The ceremony of Commemoration took place at Orford on Wednesday,
the interest of the day being centred in the Public Orator's speech, which was more than usually success- ful. Dr. Merry seems to justify his name ; and to succeed in justifying such a name in a measured Latin speech is a feat of no little difficulty. What seems to have amused the under- graduates more than anything was the Public Orator's descrip- tion of the Long Vacatidn interlude last August, when the girls and boys attended lectures together and played lawn- tennis together. The description of their rather varied studies and games (lusumque trigonem) was regarded with much favour, the humour chiefly consisting, apparently, in the learned descriptions given to rather ordinary amusements. The Public Orator, however, did not limit himself to mere references to the recreations of the year. He described tersely some of the public men whom the University had lost,—especially Mr. Bright and Dean Burgon,—and his epitaph on the latter had the merit of both candour and cordiality : " Impiger, iracundus, sincerus temporis acti laudator,"—a very vivid and yet not at all an unfriendly account of that eager, acute, and profoundly prejudiced theologian, who piqued himself so much upon his prejudices that he evidently regarded their retention as an obligatory act of loyalty to the convictions of his youth.
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