Past Grand- -GRAND-MASTER_{ Past Grand Master. Past Deputy Grand-Masters. Past Grand-Sires and Officers and Members of the Brothers engaged in procession will wear regalia suitable to the degrees to which they may have attained. When two or more Lodges or Encampments walk in procession, they form severally as above; and the younger Lodges or Encampments should precede the elder. All officers in processions should wear the badges of their office. Emblems of the Order may be borne in processions, either in carriages prepared for the purpose, or by persons whose positions in the Order are such that they may appropriately bear the several emblems. Chaplains usually carry the Bible. The Marshals should walk on the left of the procession, near the heads of the divisions under their charge. At the place of its destination, the procession will halt and open right and left, while the Grand officers, etc. will pass through, in reversed order. CEREMONY AT THE FUNERAL OF A DECEASED BROTHER. T an hour appointed, the subordinate Lodge of which the brother was a member must meet at its room, and open the Lodge in the Initiatory Degree. The Noble-Grand will then appoint a Marshal and assistants. The Lodge will thereupon close, and the brothers pass in procession from the room to the place whence the brother is to be taken for interment. The order of procession will be as follows: 1. The Marshal, with black scarf, and baton bound with a band of black crape. 2. Outside Guardian, with red staff, in like mourning. 3. Scene Supporters, with white wands, in like mourning. 4. Members of the Initiatory Degree, in order of juniority, two abreast. 5. Members of the White, Pink, Royal-Blue, Green, and Scarlet Degrees, respectively, in like order. 6. Members of the Lodge having the degrees of the Encampment, respectively, in like order. 7. Inside Guardian, bearing the regalia and insignia indicative of the rank in the Order of the deceased brother. 8. Treasurer and Secretaries of the Lodge. 9. Vice-Grand, with Right and Left Supporters, each bearing his wand of office bound with a band of black crape. 10. Chaplain, with white scarf, supported by the Warden and Conductor, each bearing his staff of office in like mourning. 11. Noble-Grand, with his Right and Left Supporters, each bearing his wand of office in like mourning." * *If the deceased brother, at the time of his death, was a member of an Encampment, or of a State, District, or Territorial Grand Lodge or Grand Encampment, or of the Grand Lodge of the United States, the Chaplain, and the highest officer or officers present, of such Encampment or Grand body or bodies, supported each by two members thereof, may take a position in the funeral procession next after the Chaplain and Noble-Grand, respectively, of the subordinate Lodge of the deceased; they being entitled to take pre cedence of such Noble-Grand, and of each other (in all processio of the Order, of whatever kind, according to their respective rask) in conducting the ceremony of interment as above set forth. 12. Past Grands of the Lodge, in order of juniority. 13. Brethren of invited Lodges, those of each Lodge arranged in the order above prescribed; the Lodges, when more than one may be represented, arranged in order of juniority. On arriving at the place appointed for the starting of the funeral, the brothers must take position in the above order immediately before the corpse, and precede it to the place of interment. On arriving at such place, the brothers will open to the right and left, and allow the corpse, mourners, etc. to pass through, the brothers on either side standing uncovered, the hat held in the left hand of each, and joining hands with each other. And after the passing of the corpse, mourners, etc. between the two lines, the brothers will re-form in procession after them in reversed order, and close the procession into and within the place of interment. After the performance of such religious service as the friends of the deceased may cause to be there performed, and before the final closing of the grave, the brothers must form silently around the grave, (as near to it as may be,) according to the order above set forth; they must be uncovered, the hat in the left hand of each, and joining right hands with each other in one or more circles, as regularly as the nature of the ground may admit; the Chaplain—or, if there be no Chaplain present, the Noble-Grandmay deliver the following Address. We are assembled, my brethren, to render the last office which the living may minister to the dead. Man is born to die. The coffin, the grave, the sepulchre speak to us in language that cannot be misunderstood, however unheeded it may be, of "man's latter end." Youth in its harmlessness and comparative innocency, and manhood with its wonted vigor and pride of strength, are not more exempt than decrepit and tottering age from the fixed law of being that dedicates all that is mortal to decay and death. This truth is inscribed in the great volume of nature upon its every page. The beautiful and the sublime, which the handiwork of the Creator displays on our every side, fearfully associate the unerring certainty of the end of all things, amid the vividness of the moral which they are ever suggesting to the contemplative mind. Day after day, we are called upon to follow our fellow-creatures to that bourne whence no traveller returns: but, from the house of mourning, we go forth again to mingle in the crowded world, heedless, perhaps, of the precarious tenure of life, and the certainty of that end to which all flesh is rapidly tending. He who gives vigor of body, without warning paralyzes the stout heart and strikes down the athletic frame-the living of to-day become the dead of to-morrow. Men appear upon, and disappear from the stage of life, as wave meets wave and parts upon the troubled waters: "in the midst of life we are in death." He whose lips now echo these tones of solemn warning, in his turn will be stilled in the cold and cheerless house of the dead; and, in the providence of God, none may escape. Let us, then, so far improve the lesson as to be prepared for that change which leads to life eternal. After which the Chaplain will offer the following— Prayer. Our Father and our God! who art the resurrection and the life; in whom whosoever believeth shall live, though he die; and whosoever liveth and believeth in thee shall not die: hear, we beseech thee, the voice of thy creatures here assembled, and turn not away from our supplications. We humbly beseech thee so to imbue us with a conviction of our entire helplessness and dependence upon thee, that we may be brought to meditate upon the uncertainty of life and the certainty of death. In the dispensation of thy providence, thou hast summoned from among us our brother, and we, the surviving monuments of thy mercy, are gathered together to commit his remains to the earth. Give, O God! we beseech thee, thy Holy Spirit to us, whom thou hast spared; increase our knowledge; and con firm our faith in thee for ever. (Bless and comfort, we pray thee, those whom i✦ has pleased thee to add to the number of the discon solate; buoy them up under this heavy stroke; sus tain them against despondency. Oh! wilt thou be their Father and their God, and pour down from on high thy blessings upon their heads!) Bless, O Heavenly Father! the brethren here assembled: imbue them with the wisdom of thy laws; and draw them unto thee by the cords of thy inestimable love: impress them with their duty to each other as brethren, and their obligations in the various relations of human life; and, finally, bless our beloved Order throughout the globe. Preserve its principles and its purposes from innovation; sustain it from the shafts |