I said nothing, but tried him with the Fellow-craft
Grip. He answers all right, and I tried the Master's Grip, but that was a
slip. 'A Fellow-craft he is!' I says to Dan. 'Does he know the word?' 'He
does,' says Dan, 'and all the priests know. It's a miracle! The Chiefs and the
priests can work a Fellow-craft Lodge in a way that's very like ours, and
they've cut the marks on the rocks, but they don't know the Third Degree, and
they've come to find out. It's Gord's Truth. I've known these long years that
the Afghans knew up to the Fellow-craft Degree, but this is a miracle. A God
and a Grand Master of the Craft am I, and a Lodge in the Third Degree I will
open, and we'll raise the head priests and the Chiefs of the villages.'
"'It's against all the law,' I says, 'holding a Lodge without warrant from any
one; and you know we never held office in any Lodge.'
"'It's a master stroke o' policy,' says Dravot. 'It means running the country
as easy as a four-wheeled bogie on a down grade. We can't stop to inquire now,
or they'll turn against us. I've forty Chiefs at my heel, and passed and
raised according to their merit they shall be. Billet these men on the
villages, and see that we run up a Lodge of some kind. The temple of Imbra
will do for a Lodge-room.
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