CHARTER OF THE FIRST LODGE IN DETROIT. BRO. S. HAYDEN furnishes the Review with a copy of the charter of the first Lodge held in Detroit, taken from the original parchment. It is dated in the year seventeen hundred and sixty-four, and reads as follows: To all and Every, Our Worshipful and Loving Brethren. We, George Harrison, Efq., Provincial Grand Master of the moft Ancient and Honorable Society of Free and Accepted Mafons in the Province of New York in America, fend greeting. KNOW YE, That repofing especial truft and confidence in our Worfhipful and well beloved Brother, Lieut. John Criftie, of the 60th Regiment, we do hereby nominate, conftitute and appoint him the faid John Cristie, to be Mafter of a Lodge of Mafons, Number One, to be held at Detroit, under whatsoever name the faid Mafter and his officers fhall please to distinguish it, and alfo appoint Samfon Flemming, Senior Warden, Jofias Hartz, Junior Warden of the faid Lodge, by virtue of the power and authority vefted in us, by a difpenfation bearing date in LONDON, the Ninth day of June, One Thoufand Seven Hundred and Fifty-Three, from the Right Worshipful John Proby, Baron Carysfort, in the County of Wicklow, in the Kingdom of Ireland, the then Grand Master of England, appointing us Provincial Grand Master of New York. And we do hereby authorize the said John Cristie to make Mafons, alfo to do and execute all things lawful in Masonry, he taking efpecial care that the members of his said Lodge obferve and keep the Rules, Regulations and inftructions contained in our Conftitutions as fhall be given us, and paying out of the first money he fhall receive for initiation fees to me at New York, Three pounds three fhillings fterling, to be by me applied to the use of the Grand Charity here or elsewhere. Given under our hand and feal of Masonry at New York, this Twenty-feventh day of April, A. D. One Thousand Seven Hundred and Sixty-four, and in the year of Mafonry, Five Thousand Seven Hundred and Sixty-four. SEAL. George Harrison, P. G. Master. Witnefs, Peter Middleton. No. 448, Registry of England-No. 1, Detroit. This is a copy of the charter of the first Lodge probably which was held in Detroit. Its members have long since paid the debt of nature, and gone to their silent and last resting place. The records of this Lodge would possess great interest at the present time. LAYING THE CORNER STONE OF ROSEHILL CHAPEL. THE citizens of Chicago have made provision to supply an appropriate burial place for the dead, without the city limits. Rosehill Cemetery is six miles and a half north of Chicago. On the twenty-eighth day of July it was inaugurated, and the corner-stone of the Chapel which is to be built in the City of the Dead, was laid with Masonic ceremonies. Not less than eight thousand people were present. Bro. Hosmer A. Johnson, M. D., officiated as Grand Master, M. W. Ira A. W. Buck not being able to be present. Bro. Johnson made some appropriate remarks, from which we make the following extract: We thank you, Mr. President, for the honor you have conferred upon us, in inviting us to perform this ceremony. The appropriateness of this act on your part will be apparent, when we assure you that our Order was once operative in its character; that one of its objects, at least, was to contribute to the necessities, convenience and comforts of man, as a social being. During the middle ages and up to the time of the general diffusion of learning in the sixteenth century, it was the conservator of art, and the embodiment of practical science. While the schoolmen were debating, with loud sounding words and meaningless propositions, the abstractions of metaphysics, the Masons were studying science and applying it, in a thousand different ways, to the arts of life. In Britain and Continental Europe, our Masonic forefathers erected those grand old structures that enchant the eye of the modern traveller; those massive and yet symmetrical fortresses that constituted the strong-holds of the Medieval barons, and that, like old men, wrinkled and furrowed and bending beneath the weight of years, yet stand on the hill-tops of merrie England, and along the banks of the rushing Rhine. It is to our Order that the church is indebted for the mouldering abbeys where, as the centuries slowly pass, she has been gathering, in the harvest fields of earth, the brave, the wise and the good, and her lofty cathedrals now crumbling beneath the weight of time, with their dim and solemn aisles, supported by a forest of noble columns and lighted by a thousand tapers, where the sturdy Northman and the stalwart, strong-armed Saxon knelt and listened to the wondrous story of the Cross. At the close of the ceremonies of laying the corner stone, Bro. J. V. Z. Blaney, the President of the Cemetery Company, delivered an address, devoted chiefly to the history of the enterprise which was then carried into practical effect. A portion of his remarks, however, relative to the custom of the ancients in burying their dead, is instructive, and will interest our readers. The custom of burying the dead within the limits of large cities is one which was unknown to the ancients, and resulted from the abuse of a privilege, granted at first, only as a mark of high distinction, to martyrs and saints, and afterwards claimed as a right by the rich and powerful, but ever deprecated by science and by the church, as detrimental to the public health. By the Jews, the Greeks, and the Romans, cemeteries were, by the most vigorous enactments, placed without the walls of cities and villages, and this salutary provision was adopted in the discipline of the early Christian Church. It was only during the period of decadence of letters in the middle ages, that this custom, injurious to the living, and unwarranted by any principle of public hygiene, by good taste, or by respect for the dead, was allowed to creep in as one of many evidences of stolid ignorance and degraded morals. With the revival of letters, efforts began to be made to remedy a custom whose consequences in the more crowded communities of Europe, had come to be seriously felt. To the clergy of France, and more especially to the Archbishop of Toulouse, is due the credit of arousing public sentiment to the dangers of intermural interments. In a most eloquent appeal, after rehearsing the abuses by which the practice had been introduced, he portrays vividly the evils to which it gives rise, and exhorts the secular power to assist the efforts of the church "to recall the ancient discipline on this point." It was not, however, until 1765, that the parliament of Paris, by legal enactment, led the way to a remedy of these evils; the French government adopted the same course, and those noble institutions, Pere la Chaise,' Vangirard," and "Montmartre," were the first exemplars of those rural cemeteries which, both in Europe and America, are at once the ornaments and the patterns of horticultural taste of so many large communities. I have only to point you to Mount Auburn, Greenwood, Laurel Hill, Forest Lawn, Mount Hope, and Spring Grove, as illustrious examples of the disposition, in our own country, to return to the correct taste and delicate sentiment so beautifully expressed in the epitaph of Sophocles, the founder of Grecian tragedy : "Wind gentle evergreen, to form a shade To-day inaugurates a movement in imitation of these examples, and to the citizens of Chicago we look to sustain our efforts. There were other exercises connected with the occasion, but not of a Masonic character. THE G. G. CHAPTER AND THE FREEMASONS' MONTHLY MAGAZINE. In the August No. of his Magazine, Bro. Moore, of Boston, gives his views respecting the G. G. C. and the "Michigan Case." The subject is one of vast importance, and worthy the best efforts of our able and learned Brother; yet-in accordance with a habit which is too frequently displayed, to the annoyance and injury of his readers-he takes the most cursory view of the subject, and dismisses it as though his ipse dixit were law, and assertions made with an air of wisdom and dignity would answer better than argument. Distinguished as Bro. Moore justly is for talent and Masonic knowledge, few will be found who will blindly receive the opinions expressed in the article alluded to, as correct. The Michigan case has called forth some labored disquisitions, which, for evidence of ability in the authors, are not surpassed by any Masonic productions of the kind. Notwithstanding this, Bro. Moore has not deigned at any time to notice the arguments of those opposed to his views, in any lengthened remarks, nor has he ever attempted to answer them. Now, just before the meeting of the G. G. Chapter he devotes one page and a half to an article on “the Michigan Case," and without argument, but by mere assertion, settles the matter in substance, thus: The G. Chapter of Michigan acted wrongly; the M. E. Chas. E. Gilman acted rightly. An easy and comfortable way is this, most certainly, of arriving at a conclusion, but it is probably more satisfactory to its author than to any one else. Respecting the resolution which says that the G. G. Chapter cannot, under any circumstances, receive an appeal or complaint against a Grand Chapter, Bro. Moore intimates that it is contrary to an article in the constitution of the G. G. Body, and therefore a nullity. This is, indeed, sophistical. If the resolution was intended to alter the constitution, the assertion is correct; but it was not. It was adopted for the express purpose of putting a construction upon the constitution-to explain its meaning. Cannot any organization declare what its constitution means? Cannot the G. G. Chapter declare what its constitution means? If it cannot, then it is the height of absurdity to say that Comp. Chas. E. Gilman, or Comp. Chas. W. Moore can declare what it means. The fallacy of our Brother's remarks on this point is obvious. Bro. Moore holds that the G. G. Chapter cannot dissolve itself, because, he says, as long as the requisite number of Masons remain to work a Lodge, the majority have no power to dissolve it. There is no analogy, in our mind, between a Lodge and the G. G. Body, or between a Grand Body and the G. G. Body. The latter is entirely dif ferent from the organizations of Grand and Subordinate Bodies. This, however, is a subject which we have not room to treat in this number. RUFUS CHOATE. MANY of our readers probably are not aware that the late Rufus Choate was a member of the Fraternity. He was initiated in Jordan Lodge, in Danvers, Mass., on the 25th of December, 1823, and in January following received the 2d and 3d degrees. He subsequently served as Junior Warden and Senior Warden. He ever entertained for our time-honored Institution a deep love and reverence. A great man-a giant in intellect, has fallen. A genius such as nature seldom deigns to bestow on mortals was given to Rufus Choate. A brilliant scholar; a profound student; a statesman; a splendid advocate and thorough lawyer; an eloquent, brilliant orator; he stood unrivalled by any of his compeers at the time of his death. As an advocate, his eloquence and logic were irresistible. was large; his love of his fellow man was larger. His love of nature None knew him but to love and esteem him. He gained the good will alike of opponents and friends. We find the following brief account of his life, in the Freemasons' Magazine : Rufus Choate was born at Essex, in this State, October 1, 1799. He was graduated with the highest honors of his class, at Dartmouth, in 1819; and for a year continued attached to this college as tutor. After spending a few months at the Cambridge Law School, he went to Washington, and for about a year was in the office of William Wirt. His preparatory law studies were completed in the office of Mr. Andrews, of Ipswich, and Judge Cummings, of Salem; and in 1824 he commenced the practice of the law at Danvers. He resided for about three years in Danvers, and then went to Salem, where he lived until his removal to Boston, in 1834. His eloquence and power as an advocate, and his worth as a man, won him a large reputation; and his friends tempted him to engage in political life. He served one year, during this period, in the Massachusetts House of Representatives, and one year in the Senate; and in 1832 was elected to Congress, where he served one term. He, however, declined a re-election, and for the first eight years of his residence in Boston, devoted himself to professional life. If he made this portion of his career of unceasing toil, |