The influence of England on oratorio is by no means to be measured by the number of original works of this class produced by Englishmen. No other country in the world has such a record of long and unbroken loyalty to this musical form and no other country has so freely opened its doors to composers of other nationalities. When one recalls that Handel’s series of magnificent oratorios was written for English appreciation, that Haydn’s ‘Creation’ drew its inspiration from London, that Mendelssohn’s ‘Elijah,’ Gounod’s ‘Redemption’ and _Mors et Vita_, and many other oratorios of less worth were written for, and received their initial performances before, English festival audiences, one can form some estimate of what English love of choral art has done for its development. English composers of this period were still using the musical phraseology of Handel and Mendelssohn, so that not much can be said of the individual works produced, though several were worthy and held a certain popularity for a long time. Among the more notable English oratorios of the period were Sir Julius Benedict’s ‘St. Peter’ (1870), George Alexander Macfarren’s ‘St. John the Baptist,’ which was received enthusiastically at the Bristol Festival of 1873, William Sterndale Bennett’s ‘The Woman of Samaria,’ and Sir Michael Costa’s ‘Eli’ and ‘Naaman’ (Birmingham Festival, 1864). ‘The Woman of Samaria,’ a ‘sacred cantata’ by W. Sterndale Bennett (1816-75), was first performed at Birmingham August 27, 1867. The story, taken from the fourth chapter of St. John’s Gospel, follows literally the Bible narrative--Jesus’ journey to Samaria, his rest at the well, and the entrance of the Samaritan woman. This is interspersed with choral and solo passages, the former enacting the part of moralist, commenting upon the situations as they occur by means of appropriate scriptural selections. The part of the Woman of Samaria is sung by the soprano, while the declamatory parts are assigned to the contralto. The tenor has but one aria and the bass acts almost entirely as narrator, the Saviour’s words being always related in the third person. In a single instance the chorus assumes the rôle of narrator, ‘Now we believe,’ where the words are part of the story.