HORNS OF THE ALTAR.
In the Jewish Temple, the altars of burnt-offering and of incense had eaeh at the four corners four horns of shittim wood, s'nittim being a species of acacia having yellowish wood. Among the Jews, as well as all other ancient peoples, the altar was considered peculiarly holy and privileged; and hence, when a criminal, fleeing took hold of these horns, he found an asylum and safety. As the Masonic altar is a representation of the altar of the Solomonic member, it should be constructed with these horns; and Brother Cross has very properly so represented it in his Hieroglyphic Chart.
HOSCHEA.
The word of acclamation used by the French Freemasons of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite. In some of the Cahiers it is spelled Ozee. It is, as Brother Mackey believed, a corruption of the word Huzza, which has been used by the English and American Freemasons of the same Rite.
HOSMER, HESIKIAH LORD.
First Chief Justice of Montana, appointed by President Lincoln, 186S, he organized orderly justice from frontier violence. Born at Hudson, New York, December 10, 1814, he died at San Francisco, California, October 31, 1893. Studied law at Cleveland, Ohio; was editor of the Toledo Blade, and author of the novel "Octoroon," 1859, prompting Boucicault's play of that name. Hosmer in 1861 was at Washington as Secretary of House Committee on Territories.
Judge Hosmer published in 1887 "Bacon and Shakespeare in the Sonnets." Made a Freemason in Wood County Lodge No. 112, Ohio, 1843, going ten miles into the forest for the Degrees, the Morgan excitement still causing much bitterness; exalted in Circleville Chapter No. 20, Ohio, 1845, and knighted, Toledo Commandery No. 7, 1847. At Toledo he was Master of Rubicon Lodge No. 237; High Priest, Fort Meigs Chapter No. 29, and for several years Erninent Commander, Toledo Commandery No. 7. He became Grand King, Grand Chapter of Ohio; Grand Orator and then Deputy Grand Master, Grand Lodge of Ohio; at Cleveland, 1851, delivering an eloquent address to the Grand Lodge. In Montana in 1865 he was first Master of Montana Lodge No. 2, and six years Eminent Commander of Virginia City Commandery No. 1. In the Grand Lodge of Montana he was for several years Chairman, Foreign Correspondence Committee, and for two years, 1870-1, Grand Secretary. At death he had been thirteen years Prelate of Golden Gate Commandery No. 16, San Francisco, and ten years Grand Prelate of the Grand Commandery of California. An accomplished and impressive ritualist, an able civic and Masonic official (see Proceedings, Grand Lodge of Montana, 1903, page 62, and volume ui, Transactions, Historical Society of Montana, 1890).
HOSPITALER.
An officer in each of the Bodies of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite, and in the Modern French Rite, one whose duty it is to collect obligatory contributions of the members, and, as the custodian, to disburse the sa ne, under the advisement of the Master, to needy Brethren, or even worthy profanes who may be in distress. The fund is entirely a secret one, and is reserved apart from all other receipts and disbursements.
HOSPITALER, KNIGHT.
See Rnight Hospzfaler.
HOSPITALERS OF JERUSALEM.
In the middle of the eleventh century, some merchants of Amalfi, a rich city of the kingdom of Naples, while trading in Egypt, obtained from the Calif Monstaser Billah permission to establish hospitals in the city of Jerusalem for the use of poor and sick Catholic pilgrims. A site was assigned to them close to the Holy Sepulcher, on which they erected a chapel dedicated to the Virgin, giving it the name of Saint Mary ad Latinos, to distinguish it from those churches where the service was performed accordinmr to this Greek ritual.
The building was completed in the year 1048; and at the same time two hospitals, one for either sex, were erected in the vicinity of the chapel for the reception of pilgrims. Subsequently each of these hospitals had a separate chapel annexed to it; that for the men being dedicated to Saint John the Almoner, and that for the women to Saint Mary Magdalen. Many of the pilgrims who had experienced the kindness so liberally bestowed upon all wayfarers, abandoned all idea of returning to Europe, and formed themselves into a band of charitable assistants, and, without assuming any regular, religious profession, devoted themselves to the service of the hospital and the care of its sick inmates. The chief cities of the south of Europe subscribed liberally for the support of this institution; and the merchants of Amalfi who were its original founders acted as the stewards of their bounty, which was greatly augmented from the favorable reports of grateful pilgrims who had returned home, and the revenues of the hospital were thus much increased. The associates assumed the name of Hospitalers of Jerusalern. Afterward, taking up arms for the protection of the holy places against the Saracens, they called themselves Knights Hospitalers, a title which they subsequently changed to that of Rnights of Rhodes, and finally to that of Knights of Malta.
HOSPITALITY.
This virtue has always been highly esteemed among Freernasons. Nothing is more usual in diplomas or certificates than to recommend the bearer "to the hospitality of all the Brethren wheresoever dispersed over the globe"; a recommendation that is seldom disregarded. All of the old Constitutions detail the practice of hospitality, as one of the duties of the Craft, in language like this: "Every Mason shall receive and cherish strange fellowes when they come over the countreye."
HOST, CAPTAIN OF THE.
See Captain of the Host.
HOUDON, JEAN ANTOINE.
Celebrated French sculptor; born March 20, 1741, at Versailles; died at Paris on July 16, 1828. His name appears on the list of members of the Lodge of the Nine Sisters at Paris for 1779, 1783, 1784 and those of 1806, where he is designated as the "Imperial Sculptor, Member of tLe Institute, and Professor." At twelve entered the Royal School of Sculpture, won the Prize of Rome at twenty, and became famous for his statues and busts of prominent people. Came to the United States with Franklin and was for a time with Washington at Mount Vernon His statues of Washington and Voltaire are especially well known.
HOUEL.
An officer of the Grand Orient of France in 1804. Grand Orator of the Grand Chapter in 1814.
HOUEL, JEAN PIERRE LOUIS LAURENT.
French engraver and painter, born at Rouen about 1735, studied painting and engraving in Italy, and also wrote four volumes entitled voyage Pittoresque de Sicile, de Malte, et de Lipari, 1782-7. His name is listed on the rosters of the Lodge of the Nine Sisters at Paris for the years 1783, 1784, 1806. Brother Houël died on November 14, 1813, at Paris.
HOUR-GLASS.
An emblem connected with the Third Degree, according to the Webb lectures, to remind us by the quick passage of its sands of the transitory nature of human life. As a Masonic symbol it is of comparatively modern date, but the use of the hourglass as an emblem of the passage of time is older than our oldest known rituals. Thus, in a speech before Parliament, in 1627, it is said: "We may dan dandle and play with the hour-glass that is in our power, but the hour will not stay for us; and an opportunity once lost cannot be regained." We are told in Notes and Queries (First Series, v, page 223) that in the early part of the eighteenth century it was a custom to inter an hour-glass with the dead, as an emblem of the sand of life being run out.
- There is in Sir John Soane's Museum, Lincoln's Inn Fields, London, a manuseript account book, of 1614- 41, once owned by Nicholas Stone, Mason to King James I and Charles I, which on the title page has the following written note:
- In time take time while time doth last,
- For time is no time wheel time is past.
- A few sad and studious lines written in his Bible by Sir Falter Raleigh are found in Cayley's biography of him (volume in, chapter ix):
- E'en such is time! which takes in trust
- Our youth, our joys, and an we have
- And pays us naught but age and dust,
- Which, in the dark arld silent grave,
- When we have wandered aU our ways,
- Shuts up the story of our days.
- And from which grave, and earth, and dust
- The Lord will raise me up, I trust.
- Longfellow, in his "Sand of the Desert in an Hour glass," has written thus:
- A handful of red sand from the hot clime
- Of Arab deserts brought
- gWithin the glass oeeomes the spy of Time,
- The minister of Thought.
- An hour-glass is in the possession of the Lodge at Alexandria, Virginia, of which our Brother George Washington was Master.
That old treasure, a measure of the flying moments, well exhibits the changing methods brought about in time.
HOURS, MASONIC.
The language of Freemasonry, in reference to the hours of labor and refreshment, is altogether symbolical. The old lectures contained a tradition that our ancient Brethren wrought six days in the week and twelve hours in the day, being called off regularly at the hour of high twelve from labor to refreshment. In the French and German systems, the Craft were said to be called from labor at low twelve, or midnight, which is therefore the supposed or fictitious time at which a
French or German Lodge is closed. But in the English and American systems the Craft are supposed to be called off at high twelve, and when called on again the time for recommencing labor is said to be "one hour past high twelve": all this refers to Ancient Craft Freemasonry. In some of the advanced Degrees the hours designated for labor or rest are different.
So, too, in the different Rites: thus, in the system of Zinnendorf, it is said that there are in a Mason's Lodge five hours, namely, twelve struck, noon, high noon, midnight, and high midnight; which are thus explained: Twelve struck, is before the Lodge is opened and after it is closed; noon is when the Master is about to open the Lodge; high noon, when it is duly open; midnight, when the Master is about to close it; and high midnight, when it is closed and the uninitiated are permitted to draw near.
HOURS OF INITIATION.
In Masonic Lodges, as they were in the Ancient Mysteries, initiations are always at night. No Lodges ever meet in the daytime for that purpose, if it can be avoided.
More recently than the time of brother Mackey there have been in the United States and in Europe a number of Masonic Bodies which meet in the afternoon because of greater convenience, the majority of the members being connected with the Stage, the Press, and similar businesses (see Night).
HOUSTON, SAM.
Born March 2, 1792; died July 26, 1863. First president of the Republic of Texas in 1836 and later governor of Texas under American rule in 1861. Made a Freemason in 1817, in Cumberland Lodge No. 8, Nashville, Tennessee, and became affiliated with Holland Lodge No. 1, Houston, in 1837. He presided over the Masonic Convention held to create the first Grand Lodge of Texas (see NeuJ Age Magazine, March, 1924; also Mackey'sHistory of Freernasonry, page 1613).
HOW GO SQUARES?
The question was one of the earliest of the tests which were common in the eighteenth century. In the Grand Mystery, published in 1724, we find it in the following form:
Q. :EIow go squares?
A. Straight.
It is noteworthy, that this phrasese has an earlier date than the eighteenth century, and did not belong exclusively to the Freemasons. In Thomas May's comedy of The Old Couple, published in 1658, Act iv, scene i (see also Dodsley's Colkstion of Old Plays, volume 10), will be found the following passage:
Sir Argent Scrape. Ha! Mr. Frightful, welcome.
How go squares? What do you think of me to make a bridegroom? Do I look young enough?
H.-. R.-. D.-. M.-.
An abbreviation of Heredom or Herodem.
HU.
The name of the chief god among the Druids, commonly called Hu Gadarn, or Hu the Mighty. He is thus described by one of the Welsh bards: "The smallest of the small, Hu is the mighty in the world's judgment; yet he is the greatest and Lord over us and our God of mystery. His course is light and swift, his car is a particle of bright sunshine. He is great on land and sea, the greatest whom I shall behold, greater than the worlds. Offer not indignity to him, the Great and Beautiful." Bryant and Davies, in accordance with their arkite theory, think that he was Noah deified; but the Masonic scholar will be reminded of the Hi-hu taken by the Cabalists out of the name of Jehovah.
HUETTE.
A word equivalent among the StoneMasons of Germany, in the Middle Ages, to the English word Lodge. Findel defines it as "a booth made of boards erected near the edifice that was being built, where the stone-cutters kept their tools, carried on their work, assembled, and most probably occasionally ate and slept." These Hütten accord exactly with the Lodges which Wren describes as having been erected by the English Masons around the edifice they were constructing.
HUGHAN, WILLIAM JAMES.
Suplement
This able and well-known Masonic scholar was born on February 13, 1841, and died on May 20, 1911. His father vas a native of Dunscore, in Scotland, who had settled at East Stonehouse in Devonshire, where Brother Hughan was born. At the age of fifteen he was apprenticed to a draper at Devonport; at nineteen he entered a wholesale firm at Plymouth, going thence to Manchester and Truro, at which latter place he remained until 1883, when he retired from business and settled at Torquay, where he died.
He was initiated in 1863 in the Saint Aubyn Lodge, No. 954, at Devonport; in the following year he joined the Emulation Lodge of Improvement in London, and on removing to Truro in 1864 he joined the Phenix Lodge of Honor and Prudence, No. 331, of which he was for a time Secretary, and in 1866 the Fortitude Lodge, No. 131, of which he was Worshipful Master in 1868 and 1878. In 1865 he was exalted in the Glasgow Chapter, No. 60, and joined Kilwinning Chapter, Ayr, No. 80, in 1868, becoming its Z., the chief officer, in 1873, and he was appointed Past Assistant Grand Sojourner of England in 1883; at various times he took most, if not all, of the Degrees worked in England and Scotland. In 1869 he was appointed Provincial Grand Secretary for Cornwall, which post he held for two years, and in 1874 he received the rank of Past Senior Grand Deacon of England, in recognition of his literary labors in the service of the Craft, this honor being the first of its kind to be so bestowed. In 1876 he was given the rank of Past Senior Grand Warden of the Grand Lodge of Egypt, which was followed by many similar honors from various foreign Masonic I3Odies, including Senior Grand Warden of the Grand Lodge of Iowa.
Brother Hughan was devoted to Masonic study and research ever since he first saw the light of Freemasonry, and the Masonic periodicals of both hemispheres contain innumerable articles from his pen. His chief published works are: Constitutions of the Freemasons, 1869; History of Freemasonry in York, 1871; Unpublished Records of the Craft, 1871- Old Charges of British Freemasons, 1872; Memorials of the Masonic Union of ISIS, 1874; Numerical and Medallic Register of Lodges, 1878; Origin of the English Rite of Freemasonry, 1884 and 1909; Engraved List of Regular Lodges for 1734, 1889; History of the Apollo Lodge and the R. A. York, 1889; History of the Lion and Lamb Lodge, 1894; Old Charges of British Freemasons, 1895; Constitutions of the Freemasons, 1725-1896, 1899 and The Jacobite Lodge at Rome, 1756-7, 1910. His writings cover the whole range of Freemasonry, but he gave special attention to the Old Charges, in the search for which he was indefatigable. The copyright in his books now belongs to the Lodge of Research, Leicester, England.
HUMILITY.
The Divine Master has said, "He that humbleth himself shall be exalted" (Luke, xiv 2), and the lesson is emphatically taught by a portion of the instructions of the Royal Arch Degree. Indeed, the first step toward the acquisition of truth is a humility of mind xvhich teaches us our own ignorance and our necessity for knowledge, so that thus we may be prepared for its reception. Doctor Oliver has erred in saying (Landmarks ii 471) that bare feet are a Masonic symbol of humility. They are properly a symbol of reverence. The true Masonic symbol of humility is bodily prostration, anel it is so exemplifiedl in the Roval Arch Degree.
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