ongst the members of "The Star in the East," an Order
founded at Benares in 1911 by Mr. Leadbeater and J. Krishnamurti for the
purpose of preparing the world for the coming of the Great Teacher.

But it is time to return to the alliance between Theosophy and the
Maconnerie Mixte. Whether Mrs. Besant, who had begun her career as a
Freethinker, retained some lingering belief in her earlier creed at the
time she entered into relations with the Order, or whether she saw in
this materialistic society a valuable concrete organization for the
dissemination of her new esoteric theories, it is impossible to know. At
any rate, she rose rapidly through the succeeding degrees and became
before long Vice President of the _Supreme Conseil_, which appointed her
its national delegate to Great Britain. It was in this capacity that she
founded the English branch of the Order under the name of Co-Masonry
(that is, admitting both sexes) at the Lodge "Human Duty" in London,
which was consecrated on September 26, 1902, and later founded another
lodge at Adyar in India, named "The Rising Sun." The number of lodges on
the Grand Roll of Co-Masonry, including those abroad, is now said to be
no less than 442.

Co-Masonry thus receives a two-fold direction, for whilst remaining in
constant correspondence with the _Supreme Conseil Universel Mixte_,
situated at 5 Rue Jules-Breton in Paris and presided over by the Grand
Master Piron, with Madame Amelie Gedalje, thirty-third degree, as Grand
Secretary-General, it receives further instructions from "the V.'. Ill.'.
Bro.'. Annie Besant 33deg." at Adyar. In order not to shock the
susceptibilities of English adepts who might be repelled by the
rationalist tendencies of the Maconnerie Mixte, Mrs. Besant has,
however, borrowed the formulas of British Masonry together with its
custom of placing the V.S.L. on the table in the lodges. These
conflicting doctrines are blended in an amusing manner on the
certificates of the Order, where at the top we find the French motto and
initials:

Liberte Egalite Fraternite
A.'. L.'. G.'. D.'. L'H.'.
(i.e. a la gloire de l'Humanite)

and below, for the benefit of English members, the initials of the
British masonic device, that does not of course appear on the diplomas
of the French Order, which, like the Grand Orient, has rejected the
Great Architect:

T.'. T.'. G.'. O.'. T.'. G.'. A.'. O.'. T.'. U.'.
(To the