This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated.1879 Excerpt: ... JIN my Biographical Sketch of Bro. Emra Holmes, prefixed to his Tales, Poems, and Masonic Papers, issued last year, I have noticed his rather remarkable parentage, as well as "the even tenor of his way" through life, from his birth to his appointment to the Collectorship of Customs at Fowey, in Cornwall (which office he still holds), remarking towards the close, that "Mr. Emra Holmes happening to be a resident in South Durham at the very time when I was collecting materials for biographical notices of all the poets and prose writers of the district, I could not but notice his many Dromising contributions to the press of the Northern Counties j and since then we have been for years fellow-labourers in the London Masonic press, especially in Bro. Kenning"s excellent publications, The Freemason, and The Masonic Magazine. It was, indeed, during his residence in South Durham that all that was manly and noble in his character first markedly showed itself. Those public readings, which he is still so ready to give to delighted audiences, for every good object, originated in South Durham j and there, in 1861, he first saw the light of that glorious Freemasonry, of which he has ever since been a teacher as well as a learner, a writer as well as a reader. In the Second Series, I hope to trace his Masonic career from his initiation as E.A. to his highest honours." I, therefore, now proceed to redeem my promise. Bro. Emra Holmes, I find, was initiated into Freemasonry on the second of May, 1861, in the St. Helen"s Lodge, No. 5319 Hartlepool, and was raised to the sublime degree of Master Mason on the fifth of September following. He soon after became Secretary of the Lodge, was next appointed to one of the Warden"s chairs, and in due course elected Worshipful Master, On...