Masonic Reminiscences.

" I should think it absurd , and unreasonable , and wicked , and' — "Don ' t get into a passion , if is a mere supposition , but just as unreasonable are they who abuse Freemasonry without knowing anything ¦ whatever about it—I need scarcely . tell you , that none but Freemasons can know any thing of it ; from them alone can be learned what it is , or what it is not ; your father is not a Freemason , and with all possible

respect , he cannot be received as good authority on the point . Your friend the Sector , you will admit , is a good man , and not likely to belongto , or sanction anything wicked , yet lie is a most zealous Freemason : you have heard me profess myself one , and I should feel but too happy , if I thought my nephew had intellect sufficient to understand and appreciate its social usefulness , and moral beauty—to see him also a member of

an Order , which comprehends within its sacred circle a large portion of the good and wise of every civilized land ; it is true that in these Islands ladies have hitherto been excluded , but I may mention to you one extraordinary exception ( the interesting particulars of which we shall place before our readers in a future paper ) of a highly respectable lady in a southern city , who was found concealed in a Masonic Lodge ( fact ) , and

who afterwards during a long life , energetically devoted herself to the dissemination of our principles and the support of our charities , and whose portrait ( we believe ) to this day forms a graceful ornament in the Masonic orphan school of her native city of Cork . " * The Colonel ceased : Mrs . Phil vouchsafed no reply , she was silenced ,

but not convinced ; in truth she now seemed truly miserable , and lost no opportunity of endeavouring to make all within the reach of her influence as wretched as herself , by those numberless little pevish absurdities resulting from an uninformed , and ill-regulated mind ; she would , first order the close carriage , when that was announced , it was sent back , and she should have the open phaeton ; when that was ready , she changed her

mind , and fancied horse exercise ; the horses were dismissed to the stable ; she now preferred a walk , from which she speedily returned , to abuse her unoffending maid for not having foretold the light shower in which she had just been caught . While at Elysium , the necessity of economizing gave her employments , which , in her home hours , preserved her from that lassitude , often of laziness ,

known as ennui , there she generally dispensed with the services of milliners and dress makers , but since she became the wife of a man of fortune , she endured the self-inflicted torture of idleness ; she gave up , as quile beneath her dignity , all that nervous activity and exercise of harmless ingenuity , which in ladies of peculiar temperaments degenerates into a troublesome maladyunpleasantlknown to many a suffering Benedict

, y , underthc title of " fidgets . " The presence of this disease may be sometimes detected by a restless disposition to turn things inside out , or upside down without any very definite object , or when it assumes its milder form , in strenuous efforts to adapt the dress or bonnet of a bye-goue date , to some OK / r / fashion of the day .