secrets of the Craft for the purpose of making capital out of their information. The advertisement appears in the Newcastle Courant of January 4, 1770, and runs as follows:—
THIS is to acquaint the Public, That on Monday the first instant, being the Lodge (or Monthly Meeting) night of the Free and Accepted Masons of the 22d Regiment, held at the Crown, near Newgate (Newcastle) Mrs Bell, the Landlady of the House, broke open a Door (with a Poker) that had not been opened for some Years past, by which means she got into an adjacent Room, made two Holes through the Wall, and by that stratagem discovered the secrets of Masonry; and she, knowing herself to be the first Woman in the World that ever found out the Secret, is willing to make it known to all her Sex. So any Lady who is desirous of learning the Secrets of Free Masonry, by applying to that well-learned Woman (Mrs Bell that lived 15 years in and about Newgate) may be instructed in all the Secrets of Masonry.
Coming back to London again, we find the following announcement published in more papers than one. It is well worthy of perusal, as giving a picture of the loneliness of Chelsea and its approaches a hundred years ago, when it was a little outlying village, and when the whole duty of a watchman was to evade by any and every means in his power, contact with footpads, “high tobymen,” or burglars:—
Chelsea, Middlesex, Feb. 20, 1770.