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ing them a Warrant, or annul the same by their special act, in which last case the said petitioners shall receive back such sum or sums of money which they have heretofore paid, after deducting the sum of $5.00 for the expense of granting the Dispensation.

For the government of Subordinate Chapters and
Lodges under the jurisdiction of the Grand
Royal Arch Chapter of the State of
New York.

ARTICLE IV.

Sec. I. A Royal Arch Chapter shall consist of a High Priest, a King and Scribe, Captain of the Host, a Principal Sojourner, Royal Arch Captain, three Grand Masters, a Secretary and Treasurer, and as many members as may be found convenient, not less than nine regular Royal Arch Masons, including the officers; and no Chapter shall be opened in the degree of Royal Arch without that number; and every Mark Master's Lodge shall consist of a Master, a Senior and Junior Warden, a Secretary and Treasurer, and shall never be opened without the number of five regular Mark Master Masons present; and no Chapter or Lodge can be held under this jurisdiction without a Warrant from this Grand Chapter.

Sec. 2. That the election of officers in all Chapters or Lodges under this jurisdiction shall take place on the regular meeting of such Chapter or Lodge next preceding the festival of St. John the Evangelist, in each year, and be installed in their respective offices at the same meeting, before any other business can take place, to be determined by ballot in manner and form as laid down in article the first, section the third.

Sec. 3. Every Chapter of Royal Arch Masons, holding under this Grand Chapter, shall pay into the funds thereof the following sums, viz.: For the exaltation of every Companion to the degree of Royal Arch Masons, the sum of $2.00, and for every member thereof the annual sum of fifty cents; and every Mark Master's Lodge shall also pay into the funds of this Grand Chapter, for every Brother advanced to the degree of Mark Master Mason, the sum of fifty cents, and for every member thereof the annual sum of twenty-five cents; which said several sums shall be punctually paid during the session of this Grand Chapter at their regular annual meeting; and every Chapter or Lodge which shall neglect or refuse to pay the said sums at the time aforesaid, and continue so to refuse or neglect, without good reasons shown to the satisfaction of a majority of the members present of this Grand Chapter, until the next regular session thereof, shall be deemed the violators of this Constitution, and unwholesome members of this Grand Body, and shall therefore be punished by forfeiture of their Warrant and expulsion from this Grand Chapter and only restored by paying up all dues, and a sufficient and satisfactory apology for the breach of good rules.

Sec. 4. And for the better carrying the preceding section into effect, the Grand Secretary shall, on the last day of the session of this Grand Chapter. inform the same what Chapters or Lodges are deficient, and how long they have been so in the

payment of their dues aforesaid, that the Grand Chapter may make such order thereon as the members thereof shall deem right.

Sec. 5. No one can be exalted to the degree of Royal Arch Mason in any Chapter under this jurisdiction, without being regularly proposed in open Chapter, by petition (which petition shall lie over at least one meeting, that the character of the candidate may be fairly investigated by the members), and paying not less than $16.00 into the treasury thereof; and for the degree of Mark Master, whether in a Chapter or Lodge, not less than $4.00, to be paid into the treasury thereof, and having his character investigated in like manner as above.

Sec. 6. Every Chapter and Lodge holden under this Grand Chapter shall have a seal, the device thereof to be made at the pleasure of the person for whom it shall be made, and shall be engraven, with the name of the Chapter or Lodge aforesaid, and the number thereof in figures or numeral letters; an impression of which said seal shall be deposited with the Grand Secretary, and the device of the same described in writing, in a book to be kept by him for that purpose; and no papers or documents presented to this Grand Chapter, as credentials or evidence from any such Chapter or Lodge, shall be received as such, unless there is a sufficient similarity between the impression thereon and the one deposited as aforesaid, to be determined by the Grand Secretary, or in case of doubt or controversy on the subject, to be determined as is heretofore pointed out for the admission of members, in article second and section second.

Sec. 7. It being the duty of every Chapter and Mark Master's Lodge belonging to this Grand Body to be represented at an early period of each session thereof, in order to support its respectability, and to become informed of all proceedings and doings, and to aid by their wisdom in the deliberations and counsels, that the general interest may be advanced, good order prevail, and the true state of every branch of this Grand Chapter well understood. It is therefore hereby declared, that an omission of a duty so important to the well being of this institution deserved severe censure; it is therefore hereby strongly enjoined on all such persons to be prompt in the performance of the duties aforesaid, to be early at the said sessions, with their returns of the officers, members, and dues, of the respective Chapters and Lodges aforesaid.

Sec. 8. If any Companion or Brother of any Chapter or Lodge under this jurisdiction shall be guilty of a Masonic misdemeanor, by breaking the rules and regulations thereof, or by betraying the trust reposed in him, the Chapter or Lodge to which such offender may belong (but in case he belongs to no Chapter or Lodge, he may be called on by the nearest Chapter or Lodge having cognized thereof) shall have full power of punishing the same by reprimand, suspension or expulsion, as they may deem proper. But if by expulsion, the nature of the offense, with a copy of the proceeding thereon, shall be transmitted to the Grand Secretary without delay, who shall lay the same before the Grand Chapter at their next meeting. who shall ratify or annul the same: Provided always, the person so offending, and being expelled, feeling himself aggrieved thereby, shall have the privilege of an appeal to this Grand Chapter, if in session,

and during the recess, to the Grand High Priest or his Deputy, who shall appoint a committee to investigate the facts in the proceedings, and make report at the next meeting thereof; which shall have the power of restoring him to the general privileges of Masonry, but not to membership within the body from which he has been expelled, without their own consent, nor can there be a Dispensation in this case; for every Masonic body ought to have the power of determining its own members, for the better maintenance of harmony and good order therein.

Sec. 9. That no candidate residing in or near any city or town where a Chapter of Royal Arch Masons, or a Lodge of Mark Master Masons is holden under this jurisdiction, shall be exalted or advanced in any Chapter or Lodge in any other place, without a recommendation from the Chapter or Lodge nearest the place where said candidate may reside.

Sec. 10. That no candidate, whose application may be rejected in any Chapter or Lodge under this jurisdiction, shall be exalted or advanced in any other Chapter or Lodge which shall have received official notice of such rejection, without an appeal to the Grand Chapter.

Sec. II. That no Royal Arch Mason shall be admitted as a member or visitor in any Royal Arch Chapter under this jurisdiction, unless he shall have regularly received the several degrees of Entered Apprentice, Fellow Craft, Master Mason, Mark Master Mason, Past Master, Most Excellent Master and Royal Arch Mason.

Sec. 12.

That whenever a Warrant shall be issued to authorize the holding a Chapter, and in the same to hold a Lodge of Most Excellent Masters, Past Masters and Mark Master Masons, the High Priest, King and Scribe of such Chapters shall, ex officio, be the Master and Wardens of said Lodge.

Sec. 13. It shall be the duty of the Grand Secretary, at the expense of this Grand Chapter, to cause to be printed a sufficient number of blank warrants and certificated, agreeable to the form in this Constitution, and also devise a suitable form for annual returns; cause blanks to be printed, and from time to time, as need may be, to transmit them to the several Chapters and Lodges belonging to this Grand Body.

Sec. 14. The Grand High Priest, or his Deputy, may annually appoint one or more discreet and well informed Royal Arch Masons, Grand Visitors, whose duty it shall be if required by any Chapter or Lodge belonging to this Grand Body, to visit such Chapter or Lodge, and instruct them in the lectures of the degrees which they have taken, and the mode of work; and such Chapter or Lodge shall pay such visitor a reasonable compensation for the same.

Sec. 15. No Chapter shall be removed without

the knowledge of the High Priest, nor any motion made for that purpose in his absence; but if the High Priest be present, and a motion is made and seconded for removing the Chapter to some more convenient place (within the limits prescribed in the Warrant), the High Priest shall immediately cause notifications to be issued to all the members, informing them of the motion of removal, and the time and place when the question is to be determined, which shall be issued at least ten days previous to the appointed meeting; but if the High Priest, after motion duly made as aforesaid, should refuse or neglect to cause the notices to be issued as aforesaid, the officer next in rank who may be present at the next regular meeting following, upon motion duly made for that purpose, may in like manner issue the said notice.

Sec. 16. All Mark Master's Lodges, in case of removal, shall be governed by the same rules as prescribed in the foregoing section.

Sec. 17. Whenever a Warrant shall issue to authorize the holding a new Chapter, the same shall be installed by the Grand High Priest, or the Deputy Grand High Priest, unless where the distance is such that they or either of them, cannot conveniently attend, in which case they or either of them, may appoint some capable High Priest or Past High Priest of a Chapter, by a Dispensation under their hands and seals, or the hand and seal of either of them, to perform the services aforesaid; and the installation of Mark Master Lodges shall be done in the same manner, excepting a Dispensation may be granted in like manner to any Master or Past Master of a Mark Lodge, although a High Priest or Past High Priest is to be preferred; and the form of installation in those cases shall be agreeable to that directed by the General Grand Constitution.

Sec. 18. No person shall be permitted to sit in this Grand Chapter, as a visitor, without the unanimous consent of all the members present.

Sec. 19. Every Chapter or Lodge under this jurisdiction ought to assemble at least once in three months, for the purpose of perfecting themselves in working in their respective degrees; and such as shall not meet for the space of one year forfeit all their privileges under this Grand Chapter, and the name of their Warrant shall be struck from the record of the same, unless some sufficient reasons be offered to induce a forbearance.

Sec. 20.

Whenever it shall be deemed necessary to alter or amend this Constitution the same shall be done in the manner following: The Grand Chapter in session may propose any alterations or amendments, reduce them to form, the consideration of which shall lie over until the next session of the Grand Chapter, and if then voted by two-thirds of the members present, they shall become a part of this Constitution.

CHAPTER III.

EARLY STRUGGLES-MARK LODGES.

HE year 1807 may be regarded as the beginning of the upward progress of the Grand Chapter. Ezra Ames, who in 1002 had succeeded DeWitt Clinton as Grand High Priest, was a member of Temple Chapter, Albany, and, with the possible exception of Webb, was the most enthusiastic Royal Arch Mason in the State. This is amply evidenced by his being elected to its highest office for over twenty-four terms and for his having been for some twenty-six years the most active power in its circles. In saying this we do not desire to detract one iota from the fame of Webb, but the work of tnat Masonic genius extended over the field of Masonry, and the Royal Arch by the time Ames became its foremost figure in New York occupied a secondary place in his thoughts to the Chivalric degrees.

This, however, is a matter of opinion; the fact which we stated at the outset remainsthat 1807 marked the real beginning of the upward progress of red Masonry in the State of New York. The High Priest was able to announce that the two early Chapters in New York-Ancient and Washington-had at. length waived their objections and accepted charters from the Grand body. The Chapters represented at the meeting were:

1. Ancient-J. Disbrow, proxy.
2. Washington-Unarles Parsley, proxy.
3. Hibernian-J. Disbrow, proxy.

4. Montgomery-Daniel Hale, P. G. K., proxy; E. Child.

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To modern readers a certain amount of weakness might be observable in this list on account of the preponderating number of proxies. But then it should be remembered that traveling in those days was by no means so expeditious, so comfortable or so regular as now and that the discomforts of a journey in February (the month the Grand Chapter selected for its meetings) were greater than at almost any other period of the year. Then the business to be transacted was small, comparatively, and the influence of the body itself by no means appreciated. True, the representatives were paid at the rate of $1.50 a day, but even that was not sufficient inducement to impel men to undergo the discomforts of a midwinter journey.

At the meeting a dispensation which had been granted by the High Priest to a new Chapter in New York-Freedonian-was indorsed and warrants also were issued for Chapters in Onondaga and New Concord. No fewer than nine warrants for Mark Lodges were issued, as follows:

Ames Mark Lodge, Schoharie.
Steuben Mark Lodge, Painted Post.
Hiram Mark Lodge, Aurelius.
Harmony Mark Lodge, Windham.
Montgomery Mark Lodge, Johnstown.
Middleburgh Mark Lodge, Middleburgh.
Madison Mark Lodge, Hamilton.
Hoosack Mark Lodge, Hoosack
Apollo Mark Lodge, Troy.

In all of the places named above, or at least in the territory Masonically covered by them, there already existed Blue Lodges, and it is not to be supposed from the fact that in 1807 warrants were granted to those named that the Mark Lodges designated were then brought into existence. That would be the case undoubtedly with one or two of them, but of the majority it seems likely that in the year 1806-7 they simply acknowledged the supremacy of the Grand Chapter.

Of course this is purely surmise, for we have nothing, unfortunately, to guide us to a correct understanding or a definite conclusion. In fact, we find it difficult to trace the beginning of Mark Masonry in this State, although the evidence tends to show that it was represented in many of the early homes of the craft, and there is no doubt that long after the Grand Chapter was formed it was more popular, numerically speaking, than the Royal Arch itself. In those times, as now, a man had to be an actual or honorary Past Master before being exalted, but the Mark degree was conferred without this period of servitude, and so any Master Mason was eligible to receive it. At all events, one might judge from the early minutes of the State Grand Chapter, its officers for some years appeared to be more busily engaged in founding Mark Lodges than Chapters, and were zealous in their prerogatives and suzerainty in this matter. Undoubtedly their main idea was that by founding Mark Lodges they were laying the foundation for future Chapters, and in this they were right, for most of these Lodges, when they displayed any sort of vitality at all, did so develop. So important a factor did these

Lodges become that the Grand Chapter for years opened for business on the Mark degree, although the business done was generally adopted pro forma when the Royal Arch degree was opened, and the ritual of the Mark degree was exemplified by the officers more frequently than any of the others.

After a time the number of Mark Lodges on the roll of the Grand Chapter began to cause trouble and gave rise to some dissension. In the first place, the Lodges themselves were a source of annoyance, due in great part to the fact that the members were divided between their allegiance to the Grand Lodge and to the Grand Chapter. This was especially the case in those instances when a Mark Lodge was formed out of members of a Blue Lodge, and was run as a sort of annex to it.

Take the case of that warranted in New York in 1809 in connection with St. John's Lodge, No. 1, the warrant being issued to three of its Past Masters, Elam Williams, James Wood, and Thomas Richards. Its existence never amounted to much, there is no record of its having paid any money into the Grand Chapter beyond the fee of $15 charged for its warrant, and, while we know that it gave marks to its members, there is no evidence that it ever worked the Mark degree. It was in reality a source of weakness rather than of strength, it entailed a lot of needless correspondence on the part of the Grand Secretary, and probably it was a relief to all concerned when, in 1816, its warrant was declared forfeited, along with those of eighteen other similar Lodges, for non-payment of its indebtedness. In the same year that St. John's Mark Lodge received its warrant one was granted to brethren belonging to Independent Royal Arch Lodge, No. 2, under the designation of "Independent Royal Arch Mark Lodge, No. 57." Like its sister Lodge in old St. John's, it does not appear to have led a very useful or a very active life. In fact, it gives us little or no sign of life at all

until the very close of its career, in 1813, when, probably in answer to the importunities of the Grand Secretary for returns, or dues, it sent that official a letter which when read to the Grand Chapter was ordered to be returned because it was "couched in indecorous terms" and not fit to be placed on file. The words of the letter are unknown to us, but they seem to have included an offer of a surrender of the warrant, and that offer was gladly accepted. I mention these Lodges on account of their prominence, from their numerical position, if from nothing else, in the craft, but there were many others scattered throughout the State of which a similar record could be presented.

It was early seen that Mark Lodges were likely to become increasingly troublesome if not actually detrimental, to red Masonry, and in 1811 we find the first steps taken toward limiting their power and causing their functions to cease as distinct bodies from the Mark Lodges which were worked in connection with Chapters-Lodges which were merely so formed as part of the plan of the first degree in the Royal Arch system. At that time the latest Chapter admitted was numbered 30, while the latest Mark Lodge was No. 66. These figures do not show the exact strength of each, for many of the numbers were blank on both rolls, but they serve very clearly to show the relative strength, and this is borne out by the fact that at the same meeting a warrant was granted for one new Chapter while two new Mark Lodges were sanctioned. At that meeting the following resolution was adopted:

That although authority be given by a Warrant constituting a Chapter to open a Mark Lodge and confer that degree, yet that a Chapter of Royal Arch Masons and a Mark Master's Lodge are, notwithstanding, two separate and distinct bodies; and that although by immemorial usage, Mark Lodges have been under the immediate jurisdiction of Grand Chapters, there is still as definite a distinction between a Chapter and a Mark Lodge as there is between the latter and a Lodge of Master

*

Masons. The Committee are therefore of opinion that it is unconstitutional; * * that members of a Mark Lodge, constituted by exclusive and special Warrant, should also be members of a Mark Lodge held under the authority of a Chapter Warrant. * * * Members of a Mark Lodge constituted by special and exclusive Warrant may also be members of a Chapter, although the Warrant of such Chapter give authority for holding a Mark Lodge, and that such members, if they have received the higher degrees, may, when said Chapter is open in the higher degrees, have all the privileges of other members; but that when such Chapter is opened on the Mark degree, the privileges of members belonging to any other Mark Lodge entirely cease and they can be considered in no other point of view than as visiting brethren.

The effect of this was threefold-it not only reduced the financial prosperity of the Lodges by removing the necessity heretofore in some cases understood of membership in them as an adjunct to Royal Arch Masonry, but it cut off from their rolls many active workers. Its most serious effect lay in its limitation of the power and influence of the Lodges themselves by placing them in an abnormal position. It, in fact, divested them of all power outside of the immediate limits of their warrants; they were outside the blue Lodge and subordinate to, but not of, the red one. But it took some time for these effects to be fully seen and meanwhile Mark Lodges continued to be formed. In 1817, as "serious evils" had arisen "in consequence of the unusual multitude of Mark Lodges," a resolution was passed recommending that no dispensation for such bodies should be issued during the recess of the Grand Chapter, and no fewer than twenty-three were reported delinquent.

Slowly, however, the sentiment against such Lodges began to form throughout the State and applications for such warrants gradually lessened until they ceased either because they were not encouraged by the Grand Chapter or because of the unpopularity of attempts to create them among the members of the craft. Probably both these features operated to bring about an end to a condition of things

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