The clarion. [volume] (Jackson, Miss.) 1883-1888, 1884-09-24
SHAKESPEARE AND BACON.

SHAKESPEARE AND BACON.
Additional Argument in Favor Q
the Latter as the Author of tn
Great Plays.
From the Minneapolis Tribune.
A discovery has been made in thi
State which is certain to produce world
wide sensation. The Hon. Ignatius Don
nelly, of Hastings. Mimi, author O
Atlantis" and "Ragnarok," found fou
years ago, in the writing of Franci;
Bacon, "a description, twice repeated, Of
a cipher, whereby one writing could bt
infolded and hidden in another, "omnio
per omnia-the writing Unfolding hold
ing quintuple relation to the writing
infolded"
He also noted in Baeon's ''De Aug
mentis" Book vi, chapter p that he
was in favor of removing certain
secrets of knowledge" by "obscurity
of delivery" from '.the capacities of
the vulgar" and to reserve them to
selected auditors, or wits of such sharp
ness as can pierce the veil"
As Mr.. Donnelly was a convert to the
theory that Francis Bacon was the real
author of the plays attributed to Shaks-
peare, and as he did not believe that the
author of such works conld forever re-
nounce them, 1t occurred to him that this
cipher rule was intended by Bacon as a
hint that there was such a cipher in the
plays, in which he asserted his author
ship of them. Mr.. Donnelly has worked
for four years past with the greatest in
dustry and perseverance, and has at last,
within the past three months, found the
rule and solved the problem.
Lately Mr.. Donnelly was visited at
his residence by Appleton Morgan, au-
thor of ''The Shakspearan Myth" and
himself disbeliever in the Shakespeare
authorship, though, as he has expressly
stated, by no means committed to Ba-
CONAN authorship. Mr.. Morgan looked |
at first rather skeptically at Mr.. Don
nelly's work, but ultimately expressed |
himself satisfied that, ''if it was not a |
cipher-written into the plays examined |
by the method described by Bacon in
the Sixth Book, Chapter ], of his DE |
Augmentis-it was a most marvellous
sequence of identical condolences, and
one forbidden by any known % conjec-
tured law of chances"
The law of chances, in fact, makes it
impossible that whole consecutive, cohe-
rent sentences could be worked out by
consistent rule if there was not cipher.
The words of the hidden story hold
fixed and regular relation to the scenes
and acts of the plays, to be determined
by counting; hence the results are not
matter of guesswork, but as demonstra-
BILE as a sum in arithmetic.
The play Mr.. Donnelly has been prin-
cipally working on is the first part of {
Henry ". He was attracted to this play /
by the fact that within few pages( act ii .
scenes l, 2, and 4, and act iv., scene y,
he found the words Francis, "Bacon"
(twiee repeated), Nicholas (twice re-
peated), "Bacon's'' ''son" "master"
"kings" "Exchequer, st. Albans"-
latter, as is well known, being the name {
of Bacon's place of residence. In act H., I
scene 4, he found the name of "Francis'' s
(Bacon's first name), repeated On one I
page twenty times; while in a scene in $
the Merry Wives (act iy., scene y the c
name of William" (the first name of c
is repeated eleven times c
IN one short verse, as if by one reitera- 9
ton of these two names to call attention G
to the fact that there was a cipher in t
the plays. The name Shakespeare oc- '
ours as "Shake" and "speare" or 5
"sphere," or as Shakes" and 'peer," and I
these combinations are found in every /
one of the plays. 1t was upon these a
clews Mr.. Donnelly labored until he has a
discovered the rule and worked out |
enough of the cipher story to show that 0
the plays contain a narrative of BacOn's Ii
own life, and secret history of the reign t
of Elizabeth. 5
1t seems that Elizabeth during the t
Essex troubles became, as is known, in o
censed at the use made of the play of
Richard H., in which is represented the e
deposition and killing of the king; and "
she made it one of the points of prose n
cution which cost Essex his head, that Il
he had hired the company of players to C.
which Shakespeare belonged, to represent Il
it 'more than forty times in open Y
streets and in tavern yards" in order to h
prepare the public mind for her own "
deposition and murder. History tells t;
US that she caused the arrest of Hay n
wards, who wrote prose narrative of 81
the deposition of Richard H., and dedi- e
Gated it to Essex, and he narrowly O.
escaped state prosecution. The cipher 81
rs worked out by Mr.. Donuelly, shows t.
that at the same time Shakespeare was a
arrested as the author of the plays; he Il
was threatened with the torture, and n
disclosed to the officers of the crown the a.
fact that Bacon was the real author of D
The plays. Bacon threw himself on the t.
of his uncle, Lord Burleigh, al
,he great Lord Treasurer, who saved b
aim from exposure and prosecution, b
Id al. L, I, 1
ind this is the explanation of the fact, sc
hat, as long as Elizabeth lived, she IL
Kept Bacon out of Office and in poverty. u
Such discovery would be the most CT
in modern literature; it IL
would settle the long-yexed question of di
he authorship of the plays, and the dis b,
,losures that would then be revealed by a
he cipher narrative might even recon- cs
truct the history of the reign Of the CT
greatest Queen ofEngland. Bacon alludes m
o her in the cipher as E'the jade, - 'the e,
yanton, the old termagent," ETC., and l
larrates, among other things, the we'll tt
ZnoWn scene where she struck Essex iI
oox on the ear for turning his back up al
N her. Bacon doubtless wrote in cipher cl
hat which would have brought his re
lead to the block if written in any other m
Yay. nj
Mr.. Donnelly has kept his secret from g,
IL but few personal friends, and it to
vas not his intention to have revealed al
lis discovery until he had worked out IL
he whole story, and until his book, "
it, was ready for publication T
,ut he has recently been nominated for b
Congress in the Third District of Min q:
lesota, and will be engaged in the can
rass for some time to come, and this p
will necessarily delay his work. On the u
ldYiee of his friends, therefore, he has 4
consented to file caveat, 50 far as to cl
permit the announcement of the fact :.
hat such cipher has unquestionably j
1een found. ii
His book win probably not be ready ;,
or publication until next spring or :,
summer, for the work of translaiing the { {
cipher is a very slow and tedious one; 3
every word has to be carefully counted, :,
ior the miscount Of q single word would i
throw out the work Of whole pages. !,
The Quotation Nuisance. 5
- SO.