Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume XII.djvu/592

578 O'CURRY ODD FELLOWS The largest had a body 2 in. long and 1 in. wide, with arms 2 in. long; the color pale bluish white, translucent, with specks of light and dark brown. The body was short and thick, dotted with erectile tubercles, broadly rounded posteriorly ; head almost as broad as body, swollen and rough about the eyes ; arms of about equal length, relatively short, stout, and tapering, and webbed for the basal third. Each arm had two rows of 60 to 65 acetabula or suckers ; the right arm of the third pair, for about a third of its length, was modified into a large spoon-shaped organ for reproduction, evidently not to be detached from the animal, as in many male cephalopoda. The females, in this class generally by far the more numerous, were not seen, but were probably considerably larger than the males. Several were kept in confinement in tanks, and were most active at night. It was seen that when they were swim- ming by the basal web and the siphon, after each contraction of these parts and daring the motion backward, the arms wer.e held straight forward in a compact bundle ; the only way in which they could swim forward seemed to be by ejecting jets of water from the siphon curved backward. The southern American species are very much larger, and very different. O'CCRRY, Eugene, an Irish archaeologist, born at Dunaha, near Oarrigaholt, county Clare, in 1796, died in Dublin, July 30, 1862. He was an assistant in the antiquarian department of the government ordnance survey of Ireland from 1834 to 1841, when he was employed by the royal Irish academy and by Trinity college, Dublin, in transcribing and cataloguing their Gaelic MSS. He also rendered valuable assis- tance in the publication of the Irish archaeolo- gical society, and was a member of the council of the Celtic society. In 1853 he was engaged with Dr. O'Donovan, under the Brehon law commission, to transcribe and translate ancient laws from originals in Trinity college and the British museum ; these he had himself in great part discovered, and he was the first modern scholar able to decipher and explain them. (See BREHON LAWS.) In 1854, on the estab- lishment of the Roman Catholic university in Dublin, he was appointed to the chair of Irish history and archaeology. He translated " Bat- tle of the Magh Leana, together with the Court- ship of Mornera " (Dublin, 1855), and published his "Lectures on the Manuscript Materials of Ancient Irish History (1861). CD. See REIOHENBACH, KARL. ODD FELLOWS, Independent Order of, a secret charitable society, existing chiefly in Great Britain and the United States. I. MANCHESTER UNITY. From societies of mechanics and la- borers which existed in London in the latter part of the 18th century, calling themselves " Ancient and Honorable Loyal Odd Fellows," and holding convivial meetings, sprang the "Union Order of Odd Fellows," which had its seat of government in London and spread rapidly to other English cities. From attempts to abolish its convivial character arose a schism which culminated in 1813, when several se- ceding lodges formed the Manchester unity. In 1825 a central standing committee was es- tablished in Manchester to govern the order in the interim between the sessions of the grand lodge or national movable committee, as it is termed, and the Manchester unity still consti- tutes the main body of British odd fellows. It numbers about 500,000 members. II. AMERI- CAN. Thomas Wildey and four others organ- ized Washington lodge No. 1, in Baltimore, Md., April 26, 1819, to work according to the usages of the London or union order. A lodge was organized in Boston, Mass., March 26, 1820, and one in Philadelphia, Dec. 26, 1821, both of which received grand charters from Baltimore in June, 1823. At the same time a grand charter was granted to the past grands in New York. Since then the order has been established in every state and territory of the* Union. There were in the United States and Canada at the date of the last report 48 grand lodges, 36 grand encampments, 5,486 subordi- nate lodges, 1,512 subordinate encampments, and 512 Rebekah degree lodges. Candidates for admission to the order must be free white males of good moral character, 21 years of age or over, who believe in a Supreme Being, the creator and preserver of the universe. Fidel- ity not only to the laws and obligations of the order, but to the laws of God, the laws of the land, and all the duties of citizenship, is strictly enjoined; but the order is a moral, not a religious organization. Its secrecy con- sists solely in the possession of an unwritten and unspoken language, intelligible only to its members, which serves simply for mutual rec- ognition. Five or more members may con- stitute a subordinate lodge, whose functions are chiefly administrative ; it provides the means to meet the claims of its sick and dis- tressed members, to bury the dead, to relieve the widow, and to educate the orphan. The by-laws constitute the legal contract between the initiate and the lodge. To the lodge be- long a series of degrees, known as the initia- tory, white, pink, blue, green, and scarlet, rep- resenting a code of moral lessons. In 1851 the degree of Rebekah was adopted by the grand lodge of the United States, for the use of ladies legally connected with subordinate lodges by male membership. The lodge is of- ficered by a noble grand, vice grand, secretary, and treasurer, elected semi-annually. The grand lodge consists of the past grands of its subordinate lodges in good standing, or it may be made a representative body. It is officered by a grand master, deputy grand master, grand warden, grand secretary, and grand treasurer, elected annually. Subordinate encampments are composed of scarlet-degree members in good standing in subordinate lodges. The beneficial feature of the order is optional with them. They have the exclusive right to con- fer the patriarchal, golden rule, and royal pur-