The record-union., 1897-07-19

the Navy Department and our ships in
foreign parts is conducted by the help
of this cipher During the trouble with
Chile the Government was put to an
enormous expense for cable tolls, which
would have been quadrupled but for the
fact that for every cipher word sent
three We're saved in English.
When the Secretary of the Navs
wishes to send a message he dictates
it in plain English TO typewriter 1t
is tEen given to two officers who are
especially skilled in cipher work. They
translate the message into cipher, the
process being very laborious one, in
aSmuch as the utmost care must be
taken not to make any mistake. But
the most difficult task is to unrava the
messages in cipher that arrive at the
department, because they are SO apt to
contain errors which throw out the
whole meaning 1t sometimes takes
several hours to decipher dispatch of
twenty words The system is based
on the substitution of numerals for
words, and then for the numerals are
put made-up words that have no mean
ing whatever outside of the cipher.
L
double transformation. Most trou
BILE is had with messages from South
America, because they have to be re-
peated over several lines, and the tel
egraph operators are poor. During the
rebellion in Brazil several dispatches
were two days on the way.
The State Departments cipher is
much like that used for many years
by the French Foreign Office. The
French code was composed entirely of
numerals each representing word or
phrase. The key of this cipher was
stolen more than once, but shifting
key made it's variations so complicated
that the Foreign Office continued to
use it, merely notifying correspondents
of changes decided upon. In most
European countries the telegraphs are
under Government control, but in the
United States it is different and Uncle
Sam must pay like anybody else. He
pays as much as anybody for cable
service. One of the most expensive
messages was from Rio, and cost 5000.
When the Trenton and Vandalia were
lost in the Samoan hurricane, a mes
sage was sent from Auckland which
! cost nearly $1,000. 1t was made much
more expensive by the fact that the
cipher key was lost with the Trenton,
and every word had to be sent in plain
English. The saving by the use of the
navy code is about three and one-half
words to every word Of cipher.
The work of editing and publishing
the records of the civU war has been
greatly increased by the circumstance
that many of the dispatches sent to
and by commanding officers during
that conflict were in cipher The keys
to the ciphers used are not always OBJ
tainable, and the kilograms have to
be made out by sheer force of ingenuity
and perseverance. 1t is stated that
the dispatches sent over the lines of
the Federal military telegraph during
single year of the war numbered
], 100000. The last important use
made of the military telegraph of those
days was to aid in the capture of the
assassin of President Lincoln. Beck
with, a cipher OPERATOR who became
famous as a member of General Grants
staff, was one of the first to get on the
track of the murderer, and it was upon
information which he sent to Washing
ton in cipher that Booth was located
Booth having been shot while attempt
ing to escape Becwith received $500 of
the reward offered by the Government
for the capture
A QUEER CIPHER.
The queerest of ciphers used by the
Government is employed by the
Weather Bureau. The kilograms
which come to the Weather Bureau
from $50 signal stations all over the
country are curiosfties of style Here
is an actual specimen by way of illus
tration:
Buffalo, April 7.-Bashful barmaid
damnable bony hirsute pirate"
This apparently unintelligible COM
munication contains a lot of real in
formation, each letter in every word
having a meaning. "Bashful" signifies
that the barometer is 30.12 and the
temperature go degrees Fahrenheit.
"Barmaid" tells that the wind is from
the north, and that fifty-two hun
dredthS of an inch of rain has fallen
during the last twenty-four hours.
"Damnable'' says that the velocity Of
the wind is twenty-five miles an hour,
and that the highest temperature dur
ing the day was &c degrees. 'Bony"
declares that the sky is covered with
cirrhus clouds 'Hirsute" makes it
known that the observations We're
taken at s p. M; that the dew point is
so, and that the local prediction is for
fair weather. Pirate" communicat tes
the fact that the highest wind velocity
was fifty-two miles an hour
There is no secrecy about the Wealth
er Bureaus cipher; it is purely for
condensation and cheapness. AS fast
as the dispatches arrive they are
translated by an expert into ordinary
English, the information they convey
being jotted down on outlined maps of
the United States.-Boston Transcript.