degree of elegance, and every thing conduced with the most delicate respect for our fair sisters, and the old song of brotherly love was chanted in the most refined strain of sentiment. I do not suppose that the Parisian Free Masonry of forty-five degrees could give me more entertainment. I had profited so much by it, that I had the honour of being appointed the Brother-orator. In this office I gave such satisfaction, that a worthy Brother sent me at midnight a box, which he committed to my care, as a person far advanced in masonic science, zealously attached to the order, and therefore a fit depository of important writings. I learned next day that this gentleman had found it convenient to leave the empire in a hurry, but taking with him the funds of an establishment of which her Imperial Majesty had made him the manager. I was desired to keep these writings till he should see me again. I obeyed. About ten years afterward I saw the gentleman on the street in Edinburgh, conversing with a foreigner. As I passed by him, I saluted him softly in the Russian language; but without stopping, or looking him directly in the face. He coloured, but made no return. I endeavoured, in vain, to meet with him, wishing to make a proper return for much civility and kindness which I had received from him in his own country. I now considered the box as accessible to myself, and opened it. I found it to contain all the degrees of the _Parfait Maçon Ecossois_, with the Rituals, Catechisms, and Instructions, and also four other degrees of Free Masonry, as cultivated in the Parisian Lodges. I have kept them with all care, and mean to give them to some respectable Lodge. But as I am bound by no engagement of any kind, I hold myself at liberty to make such use of them as may be serviceable to the public, without enabling any uninitiated person to enter the Lodges of these degrees. This acquisition might have roused my former relish for masonry, had it been merely dormant; but, after so long separation from the _Lodge de la Fidelité_, the masonic spirit had evaporated. Some curiosity however remained, and some wish to trace this plastic mystery to the pit from which the clay had been dug, which has been moulded into so many different shapes, "some to honour, and some to dishonour." But my opportunities were now gone. I have given away (when in Russia) my volumes of discourses, and some far-fetched and gratuitous histories, and nothing remained but the pitiful work of Anderson, and the _Maçonnerie Adonhiramique devoilêe_, which are in every one's hands.