Your correspondent was not mistaken in his belief that he had met with an imperfect transcript of this prose, for the original consists not of "twenty-seven," but of fifty-seven lines. I may add that I do not remember to have found the text more correctly given than in the beautiful folio missal of the church of Augsburg, partly printed on vellum in 1555 (fol. 466. b.).
R.G.
The Dies Iræ is truly said by Mr. SPARROW SIMPSON (Vol. ii., p. 72.) to be an extremely beautiful hymn. Who was its author is very doubtful, but the probabilities are in favour of Thomas de Celano, a Minorite friar, who lived during the second half of the fourteenth century. It consists of nineteen strophes, each having three lines. Bartholomew of Pisa, A.D. 1401, in his Liber Conformitatum, speaks of it; but the earliest printed book in which I have ever seen this hymn, is the Missale Romanum, printed at Pavia, A.D. 1491, in 8vo., a copy of which I have in my possession.
D. ROCK.
Buckland, Faringdon.
DR. SAMUEL OGDEN.
In reply to your correspondent TWYFORD (Vol. ii., p. 73.), the original of the common surname Ogden is doubtless Oakden. A place so called is situated in Butterworth, Lancashire, and gave name to a family,—possibly extinct in the sixteenth century. A clergymam, whose name partook both of the original and its corruption, was vicar of Bradford, 1556, viz Dus Tho. Okden. The arms and crest borne by the Oakdens were both allusive to the name, certainly without any reference to King Charles's hiding-place.
Dr. Samuel Ogden, born in 1716 at Winchester, was the son of Thomas Ogden, a man of very humble origin: but he had the merit of giving a liberal education to one whose natural talents well deserved culture; and both his parents, in the decline of life, owed their support to Ogden's filial piety and affection. Cole is quite mistaken in fixing the father's residence at Mansfield, and in stating that he had been in the army. The monument, spoken of by Cole, is not at Mansfield, but in the cathedral of Manchester: nor is it a memorial of Dr. Ogden. It was placed by him in memory of his father. Ogden was buried in his own church, St. Sephlchre's, Cambridge.
The following epigram, it is believed, has not been printed. It is transcribed from a letter in my possession, addressed by the first Lord Alvanley, when at college, to his former tutor, Mr. Thyer, editor of Butler's Remains:—