Chapter VIII: Preface (5)

As it happened, similar printers’ errors occurred in one of Mr. Mallock’s examples in the _Nineteenth Century_--the passage from _De Augmentis_ in which he concealed his own couplet: “The star of Shakespeare, etc.”--and that work was done by twentieth-century printers, of Mr. Mallock’s own selection; The passage he quotes, printed in the two forms of types, cannot be deciphered as printed on account of an error in the tenth group, and a few letters used from wrong founts. I have sent Mr. Mallock the correction; but I have been wondering since whether it were not incorporated intentionally, to test my powers of observation, for after the tenth group the rest of the passage is simply impossible to read in bi-literal cipher, until the short group is detected and a new division made. I cannot think Mr. Mallock made these mistakes in marking his MS. Some errors exist in our own work, which have been discovered since publication, and may quite possibly be found by those who study the book.

PRINTERS AND “DIGRAPHS.”

6. “In the period when the writings under discussion were published, printers made a liberal use of digraphs, such as 'ft,’ 'fh,’ 'ct,’ 'fl,’ etc. (In one page of 24 lines, from which Mrs. Gallup derives her cipher narrative, there are 26 digraphs.) With regard to the deciphering of these, Mrs. Gallup suggests no rules and obeys no laws.”

Again this is erroneous in the last clause. I quote from a preceding paragraph of this correspondent’s own article, regarding Bacon’s treatment of the digraph, as follows: “In the example which he gave of the enfolding of such a cipher in a portion of one of Cicero’s letters, he printed an æ (diphthong), occuring in the Latin word 'cæteris,’ not as a diphthong at all, but as two separate letters--ae. Similarly, he caused the ordinary digraph 'ct,’ invariably printed in one type in those days, to be printed as two separate letters--ct, showing, I think conclusively, that in his cipher, as applied to printing, digraphs must be--treated separately.” Our “Correspondent” says “digraphs must be kept out of the print,” but it is a wrong inference. These diphthongs and digraphs must be compared with one another, not with single letters, but the parts are to be considered separately. They will each be found to have distinctive features, and a decipherer who has become at all expert will at once determine their proper classification.

ROMAN TYPES.

7. “In certain specific instances, Mrs. Gallup’s deciphering is arithmetically incorrect, or must be helped out with the help of an arbitrary employment of Roman types--on occasion even this device will not avail to produce the requisite number of letters for her alleged cipher message.”

For the specific instances where Roman type is used, Bacon’s instructions are found on pp. 66-67 of the _Bi-literal Cypher_, which “Correspondent” has evidently overlooked. I have used this passage on another occasion, but will quote again, as others have stumbled over the same difficulty:

“In order to conceale my Cypher more perfectly, I am preparing for th’ purpose a sette of alphabets in th’ Latine tipe, not for use in th’ greatest or lengthy story or epistle, but as another disguise, for, in ensample, a prologue, præfatio, the epilogues, and headlines attracted too much notice. Noe othe’ waie of diverting th’ curious could be used where th’ exterior epistle is but briefe, however it will not thus turne aside my decipherer, for his eye is too well practis’d in artes that easily misleade others who enquire th’ waye.”

I found Roman type used in such places, and the differences in the letters are quite distinct, but no use was made of this new device, so far as I have found, until 1623, when it appeared in the First Folio, and in _Vitae et Mortis_.

An incident, for the moment mortifying, occurred in Boston, by which I discovered an error of our printers in the first edition issued. Those having copies of the first edition will notice the word “Baron” is left out of the signature, which reads in the later edition Francis, Baron of Verulam (p. 166), deciphered from the short poem signed “I. M.” in the Shakespeare Folio. When I visited Boston to continue my researches, friends previously interested in my work mentioned the difficulty they had in trying to decipher, as I did, this portion. I remarked the Roman letters must be used; to which they replied the number of Italic letters corresponded with the number of groups required, but the groups would not “read.” Upon deciphering it again, in the presence of these people, I found the word Baron had been dropped out in the printing, and the error was corrected in the second edition.

The answers already given meet the summarised objection of the correspondent’s eighth and ninth paragraphs.

THE DECIPHERING WORKROOM.

10. “The nature of the Cipher is such, being in fact entirely dependent upon the presence and position of a certain number of _b_'s, that, given a framework of such determining, factors (which might easily be supplied by the acknowledged differences in a few letters), a misdirected ingenuity could with patience supply all that a preconceived notion could possibly demand.”

The cipher alphabet Bacon illustrates in _De Augmentis Scientiarum_ contains 68 _a_'s and 52 _b_'s. The proportion in general use was found to be about 5 to 3. Perhaps I cannot do better to clear myself from the aspersions here intimated than to explain the methods of the workroom by which the larger part of the deciphering was actually done. A type-writing machine was changed in its mechanism to space automatically after each group of five letters. The operator alone copied every Italic letter, and the sheets came to me with the letters already grouped. The different forms of letters in the book to be deciphered were then made a study, the peculiarities of each fount classified and sketched in an enlarged and accentuated form upon a small chart, and the '_b_ fount’ (being the fewer) was thoroughly learned. The chart was always before me for use upon doubtful letters. I marked upon the sheet on which the letters had been grouped only those that I found to be of the '_b_ fount.’ An assistant marked the _a_'s and transcribed the result, when I knew for the first time the reading of the deciphered product. It was thus impossible for me to “preconceive” it, and no amount of “ingenuity, misdirected” or otherwise, could have developed the hundreds of pages of MS. of these consecutive letters into anything except what the cipher letters would spell out.

THE OPERATOR AND THE ERRORS.

Excepting, of course, occasional corrections of the errors of the operator in copying, or myself in determining the proper fount, the work stands exactly as it left the assistant’s hands. The original sheets are unchanged and in my possession. Errors occurred in the work as it progressed, but they were so guarded against by the system itself that the deciphering was quickly brought to a stop until they were corrected. Coming from the assistant, the words were without capitals, or punctuation, as would be the case by any method of deciphering a cipher. The work of capitalization and punctuation, in the book, is my own, and in this alone was choice permitted me.

The difficulty with “A Correspondent,” as with many observers, is that he jumps at once to conclusions from very superficial and limited examination, as well as unfamiliarity with the principles which underlie the work; and while his keenness of observation is greater than some evince, he has not, by any means, given the matter sufficient study to become an expert, or to warrant him in expressing a critical judgment. He would not expect to learn Greek in a day, nor to decipher hieroglyphics on an obelisk upon a first attempt. There are in the Plays five pairs of alphabets of twenty-four letters each (capital and small) in the different styles and sizes of Italic type. In other words, four hundred and eighty different letters have to be compared with their fellows to determine the classification. It is not, then, the work of a day or a week to enable one to pass an opinion upon the Folio as a whole, and yet that is what he attempts to do.

THE “TIMES” FACSIMILES.

The _Times_ reproduces a page of facsimiles and an illustration taken from Spenser’s _Complaints_, and has also arranged in enlarged form some small letters. In fairness the captials should have appeared as well. In the processes necessary for reproduction, upon newspaper of coarse fibre and uneven surface with the speed of a modern press, many distinctive features of the letters have been lost or distorted to the skilled eye, and the unskilled should not be asked to form a judgment of the integrity of a difficult cipher from such utterly untrustworthy reproductions.

As explained in the Introduction to the second edition of my book, the facsimiles were not satisfactory. The difficulties arising from age, unequal absorption of ink, poor paper, and poor printing in the old books, cause some features to be exaggerated, while others disappear; and on account of unavoidable inaccuracies, they were omitted from the third edition.

INSPIRATION.

It is strange how an inadvertent word or phrase, in the hands of those who choose to pervert, will return to plague one. In an article in _Baconiana_, I enumerated the requirements for the work of deciphering as “eyesight of the keenest and perfect accuracy of vision in distinguishing minute differences in form, lines, angles, and curves of the printed letters ... unlimited time and patience, persistency and aptitude, love for overcoming puzzling difficulties, and I sometimes think inspiration.” Any one who has worked long in an absorbing and difficult field, will know that the word in this connection meant only the light that breaks upon one’s mind, in the solution of some difficulty as the result of earnest effort; and for a critic to make from this a charge that I allege the cipher work to be one of inspiration on my part is such a misuse of terms as to be wholly unjustifiable. I think I have the right to complain when the word so used is made the basis of sneering attack through the public press. The word was used by me in no other connection, and as my critics must know, in no other than this very harmless and allowable sense. This is particularly in reply to a lengthy editorial in the _Times_, which assumed that I made claims to “inspiration.”

Those who have read my book carefully will recall some of the difficulties recounted on page 11 of the Introduction, relating to a subject that has puzzled many students--_i.e._, the wrong paging of the Folio and some of the other old books. It is told in few words in the book, but they are totally inadequate to describe the strain upon eyes and nerves in those days of alternating struggle and elation as one by one the difficulties were overcome. I think my readers will pardon a careless, perhaps irrevelant use of the term, “I sometimes think inspiration”--may have prompted me to make one more trial.

MR. LANG AND MRS. GALLUP.

I am also desired to refer to the writings of Mr. Lang, who, on several occasions, has made the _Bi-literal Cypher_ the theme of much ironical pleasantry, more especially in the _Monthly Review_. Mr. Lang is one of those happy individuals possessed of a large vocabulary and of a vivid imagination that like Tennyson’s babbling brook “goes on for ever,” but he prefers the interrogation to the period--questions more than he asserts.

In the _Monthly Review_ he cites again, from his _Morning Post_ article (August 1901), some of the reasons for considering Bacon a lunatic. He has, however, omitted one query then made regarding “the new Atlantis men sought beyond the western sea:” “Was Bacon ignorant of the fact that America was discovered?” The question was not repeated after I called attention to the fact that in _New Atlantis_ Bacon said, “Wee sailed from Peru.”

The Alpha and Omega of his article--since it appears on the first page and the last--is Mr. Sidney Lee’s declaration that the cipher cannot exist in the books in which I _know it does exist_. I pointed out in a recent communication to the _Times_ that Mr. Lee had not even understood the elementary principles of the cipher. This is betrayed in his statement: “Italic and Roman types were never intermingled in the manner which would be essential if the words embodied Bacon’s biliteral cipher”--for that is not the manner of its incorporation. Mr. Lang goes no farther than this very arbitrary decision in his examination of the cipher itself.

He says: “The consistency of Mrs. Gallup next amazes us. Greene, Peele, Marlowe, and Shakespeare, resemble each other in style (or so she says), because 'one hand wrote them all’ (i., p. 3). But Bacon (deciphered) avers, 'I varied my style to suit different men, since no two show the same taste and like imagination.’ (i., p. 34).... Bacon 'let his own [style] be seen.’” Mr. Lang should have quoted an additional line--“yet should [let] my owne bee seene, as a third o’ warpe in my entire fabricke,” and it would explain why there are both resemblances and differences in the style of those dramatic works, which have been commented upon by numberless writers as giving evidence of collaboration or of plagiarism.

THE WIFEHOOD AND MOTHERHOOD OF ELIZABETH.

Mr. Lang thinks the idea of the wifehood and motherhood of Elizabeth originated in Mr. Lee’s articles in the _Dictionary of National Biography_ cited as corroborating the cipher. The facts set forth in Mr. Lee’s work are very good circumstantial evidence. Assuredly the statments in the word-cipher and in the bi-literal should accord, for in Bacon’s design the principal use of the one was to teach, and assist in deciphering, the others Mr. Lang quotes: “He learned _from the interview and subsequent occurrences_,” and exclaims, “how Elizabethan is the style!”

In _Love’s Labour’s Lost_ (Act II., Sc. i.) he may read:

at which interview
All liberall reason would I yeeld unto.

In _Troilus and Cressida_ (Act I., Sc. iii.) we find:

To their subsequent volumes.

And in _Henry the Fifth_ (V. Prol.) is the line:

Omit all the occurrences.

This is where Mr. Lang should exclaim again, “How Elizabethan the style!”

My critics would find it interesting and profitable to learn how many expressions, thought to be modern, are to be seen in the original works. They would be surprised--agreeably or otherwise--at the long list.

“TIDDER” OR BACON.

The next point is this: “His name, 'Fr. Bacon,’ is his only 'by adoption,’” and in a footnote Mr. Lang quotes: “'My name is Tidder, yet men speak of me as Bacon.’” In Bacon’s _Historie of the Raigne of King Henry the Seventh_ (p. 151), we find the name of the first reigning Tudor spelled Tidder. The assertion “We be Tudor” merely shows that he belonged to the Royal house. It was certainly not from Robert Dudley that he claimed a title to the throne. I myself asked, “Why Francis I.?” when this passage was deciphered; and the answer is perhaps in this--as Elizabeth was “Queene of England, Fraunce, and Ireland, and of Virginia,” her son as king would be Francis III. of France and Francis I. of England, as James VI. of Scotland became James I. of England. The right to the French title is questionable, of course; but when the play of _Edward the Third_ has been deciphered we shall know how Bacon regarded it.

In the expression, “our law giveth to the first-borne of the royall house the title of the Prince of Wales,” Bacon did not intend to say “the _statute_ giveth.” Had he used _custom_ no one would have cavilled, but _custom_ is defined in law as “long-established practice, or usage, considered as unwritten _law_, and resting for authority on long consent,” and, even at that time, it had long been customary to invest the eldest son of the sovreign with this title. In the _Historie of Henry the Seventh_ (p. 207), speaking of the time when “Henry, Duke of Yorke, was created Prince of Wales, and Earle of Chester and Flint,” he added, “For the Dukedom of Cornewall devolved to him by statute.” We see _per contra_ that in this place he did not mean by _custom_.

BACON AND THE SMALL POEMS.

As evidence of the superficiality of Mr. Lang’s knowledge of the book he attempts to criticise, I quote: “In 1596, in his 'Faerie Queene,’ Bacon grew wilder, in saying 'We were in good hope that when our divers small poemes might bee seene in printed forme, th’ approval o’ Lord Leicester might be gain’d!’ The earliest of the small Bacon-Spenser works used here, by Mrs. Gallup, is of 1591. Leicester died in 1588. Only a raving maniac like Mrs. Gallup’s Bacon could hope to please Leicester, who died in 1588, by 'small poemes’ printed in 1591, if he means that.”

Has Mr. Lang read so carelessly that he thinks “he means that”? Does he really not preceive that Bacon was speaking of the small poems appearing between 1579 and 1588--_Shepheards’ Calender_ in several editions, _Virgil’s Gnat_ nearly ready for the printer and suggestively dedicated to the Earl of Leicester? If a careless reading, it discredits his criticism; if a wilful perversion, it is unworthy and without justification.

This is much like his remarkable statement in _Longman’s Magazine_ regarding the _Argument of the Iliad_: “The right course with Mrs. Gallup is to ask her to explain why or how Bacon stole from Pope’s Homer ... and how he could be (as he certainly was) ignorant of facts of his own time.... These circumstances make it certain that, though the cipher may be a very nice cipher, Mrs. Gallup must have interpreted it all wrong. She will see that, she would have seen it long ago, if she had _read Pope’s Homer_ and had known anything about Elizabethan history.”

We all know what this impossible charge--that “Bacon stole from Pope’s Homer,” and also the insinuation regarding Melville--covertly asserts. I have fully set out in another article the answer to this baseless accusation of Mr. Marston; but I will here repeat that any statement that I copied from Pope, or from any other source whatever, in obtaining the matter put forth as deciphered from Bacon’s works, _is false in every particular_.

BACON AND ELIZABETH’S MARRIAGE.

Mr. Lang, and others, have asserted that Bacon refers to the first Lord Burghley as Robert. This is incorrect. Bacon says _Robert Cecil_ when he means _Robert_ Cecil, and at no other time. Robert is not only named, but described unmistakably. Mr. Lang says, “Robert Cecil was born in 1563, or thereabout, was younger than Bacon,” consequently could not have incited the Queen against him, etc., and devotes a page to mis-statements and sarcasms. Here again is he ignorant, or indulges in wilful perversion. The encyclopædias say, “Robert Cecil was born in 1550.” He was therefore eleven years older than Bacon, and twenty-seven years of age when the incident referred to occurred. We learn also from the same source: “Of his cousin, Francis Bacon, he appears to have been jealous.” The “blunder” is Mr. Lang’s, not Bacon’s, and it is not an evidence that “either an ignorant American wrote all this, or Bacon was an idiot.”

In speaking of Elizabeth’s marriage, Mr. Lang says, “The second was 'after her ascent to royal power’ (1558). Any one but Bacon would have said, 'after the death of Dudley’s first wife,’ because only after that death could the marriage be legal.”

What Bacon really said is this: “Afte’ her ascent to royale power, before my birth, a second nuptiall rite duly witness’d was observed, soe that I was borne in holy wedlocke” (p. 154). Mr. Lang’s opinion of what any other man might have said is quite immaterial.

A question of Bacon’s legitimacy would, without a doubt, have been raised; and as Leicester favoured his second son, Essex, this may account for the express wish to have the story openly told. Such questions were debated concerning more than one royal title in those days, but Bacon believed his birth in holy wedlock was sufficient legitimation. The mere fact that both Mary and Elizabeth succeeded to the throne, although one or the other was not strictly legitimate, would confirm this opinion, and the history of the founding of the line of Tudor involved the same question.

I regret that lack of space prevents a reference to some of Mr. Lang’s other remarks, which are equally subject to criticism and correction. Brander Matthews, in _Pen and Ink_, formulates “Twelve Rules for Reviewers,” that will, I am very sure, commend themselves to those who desire to make criticism of value. Had Mr. Lang followed any of these rules he would have written in a different manner and more to his own credit.

MR. SCHOOLING AND THE CIPHER.

I can only say that with regard to Mr. Schooling as with thousands of others, defective vision or superficial examination is responsible for his criticism, for it culminates in the assertion, merely, that different founts of Italic type are not used in the books referred to, and that the work “can be regarded only as a phantasy of my imagining, wholly unworthy of credence.” I again assert, with that degree of positiveness which comes from a study of years, that the Italic types _are_ from different founts and are used in the manner I have set forth. There is no room whatever for imagination in the work.

Mr. Schooling enters into particulars, and reports upon _o_'s, _n_'s, _and_ _p_'s in a few lines of small letters, and says “they are from the same fount, and the cipher, therefore, non-existent.” In this he is absolutely wrong. He makes no mention of the marked differences in the capitals, and, too, he should have studied the originals on many pages, as I have done, for in the photographic facsimiles of the book some of the distinctive features are lost. It is difficult to describe in words the particular lines in a drawing, and equally so those in several forms of type, but I will attempt to make the differences clear.

THE ITALICS IN SPENSER.

Extending these examples of Mr. Schooling, take for illustration the Italics in the first lines of the selection from Spenser. The type is large and clear, and there are several letters so close together that comparisons can easily be made.

_full Ladie the La Marie._

There are two captial _L_'s. The serif of the first is curved, of the second straight. At the bottom, the horizontal of the first gradually thickens, and the small line at the end is nearly vertical, while the horizontal of the second is of even thickness and the small line slanting.

There are three small _a_'s. The oval of the first is narrow and pointed at the top, those of the other two are broad at the top. The small line at the bottom of the first is long and strong, of the other two short and weak.

There are three small _e_'s. The ovals of the first two are broad, the letters themselves narrow; the oval of the last is longer and more pointed, but the letter itself is wide.

The two small _i_'s do not stand at the same degree of inclination, and the dot of the first is slightly to the left.

The capital _M_ is a striking form, and the plain _M_ of that size of type must be familiar to Mr. Schooling and others.

Taking the next Italic line, the small _n_'s are from different founts. The inclination of the second is greater than that of the first. The stem of the first _n_ (in _Honourable_) is straight, that of the second (in _and_) is slightly curved. The small line at the bottom of the first stands well under the downward stroke, that of the second freely leaves the downward stroke.

In the next line, the difference in the small _l_'s is very marked, and one is much longer than the other.

In the line below, an _e_ from the “_b_ fount” and one from the “_a_ fount” stand together in the word _bee_. These can easily be discriminated, but the characteristics of the _e_ in this size of type are the reverse of the same in the large size above.

The _o_ in _long_ is a wider oval than the _o_ from the “_a_ fount” in _bountifull_. It has already been pointed out why the _n_'s in both words are “_a_-fount” letters, although the one in _long_ is not a perfect letter--the lower part of the last stroke being blotted--but, as I have said on other occasions, where broken or blotted letters or errors of the printer occur in the original, the context will unmistakably indicate what they are.

THE “NOVUM ORGANUM.”

In the _Praefatio_ of _Novum Organum_, the first letter considered is the small _o_, and of this two examples given by Mr. Schooling are in the second line--in _explorata_ and _pronuntiare_, The longest diameter produced until it intersects the line of writing does not make so large an angle in the first as in the second. The oval is much narrower in the first. The description of these two will suffice for all others not changed by a mark, unless a printer’s error occurs.

The two _p_'s in _propria_ are most easily compared, as the first is from the “_a_ fount” and the second is from the “_b_ fount.” The stem of the first is not quite so long as that of the second; and, in the first, the oval is somewhat angular on the right side at the top, in the second this angularity is seen at the bottom. The same rule applies to other cases. Of the half-dozen cited by Mr. Schooling, I have merely chosen two that stand close together. He would find as great difficulty in the differentiation of the _o_'s and _c_'s of any two founts of modern Italic type, as in these he points out, for the differences are often as minute.

BACON AND THE COMPOSITOR.

Mr. Schooling says, “Mrs. Gallup does not tell us how Lord Bacon managed to get his work set up by the compositor.”

Any printer will tell him, if he will inquire, that it is not more difficult to take certain letters that have been marked on the MS. from one case of Italic type, and certain other letters, not marked, from another case of Italic, than to take Roman from one case and Italic from another in ordinary composition. The system has the advantage that the printer, in following copy, could not know the cipher without the key, which in Bacon’s case was withheld until 1623--forty-four years after the cipher was invented and first used.

THE POWERS OF IMAGINATION.

Perhaps I should thank Mr. Schooling for the implied compliment to my abilities in the realm of creation; for if not a deciphering, what is the alternative? I must first have conceived the plot of the entire fabric of 380 pages, its historical points, statements of facts not recorded in history--which in some particulars conflict with, in others supplement, the records. I must have imagined the moanings of remorse over the tragedy of Essex; the discovery of the motherhood of Elizabeth; guessed at the broadened field of Bacon’s literary powers to take in all the works which are disclosed as coming from his hand; the directions for writing out the word-cipher; the argument of the _Tragedy of Anne Boleyn_; the epitome of the _Iliad_ and of the _Odyssey_; the explanatory letters of Dr. Rawley and Ben Jonson that are found in the cipher; the flights of fancy which occasionally appear in the deciphered work, and all the rest. This must all have been written out in the old English spelling and in the language of Bacon’s time; this previously written plot and story in the main narration must have been fitted to the exact number of Italic letters, and so arranged that the forms of the capital letters and those whose differences are easily perceived, must in every case fit into place as an _a_ or a _b_, so that those letters, at least, should consistently follow Bacon’s biliteral cipher. The simple enumeration, with all that these things imply, carries the refutation of the possibility of such a manner of production, to say nothing of the absurdity of attempting it. Had it been undertaken, it would have been along lines that were better known, and statments of facts would have been in accord with the records. Historical romance would never so far have transcended the beliefs of the world, nor subverted all previous ideas concerning authorship of literature which will be immortal. The only reason for the book’s existence is that it is the transcription of a cipher placed in the works for the purposes disclosed by its decipherment.

BACON-SHAKESPEARE.

THE TIMES, LONDON, ENG., JAN. 27, 1902.

TO THE EDITOR OF THE TIMES:

Sir,--Your issues of December 19, 20, and 21 have been forwarded to me by Messrs. Gay and Bird, and, while regretting that distance will cause much time to elapse between the issues and the time this can reach London, I yet desire space to reply to the communications of Mr. Marston and Mr. Lee concerning myself, and the book recently given to the public, “_The Bi-literal Cypher of Francis Bacon_.” I trust I may not be refused because of lapse of time, or for any other reason.

I hope the gentlemen do not mean to be rude or do me an injustice, and I do not think they can persist in the characterization which their words imply.

The assertion that Mr. Mallock has become “addlepated,” because of thinking there may be something in the cipher, must be something of a shock to his friends.

Mr. Marston did me the honour of two favourable notices, in succeeding issues of the _Publishers’ Circular_. I was about to thank him for numbers sent to me when I learned that he had prepared and published an elaborate article attempting to discredit the entire work, because of doubts arising in his mind upon a single point. He does not base his disbelief upon any investigation he has made of the cipher itself, but because a fragment which forms a part of Bacon’s “Argument” or epitome (but not the full translation) of the Iliad, in that portion which catalogues the ships and the troops they transported, is similar--“nearly like”--Pope’s translation of the same passages, _ergo_, it must be that I paraphrased Pope, and hence that the whole cipher fabric is tumbled into dust. Because of this similarity he takes Mr. Mallock to task for considering my work seriously, and declares that, as I have, as he thinks, copied Pope in this, the results of my four years’ research in America and in England, set down on 385 printed pages, must be pure invention, and Mr. Mallock a poor deluded mortal to have gone into the cipher at all. The statement of the case exhibits the value of the conclusion.

It does not appear just how much variation Mr. Marston would have between the translations of the identical Greek text, describing definite things, to prove which was the correct one, and which the copy. It will also be noted that this is not one of the portions of Homer’s wondrous story where imagination may run riot, and imagery and poetic license add lustre to the original.

The claim of identities set me to wondering whom else I might have paraphrased, or if it was not possible that Pope had copied from some one other than Bacon. An examination of six different English translations and one Latin shows me such substantial accord, that either of them could be called with equal justice a paraphrase of Pope, or that Pope had copied from the others.

In phrasing no two translations of the Iliad entirely agree, but are we to conclude that, because the translations of the same text are in substantial agreement (though not exact), that one of the two most nearly alike must be a paraphrase? The trifling additions showing some exterior knowledge of persons and places may be found in Bacon’s other works.

It will be observed by readers of the “_Bi-literal Cypher_” that the fragment of the Fourth Book of the Iliad which is injected by Bacon into the “Argument” is for illustration merely, and is clearly stated to be only “a supreme effort of memory” of the fuller translation which he had previously embedded as a part of the mosaic in his works, to be extracted and reconstructed through the methods of another cipher.

Surely there can be no more distressing condition than when critics refuse to know all the facts, and are guilty of drawing conclusions without them. Bacon, who knew human nature, has described this class of minds most precisely in his aphorisms, and it would almost seem he had this controversy in view, or at least a permonition of it, when he says, in Number XXXIII:--

“This must be plainly avowed; no judgment can be rightly formed
either of my method or of the discoveries to which it leads
by means of anticipations ... since I cannot be called upon
to abide by the sentence of a tribunal which is itself on its
trial.”

“One method of delivery alone remains to us: ... we must lead
men to the particulars themselves and their series and order;
while men on their side must force themselves for awhile to
lay their notions by and begin to familiarize themselves with
facts.” (XXXVI.)

Mr. Lee, too, bases his disbelief on most inconclusive grounds. The witty author of “Democritus to the Reader” said that any one who sought what he did not want, or that would do him harm when found, wanted wisdom. To be exact, it was expressed less euphemistically, “He is a fool that seeks what he does not want.”

Mr. Lee insists that, because he has collated 25 copies of the plays, during which time he was not looking for a cipher, none exists. As well say that the stars of late discovery which are as yet unknown to any but the most skilled eye of the astronomer do not exist because Mr. Lee, with his unskilled eye, has not discovered them while looking for something else.

Mr. Sinnett, in the same issue of _The Times_, states the case fairly in the remark that there are two schools of thinkers on the subject--those who have studied the matter, and those who have not--and he illustrates the feelings of a surprisingly large class by the repetition of the remark of a friend, who, when asked if he had seriously considered certain points (of the Baconians), replied: “I would rather hang myself than consider anything so atrocious.” I have no doubt Mr. Lee would sympathize with, if not echo, this sentiment.

I wish politely, and with all due deference, to assert, with a positiveness as emphatic as that of Mr. Lee, that the cipher _does_ exist in the typography of the Plays, and in the “Anatomy of Melancholy” and in the other works which I have deciphered. The difference between us is that I found what I was looking for (and much besides), while Mr. Lee did not find what he was not looking for.

Another aphorism, Number XXXVIII, would apply here:--

“The idols and false notions which are now in possession of the
human understanding, and have taken deep root therein, so beset
men’s minds that truth can hardly find entrance.”

And again, in Number XLVI:--

“The human understanding when it has once adopted an opinion
(either as being the received opinion or as being agreeable to
itself) draws all things else to support and agree with it. And
though there be a greater weight of instances to be found on
the other side, yet these it either neglects and despises, or
else by some distinction sets aside and rejects, in order that
by this great and pernicious predetermination the authority of
its former conclusions may remain inviolate.”

If Mr. Lee has a vision sufficiently accurate to discriminate in form, and will spend as much time as I have spent upon the typography of the old books, he will find the letters can be classified, and starting from the proper points and placing in “groups of five” the Bi-literal Cipher will read as I have written, and will not read anything else.

Sincerely yours,

ELIZABETH WELLS GALLUP.

Detroit, January 9.

* * * * *

P. S. Jan. 11.--Copies of your issue of December 26 and 27 have just reached me.

The articles on the “Bacon Bi-literal Cypher” show that _The Times_ is not averse to whatever aids in elucidation of this new phase of the Bacon-Shakespeare question.

I am glad to note that “A Correspondent” has taken some of the preliminary steps to an actual examination of the cipher and apparently has the perception required to reach conclusions that Mr. Mallock and Mr. Sinnett have also reached as to distinctive variations in the forms of letters used in the old books. This denotes real progress in the investigation, and I think the gentleman, with patience, would easily become a decipherer. The peculiarities of the type are clear to the skilled artist or engraver, but they are not so quickly apparent to those less fitted for the closest observation.

Some of the difficulties encountered by the novice are explained by Mr. Sinnett in the issue of the 27th. I shall be greatly pleased to clear up some of this correspondent’s difficulties, in another communication, but will only note in this two paragraphs. One difficulty he mentions is that in certain passages he does not find sufficient Italic letters to make up the extracted sentences. He had overlooked the application of the passage in the book, on pp. 66-67:--

“In order to conceale my Cypher more perfectly I am preparing
for th’ purpose a sette of alphabets in th’ Latine tipe not
for use in th’ greatest or lengthy story or epistle, but as
another disguise, for, in ensample, a prologue, praefatio,
the epilogues, and head lines attracted too much notice. I,
therefore, have given much trouble to mine ayders by making
two kinds or formes of these letters. These be not designed
for other use than hath but now beene explain’d, nor must you
looke to see them employ’d if a reason for th’ change appeare,
but there will be warning given you for your instruction or
guidance. Noe othe’ waie of diverting th’ curious could be used
where th’ exteriour epistle is but briefe, however it will not
thus turn aside my decipherer, for his eye is too well practs’d
in artes that easily misleade others who enquire of th’ waie.”

There are a very few dedications, commendatory poems, headings, etc., in which Roman letters were used by Bacon. These are in his later printings.

Another thing this correspondent makes note of is that many of the old books of the Elizabethan period have the same differences. I have examined many of these, beside those belonging to Bacon in which differences occur. In some of them I was led to think the cipher might be found, but on examination it was seen that the different forms were used promiscuously, without method, and could not be grouped in fives to read in the bi-literal.

Replying to Mr. Lee’s communication in the issue of the 27th, I quote this extraordinary extract:

“I should like to state unmistakably that I hold there to be
not the smallest jot of even _prima facie_ justification ...
in the text of the First Folio for the belief that a cipher
is concealed in that volume. I write with a fine copy on my
desk.... Italic and Roman type appear in the preliminary pages
... they are never intermingled in the manner which would be
essential if the words embodied Bacon’s bi-literal cipher.”

His idea of the intermingling of the Roman and Italic type as an essential is entirely wrong. If he had read my book understandingly, he would have known the different founts used by Bacon were in the differing forms of Italic type, not the Roman, except in the very few instances noted above. The cipher letters are not produced by intermingling Roman and Italic type in the Plays. He will find on every page of the Plays more than one fount or form of these Italic letters, and that not proper names only, but much besides was printed in them. See especially pp. 42-43, _Merry Wives of Windsor_.

Quoting again from Mr. Lee:--“To assert that a bi-literal cipher can or does appear in a text printed as the First Folio is printed is a bold denial of plain facts.” I wish to repeat, with equal earnestness and entire certainty, that to assert that the cipher cannot and does not exist in the text is a denial of a fact which I have demonstrated.

He mistakenly says, “The proper names figuring in the text of the plays alone appear in a different type.” To these must be added the abbreviated names of the speakers, the running titles, etc., and all other words in Italic type, which together make up when deciphered over 50 pages of my book that are extracted from the folio.

What shall we say of this quotation from Mr. Lee?

“Ignorance, vanity, inability to test evidence, lack of
scholarly habits of mind are in each of these instances found
to be the main causes predisposing half-educated members of
the public to the acceptance of the delusion (!). And when any
of the deluded victims have been narrowly examined they have
invariably exhibited a tendency to monomania.... May a second
Hogarth deal as effectually with Mrs. Gallup and Mr. Mallock,
and their feeble-witted followers.”

Mr. Mallock “addlepated!” and “half-educated!” Lord Palmerston “feeble-witted”--“with a tendency to monomania!” Is this temperate discussion of a new discovery? Is true criticism of this subject and its believers reduced to vituperation, and this the end of the argument?

The public will refuse to accept Mr. Lee’s dictum as having any weight at all over against the examination made, and being made, by Mr. Mallock, Mr. Sinnett, and many others. I must assume them to be the peers of Mr. Lee in intelligence and discrimination, for he is most surely wrong and refuses knowledge, while they are willing to study the subject with patience and candour.

LITERARY WORLD.

LONDON.

TO THE EDITOR.

Sir:--There is a sense of relief after the worst has been said, in the assurance that nothing more dreadful can be expected. Since the “critic” of the _Literary World_ has consigned me to that _Avernus_ whose horrors all good people hope to escape, I should be beyond attack, as none would willingly follow me into the infernal regions.

After reading the article entitled _Galluping in Avernum_, my eyes fell upon a clipping in which George Brandes is named as the “famous Danish critic, and the greatest of living Shakespearean commentators.” It says: “He dismisses the whole 'Baconian Craze’ with the remark that it is on the one hand a piece of weak and inartistic feminine criticism, and on the other an Americanism and therefore lacking in spiritual delicacy.”

The criticism in the _Literary World_ of Bacon’s _Bi-literal Cypher_ and of the _Tragedy of Anne Boleyn_ is not, I think, feminine nor American, but somehow the quality of _spiritual delicacy_ seems lacking, and it can hardly be called _artistic_.

It is only recently that I have noticed--this rule has not reached America--that some writers apparently think it is good form to pun, or play, upon another’s surname. If the name is not pleasing to the ear, the mortal who bears it has perhaps a lifelong affliction, yet it is certainly a misfortune rather than a fault. Nor did I suppose, until I saw the articles of a large number of reviewers, that any--except writers more intent on filling space than careful of the value of the matter--rushed into print before the subject discussed, or book reviewed was half read. And yet it is this critic’s own confession, regarding the _Bi-literal Cypher_, that he has read but “half the book, and a few scattered sentences of the rest.” From this admittedly superficial reading he concludes a “Phantom personating Bacon claims to have written all the plays” etc.--the literature throughout which the ciphers have with infinite pains been traced, and the principles upon which they are based, the keys and directions for their decipherment, ascertained and set out in the work he attempts to criticise.

After quoting the statement that Elizabeth and Dudley were honorably married, and that Bacon and Essex were the issue of this union, our critic asks, “when were Elizabeth and Leicester again married?” This is answered in the _Bi-literal Cypher_ (p. 154).

A little farther on critic says: “_If_ there had been a marriage, which there wasn’t, sometime in the four months between Lady Dudley’s (Amy Robsart’s) death and (the supposed) Bacon’s birth, it would have legitimated Bacon; but then he would not have been a Tudor but a _Dudley_.”

Bacon evidently considered himself legitimated by “this second nuptial rite,” and when he wrote, probably knew quite as much of the law, and of the time the marriage took place, as our critic. It was not descent from Dudley that made him prince. Long-established custom was the law that gave “to the first borne of the sovereign the title of Prince of Wales.”

Our critic makes a point of the use and spelling of _Brittain_ and of the expression '_in_ the throne,’ quoting: “Ended now is my great desire to sit in the British throne.”

In the _Advancement of Learning_ (1605) he may read: “Queene Elizabeth, your immediate Predecessor in this part of _Brittaine_” (B. 1, p. 36); while in Shakespeare he will find:

“Shall see me rising _in_ my throne,” R. II. 3-2;

“When I do rouse me _in_ my throne,” H. V. 1-2;

“But one imperious _in_ another’s throne,” 1 H. VI. 3-1;

“_In_ that throne
“Which now the house of Lancaster usurps,” 3 H. VI. 1-1;

“And shall I stand, and thou sit _in_ my throne?” 3 H. VI. 1-1;

“And see him seated _in_ the regal throne,” 3 H. VI. 4-3;

“Once more we sit ~in~ England’s royal throne,” 3 H. VI. 5-7;

“And plant your joys ~in~ living Edward’s throne,” R. III. 2-2;

“We will plant some other ~in~ the throne,” R. III. 3-7;

“You are but newly planted ~in~ your throne,” T. A. 1-1;

“My bosom’s lord sits lightly ~in~ his throne,” R. & J. 5-1

Our critic has not read his Shakespeare well, if he thinks the term unusual in Bacon’s time.

He also objects to the phrase, “_Every land_ in which the English language hath a place.” Bacon wrote his cipher history to be read, when deciphered, in all parts of the world. The reference to our colonies, etc., was a prophecy more than half realized even then, and he claimed for Elizabeth command of the sea which he called a “universal monarchy.”

Critic again quotes: “We spent our greatest labours in making cyphares’ (a noble occupation!)” Certainly, and a natural one when seeking means of communicating important matters. Some one has suggested that instead of committing his secret history to ciphers, he should have written it out and confided the papers to the keeping of trusted literary executors. But that would have been the action of mature years, or of one who believed he was about to leave this life. Bacon then was an eager youth, hardly yet upon the threshold of manhood, and he believed his claims would ultimately be acknowledged. As to the nobleness of the occupation, Bacon says of it: “These Arts (cyphers) being here placed with the principal and supreame Sciences, seeme petty thinges: yet to such as have chosen them to spende their labours studies in them, they seem great Matters”--_Adv. of Learn._ B. 2, p. 61. (1605).

Our critic states: “To the real Bacon Elizabeth’s movements in January 1560-1 would have been known.”

To an _infant of days_? That is very good. These things _became_ known to him in the way he states.

Again, “Robert Cecil, at the period referred to, was about fourteen years of age.” Critic must have copied this from Mr. Andrew Lang who makes the same mistake. The encyclopaedias give the date of Robert Cecil’s birth as 1550. He was therefore eleven years older than Bacon and about twenty-seven years of age when, Bacon says, he caused the tempestuous scene that resulted in the disclosure to Francis that he was the son of the Queen.

Then, “Hamlet was not in 1611 a new play.”

Could Bacon record in the types of a play then appearing for the first time, that it had “breasted the wave gallantly?” Whatever the play or whenever it was “new,” it could not be the 1611 edition of Hamlet.

The critic further says: “For Bacon’s style we know--compact, well-built, grammatical, lucid; no feeble tautology, dilutions, or repetitions; harmonious, and satisfying to the ear; pregnant with meaning, and grateful to the intellect. But what about the Phantoms? Here we find clumsy and sprawling sentences of half a page, or nearly, with shambling subordinate clauses 'spatch-cocked’ in between brackets or dashes” etc.

Refer again to the _Advancement of Learning_ (1605):

“Antonius Pius, who succeeded him, was a Prince excellently learned; and had the Patient and subtile witte of a Schoole man: insomuch as in common speech, (which leaves no vertue untaxed) hee was called _Cymini Sector_, a carver, or a divider of Comine seede, which is one of the least seedes: such a patience hee had and setled spirite, to enter into the least and most exact differences of causes; a fruit no doubt of the exceeding tranquillitie, and serenitie of his minde: which being no wayes charged or incombred, either with feares, remorses, or scruples, but having been noted for a man of the purest goodnesse without all fiction or affectation, that raigned or lived: made his minde continually present and entier: he likewise approached a degree neerer unto Christianitie, and became as _Agrippa_ sayd unto S. _Paule, Halfe a Christian_; holding their Religion and Law in good opinion: and not only ceasing persecution, but giving way to the advancement of Christians.” (B. 1, p. 35).

“Compact, well-built, lucid,” “satisfying to the ear,” “not clumsy, sprawling sentences of half a page”--and yet here is nearly a page before Bacon completed his period, and what about unity of subject?

And again from the same work:

“In which kind I cannot but mencion _Honoris causa_ your Maiesties exellent book touching the duty of a king: a woorke ritchlye compounded of _Divinity Morality and Policy_, with great aspersion of all other artes: & being in myne opinion one of the moste sound & healthful writings that I have read: not distempered in the heat of invention nor in the Couldnes of negligence: not sick of Dusinesse as those are who leese themselves in their order; nor of Convulsions as those which Crampe in matters impertinent; not savoring of perfumes & paintings as those doe who seek to please the Reader more than Nature beareth, and chiefelye wel disposed in the spirits thereof, beeing agreeable to truth, and apt for action: and farre remooved from that Natural infirmity, whereunto I noted those, that write in their own professions to be subject, which is, that they exalt it above measure.” (B. 1, 2d p. 69).

I quote again:

“This kinde of degenerate learning did chiefely raigne amongst the Schoole-men, who having sharpe and stronge wits, and aboundance of leasure, and smal varietie of reading; but their with being shut up in the Cels of a few Authors (chiefely _Aristotle_ their Dictator) as their persons were shut up in the Cells of Monasteries and Colledges, and knowing little Historie, either of Nature or time, did out of no great quantitie of matter, and infinite agitation of wit, spin out unto us those laborious webbes of Learning which are extant in their Bookes,” (B. 1, 2d p. 18).

In eleven lines we are told that 'this kind of learning did reign among schoolmen who did spin out to us those webs of learning extant in their books.’

Many such examples could be quoted, but these will suffice to show that this critic has not read Bacon well even in modern editions, and not at all in the old English of the original editions. So slightly familiar is he with the great author, that he has failed to discriminate betwen the compact, forceful style of the _Essays_ and _Apothegms_ and the “clumsy, sprawling sentences,” of his scientific works--a variation in the manner of writing so marked that one might think these were not from the same pen.

Mr. Candler has kindly replied to the objection to the sentence, “Such things _doth_ burn,” but I will add other instances: “Which Religion and the holy faith _doth_ conduct men unto” (A. of L. B. 2, 4th p. 69); “which the example and countenance of twoo so learned Princes ... hath wrought” (A. of L. B. 1, p. 11); “like Ants which is a wise creature for itself” (B. 2, st p. 93).

Our critic next quotes: “'Whilst writing these interior works these keies and joining words did _deter_ [it means _retard_] th’ advancement’ (pretty, to see keys and words writing).”