonry in Kentucky", p. I. These two works, together with some other sources of information, we have followed the most closely. In the last mentioned work, there is a complete impression of Price's warrant of constitution. This brother, born in 1697 in London, was an emigrant. He lived as a merchant tailor in Boston, and died at Townsend, May 20, 1780.

tion. A letter of his addressed to Br. Price, dated November 28, 1734, has been preserved, in which it is said (see "Triangel"): "In the Boston newspaper we read an article from London, which informs us that by a decree of the Grand Lodge, held in August last, Mr. Price has been empowered to establish Lodges any where upon the continent of America, which report we hope is true, for we wish him success from the very bottom of our heart. Although this has not been communicated to us in a regular way, yet we believe the intelligence to be true, and deem it our duty to submit to your Lodge that which, according to our judgment, is necessary to raise and strengthen the interests of Freemasonry in this country (whereunto the approbation of a superior authority appears to be necessary, to give the requisite weight and authority to the records and resolutions of our Lodge), viz., a warrant or charter, accorded by the Worshipful Master Price, in virtue of his appointment received from England, wherein the privileges now enjoyed by the Brethren in Pennsylvania are confirmed to them, i. e., the holding of a Grand Lodge once a year, the power of electing their Grand Master, Wardens, and other officers, for the administration of the affairs of the whole Fraternity in this country, with complete authority and jurisdiction according to the rules and customs observed by the Masons, and that the Grand Master of Pennsylvania shall only resign his seat when the Grand Master of all America is present", &c.

In Boston many so-called Ancient Masons had, by degrees, assembled themselves, who did not join the Lodges then existing there, but petitioned the Grand Lodge of Scotland for a constitution, which was accorded them. Whereupon they established a Lodge in 1752 (the same year in which George Washington was initiated a Mason, in the Fredericksburg Lodge, Virginia), the St. Andrews Lodge No. 88, and of course transplanted the dissensions prevailing in England, and formed two opposing camps over the ocean. As, notwithstanding the persecution of

Findel, History of FM.

23

the elder Grand Lodge, merely on account of the name they bore of "Ancient Masons", they throve and flourished, they did all in their power to found other Lodges according to this Rite. The members, joined by some Lodges belonging to the British army, determined upon demanding a constitution as a Grand Lodge, which the Grand Master of Scotland was only too willing to grant. At a meeting of the Brethren at the festival of St. John the Evangelist in 1769, Br. Joseph Warren received from the Earl of Dalhousie, then Grand Master of Scotland, a warrant nominating the said brother Provincial Grand Master of the so-styled Ancient Masons in Boston within a circuit of a hundred miles, with which office he was formally invested at the same meeting. The name of this highly esteemed Brother was well calculated to impart power and influence to the new Grand Lodge. The above document was followed by another in 1773, extending his jurisdiction over the whole continent of America. While Freemasonry was thus extending itself throughout every part of the country, the two Grand Lodges in Boston were working under different systems, showing enmity towards each other, and yet each increasing in power, till at length in 1775, the American War of Independence broke out, putting an end to all strife and dissension, but at the same time suspending the activity of the Lodges and the Grand Lodges.

Besides these charters from England and Scotland, the records of the Lodge of Kilwinning1 show that at least two of its charters also found their way across the Atlantic. It was in June, 1758, that on the petition of certain Masons in Essex County, Virginia, a charter was granted by Mother Kilwinning, under the title of "Rapahannok Kilwinning" and seventeen years later another to the Falmouth Lodge, Virginia, then working under it was granted

1 Br. D. Murray Lyon in the London Freemason's Magazine, 1866, P. 444.

a dispensation issued by the Lodge of Fredericksburg, whose officebearers recommended the newly erected Lodge to apply to the Grand Lodge of Scotland for confirmation by a more ample charter. We have no knowledge as to the influence which guided the Falmouth brethren in their desire for a Kilwinning charter in preference to one from Edinburgh, but it is probable that the fables of the high degrees induced them to do so.

Not till 1777 did the Boston brethren, scattered asunder by the war, assemble again. Many old friends were wanting. Many had been left on the field of honour. Warren, the brave soldier and distinguished citizen, had fallen at the battle of Charlestown, June 17, 1775, while fighting for freedom and his native land, and the office of Grand Master in one of the Grand Lodges was thus made vacant. In order to fill up this vacancy, and to animate and reorganize the Grand Lodge, the so-called Ancient Masons summoned a meeting for the first time, March 8, 1777, in which Br. Joseph Webb was chosen Grand Master, and the Grand Lodge declared to be the Grand Lodge of Massachusetts and independent of Scotland.

After the conclusion of peace in 1783, the St. John's Grand Lodge again recommenced work, but was far behind her more energetic sister, until they became one in 1792. Long previous to this, the disadvantages arising from the existence of two Grand Lodges close to each other had been sensibly felt; and a strong desire prevailed to restore harmony, confidence, and brotherly feeling by uniting them into one. Br. Webb, especially, eagerly desired the union, his chief aim being to further to the utmost of his power the cause of Freemasonry in America.

Besides these Grand Lodges with their daughters, there had been established during the war Lodges of coloured people, which worked separately. I was long doubted whether these were legally constituted, until Br. Dr. R. Barthelmess of Brooklyn demonstrated from the