[Surely, if there is no _Occasional_ Oratorio to be found, the
_Overture_ must mean that it was to be used on _occasion_. Our
correspondent does not seem to know the word as it is used by writers
of a century ago, for "Occasional Sermons" or services, &c. The
question is simply one of fact. _Is_ there an Oratorio? Everybody
knows the overture. The writer of this note remembers being horrified,
when a freshman, at hearing the fugue break forth in the College
Chapel, was pondering in his mind whether it was Drops of Brandy, or
the Rondo in the Turnpike-Gate, both then popular tunes.]
* * * * *
_Archbishop Waldeby's Epitaph._--W. W. KING would be obliged by a
perfect copy of the inscription on the monumental brass of Archbishop
Waldeby in Westminster Abbey.
[The brass is engraved in Harding's _Antiquities of Westminster
Abbey_; but it appears that one half of the following inscription,
which was formerly round the verge of the brass, has now been torn
away:--
"Hic fuit expertus in quovis jure Robertus,
De Waldeby dictus nunc est sub marmore strictus;
Sacre Scripture Doctor fuit, et geniture
Ingenuus Medicus et plebis semper amicus
Presul Adurensis posthoc Archas Dublinensis
Hinc Cicestrensis, tandem Primas Eborensis
Quarto kalend. Junii migravit cursibus anni
Sepultus milleni ter C. septem Nonies quoque deni.
Vos precor, Orate quod sint sibi dona beate
Cum sanctis vite requiescat et hic sine lite."
Weever, in his _Funeral Monuments_, quotes the following description
of him from a MS. account of the Archbishops of York, in the Cottonian
Collection:--
"Tunc Robertus ordinis fratris Augustini
Ascendit in cathedram primatis Paulini,
Lingua scientificus sermonis latini
Anno primo proximat vite sue fini,
De carnis ergastulo presul evocatur
Gleba sui corporis Westminstre humatur."]
* * * * *
_Verstegan._--Will any of the contributors to your valuable miscellany
be kind enough to inform me if there are any engraved portraits of the
quaint old antiquary Richard Verstegan, the author of a curious work,
entitled _A Restitution of Decayed Intelligence_? The portraits may be
common, but living in the country, and at distance from town, I have no
friend from whom I can glean the required information. Can my informant
at the same time acquaint me with the best edition of his work? There
was one printed at Antwerp in 1605.