this opportunity to make a collection for those unfortunate persons who had suffered from the fearful inundations, which brought in more than 4000 francs. The Belgian Masons met everywhere with an unprecedentedly warm reception; each of them received from the Grand Master of the Netherlands a coin having his likeness stamped on it1, and they on their part did not fail to show their appreciation of this attention, by inviting him to Brussels. The Fraternization Festival, which was celebrated in the June of that same year between the North and South, was a most brilliant affair.

The Suprême Conseil in Brussels keeps up brotherly intercourse with the Grand Orient there, so that the members of the latter, as being possessed of the High Degrees, are considered as belonging on this account to the former. Under the jurisdiction of the Suprême Conseil of Belgium were in 1860 the following Daughter Lodges: 1. les Amis du Commerce et la Persévérance Réunis in Antwerp; 2. les élèves de Thémis in Antwerp; 3. l'union militaire in Beverloo; 4. les Vrais Amis de l Union; 5. les Amis Philanthropes; 6. les Amis de l'Ordre, all three in Brussels; — 7. l'Avenir et l'Industrie in Charleroi; -8. la Fidélité in Ghent; -9. la Parfaite Union in Mons; 10. les Frères Réunis in Mons; la Régénération in Mechelen; - 12. l'Espérance in Ostend; 13, les Frères Réunis in Tournay.

II,

II. THE NETHERLANDS.

It was completely in keeping with the national character of the Dutch, that those innovations and disputes

He was beloved by his friends and by the people, and esteemed even by his opponents. On his death he left his large fortune either to the "Free University", or to some other equally benevolent institution.

2 See "Bauhütte", 1861, page 117 and 223.

about systems which were rife everywhere else, scarcely intruded into the Freemasonry of Holland. At first the Lodges remained faithful to the Rite of the Grand Lodge of England, and only some years later did they accept the four higher degrees of French Scotch Masonry.

In 1798, Br. von Boetzelaar, in this the last year of his life (he had Nov. 13, 1784, celebrated the 25th anniversary of his National Grand Mastership), determined to lay a new Statute Book before the Brethren, which May 28, did actually take place.1 In pursuance of the laws therein prescribed, the Grand Lodge only accepted the three Symbolic Degrees, while the four high degrees were under a Grand Chapter, who were to be entrusted with their distribution. In the same year, Br. Baron J. van Teylingen was elected Grand Master. Under his guidance, the number of the Lodges was increased both in the country itself and in its colonies. In 1801 it first occurred in Holland that a Lodge (La Bien Aimée at Amsterdam) held a meeting in the presence of ladies. On June 10, 1810, the Grand Lodge forbade any further Lodges of Adoption.

To render ineffectual the frequent accusations which were being brought up against the Fraternity, the Grand Lodge of Holland offered a prize of fifty Dutch ducats to any one who should compose the best answer to the libellous writings of Baruel, Robinson, &c. A contradiction however, had before this in the year 1801, been published by the privy counsellor Mounier in his pamphlet entitled, "Upon the supposed influence of the Philosophers, Freemasons, and Illuminati on the French Revolution". pamphlet was published in German and French, edited by Cotta. In this writing all accusations met with complete contradiction.

This

In 1804, Br. C. G. Bylefeld was appointed Grand

1 See Rebold, Histoire &c., p. 179, and “Latomia", Vol. II, p. 186.

Master. Br. Bosquet succeeded him in 1810, and Br. S. W. Barnaart in 1812.

In 1808 a disagreeable dispute had arisen in consequence of some arbitrary proceedings on the part of the dignitaries in the Lodge Union Royale in the Hague, and which were the cause of their being excommunicated from the Fraternity; but the quarrel was at length happily adjusted by the intervention of the Provincial Lodge of Hamburg and Lower Saxony. In the same year the Dutch brethren erected a beautiful and noble memorial of philanthropy and beneficence, by founding an Asylum for the Blind in Amsterdam, which was completed at the expense of the four Lodges in that town, without any contribution from the municipality. Br. William Holtrop, a bookseller, and Grand Orator of the Grand Lodge since 1792, and W. Master of the Lodge La Charité in Amsterdam, assisted by his Deputy, Professor Vrolick, gave the first impetus to this good work. In general it may be affirmed of the Dutch Brethren, that they seized every opportunity to practice the duty of benevolence, in the largest sense of the word, and did very much for the alleviation of want and misery.

When Holland was united to the French Empire, the Grand Orient of France sought to extend the sphere of her jurisdiction.1 She had founded two Lodges in Amsterdam, and these two did not see the necessity of recognising those Lodges long previously established there until they were acknowledged by the Grand Orient, and again these older Lodges did the like, because the two more recently formed were not appointed by the Grand Lodge of Holland. The Grand Orient continued in its course of opposition, citing the so-called right of jurisdiction as a warrant for its proceedings; asserting that in each kingdom the Fraternity only acknowledged one single Grand Orient, and that the Grand Lodge in the Hague ceased to exist

1 Rebold, L. c. p. 180, and Kloss, France, I, p. 557.

when Holland was embodied into the French Empire; but that the Dutch Lodges were at liberty regularly to constitute themselves by permitting their warrant to be revised. The Grand Lodge of Holland answered, March 21, 1812, in a very becoming manner to this indictment, by maintaining her independence, and declaring that her right to continue to exist was derived from the past; all political convulsions had passed over her without leaving a trace behind, and the order of her Grand Masters had never once been interrupted. Thus far had matters proceeded, when a new turn was given to the aspect of affairs in the year 1814.

We will further mention, upon the authority of Kloss (L. c., page 530). one more Order, "Jonathan and David", whose statutes and formulas appeared in 1773, and were drawn up exclusively for the use of Roman Catholics. This Order still existed in Amsterdam in 1791. In its form it bears no resemblance to Freemasonry, and to the fifth degree the name of Confrérie Jesu was attached. The Pope was the head of the Fraternity, and a Vicarius had the conduct of affairs in Holland. The superior of the interior was called the superior Vicarius (in the Swedish system Vicarius Salomonis), who equally with the Pope was regarded as Christ's Vicegerent.

"One might imagine", remarks Kloss, "that the Order of Jonathan and David was the one and only means especially employed for proselytising in Holland". But then we have besides: Songs of the Order of St. Peter, with a title page published in 1781, which even in the smallest details refers to Rome and the Papacy. A more recent alliance formed in Holland, but which must be mentioned here, was that of the Maatschappy of Voorzichtigheid, which existed even at the period of the erection. of the Batavian Republic, and must have been one of the multitudinous forms which, under the direction of the Vicarius, were employed as traps to facilitate proselytism.

In May, 1814, the Grand Lodge of the Netherlands

summoned all the Lodges under her jurisdiction, which were constituted in France, to change their warrants for Dutch ones, In the same year, Br, H. M. Reepmaker was elected Grand Master, who was succeeded in 1816 by Prince Frederick of the Netherlands. We have already mentioned what arrangement he entered into with the Belgian Lodges. Under his cautious administration, the Netherlandic Lodges continued their operations without any marked occurrence, while the benefits of Freemasonry were made more accessible by the erection of new Lodges in the transatlantic colonies.

In 1816, Prince Frederic received a packet of papers, and amongst them a letter written in a woman's hand and signed C. née von T., in which it was announced that the enclosed papers had been found amongst the manuscripts left by her father on his demise, and which had been always most carefully preserved by him; she believed he had received them from Mr. van Boetzelaar. Another tradition maintains that these papers had been long in the possession of the family von Wassenaar. In the packet there were, together with some few unimportant writings, the following: 1. The so-called Charter of Cologne, i. e. a document, signed by 19 Master-Masons in Cologne, June 24, 1535, in cipher, on parchment; 2. The minutes of a Lodge, supposed to have existed in the Hague from 1519-1638, het Vrededall or Frederick's Vredendall, and written in Dutch. If these documents had been proved to be genuine, which was not the case, they would completely have overthrown the aim and design of Freemasonry, as well as the result of historical researches; for the aim and purpose of the Brotherhood would then have been the maintenance and propagation of the fundamental doctrines of Chrittianity, and the history of the Order would have been traced farther back than the time of the Crusades. Kloss remarks: "Here it is proved that all Masons in this sublunary sphere have been, since the year 1717, employing spurious rituals, customs, and laws, while