Mistaken identity

An examination

gone wrong

This interesting little story was taken from Revelations of a Square, written by the Reverend Bro G Oliver DD and published in 1855 by Richard Spencer. ‘W e had once, a rich scene in our lodge, during Brother Dunckerley’s mastership, which ‘Out with him! Down carries with it a useful lesson, and ought with the intruder! not to be disregarded,’ proceeded my gossiping companion, who, like the Turn him out!’ barber in the Arabian Nights, would not suffer anyone to talk but himself. ‘A stranger presented himself as a visitor, was examined, and admitted. He proved to be of a respectable standing in society, ‘This reply betrayed him; the daw was although on the present occasion he lent stripped of his borrowed plumes. The himself to the perpetration of a very brethren rose simultaneously from their disreputable affair; and the Right seats in some degree of unnecessary Worshipful Master, with all his tact and discrimination was very nearly outwitted. An ancient law of Freemasonry provided that no visitor, however skilled in the art, shall be admitted into a lodge unless he is personally known to, or well vouched and recommended by some of the brethren then present. Many occasions arose in which it had been deemed expedient to remit the strict observance alarm, like a flock of sheep in the presence of some strange dog. The intruder was perplexed; he saw his error, but knew not the remedy: and when the Right Worshipful Master quietly observed: ‘Now sir, will you be kind enough to favour us with your version of the story,’ he replied, in the language of Canning’s Knife Grinder: ‘Story! Lord bless you! I have none to tell! I was anxious to see a lodge of brethren at of the rule, and such had been the case work; and one of your seceding members in the present instance. The intruder, furnished me with answers to a few however, had not occupied his precariquestions which he said would be proous position more than five minutes, posed in the Tyler’s room, and for a frolic before a venerable brother called aloud I was determined to test their truth, as, – ‘It rains!’ at the very worst, I could only be rejected,

‘Brother Dunckerley’s presence of which I did not conceive would be either mind did not forsake him in this emera disappointment or a disgrace; for to say gency, and he gravely demanded of the the truth, I scarcely expected to gain visitor, – Where were you made a admittance into the lodge.’ mason?’ The answer was at hand, ‘In a ‘What was to be done? The dilemma lodge at the King’s Head, Gravesend.’ was pressing, and various opinions were proposed and discussed, while the delinquent was securely locked up in the preparing room, and left in darkness to his own disagreeable reflections. The confusion in King Agramante’s camp, so well described by Ariosto, where one said one thing and another, the reverse, may convey some idea of the consternation which issued. All spoke together, and the reins of authority seemed to have been unnaturally snapped asunder, for the R.W.M. had retired with his Wardens behind the pedestal, leaving the brethren in the body of the room to denounce or threaten at their pleasure; and their objurgations were rather amusing than otherwise. One or two young members, in the exuberance of their zeal, thoughtless and ill-judging, like sailors at the prospect of a wreck breaking open the spirit room, jumped upon the benches, like Victor Hugo’s scholars in Notre Dame, vociferating, – “Out with him! Down with the intruder! Turn him out!”

Others were more moderate. One brother observed, in a deprecatory tone of voice: ‘He ought not to have been admitted.’ A fat brother, with a red face peering from beneath his periwig and queue, who had not taken the trouble, amidst all this excitement, to move from his seat, quietly asked, ‘Who examined him?’ And others, acting under the impulse so universally displayed by the young men on the bench, were clamorous that the watch should be called in, and the intruder transferred to the roundhouse.

‘Meanwhile, Bro. Dunckerley had matured his plan, and having ascended into the chair, and given the signal which appeased the tumult, and brought every brother to his seat in a moment, he said: “Brethren, – I need not tell you that we are placed at this moment in a situation where a false step may involve not only this lodge but the whole Craft in unknown difficulties. It was the maxim of Socrates, – it is well to punish an enemy, but it is better to make him your friend. Now we must not content ourselves with asking who examined him? Or why he was admitted? For he is actually amongst us; and it is too late to prevent the intrusion. And if we were to adopt that worthy brother’s advice who recommended him to be turned out, the matter would not be greatly mended; – the principal