Cyphers

Cypher Facts

We know that Walsingham, the Queen’s Minister in Paris, once ventured to leave his post, and journey on foot to London, to communicate personally with Elizabeth, as he was unwilling that her decipherers should know what he desired to say to her.

Spedding says that Francis and Anthony Bacon employed a number of writers, “receiving letters which were mostly in cipher,” and that these passed through the hands of Francis “to the Earl of Essex deciphered.”

In one of Anthony’s letters directed to Francis at Court, September 1593, he says that his servant Edward Yates having lost his letters, it was impossible for him to recover his cipher that night. (Thomas Birch, D.D., Memoirs of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth, vol. i, p. 1 21. London, 1754 )

Spedding’s allusion to writers employed by the Bacons in their Scriptorium, begun at Gray’s Inn, and later removed to Twickenham, we have mentioned before as much like the typewriting office of today. It was convenient for their official and literary work, and served also to increase their income.

The Shakespearean Works & Cyphers

Bacon speaks of six ciphers, in a manner which implies that he made use of them, of which the bi-literal seems to have been the principal one, and for several years students of ciphers have been attempting to discover and apply them to his works, especially, the Shakespeare Works.

The first author to deal with this was Ignatius Donnelly, who endeavoured to elucidate one of them. His work is a marvel of patient study, and has attracted wide attention. That he was perfectly honest in his application of his theory, and fully believed in it, no one can reasonably doubt. Unfortunately, he died without leaving sufficient data to enable any one, thus far, to continue his work, and we now hear little about it except abuse.

Dr. Orville W. Owen claims to have discovered Bacon’s word-cipher, and by it has “translated” from his philosophical works, and others bearing the name of Shakspere, Spenser, Green, Marlowe, Peele, and Burton, several volumes of prose and poetry hitherto unheard of; indeed, they greet us like strange visitants from those far-off days, when Elizabeth and James thought themselves essential to the existence of our forefathers. Translated, however, is hardly the proper word; constructed would be better, for they are composed of detached lines taken from a large number of works according to certain guide-and key-words, which reveal where such excerpts should begin and end. The works which Dr. Owen introduces to us are remarkable, not only for intrinsic merit, but for their bearing upon history. In them not only Bacon’s early life is disclosed, but secrets of state as well.

We give a single brief example of the method of the word cipher. To apply it extracts are taken from various works, and brought together to form a continuous chain of thought; the decipherer being guided by certain guide-and key-words, which we shall explain more fully hereafter:

The Prelude to a Storm
The day is clear the welkin bright and gay
The lark is merry and records her note (Peele)
The thrush replies the mavis descant plays
The ousel shrills the ruddock warbles soft
So goodly all agree with sweet content
To this gladsome day of merriment. (Faerie Queene)
Fair blows the gale (Marlowe)
From the South furrowed Neptune’s seas
Northeast as far as the frozen Rhine (Greene)
The bright sun thereon his beams doth beat
As if he nought but peace and pleasure meant (Faerie Queene)
A solid mass of gold (Anatomy of Melancholy)
As a mirror glass the surface of the water (Bacon)
Reflected in my sight as doth a crystal mirror in the sun (Peele)

This method of joining lines so as to make sense is not unknown, but has never been attempted on a large scale, or by following hidden guides. What makes this, however, unique in the history of literature is the revelation it makes, and the ingenious method which it displays.

The first volume of Dr. Owen’s work begins with this remarkable letter:

Sir Francis Bacon’s Letter to the decipherer
London, 1623.
My Dear Sir:
Thus leaning on my elbow I begin the letter scattered wider than the sky and earth: And yet the spacious breath of this division. As it spreads round in the widest circle, admits the mingling of the four great guides we use, so that we have no need of any minute rule to make the opening of our device appear as plainly to you as the sun. And for fear that you would go astray from our design before you had your powers well put on, we have marked out a plan in this epistle to communicate to you how our great cipher cues combine.

This letter which is really a dialogue between the author and his future decipherer, covers forty-three pages, and in it we are told the works in which a cipher is used.