The Van Buren press., 1897-12-25
THE LADY FREEMASON.
Historical Authority for the Legend
About Miss St. Leger.


The legend of the Lady Freemason
is examined as in the dry light of his
tory. by a correspondent who com
municates his learned inquiries to us
this morning. The popular version
which everybody had heard and no.
body quite believed-was that Miss st.
Leger. daughter of former Lord
Doneraile, had concealed herself in the
case of "grandfather's clock which
was standing in a room where the oc-
cult rites of the fraternity were about
to be celebrated; that she sneeKed Tor
did she yawn?), and was dragged
from her hiding place, but, in lieu of in-
stant execution, was mercifully al
lowed, in regard for the feelings of her
father and brothers, to be initiated into
all the mysteries of the craft. Being q
woman, she was considered to be suf1i-
ciently punished by being told secret
and forced to keep it. The fact that she
never divulged what she learned has
been used by peryerse misogynists as
proof that there was nothing to reveal.
Faithful masons have been fixed on the
horns of rather disconcerting dilem-
ma; either there was nothing to tell or
a woman never found it out. They have
been invited to repudiate either the
mystery or the woman. But our cor
respondent comes to their rescue.
From his researches in stu, and his
investigation of the family archives,{t
appears that Miss st. Leger did not hio>il
herself in a clock, for the simple reason
that no timepiece of sufficient capacity
was kept at Doneraile Court. What
really happened, or may have happened,
is that she was sitting in library ad-
Joining the room in which the ceremony
was being enacted. But the partition
wall CHANGED to be undergoing repair;
and while she was doing perhaps over
novel of the period-she was awak-
ened by the sound of voices. Naturally
she wished to know what was being
said. Some girls in their fathers house
would have walked into the next room
and taken their proper share in the
conversation.
But this was too tame for Miss St.
Leger. She pulled away some of the
bricks and established a position OF
vantage where she could see and hear
without being observed. All might have
gone well, but either the lodge pro-
gramme was less entertaining than
she had expected or, as our eorre-
spondent suggests, she suddenly real
lied the terrible consequences of her
action" Whether she was conscience
stricken or merely bored, she deter
mined to make her escape. She got
safely into the hall, and saw nobody
there but the family butler. But he
was no longer the obsequious retainer;
he was a man and a mason. Indeed, he
was acting as doorkeeper to the lodge
whose sacred rites she had profaned. 1t
was no longer q case of servant and
mistress; she was the culprit, he the
avenging priest. Obviously, he had to
tell her papa. 1t was equally matter
of course that she should fall into
swoon-it gave her time to review the
situation. The sequel cannot be more
touchingly described than in our corre-
spondent's own language: "The fair
culprit, endowed with high sense OF
honor, at once consented to pass
through the impressive ceremonies she
had already in part witnessed and be-
come freemason." The precision Of
the narrative leaves nothing to be de-
sired until we ask for the date. All we
are told is that 'the year was probably
l710" ProbablVl We had imagined
that this full, true and particular ac-
count was transcribed from authentic
and contemporary records. But If the
year is only a matter of conjecture,
what of the rest of the narrative? Is it
one more essay in that branch of his
tory which the Germans call "subjec-
tive Notwithstanding a pri-
yate fancy and stating it as an ascer-
tanned fact?-London Standard.