Ir^M- i jf.*^ ; PR Qlornell Mtitueraity ffiihrary JItlfara, ^tm $ark FROM THE BENNO LOEWY LIBRARY COLLECTED BY BENNO LOEWY 1854-1919 BEQUEATHED TO CORNELL UNIVERSITY The original of tliis book is in tlie Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924013154582 Cornell University Library PR 2948.C59 The tale of the Shakspere epitaph, 3 1924 013 154 582 The tale of THE SHARSPERE EPITAPH BY FRANCIS BACON, (Baron Verulam and Viscouni St. Alban). TRANStATED FROM THE ANGLO-PhONETIC By EDWARD GORDON CLARK. y BELFORD, CLARKE & CO. CHICAOO, new YORK, AND SAN FRANCISCO Publishers 3tlfara, Jfem lotk FROM THE BENNO LOEWY LIBRARY COLLECTED BY BENNO LOEWY 1854-1919 BEQUEATHED TO CORNELL UNIVERSITY THE TALE OF THE SHAKSPERE EPITAPH BY FRANCIS BACON {Baron Verulam and Viscount St. Alban). TRANSLATED FROM THE ANGLO -PHONETIC By Edward Gordon Clark CHICAGO, NEW YORK, & SAN FRANCISCO BELFORD, CLARKE & CO Publishers Copyright, 1888. BELFORD, CLARKE & CO. CUT OF THE ORIGINAL SHAKSPERE EPITAPH AS PRESERVED BY STEEVENS AND MALONE. COR- RECT, AS VERIFIED BY FRANCIS BACON, EX- CEPT IN THE OMISSION OF TWO PUNCTUATION MARKS WITH THE WORD " HE.Re.," AS RESTORED BY CHARLES KNIGHT. For convenient reference see Mulone's Shakespeares, any Edition. FRANCIS BACON'S BIUTERAL ALPHABET, APPLICABLE AS A CIPHER TO ANY WRITING IN TWO KINDS OF LETTERS, AS ROMAN AND ITALIC, LARGE AND SMALL, SPECIALLY MARKED, ETC., ETC. k=aaaaa I & ]—abaaa 'R.=baaaa 'B^=aaaab K=abaab S=baaab (Z=aaaba \j=ababa T^baaba Yi^aaabb M=ababb U & V=baabb 'E=aabaa "iH^abbaa 'W=babaa 7=aabab 0=abbab X^babab Q=aabba V=abbba Y=babba Y{.=aabbb Q^abbbb Z=babbb See of Bacon's works, " Advancement of Learning^,' Book VI, Chapter I. THE TALE OF THE SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. INTRODUCTION. The stone at Stratford, that now marks the grave of William Shakspere, was placed there about sixty years ago. The original slab, on which was carved the most exceptional epitaph known to history, had been worn out and de- stroyed. The genuine text of that epitaph is re- produced here in picture, with the authorities for it, and the reader should inspect it carefully as a first step. It is very strange ; but, after the lapse of more than two hundred and seventy years, these four lines of doggerel verse are found to declare a perfectly unsuspected crime ; and, if the confession they make be true, — as I must frankly say I believe it is — they expose one of the most consummate frauds ever imposed on mankind. In April of 1616, when Francis Bacon was Attorney-General of England, and at the time when the famous Overbury and Somerset scandal convulsed the realm, William Shakspere, accord- I 2 THE TALE OF THE ing to his biographers, had a "merrie-meeting," or what we now term a "spree," with ''Ben" Jonson and Michael Drayton. As the supposed result of it, he died a few days later. A meaning- less epitaph, not even bearing his name — an " un- couth," misspelled, and unaccountably stupid thing, which has been the puzzle of all succeed- ing times — was carved on his gravestone. The real purpose of that epitaph was to hide for a time, but ultimately to reveal, a most frightful obituary of Shakspere, and a confession of the secret life of Bacon. This weird and curious thing purports to come from Francis Bacon him- self. I think it does ; for I doubt that any other man ever lived with the comprehensive ingenuity to produce it. One thing is certain : the Shaks- pere epitaph, in its direct form, is only a string of thinly specious words which serve as counters for Bacon's "biliteral alphabet "or "cipher"; and somebody so arranged the epitaph and the " alphabet " that, when put together, they should weave a web of affirmations concerning the two men. One part of that web is the unqualified, iterated and reiterated statement — running, in- deed, into almost tedious particulars — that, when Shakspere took part in that last "merrie-meet- ing," he was drugged and poisoned, with a dis- tillation from the English ox-eye, prepared by Bacon himself, who needed to close Shakspere's mouth, and get him out of the way. Now I am well aware that this solemn and de- SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 3 liberate averment may seem like the most vulgar attempt to "create a sensation," or may easily be pronounced the dream of a madman. Still, it is neither. And what will any one know about it, beyond what a parrot or a wax-figure might know, until he has looked at the matter as he would look at anything else ? It is easy to grunt and turn away. ^ pig can do that ; for he is an ani- mal with strong prejudices, and with no use for facts or reasons. I have said that the Shakspere epitaph, under Bacon's biliteral alphabet, declares the poisoning of Shakspere. But what if the epitaph declares the same thing on its face ? It does so, after a fashion, in four different ways : not as a lawyer would draw a deed, to be sure, but so that "he who runs" may "read " the sense and substance. But, lest I be credited with a most coruscating imagination — a fame of which I am quite un- worthy, and which I must righteously leave to my critics — I will say that I was not at all aware of any outward confession by the epitaph until I stumbled upon it by accident, after I had reached the same thing through a long sifting of "internal evidence." Standing now in the light, however, I am somewhat surprised that, of all the innocent " Shakespearians," no one of them has ever thought of readmg the Shakspere epi- taph by a slight indirection — say cutting it up a bit, and going backward. Had he done so, he 4 THE TALE OF THE would have found, as any reader can see, this striking array of — well, let us call it "jargon " : s E NO B : y'm s. e vomyte He b't. s, R, V CD, nA ! s, e not S. s, E HT s : E RAPS ? naM. E HTe b ; e sel B. e REHd, e sA, ol cnE. 't, s, v D ! E HT G. G. I, DO'T. E 'rA E BR of E KAS. s, V se I ROFD n' erFd o, oG ! I have called this " jargon," as it certainly is, in the sense of " broken, phonetic English." But such jargon is perfectly intelligible ; and here it has quite as much significance and method as the " madness " of Hamlet. 1 will not detain the reader, just yet, with much explanation, but will merely say that I have found the outside of the Shakspere epitaph to be an index and com- pendium of the internal cipher, and that our reading here is partly a lesson in phonetics. Most English letters have several powers. One sound of Y is I, just as one power of A is Ah ; and, in writing out our phonetic paragraph, I give the Y of the first sentence its second sound. The eleventh sentence ends with the capital letter D. Its ordinary sound in the alphabet gives the word " die " as the Scotch have pronounced it for centuries ; and I so translate the letter — the meaning of which, however, is given in another SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 5 phase of our " index," under the usual sound, and is spelled "di." Tiie average Englishman, as a habit of his race and country, reduces his H to A, or sometimes drops it altogether; and our present phonetics serve the H in this popular way. The word " erfd " has a Danish cut, but is so nearly Hke our English synonym "earthed" that one need not stop to festoon it with erudi- tion, especially in such a place as it stands The letter O has sometimes the sound of ou, which, among children and lovers in special, answers for the word " You." One, Francis Bacon, has made it serve the same turn more grimly. But, without a syllable of these com- ments, I suppose any bright reader would easily make out his Lordship's phonetic revelation as follows, except that I put in certain full names and abbreviations for initials, because he has given these in another way : Shakspere — HE IS NO Bacon : I'm Shake- speare. He spews out the claim that HE is. Shakspere, ah, you seed, nay ! Shakspere — he is not Shakespere. Shakspere — HE HATES ShakespeaRe. He rapes that name. HE HATES Bacon; he sells Bacon. He read, [dictated] he says, whole scenes. Tut, "Shaq," you die! HE HATES O. G and I DO it.* He hurrah'd that he would bar off * In the original epitaph, the two " G's " in " DIGG " were carved a little larger than any other small letters of the text— just enough so to suggest prominence without capitalization. My at- 6 THE TALE OF THE THE Case, [or was the bar of the Case]. " ShA " YOU see I ROOFED AND EARTHED YOU, HOG ! Yes, the story told by the phonetic " jargon " is perfectly connected and comprehensible, whether such a dissection of the epitaph be pleas- ant or otherwise. Even the orthography is not nearly so quaint as some of Chaucer's, and can be read quite as easily, by any American familiar with imported English, as we can read that of our own Mr. " Ward," Mr. " Billings " and Mr. " Nasby," whom Bacon, driven into a corner, took the fancy to anticipate. Let us now take the large letters of the epitaph alone, going over them forward : G., F., (I., S) A K E. T' T, HE DE ! A, HE R ! B T-E M. ? T-E S. AH, ? B!" Again some of these letters are to be read by their second sounds — the "R," for example, as in the word " her." But the sense is plain enough : — G, AND Francis (I, Shakespeare) ache. Tut, he (Shakspere) dies ! Ah, he errs, (makes a great mistake FOR himself). Bacon tention was first called to this fact bya letter from Mrs. C. M. Pott of London, who had been carefully scrutinizing the authority of Knight, Malone and Steevens, SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 7 IS THE* HIM (Shakespeare); or is them (both Shakspeare and all that amounts to anything of Shakspere). That is THE Shakespeare. Ah, that Bacon ! (that wretched man). There is partly a double reading of even this esoteric confession, besides one meaning that I cannot give. The first seven letters, as ex- plained by the cipher, have this form and inter- pretation : — G., F. (I) SAK E.— G., and Francis (I) sack him. (fill him with sack and put him into his shroud. The last four characters, — AH T B. , mean " Ah, that is the fact ! " the fact being that Bacon is the reali Shakespeare. We will continue with the other direct readings from the face of the epitaph. But, in order to make them complete, I must say here that Bacon fully explains the peculiar punctuation of the epitaph, as I shall show when I come to the proper place. I must say, also — on the word of Francis Bacon — that he and Shakspere were on the most intimate terms — altogether too intimate — in their young manhood, but had a bitter quar- rel in later years, when Bacon's public work and *Ttie doubly-weig-hLed capitals correspond, as the reader will observe, with my italicized " he^^ and the two " tke^s.^^ 8 THE TALE OF THE advanced life prevented him from further using and enriching Shakspere. According to Bacon's own account, he had been exceedingly dissolute, quite as much so as any close reader would infer that some one had been who composed the last half dozen of the Shakespeare Sonnets. In this course of life Bacon says that Shakspere, whom he pronounces a " satyr," had urged him on. But Bacon grew weary of his vices, separated from Shakspere, married, and tried to live a composed life. The " satyr," he says, then turned on him, with every possible attempt to ruin the man who had made him. Not satisfied with that, he black- ened the reputation of the woman who stood in his way. The punctuation of the epitaph in the word "HEi Rei " and at the end of it, curiously recites this occurrence. Each of Knight's two periods should be an upright hyphen, and is, in the most general sense, a "mark" or "hack." Bacon makes each of them stand for the word^ "mark" or "hack." The third indirect reading from the face of the epitaph is forward, and merely cuts up the stupid words of the ostensible text into their slightly veiled significance : Go, O dFr, end ! F.,OR I., ES vs. S AKE. F OR BE AR E. To DI G, GT HE. D'u'sT ! E NCL, o As ! E. D. HE , R, E, B, — LES EBE T-E Man ^ spare s T-Es S TONES. And curst be He ^ moves' m. Y, B, one S." SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 9 This third string of minced, phonetic English, falls into syntactic and orthographic form, thus : "Go, O DEAFER, end! FrANCIS, (oR I), AM WE (both Bacon and Shakespeare). Shake- speare ACHES. Francis, or the ' bee', [which Bacon constantly calls himself] is he. To DIE, G, GET HIM, (OR HE GETs). Do YOU HIST ! ('ST !). He nuckles, o, ass; he dies! He MARKS HER ; HE MARKS BaCON — LEST HE BE THE MAN THAT SPARES " ShAQ " THE%^ SHAKES- PEARE TONES. And curst be he that moves piiM. I, Bacon, own ' Shakespeare.' [Or : Why ! Bacon owns Shakespeare !]. "Gentle reader," even the true and incompa- rable Shakespeare could not write, forward and backward, in half a dozen different ways, over the same set and order of letters, and write grammatically ; but he mtld do it inteUigibly ; and he could reduce his method lo rule. By simply using letters in their various but established sounds, and by recording English as spoken by his hostler and kitchen maids in 1620, he precon- ceived, on the most profound and comprehensive scale, all the " dialect-writing " that has since ap- peared. His analysis of his mother-tongue, to get the most possible sounds from the fewest let- ters and combinations, is quite as remarkable, I suspect, as anything else he ever achieved. He was thoroughly scientific, even ungrammati- lO THE TALE OF THE cally, diabolically, and by way of the back door. The forward, reading of the large letters, taken alone, has been given. The same letters, con- nected backward, stand thus : " B ? HAS E HT— ?M. E HT B — R, EH. A, E DE! HTT': E KAS— I, (F), G." Bacon declares that Shakspere " ate " (de- voured and ruined) as well as " hated " him. By the double play of the " H" he covers both meanings : — Bacon that he has hated and devoured — THAT IS HIM (he), ShAKESPEARE. He (" ShAQ ") hated Bacon — her — each. Ah, he dies ! Had to. The CASE ! (the great law case REQUIRED it). I. (F). G. Throughout the whole " Tale of the Epitaph " Bacon is as full of these quips and secondary in- tents as Shakespeare is well known to be every- where — in his plays, sonnets, and poems. I will give another touch of him just here : Bacon ties the ass. He hates (and ruins) — TIE him ! He ate Bacon : erred, eh ! Ah ! he dies ! I (Francis) and G. had to case him (put him into his coffin). There are other outgivings, as I have said, of Bacon's lines, which are not translatable for the modern reader. But I have given the four or SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. II five most visible and direct readings of that old epitaph, by which the same story is at once told and suppressed. A specious, commonplace' read- ing infolds these inner ones ; and then a cipher- reading, thoroughly based on linguistic principles, Sicludes all. How shall we account for it ? ^'hy, those four lines of doggerel verse were put together by the most fertile and alert man of let- ters that ever lived—" the father of induction," and the author of " Hamlet " and " Macbeth." But who was " G " the person whom the "jargon " implicates with " F. B." ? I am not going to be caught making any accusations. But I shall give what I find. " G " has, very fre- quently, the sound of " J.," ^nd the " biliteral alphabet " says that this person was " B. J.," and sometimes speaks of him as " Rar B. J." * I take this to mean " Ben Jonson." So far, I have found no allusion whatever to Drayton. But now I must be pardoned for making a summary — in bare outline, that is — of the whole case, as I derive it from the cipher as far as I have gone. " Shakespeare " was a nom de plume, founded partly on Shakspere for a mask, and partly on the generalized character of the old knight- errant, who was always shaking his speare and throwing down his glove, as a gaj^e of battle to * " Rare Ben Jonson, O ! " the familiar phrase -ail lo have bem carved on his monument at the desire of some nnlcnown man who paid for the work, was probably a complimentary proverb among liis friends. 12 THE TALE OF THE all mankind. " Shakespeare " came, to some extent, out of the same spirit that produced Don Quixote, and, to Francis Bacon himself, was largely joke and satire. He came almost to hate that "half" of his work, which he calls the " Shakespeare-Bacon," and he had sufficient rea- son for the feeling in his latter and wiser years. It is doubtful, I think, that he would have claimed Shakespeare at all, in an epitaph and cipher or anywhere else, if Shakspere had not bled, " marked " and persecuted him — which Bacon declares he did, in the most outrageous and vul- gar way. At last, when Bacon had become At- torney-General of England, and was to some ex- tent recognized as tJie ablest man in the world, Shakspere threatened to dig up his early ex- cesses for what the actor was always harping on as a "bar" to something or other. This time the " bar" was to interfere with " the Over- bury and Somerset Case " — one of murder and Scandal — which Bacon's position as both formally and confidentially the representative of the king, compelled him to manipulate. Tliis last ofifence — the end of many like threats and insults — was too great to bear. Bacon was naturally com- promising, if not "gentle," with even a streak, I fear, of very bad effeminacy in him. But he speedily plotted the death of Shakspere, and quietly accomplished his purpose. Ben Jonson loved Bacon, as is well-known. He hated Shak- spere, who had accused him of gambling, as SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 1 3 Bacon tells the ston', and of other offences much more disreputable. Shakspere was always ready to drink — history and tradition are evidently right about that — and Bacon, with a knowledge of chemistry among his acquirements, " devised " a preparation which he terms " oxeyic-acid," with which " Rare B. J." loaded Shakspere's "sack," the last time they drank together. His death resulted in such a manner that no sus- picion of foul play appears to have got abroad, if any' was aroused, and Bacon dropped all imme- diate claim to '' Siiakespeare " in hiding an " im- poisonment " — a crime which was at that time both treason and murder. Through the " mutual friend," Jonson, it was easy enough for a man like Bacon to handle the ignorant Shakspere family (no one of whose immediate numbers ap- pears to have been able to write, if any one of them could read), and thus to construct such me- morials for the Stratford Church as would honor "Shakespeare." Francis Bacon did it with a vengeance. A monument was erected to his nom de plume, " Shakespeare " bearing the well- known inscription : " Stay, passenger, why goest thou by so fast ? Read, if thou canst, whom envious death hath plast Within this monvment, Shakespeare; with whome Quick nature dide ; whose name doth deck ystombe Far more than coste, sint all yt he hath writt Leaves living art but page to serve his witt." Near the foot of this monument to " Shake- 14 THE TALE OF THE speare" — the metrical accent unmistakably on the last syllable — Shakspere was " roofed and erfed," with never a name at all on his flat gravestone, but only a plea, partly to Ben Jonson for lasting silence, and partly to the public, never to dis- turb the work that Francis had done to his satis- faction. And, in Bacon's works, published a few years after Shakspere's death — but not soon enough for suspicion — he left a remarkable little treatise on ciphers, which has always been a puzzle in that place. Of all the ciphers men- tioned there, he gave a full illustration of one, which he designated " the best." This cipher, applied to the Shakspere epitaph, in accordance with Bacon's rules and instructions, is simply loaded with information regarding the two men whom the two things connect. It does little honor to either. One part of it will not bear in- terpretation. But, fortunately, this part is an undercurrent by itself, which can be left out. It is in esoteric Sa.xon, and will be understood, in any case, only by the learned, who must work it out for themselves, if at all. There may be a possibility which, in the cir- cumstances, I can neither conceive nor imagine, that the whole story is false. But the story is told: that I see, once and for good, and all the fools on earth will never prevail against the fact. I could no more devise or imagine the tale my- self than I could ride from New York to Strat- ford on a telegraph wire. It is too " smart " for SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 15 this hasty and superficial age; and it is "smart" enough for the mind that wound up the butcheries of " Titus Andronicus," and the morals of Lear's elder daughters. Moreover, the outside of the epitaph and the inside agree with each other per- fectly, the one being what I have termed an " in- dex " to the other. The epitaph is known — as well as anything in history is known — to date back to about 1623. As it carries the narrative on its face, without reference to the small and large letters, it is certain that the epitaph and the cipher (which repeals the narrative) were fitted together at the start. As the large letters alone tell the tale — and again and again — it is certain, too, that these were cut when the stone was laid. We cannot suspect Bacon's literary aid, sour but " rare Ben ; " for it is incredible that he would have acknowledged himself a poisoner for the sake of turning the authorship of Shakespeare over to a third person. I have earnestly wished, more than once, since I came really to understand this thing, that I could find some fact that would point to malicious inter- ference, striving to injure both Bacon and Shak- spere. But there is no such fact ; and there is no theory of the kind that will hold together. Hence I am obliged to treat The Tale of the Epitaph as Bacon's own handi:work, though he pronounces himself an assassin and Shakspere a wretch. The result, of course, is iconoclastic. But 1 6 THE TALE OF THE why particularly so ? Simply because the world has set up, with no basis of information, a cer- tain imaginary likeness of William Shakspere, whom every one of his distinguished biographers and commentators, from George Steevens to Halliwell-Phillipps, frankly admits no one knows anything about, except that he was the offspring of a wholly uneducated family; that while still a boy he married an unchaste woman much older than himself ; and that he was con- nected, in his time, with the business or profes- sion of acting. As a theatrical manager and proprietor, the Shakespeare plays were publicly ascribed to him. On the other hand, it was said he " kept a clerk " (a scholar) who wrote them. No plays or poems were ever ostensibly claimed by him in his own real name ; his will made no mention of any such works ; and he never wrote his name itself so that any one can read it, if we are to judge from the only known bits of his chirography — five signatures, none of them le'gible, and no one of them like any other. 'I'he five signatures — appendages to legal documents, and the first one written when he was nearly fifty years old — certainly look as if they had been painfully scrawled by some one who could not write, for the express purpose of pretending ihat he could. They utterly destroy the tradition, said to come from his fellow actors, that he wrote out his plays in a beautiful hand, without any erasures. The " clerk " must have SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 1/ done that, anyhow. I know a gentleman who says he would not doubt Shakspere's author- ship of the plays, " if he should stand right up in his grave and say that he didn't write them." The gentleman is from New Mexico, and is well versed in land and steers. He has some equals, just now, and not so many superiors, perhaps, as may be produced by " the coming race." It ought to be unnecessary, however, for any living creature to explain that the only reason he could have for doubting that William Shak- spere was " Shakespeare " would rest on one's natural liking for the truth, and his faith in the usefulness of telling it. There is no danger of losing " Shakespeare," whoever stood behind the appellation. None of his monuments need ever be disturbed ; for they are zoholly ideal. There is no genuine likeness of Shakspere, except in the "Folio Shakespeares " of 1623. The mod- ern pictures and statues look as little like " Wil- liam Shakspere, Gent.'' as Marshall's head of Jesus looks like the character of '' Solomon Levi " on a Bowery stage. In spite of the lack of hair, the Shakespeare busts and statues bear a much closer resemblance to Francis Bacon. I am not aware of possessing so poor a fixt- ure as a mere prejudice, on any subject what- ever. But, if a gentleman were to keep such a thing in the house, it would not be apt, just yet, 2 l8 THE TALE OF THE to lead him astray toward Francis Bacon. His Lordship's record is not tempting enough for that. Besides, I for one, bear him something a little like a grudge. That "inductive method" of which he is the " father,'' while it has been a god-send to the last few generations of magnifi- cent tinkers and pedlers, is half a nuisance. It has become an obstacle to the human vision in the great general relations of cause and effect. P^or instance : the principle that underlies the science of political economy-^to take the most urgent subject of the age — is the cognition that, as man is constructed in matter, and is depend- ent from life to death on matter, every human being has a certain natural property-right in his environment. This cognition is simply a direct presentation to the mind of the way in which the universe is made. It is tlie one fact of all facts in political economy, and all other facts can only illustrate it. But go into any congregation of modern "scientists," and they will demand that you scour every crack in the earth for data to establish your premise. They have all been cracked, themselves, with Bacon's " inductive method," and in a hunt for bugs and worms of detail, to bottle and shelve, they have grown stone-blind to universal laws. This habit of scattering the brains, with no centre of movement, results in all sorts of confu- sion and nonsense. In coimcciion with our own SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 19 subject, Bacon and Shakspere, it led Prof. Thomas Davidson, — a sort of uncertain, non- committal Baconian — to express a while ago, his '■ astonishment " that " any one should think of applying Bacon"s biliteral cipher to any- thing," because it (•.•«/./ tir so used as to be in- decipherable. Certainly it could have been so used between Bacon and some other living per- son, by pre-establishing an arbitrary biliteral alphabet. But suppose Bacon's very purpose in publishing the biliteral alphabet he .//./ gizr to the ji'jr.'J was simply that it sfionlJ t^-J.' tJu tale cf the Sluiksp^Tc ff'it.irh i In that case, Francis Bacon would not have made himself •■indecipher- able,"' whatever Prof. Davidson might have done. Tills same modem critic, indeed, oft" on an- other tangent, said, in the same article I refer to.* that "no one would have taken the trouble of inserting a cipher that had not a fair prospect of being deciphered." That a learned, a scholarly, and, all things considered, a fair- minded ■" professor," cannot hold his head to- gether while writing half a column for a news- paper, is largely the work of Francis Bacon, through the excessive influence of his '" inductive method," Siiakespeare was never guilty of wrecking the human mind in that way. But I will cite a still more lamentable case. The Shakspere epitaph, as we have obser%-ed, does not outwardlv bear even the name of the * Published in ihe Xew V rjc ' ■ . S :i jav. Oclobcr ath. 1S37. 20 THE TALE OF THE man. But, the moment Bacon's special alpha- bet is applied to it, the full name comes out, correctly spelled in one of its best authenticated forms — " Shaxpere " — with Bacon's name, also, spelled in the way to give its exact sound, if there should ever be any question about it — " Bakon." This is at the start ; and further applications, as the reader will see, give both names orlliographically as well as phonetically. The Bacon alphabet fits the Shakspere epitaph mathematically — that is, the two put together come out even. The first backward conjunction of the cipher and the lines gives the names, "Shaxpere" and "Bakon," with various pho- netic statements, of which the following are examples : — Shaxpere, Bakon — We F. Ba. Shaxpere, Bakon — We a(re) F. B. Shaxpere, F. Bakon — A Web. (An involved mesh of life.) Shaxpere-Bakon — We 'af B. (The Shaxpere- Bacon was half of Bacon.) W. Shaxpere— A ! 'E B F. Bakon (Ah, he is F. Bacon !) Shaxpere, Bakon — We a Fb. (We a fib.) A friend of mine, who happened to be born with a logical intellect, perceived at once that, in all the circumstances, such findings passed the bounds of mere co-incidence, and offered a re- ward at my hand, through the New York Tribune, SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 21 for a like result from the combination of Bacon's alphabet with any four lines of English other than the Shakspere epitaph. Gabriel's trump will doubtless blow before anybody earns the reward. But, a few days after it was offered, a gentleman of some literary distinction — Mr. George Parsons Lathrop — publicly demanded the payment of it, on the ground that he had found, in a New England graveyard, an epitaph which, under the biliteral cipher, produced Shakespeare's name, with the exception of six letters — say three quarters of them — and Bacon's name except three fifths of the letters. So elated was Mr. Lathrop with this "striking parallel" that he kindly offered to lend me aid, in preparing this book, from his own " researches among the old tombstones of New England graveyards." I am under great obligation for his politeness, and as a slight return, I hitch his outcome to the " cue " of Francis Bacon — which was "William Shake- speare." Possibly Mr. Lathrop's bit of "satire," as such an appendage, may become a source of amusement even longer than he anticipated. But if Bacon's over-insistence on his " in- ductive method " has mostly emptied the modern mind of logical faculty, it has not done so without material compensation in that " solid " and " prac- tical " way which our own age special!}' vaunts and honors. It has produced no end of sleeping- cars, telegraph-poles, patent-fertilizers and im- proved cocktails. And, to tell the truth, I could 22 THE TALE OF THE do little with the Baconian cipher until I sat down with more patience than pleased me, for a mere aside in my life, and submitted the task to the rules of the inductive method. There was no getting on, with this sort of thing, by " vision " or " imagination " — only by rigid analysis and multiplicity of particulars. Out of these, at last, came the synthesis and unity. — For Bacon has made the pursuit of him, even in this odd piece of net-work, a perfect illustration of that ever- lasting "inductive method." As "The Tale of the Epitaph " demands more or less comment throughout, I shall leave for the body of this essay, and the conclusion, some matters that might otherwise be best in our in- troduction. Nor can I stop to anticipate all possible objections. There is nothing in this piece of Bacon's work to prevent the average reader from following it, and judging for himself. Its chief peculiarity, as regards being understood, is its phonetic instead of orthographic expression. Such expression was absolutely unavoidable, pro- vided Bacon wished to do anything more with the cipher, on the epitaph, than to run through it a single sentence, or possibly two or three sentences. By analyzing his mother tongue for short words nearly alike in sound, but giving various meanings — especially as metaphors and similies — and then weaving a phonetic web of these words — it was possible to do just what he did — pack a volume into four lines. He simply SUAKSPEKE LPITAPH. 23 had a purpose in view, and took the only means in the situation to accomplish it. Besides, he declared the omnh:-per-o7nnia cipher the best of the family ; and, in spile of the phonetics, I pre- sume he was right. There is no such indirection and labor in unfolding it as must needs go with any cipher restin;^ on numerical calculations. Anybody can read it who could read the letter of a London calj-man, able to write, but to spell only " by ear." i'he outside readings of the epitaph — which have been given — indicate the inside phonetics, though the latter are generally closer and better, because the obstacles are fewer than in ihis fourfold external index. I have been asked if ev(;n this most extraor- dinary phenomenon could not be imitated by cutting up some other epitaph. Yes : an\ thing can be imitated — luilh a difference: and the dif- ference is just what commonly makes the imita- tion of no account. Here, for example, is an imitation that Mr. Georj^e Parsons Lathrop might make of dissecting the Shakspere epitaph, by cutting up his favorite of the New F^ngland graveyards, whieh he says runs thus: ".StoI' f.'ARl-.I.I-.SS VofTJIK AS YoU PASS BY. As Voi; AKK NOW So ONCK WAS I. As I AM NOW .So vou Must Be. Oh thi-.n Pki-.i'Ai'K to Follow Me." Reducing these lines to Jargon — the unquali- fied thing, this time — Mr. Lathrop might give us this : 24 THE TALE OF THE "'St! o pc! ar e l? e's s. You, the ass, You Pass By. a, sy o u ! ar e now S? O onc e was I. As I am, no w. S. o, y ! o, u 'M ? u 'sT Be ! Ohth, n. Prepare to F. — ollow Me." The orthographic English, under Bacon's rules, would be as follows : Hist! oh, peace ! Are he L. (Lathrop) ? He'sShake- spere. Vou the ass, you pass by ! Ah, sigh OH you! Are he now Shakespeare? Oh onck he was I (Lath- rop). As I AM, know Willia.m Shakespeare. Oh, why! Oh, You hjm.' You hist B. Oath, N, pre- pare TO F. — hollow Me." It is quite evident that a New England grave- yard can furnish literary jargon. The only trouble with the spurious article is that it has nothing in it. We know the whole intent and purpose, at the start, of the old Calvinstic verse — a call on " the sinner " to mind his salvation. It has nothing strange and exceptional about it — no peculiarity to be explained, as everybody knows the Shakspere epitaph /las, in the eyes of every commentator. Then again, we are all pos- itively aware that Mr. Lathrop is not \\'iliiam Shakespeare, and that no one else with the initial " L," has ever been supposed to be. Mr. Lathrop might, indeed, call on some one to " hist Be," (say Bacon), whether the call would have any effect, or not. But who is " N," that Mr. Lath- rop invokes to prepare an oath to " F " ? This " N " cannot be Mr. Lathrop's Shakespearian, assistant, Mr. Learnard of New London ; for his SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 25 initials are " \V. L." And the F. can have noth- ing to do with Francis Bacon ; for he would have had no use for the affidavit of some unknown party called " N." This " F " plainly stands for '• fudge," as it is in opposition with the phrase "hollow Me." Thus one explains the other, but neitlier explains itself. By no possibility could either '" fudge " or '' hollow me " be construed to mean Mr. Lathrop ; for a scholarly critic and satirist cannot be justly described by any such ridiculous terms. .\ny one so full of imagination has no place in him for a "hollow." So this piece of gravevard jargon utterly contradicts itself, and goes all to pieces, while that of the Shakespeare epitaph points to things that, to say the least might /unv been the most actual of facts. Such will always be just about the difference be- tween truth and travesty. Whoever may laugh at " The Tale of the Epitaph," — or swear for that matter — and how- ever loud may be the giggling or the objurga- tions, I expect to smile a little, and to smile last. But I am almost sorrv that such will be the re- sult. I really wish some one could- prove to me that Francis Bacon and William Shakspere were not such men as this record makes them. But I recall Bvron ; I recall Bonaparte; I re- member that Goethe said there was no sin or crime that circumstance might not have led him to commit. Great men are seldom pure and sim- 26 THE TALE OF THE pie ones; and it will yet be found that the heat and rage and tumult of Shakespeare came out of a blast-furnace, not a bottle of tepid milk. SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. CHAPTER I. The North American Review of October, 1887, contained the following paper, written by Mr. Hugh Black, oE Kincardine, Ontario, which I am permitted to reproduce by permission of the author, and by the courtesy of the owner and publisher, Mr. Thorndike Rice. " FRA BA WRT EAR AY." If Lord Bacon wrote the plays that have come down to us under the name of Shakespeare, it was his duty to leave to posterity the means of ascertaining the truth. A secret writing such as Ignatius Donnelly has found in the plays would be one way. Another way might be an epitaph containing an inner writing, placed on Shake- speare's grave. And the key to the cipher might be made known afterwards. An inscription such as this would seem well suited to the purpose he would have in view. In this inscription he might insist that the grave be not disturbed, and that the stone, with the epitaph on it, be pre- served intact. Such a device would possess the quality of permanency in a high degree. It would keep the secret securely till the time for 28 THE TALE OF THE its revelation sliould arrive. Taking into account the place and the circumstances, a statement conveyed in this way would deserve to be re- garded as the most solemn affirmation it was pos- sible for the writer to make. The purpose of this article is to show that Lord Bacon did make such an epitaph. The epitaph, which all stu- dents of Shakespeare will remember, is as follows : Good Frend for Jesus SAKE forbeare •To DiGG T-E Dust EncloAsed HE. Re. Blese be T-E Man t spares T-Es Stones And curst be He t moves my Bones. I have copied it, preserving the distinction of large and small letters, as I find it in Knight's Edition of Shakespeare's Works. Charles Knight thinks it was not written by Shakespeare. He says : " It is very remarkable, we think, that this plain free stone does not bear the name of Shakespeare — has nothing to establish the fact that the stone originally belonged to his grave. We apprehend that during the period that elapsed between his death and the setting-up of the monu- ment a stone was temporarily placed over the grave ; and that the warning not to touch the bones was the stone- mason's invention, to secure their reverence till a fitting monument should be prepared, if the stone were not ready in his yard to serve for any grave. We quite agree with Mr. De Quincey that this doggerel attributed to Shakespeare is 'equally below his intellect, no less than his scholar- ship,' and we hold with him that 'as a sort of siste viator SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 29 appeal to future sextons, it is worthy o£ the grave-digger or the parish clerk, who was probably its author.' " On one point at least De Quincey and Charles Knight are certainly in error. If we take the group of large capital letters near the end of the first and second lines of the epitaph, and arrange them in the proper order, we get all the letters of the name " Shakespeare " except two, enough to establish the fact that the stone was prepared purposely for his grave. And further, the epitaph could not have been made by any local poetizer ; for while there was a great variety of ways of spelling the name in Stratford, in no single in- stance does the letter E occur in the first syllable. Neither could Shakespeare himself have been the author, for a similar reason. The seeming eccentricities of three of the words of the epitaph are thus accounted for. But there are other peculiarities, of spelling an-d of large and small capitals, that are not explained. And this brings me to the discovery I have made. It occurred to me, as the epitaph con- sists of two kinds of letters only, large and small, that Lord Bacon"*s omnia per omnia cipher, de- scribed in the De Augmentis, might be the key to the secret. " For this cipher is practicable in all things that are capable of two differences." That the reader may be able intelligently to fol- low the explanation, I will now quote from the De Augmentis, published seven years after Shake- speare's death, the essential part of what Lord 30 THE TALE OF THE Bacon there says on the subject o[ ciphers, in- cluding the key to the cipher used in the epitaph. "Tliere is a new and useful invention to elude the ex- amination of a cipher,* viz., to have two alphabets, the one of significant and the other of non-significant lettera ; and folding up two writings together, the one conveying the secret, whilst the other is such as the writer might probably send without danger. In case of a strict exami- nation about the ciplicr, the bearer is to produce tlic non- significant alph.abet for the true, and the line for the non- significant; by which means llie examiner would fall upon the outward writing, and finding it probable, suspect nothing of the inner. " liut to prevent all suspicion, we shall here annex a cipher of our own, that we devised at Paris in our youth, and which has the highest perfection of a cipher — that of signifying COT ///n per (•iiiiiia (anything by everything), pro- vided only the matter included be five times less than that which includes it, without any other cnndition or limi- tation. The invention is this: first, let all the letters of the alphabet be resolved into two only, by repetition and transposition; for a transposition of two letters through five places, or different arrangements, will denote two and thirty differences, and consequently fewer, or four and tvienty, the number of letters in our alphabet, as in the following example: A BILITERAL ALPHA i;F.T, CONSISING ONLY OF A AND 1! CHANCKfl THROUGH FIVE PLACES, so AS TO REPRESENT ALL THE LE ITERS OF THE COMMON ALPHABET. i\^^Mabba \\=artbhli * Mr. Black's quotations are taken from M;icon' s " Advani cmcnt of Learnin{;r," Bohn's Philosophical Library (1883). Ilr.r.k VI. Page, 121 etc. li. (;. C, SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 31 U=ababb 'S^ibbiia 0=aidai Q=abbib R=Aw^7d S=biiaab T==baaba V^=baabb X=bahib Y=babba Z=bj/>bb " Thus, in order to write A, you write five a's or aaaaa ; and to write B, you write four ci's and one b, or aaiwi ; and so of the rest. " Let there be also at hand two other common alphabets, as for example, Roman and Italic. All the letters of the Roman are read or deciphered, by translating them into the letter A only. And all the letters of the Italic alpha- bet are to be read by translating them into the letter B only. Now adjust or fit any external double-faced writing, letter by letter, to the internal writing, first made bilit- erate ; and afterwards write it down for the letter or epistle to be sent." It will be observed that Lord Bacon speaks of Roman and italic letters,* but large and small letters will do equally well. I now repeat the epitaph, placing the letters in twent^'-two groups of five letters each, translating the large capitals into B, and the small capitals into A. The dash is reckoned a small letter, because it stands for H. * In Bacon's own edition of his works, he is said to have used special plates of script, made for the occasion, to illustrate the dif- ference between his two kinds of letters ; but, the principle being precisely the same, his translators have used Roman and italic. Bacon explained .that his biliteral cipher could be illustrated by ** any objects either visible or audible, provided only the objects be capable of two differences." That he had special tables cut for the exhibition of this same cipher, when there was not the least mechanical need of it, sug-g-ests two little " asides." It was as good as saying : ** This cipher has never been used except in writ- ing, and between diplomatists or friends."~a handy fib to hide 32 THE TALE OF THE The combination T is reckoned as a single large letter because the T is placed exactly over the Y. baaab aaaaa aabaa aabbb baaaa aaaab aaaaa babba aabaa aabaa abbba baaaa aabab baaba aaaaa babab aaaaa baaaa aaaaa babaa aaaaa baaaa Two things will be noticed that give evidence of design: first, there are no letters left over; second, the combinations are all significant, that is, they all stand for letters in BacoiVs biliteral alphabet, although the number of possible com- binations is thirty-two, and the number used in the alphabet only twenty-four. Referring to the alphabet, the twenty-two groups are found to stand for the following twenty-two letters : S A E H R B A Y E E P R F T A X A R A W ^ I R Above and to the right of the line I have drawn are the letters forming the word " Shax- the truth. But, after his death, and on the republication of his works, his unnecessary plates would be apt to lead to scrutiny and questioning ; and if by that time the anomalous Shakspere epitaph should catch any alert eye, the two might be questioned together. Mr. Black is indebted, for this bit of unintended confirmation, to Mr. A. D. Vinton, a young gentleman who points to the fact of Bacon's special plates to show that he said nothing in particular about Roman and italic letters. But Mr. Vmton imagined that he had found something ^^rt/wj/ Mr. Black's discovery, instead of in its favor. When literary rags are picked up, the capacity to assort them should go along. E. G. C. SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 33 peare," spelled this time with an X. The thir- teen letters below and to the left form suggestive parts of five other words, " Fra Ba wrt ear ay" which being completed, read, '■'■Francis Bacon wrote Shakespeare's Plays." Whilst the letters are arranged promiscuously, it will be seen that there is a certain order followed, beginning at the bottom left-hand corner, and ending at the upper right-hand corner. This seems to indi- cate that the word " Shaxpeare " is to be read last, and is intended as a signature. It is now clear that this epitaph was written by Bacon ; for a cipher is used that was devised by him, and this cipher was not published until long after the plain freestone had been placed over Shakespeare's grave. It remains only to indicate what seems to have been Shakespeare's part in the affair of the epitaph. It is not at all likely that his family would have allowed such a piece of doggerel to be placed on his grave if they had not known that it was by his express command. Nor is it likely that Bacon would have caused it to be put there if he had not previously obtained Shakes- peare's consent. And the fact that his name occurs in the inner writing, seems to show that the cipher had been explained to him, and that he had consented to have his name put in it by way of signature. The tradition that Shakespeare himself made the epitaph a little before his death, has pro- 3 34 THK TALE OF TUK bably this much foundation : That before his death he instructed the slonemasori to prepare I he gravestone, gave him the ejjitaph, and insisted that every letter be faithfully eojjied, preserving accurately the distinction between large and small letters. To help in securinf^ accuracy, he very likely explained that the large letters near the end of (he firsl two lines were inlended for his own name. In doing so he would have Ijecn act- ing according lo the plan recommended by lia- con in the first paraj^raph of my quotation from the De Au^mentis. In the epitaph, then, it would appear that we have the solemn affirmation, not of Bacon only, but of Shakespeare also, that Francis Bacon was the author of Shakespeare's J'lays. \\.W,\\ I5l,ACK. At the time Mr. Black's paper was sent as a contribution to The North American Review, I was in editorial connection with that periodical, and the paper was placed in my hands for in- spection. My fnst impression was that Mr. Black had perpetrated a grim but \i:ry scholarly joke on the Hon, Ignatius Donnelly. But I tested Mr. Black's wfjrk, and found hirn correct in every detail. This led me to examine liacon's bili].eral cipher, and to find that Mr. lilack had used it in strict conformity with iJacon's explana- tions and illustrations. Next I ajjpealed to Charles Knight's compleie works, and verified SHAKSTKRE EriTAni. 35 Mr. Black's depiction of the Shakspere epitaph, on the authority he had given for it. I could not then spare time to ransack the public libra- ries of New York, and ascertain on what author- ity Knight himself stood. But I knew well enough, without much exercise of mind, that no such hideous and preposterous cut of so con- spicuous a thing as the Shakspere epitaph could have got into Chailes Knight's elegant, micro- scopic volumes, without some adequate reason. A mistake in such a matter would have simply ruined his reputation. Mr. Black's paper now became something more than a joke, especially as I found that if there was anything at all in the gentleman's theorv, he had stmck a pick, as it were, into a gold-mine. He had made a remarkable discov- ery, but had.made, with it, only one application of a cipher founded on phonetic combinations, in such a wav that many applications were possi- ble. So I continued Mr. Black's work, and sup- plemented his paper with one of my own, the two papers appearing together in the J?e7'u-7i'. But while the epitaph, under the cipher, is so loaded with Bacon and Shakspere that they crop out everywhere, and in almost e\ery way, I had not time to reach the full analysis of the matter, and to find the definite method of procedure. I could do little more than show cause for some- thing further. 36 THE TALE OF THE The first criticism that arose against Mr. Black's discovery was a very natural and sensi- ble one. It was the question of original text in the epitaph, and Knight's authority for it. Meanwhile, I had taken the first convenient op- portunity to hunt up the record, with the untir- ing courtesy of the gentlemen who represent that great public benefaction, the Astor Library.* I soon found that one of the early Shakespear- ians, George Steevens, had settled the main point. The first gravestone bearing Shaks- peare's epitaph had been worn out and destroyed, but Steevens had prepared and preserved a drawing, and given a specific account of it, in precisely the way most needed. His drawing and description had been reproduced and con- firmed for nearly a century, by all the other Shakespearians who had paid any attention to the subject, and so was perfectly authenticated, unless possibly in one or two points of punctua- tion, which might have been overlooked in tak- ing the epitaph by anything short of a "rub- bing." These punctuation points Charles Knight appeared to ha\'e supplied. I stated this bit of history in the New York World of Sunday, October gth, in the following letter. (Its captions belong to the editor.) * The custodians of the Lenox Library, with their superb Shakespeare collection, have since placed me under a like obliga- tion. SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 37 SHAKESPEARE'S QUEER EPITAPH. AN INTERESTING EXAMINATION OF THE VERSIONS ALLEGED TO EMBODY A CONFESSION. To THE Editor of The World : The recent claim that a striking connection has been discovered between the Shakespeare epitaph and Francis Bacon's biiiteral cipher raises the question, "What w the Shakespeare epitaph ? " Bacon's cipher takes care of itself, for that is fully recorded and explained in his works. The present Shakespeare epitaph is this : Several fac-similes of this inscription have been taken. One was published by Richard Grant White in 1865. Another can be found in " The Shakespeare Memorial," an English publication of recent date, and the latest of all appears to be given by Mr. Herbert J. Browne in a pamphlet just published under the title, " Is it Shakespeare's Confession ? — The Cryptogram in His Epitaph." No one doubts that the present Shakespeare epitaph is correctly reproduced in the examples 38 THE TALE OF THE here referred to. But no such form of it was ever given — no such picture to the eye, that is — until a very modern date. As late as the pub- lication of Charles Knight's Complete Works (vol. 8, page 542) the text of the epitaph, in por- traiture, stands thus : Good Friend for Jesus SAKE forbeare To DiGG T-E Dust EncloAsed HE. Re. Blese de T-E Man ^ spares T-Es Stones And curst be He !J!moves mv Bones. Now what is the matter with the epitaph and the Shakespearians ? What is the cause of their different renderings ? Halliwell-Phillipps gives the clew to it in his " Outlines of the Life of Shakespeare " (1882). He says : " The honors o£ repose, which have thus far been con- ceded to the poet's remains, have not been extended to his tombstone. The latter had, by the middle of the last century, sank below the level of the floor, and about fifty years ago had become so much decayed as to suggest a vandalic order for its removal, and in its stead to place a new slab, one which marks certainly the locality of Shake- speare's grave, and continues the record of the farewell lines, but indicates nothing more. The original memorial has wandered from its allotted station — no one can tell whither — a sacrifice to the insane worship of prosaic neat- ness, that mischievous demon whose votaries have prac- tically destroyed so many of the priceless relics of ancient England and her gifted sons." So the literal text of the original slab has been " sacrificed to the insane worship of prosaic neat- SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 39 ness." The new slab " continues the record of the farewell lines, but indicates nothing more." Perhaps the old stone was so worn and broken that the new one was made partly " by guess,'' and partly with the desire to render Shakespeare not quite so ridiculous as some good Phillistine thought he must have been when the original epitaph was laid out. But exactly what authority have we for the text of the genuine stone ? With the exception of two punctuation points, Charles Knight's ren- dering of it is traceable directly back to George Steevens, whose edition of Shakespeare it\ 1760 led to his association with Dr. Johnson in later works of the kind,'and to Steevens' great celeb- rity as a Shakespearian. To the editing of Shakespeare, Steevens gave his life. He was a man of wealth, and could work, travel or rest when he liked. He speaks of the Shakespeare epitaph as if it were under his eye at the time he wrote. He says explicitly it was "an uncouth mixture of small and capital letters," and gives it thus : Good Frend For Iesus SAKE forbeare To DiGG T-E Dust EncloAsed HE Re Blese be T-E Man '^ spares T-Es Stones And curst be He ^ moves my Bones. Steevens' facsimile makes the T-E's in the second and third lines blacker and heavier than even the " SAKE " and " HE Re," and gives no 40 THE TALE OF THE punctuation whatever. His picture has been fol- lowed by all the old Shakespearians, who gener- ally confirm it with the phrase : "It is, as Stee- vens observes, an uncouth mixture of large and small letters." All this comes down as far as the Shakespeare of A. J. Valpy in 1832. Just about that time, according to Halliwell-Phillipps, the ancient stone " wandered away." In 1845 the new stone had become authority for the old one, and Joseph Hunter, in his " New Illustra- tions," said of the former record : " Nothing can be further from being a faithful exhibi- tion of these lines : there are litera nexm . undoubtedly, but the letters are all cut with remarkable truth, evenness and delicacy, and they are all capitals." " But how many per- sons have taken " the. " ludicrous misrepresentation for a true copy.' " This oily and innocent Mr. Hunter was so anxious to help Shakespeare out of all eccentrici- ties that he helped everybody else, at least, to see through himself. The good little man held this opinion of the obituary doggerel as poetry: " Some despise these lines. To me they appear quite in Shakespeare's vein, and singularly excellent in tfieir kind, save thafthe last line is a little too harsh." Whether Mr. Hunter knew of any change in the gravestones, he emits no breath to tell. But his anxious euphemisms breed the suspicion that he did. A good many other modern Shakespear- ians, however, have written on the epitaph with- SHAKSPERE EriTAPH. 41 out such information, and the latest of them seem to be most in the darl^. Their comments in general illustrate Macaulay's remark on the "slovenly manner in which most men are con- tent to do their thinking." That Steevens was substantially if not micro- scopically correct in depicting the original Shakespeare epitaph, there can be no reasonable doubt ; for no such picture as his could rest upon the imagination ; and that picture was at once too "uncouth" and too conspicuous to pass undis- puted for nearly a hundred years if there had been a way to put him in error. The real difh- ciilty is a minor one, and lies between Steevens and Knight. Where did Knight get his excep- tional and hideous punctuation ? — the period in the middle of the word " HE.Re " ? The answer to this question rests on a strong probability, so far as I ha\'e been able to see, but I can find no direct evidence. The new epitaph, it will be observed, perpetuates the old spelling of all the regularly constructed words, except in the very one in question — the word "HE Re." This is reduced to uniformity of letters and spelled " HEARE." The presence of the " a " seems to indicate that some space or mark was in its place and was supposed to stand for it. Evidently Knight never permitted his exceptional period without deciding on some such matter. It would be interesting to know exactly why he used his two periods, and perhaps it is not 'too late to as- 42 'IIIE TALE OF IHE certain. Du^^dale, in his " Anliquilii-'s of War- wickshire" (1G56), gives the word as "iieic," but his authority fs utterly wortlilcss on liiis poinl, ns he differs from everybody else in the orthography of several words, and makes no pretense of de- lineation, but only of sense. His lellering is not even Roman, but a sort of fancy script. I trust that with the aid of The World I can call the attention of the Shakespeare associations and the liaconian Society of London to this sub- ject. It is a piece of literary bric-^-brac that is tempting, and may prove of some use. J'J)WAI;5|^©i£i'" f^SThJZtlE: 1 ^K■^VE^^ MY DOMES' -^t ' In his paper for 7"/?.' JW'rt': .-/".-.'-.v.:-.- A.- r.\-.v. >[r. Black, who is an impartial scholar. with notiiiiig to gain by mere partisanship, called attention, at the outset, to the conjectures of De Qi'.incey and others, that Sii.ikespeare inighr not have been the author of his epitaph, notwith- s:aiiding' it is presented as direcJv his. and con- * Tlie different .uiihorities of the S'-.Ak<-.vro cpit.^ph f.ill into three cUi:ises ; F:'^', those who Itave s:ivcn tlte sense of it \vi:hou: pretendins: to follow the v^ictuix- of the text — :»s r>Uj;d.-,le : .v>,.-«,i". th-'se who h.ive envie.tvoree. to reprvxiuce the or^ci"'--.! epK.^ph in bo;h fortn .\nd subs:.\n.:e— -is S:eeve'.-.s, M.i'one, Wi-py .ir,.: K:vj;:'.; ; i"4i'\:'. th-^se who have known nothin^:- .ibout the */rfe-oi;.\;oh, and have s-o.ppose^i the prx^ent s'.a!> to be the ori^io.il. So there h.is t^xM no eonrticl of .luihorities where there h.is ^eon .toy kn.ow ".ooce on the subitv: ; but the ch.stter of our third e'.ass h.is led to .i o^ ool de.xl of confusion. 44 THE TALE OF THE veys his personal blessing and malediction. Mr. Black then proceeded to show why De Quincey and his followers were in error, by examining Ae face of the epitaph in the new light of Bacon's remarks on writings fitted to his biliteral cipher. The words " SAKE " and " HE.Re," in the first and second lines of the epitaph, contain, as Mr. Black says, nearly all the letters in Shake- speare's name. But suppose we glance at " SAKE " in the first line, and then at " SPARES " immediately under it in the third line. Then only H and E are missing from the name, and these two letters are fairly thrown at the eye from all parts of the epitaph. S(H)AKESP(E)ARES, T-Es, Stones, T-E DvsT, T-E Man. But all such peculiarities — and the epitaph is full of them — are at once per- fectly explained, as Mr. Black says, in conjunc- tion with Bacon's remarks on his biliteral cipher : " In case of a strict examination about the cipher, the bearer is to produce the non-significant alphabet for the true, and the true for the non-significant ; by which means the examiner would fall upon the outward writing, and, finding it probable, suspect nothing of the inner." The fact is, however, that doubt has been cast upon the authorship of the epitaph only because of the very eccentricities necessary to the Baconian cipher. As for De Quincey, he was simply prema- ture in his conjecture, and in 1838 the case was settled against him. For, in that year, South- SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. .45 well's letter from Warwickshire, written in 1693 was dug up and published, in which the palpable understanding of Shakespeare's own generation, and e\-en of his own famih-, was given, that the epitaph was " made by himself a little before his death." Moreover, it was held in such awe that " not one, for fear of the curse dare touch his gravestone, though his wife and daughters did earnestly desire to be laid in the same grave with him." This old letter (of 1693) was written on the authority of the clerk at tlie Stratford Church, who was born several years before Shakspere died, and was, of course, familiar with the local records and traditions. The Shakspere epitaph, then, in Mr. Black's view, contains a specious, but spurious cipher on its face, exactly in accordance with Bacon's illus- trations, and hides a genuine cipher. The spuri- ous cipher — the one that discovers itself as soon as a cipher is thought of at all — and was meant to do so — is the visual fact that the epitaph is full of " Shakespeare " without uttering the word. Mr. Black is certainly correct in his observations, as far as he goes. But, if I have reached the truth in this book, Francis Bacon, the real author of the " Shakespeare" memorials, did not permit the name to appear, except by indirection, on Shakspere's gravestone, chiefly tjecause William Shakspere was not " Shakespeare." * * Hereafter, I shall use these two names in their proper distioc- tion. 46 THE TALE OF THE In Mr. Black's application of the biliteral alpha- bet to the epitaph, he has followed Bacon techni- cally, by reducing in detail, each combination of five Roman letters to the corresponding a's and b's. But we can proceed more directly by deriv- ing our significants straight from sections of the epitaph ; for there is nothing to do but count every small or usual letter as " a," and every large or secondary letter as " b,"- — just as Bacon did — at the same time taking the results from his table. Mr. Black's work is literal and entirely free from imagination. He simply covers the epitaph with the a's and b's, obeying the very eye. He employs the hyphens of the epitaph as small counters, because they are such in themselves ; and the monograms — the ^'g — as large, because, in their direct visual construction, they are each, in size and combination, one large character. But his process, can be seen most conveniently in this shape : S A E H R B GoodF-rendf-orJes-usSAK-Eforb-eareT AYE E P odigg-T-EDu-stEnc-loAse-dHE.Re. R F T A X A Blese-beT -E-ManTs-pares-T -EsS-tones R A W A R Andcu-rstbe-He!Jmo-vesmy-Bones. I have purposely varied from Mr. Black's work, so far as to let the first line of the Baconian sig- nificants contain six instead of five, and the SHAKSPERE EPITAPH, 47 second line five instead of six, The biliteral al- phabet overruns the first line of the epitaph when taken alone ; hence the division of the sig- nificants follows in two different ways. I have also excluded the letter " a " from the last sylla- ble of Mr. Black's " Shaxpeare," for reasons which will appear in a moment. The diagram that results from these changes is this : S A E H R R A W A R Here the rendering of the name we call " Shakespeare " is " Shaxpere." And I must insist, at the expense of repetition, that it will not do for any but the very ignorant to laugh at this rendering of the word : for scholars know that William Shakspere's name was spelled " Shackspere," " Shaxpere," " Shaxper," " Shag- spere," and in more than twenty other ways, at the very least. They know, too, that he himself never signed " Shakespeare " to any document on record. This form of the name was simply a mask and mm deplume, like " Shaxberd," which was also applied to him, and, when strictly spelled, contains a hyphen (Shake-speare ") as it often did in early editions of the plays.* * Four poems dedicate the Folio of 1623— the first by Ben Jonson; the others by Hugh Holland, L. Digges, and I. M. The last is " To the memorieof Master W. Shakespeare." 48 THE TALE OF THE We must remember, too, that we are dealing with what Bacon himself designated an '^ omnia- per-omnia" cipher; that is, a cipher signifying " everything by everything.'' Some critics of Mr. Black and myself have turned into the most open-featured of jack-o-lanterns, because we have claimed phonetic expression for the inner sig- nificants of the Shakspere epitaph. But these " end-men " of the newspapers have, as usual, done a good deal more laughing than think- ing. They have stretched their mouths so wide that their eyes have tumbled down their throats. Thus engulfed, the eyes could not be expected to see Bacon's fundamental requirements in con- structing his cipher. It would have been possi- ble for him to make a single application of his biliteral alphabet to the Shakspere epitaph in the orthographic English of his age. But if he wished to say hundreds of things instead of one, there was no possibility of doing it in conventional orthography. The same letters must be used over and over again in fixed positions, and must be selected with the minutest calculation, in order to achieve required sounds. Once more, suppose Bacon wished to supplement the biliteral with a numerical cipher and make the epitaph an index to several sources of hidden knowl- edge. Mr. Black offered to The North American Review, with his first article, another one in proof of such a cipher, and Mr. Herbert J. Browne, of Washington, has since presented a SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 49 like theory. I have not examined these mathe- matical ciphers closely enough to judge of them, but I shall show that Bacon did wish to say a good many different things — and pretty lively ones — through the Shakspere epitaph. But while this purpose made the compression of phonetics absolutely necessary, the meanings have been so arranged, repeated, and clinched, that they can- not be avoided. Let us return to Mr. Black's diagram of Bacon's S A E H R E B A Y E P R F T A X A The first step with them, it would seem, is just the one Mr. Black took, in his attempt to elimi- inate the names of William Shakspere and Fran- cis Bacon. — Why ? — Simply because, if the epi- taph is Shakspere's, and the cipher is Bacon's, a reasoning creature must needs draw the logical inference that the two things combined relate to the two men. Then, by employing the process of "induction," perhaps we can find out. I should mention here, for Mr. Black, that, after his article left his hands, he came to the conclusion, from a careful scrutiny of the best authorities, that he should not have included an "A" in the last syllable of Shakspere's name. He was right, if only for the reason that Bacon 4 so THE TALE OF THE could not afford to use a single unnecessary letter for his proper names, as he needed as many letters as possible for his spider-web nar- rative. Besides, whatever doubt there may be that Shakspere's name was written " Shax- speare," there is no shadow of doubt that " Shax- pere '' was one of its most customary forms for fifty years. The change makes no difference in Mr. Black's discovery. It merely throws a letter out of a subject and into a predicate, helping both. We have observed that the Shakspere epi- taph is so constructed that the biliteral cipher parts a segment on the end of the first line, necessitating two positions for Bacon's signifi- cants. I give them : s A E H R E B A Y E P R F T A X A R A W A R S A E H E R P B A Y E E F T A X A R A W A R If we have really got hold of the individual who wrote both "Richard the Third" and the " Novum Organum" it behooves us to sharpen our wits, and miss neither small matters nor large ones. The glass eye of the " end-man "-critic " won't do." By the little device just illustrated, Francis Bacon has given both a single and double subject to a "web " of sentences — to use his own SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 5 I word, and has designated a name familiarly ap- plied to him by William Shakspere in the days of their closest intimacy. This name (or say nick- name) was " Ba." " Fra Ba," indeed, with his " best cipher " and the Shakspere epitaph, is simply playing, in a grim and complex way, the modern and familiar game of " anagrams." In this amusement young people find no difficulty in taking fifteen or twenty letters, selected for them in secret, and ascertaining the words which the letters con- struct. The only condition is that all the letters must be used. With the whole scope of the English language, it is seldom possible to em- ploy the letters given, except in the word or words intended. Bacon has not left his work subject even to the little uncertainty of such a game. He has given keys to his disclosures, with each application of his cipher. But he has used his materials just as as a master- builder ze/ijzi!/^ use them — for all they are worth. His significants turn into various anagrams ; but, the keys to the meanings being furnished, the whole procession falls into line, each member in its place. By analyzing his mother-tongue, and taking the fewest words with the most mean- ings, the author of " Shakespeare " was the one man of the ages to put a phonetic volume into four lines. I see clearly how his work was done, and do not fear to trust it, though I expect that 52 THE TALE OF THE the growth and change of language, during three hundred years, may lead me into a few excep- tional mistakes. From the two last preceding figures, any sen- tence that can be formed in distinct phonetics — aided too by the dropped H, the very broad A, and other peculiarities of the English as a nation — will have some application to " The Tale of the Shakspere Epitaph ; " and, the harsher the sentence may be, or the more ridiculous — seem- ingly so at first sight — the nearer it will be, per- haps, to Bacon's direct meaning. Here is one of that kind : Shaxpere Be a Rat, a Fyr, a War. "Shakespeare " (Meaning Bacon) is a Rat, a Fire, a War. A partly corresponding anagram, from figure 2 is this : Shaxpere, Ba, are a Fyr — at War ! Shaxpere and Bacon are a fire : They are (here) at War. But such affirmations as these were at first so repugnant to my feelings, to say nothing of what appeared to be their utter nonsense, and were so much in conflict with my whole conception of the epitaph, that I walked over them impatiently, and sought beyond. So far as I then had a " theory," I believed that Bacon furnished the genius and scholarship SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 53 of the plays ; that Shakspere adapted and made the most of them for the stage ; and that the two men lived in perfect though secret harmony. But Bacon tells a very different story, and my preconceptions wasted a good deal of my time. They were finally "knocked out" by "the in- ductive method." The anagram derived by Mr. Black from the significants is plainly enough in them, but re- versely, with Shaxpere used as a predicate. The sentence, " Fra Ba. Wrt Ear Ay," Mr. Black sup- posed to be an abridgment of the assertion, " Francis Bacon wrote Shakespeare's Plays." Bacon claims the substance of Mr. Black's hypothesis in hundreds of ways ; but what he actually says at this point is, Fr. B. Ear Wryt Shaxpere. Francis Bacon has here written up Shaxpere. or, " Shakespeare " — Francis Bacon, that is — wrote here. The abbreviations, " Fr." and " Fra." for Francis, were both very common in Bacon's time, as I presume they are now. " Fra." Collyns was a witness to Shakspere's will. In Bacon's letters, etc., we find " Fr." " Fra." and " Francis," as it happens ; but Bacon appears to have generally used " Fr." As the old " indicative past " for write is 54 THE TALE OF THE " writ,"* and, as the unaccountable Briton so generally despises an " H " — a fact which Bacon constantly insists on — the last anagram could not be bettered as London phonetics on the pop- ular scale — which Bacon chose partly, perhaps, as the surest means of preserving his meanings if they should long remain locked up. Mr. Black's anagram, with the full significants, would be Fr. Ba Ear Wryt Shaxpere : A, A, A ! Francis Bacon here wrote up Shaxpere : Ha, ha, ha ! And just this account is exact. The English- man's average laugh is " Ah, ah, ah ! " and to do it according to the spelling is an " American- ism." Bacon was laughing — the laugh of hate and revenge. But I have learned from many * To show the ordinary calibre of Mr. Black's critics, I will mention that some of them have laufjhed at the cipher-use of this regular but old grammatical form of the verb " to write.'' In ^' Love's Labor's Lost " Dumain says : " Once more I'll read the ode that I have writ." In " The Merchant of Venice," Lorenzo says : '' And whiter than the paper it writ on Is the fair hand that writ." In the ii6th Sonnnet, Shakespeare in his own person speaks thus ; " If this be error, and upon me proved, I never writ, nor no man ever loved." On the Shakespeare monument itsell appear the words, " Sith all yt he hath writt." It is no weight of critical learning that will stand in the way of Francis Bacon. It will be only the weight of critical ignorance. SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 55 tests, that the great master of ciphers, as well as law, poetry, wickedness, and science, so cunningly devised his biliteral alphabet, with reference to his own name and many other things, that he could throw sounds back into it, in addition to bringing them out of it. In Shaxpere's name and the contractions, " Fra Ba," which he has used some hundreds of times in fitting his cipher to the epitaph, three A's occur, to say nothing of this very frequent letter that he would have to use elsewhere at every turn. But, as the biliteral alphabet itself is formed of A, and B, these two significants can be made to count as one for five, as well as five for one. Bacon has made the present anagram a pertinent illustration of this process — which never interferes with his meanings so far as I have discovered, but rather points and fixes them. In Fr. Ba. Ear Wryt Shaxpere : A, A, A ! the five significant A's sequester themselves in the one biliteral A, and that alone is left. Thus we get : Fr. B. Ear Wryt Shaxpere. $6 THE TALE OF THE CHAPTER II. I MUST now point to the fact that Mr. Black, in making his strange discovery, took the second step of Bacon's process first. He treated the hy- phens in the words " T-E " and " T-E s " as small letters. Not that he treated them incor- rectly. Standing alone as hyphens, they must cer- tainly be taken for small biliteral counters. Yet, in their direct and complete picture to the eye, in their limits or walls, they necessarily form capital letters, and so are large counters as well. Let us reverse Mr. Black's treatment of them, repeating the epitaph for convenience : S A E H R B GoodF-rendf-orJes-usSAK-Eforb-eareT A Q E E P odigg-T-EDu-stEnc-loAse-dHE.Re. R H T A Z A Blese-beT-E-Man'Js-pares-T-EsS-tones RAW A R Andcu-rstbe-He^mo-vesmy-Bones. Two of the biliteral representatives of this table, Q and Z, are obtained by backward read- ings of their constituents, this being the only way in which the biliteral combinations appear in Bacon's alphabet, and the only method by SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 57 which he could make full use of his doubles on the epitaph, which he has employed for keys — or " cues," as he calls them. In the end, he uses, both forward and backward, every seg- ment of the epitaph that can be so employed. But when I paused here, as I naturally did for a moment, I found that he had dictated my pro- cedure, and saved my time, by one of his most comical dodges. A presentation of his nom de plume, " Shakespeare," was now given, in the ex- actly phonetic form of " Shaqzpere." If we omit the Q and the Z, we have " Shape ere " (Shape here) as an order to shape the name. The special reason for doing so is furnished by the letters themselves, which are Q Z (cues). Bacon presently calls Shakespeare his "cue." " Shape ere ze cue (Z Q)," and "shajse ere cues (Q Z) " — Bacon meant to say this to us, I think, just as much as Shakespeare meant to make " Doctor Cains " in " The Merrie Wives of Wind- sor," talk broken French-English. From the last table of significants I will make two diagrams, corresponding with the different ways in which the first two lines of the epitaph are divided by the application of the biliteral alphabet. S A E H R S A E H R A Q E E P B A Q E E P R H T A R H T A)_Ji_2 RAWAR RAWAR Z A 58 THE TALE OF THE Let us observe and remember that, with this first application of Bacon's cipher to Shakspere's epitapli — really the first, as I have shown — the perfect sounds of both " Shakespeare " and '•' Shakspere" come out, according to the use of the long or short " A," and a touch of French comedy is thrown in. By modern investigators, the roots of William's name are supposed to be Jacques Pierre. I suspect this is right, and that Francis means to tell us the whole business has been inflated and idealized from the poor but honest base of Jack Peter. One more observation. — We have found that the Bacon cipher fits the Shakspere epitaph, not only as Mr. Black applies it, but doubly, or in two ways at once — thus giving four exact phonetic renderings of the Shakspere (and Shakespeare) name, one of these phonetic renderings being also historical and orthographic. We have " Shax- pere " (a short). With the a long, the pronun- ciation is Shaexpere (Shake-speare). " Shaqz- pere," again (a short) is Shakspere. With the long a, it is Shaqezpere (Shake-speare). This little matter,, in itself, will yet be counted, by all sane minds, as a " bar" to mere coincidence. The last two diagrams differ, in some of their letters, from the former figures ; but they re- affirm, and partly repeat, the same statements. No. I has Shaqzpere, Ba for its subject — the first and most direct one SIIAKSI'KRK El'ITAI'll. 5g at least — and these are some of the predicates : Ah, Tauk, Rawar ! Ar at War : Mear ! Ak pi ear at War. Ar a Raw 1 1 art. Ar, Wer A(n) Art : Ah ! (or) Ha !. As not the gentle reader present, but some readers, now-a-days, have that "dangerous thing," a " little learning," yet are very pugnacious critics, it may be well to mention, with the last anagram, that our English article " A " has primarily the sense of one, and that the " n " for " An " is added only to please, as it were, the modern remnant of the old Greek ear. In this anagram. Bacon states not only that " Shaqzpere " and " Ba " were an art, but he designates the specific' art by two letters wliich can be used in two ways. The dramatic art, especially in Bacon's time, was the art of "Ah ! Jla!" — ex- clamation, tragedy, comedy : and these two little words are interspersed everywhere throughout Shakes]3eare. Figure 2 is most directly read thus ; Sha(jzi'kke-Ba ! E A Tahr, Rawar! Shaqzpere — Ba(y) 1 — He (is) a Tear, Roar I Bacon uses " Ba " for the contraction of his own name, for the bay of a dog, for the bleating of a sheep, and for the word sheep itself. He 6o THE TALE OF THE says later that " Shaq " (or " Shac ") was " half a sheep." * Poor Shaq, indeed, is called a great many hard names, all of which get explained in one way or another. Francis had been " at war " with him, and had a " raw heart, "t or his own lobe of a raw heart, that we may say had been torn in two. Evidently a " raw heart" in those days was very much like what we now term a " sore head," though sometimes a good deal worse. Having become aware that the Baconian cipher, at the very start, has two different appli- cations to the Shakspere epitaph, let us now cover the epitaph with all its biliteral corre- spondents, by reading the hyphens as exactly what they are — both large and small counters : S A E H R B GOODF-RENDF-ORjES-trsSAK-EFORB-EARET A I o 1 E E P -stEnc-lo Ase-dH E. Re. ODIGG- T-EDu Y * I find Ihat " Shakespeare " gives parallels and explanations of all the most peculiar features of Bacon's "Tale of the Epitaph." One here in point is from " Love's Labor's Lost '' : Motk. What is a, b, spelt backward, with a horn on his head ? Hoto/ernes. Ba, pueritta, with a horn added. Moth, Ba, most silly sheep with a horn. — You hear his learn- ing. " Bay," for the bark of a dog, is too frequent in Shakespeare to need instancing. t Shakespeare makes " Queen Elizabeth " say to Richard the the Third,— " Send to her, by the man that slew her brothers, & oair of bleeding hearts." SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 6i R Blese- R H beT-E F -Man Ts-pares- w A T-EsS X A -TONES R Andcu-rstbe-H eTmo-vesm y-Bones. In this table we have, at last, the perfect ex- planation of the thick, black letters of the Stee- vens drawing — that doubly-queer distinction in the characters of the old tombstone. The letters of double weight to the eye carry double signifi- cants from the biliteral alphabet, and give double products. With the hyphens as small counters, (a's), the letters FYX appear. With the hyphens as large counters (b's), the product is QHS ; and, whichever way the biHteral alphabet is applied to the epitaph, one set of these letters stands out as a remainder. The following tables illustrate the distinction. Application I. s A E H R B A Q E R H T A E P Z A Application II. S A E H R B A Y E E P R F T A X A R A W A R R A W A R FYX Q H Z These extra significants — these six phonetic remainders — fall at once into perfect meaning and aptitude in the words. Fix Cues. There is certainly no word in the English Ian- 62 THE TALE OF THE guage that applies more directly and pertinently to the actor and theatrical manager, Shakspere, than the one letter, "Q." As soon as Mr. Black became aware of my finding, he exclaimed, in the parlance of the stage : " Exit Shakspere ; enter Bacon ! " The exclamation was very apt. But, as I have already said, 1 have no shadow of a prejudice, or even a predilection, between two men who have been dead nearly three hundred years. Besides, I have become aware of such tragic and pitiable meanings in the black, clotted segments of the epitaph, that to me the question of authorship has almost sunk behind a cloud. Were there no lesson for the world involved, I should care little about it. As the letters FYX QHZ all depend on the hyphens, here is a self-presented statement that Bacon claims to have used the hyphen to fix the cues of his story. The hyphen fixes his cue in " Shake-speare," if he wrote the works and, in that case,- fixes Shakspere's cue in the same 7iom de plume. The fact is, Francis Bacon is here talking directly to us himself, in the first person, and it is not necessary to take the word of any- body else. A glance back at the full table (not the last two diagrams) will show that the first order of the six cues, as English is read from right to left, is this : QHZ Y FX. We remember that one sound of Y is I ; and we have found this use of the letter specially SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 63 given in llie outward story of the epitapk — that " index," as I have called it, hidden away in the text. So " QHZ Y FX " is also QHZ7FX(I Fix cues). Or again : when these strange letters are dis- covered, the inevitable question arisee with them. " What are they for ? " They answer it them- selves : Y, FX QHZ : Why, (they) Fix Cues. And finally they say : Y. F. X. H— QZ. Y, F, X and H are cues. But, if the hyphens of the epitaph " fix the cues " — if the letters springing from them are cues — then Y, F, X, H, Q, Z are all cues. Such proves to be precisely the fact. The duplex offspring of the hyphens fix the cues, or furnish the keys, to the meanings of all the anagrams in all the applications of the cipher to the epitaph. In this way Bacon provides, first, for a straight unbroken narrative, verifying it as he goes, and then leaves the anagrams, with the cues under secondary meanings, free for subordinate inter- pretations, whenever all the letters can he used with any reference whatever to Shakspere and him- self. Such is Bacon's game of " anagrams," which he produced on the largest and most mar- vellous scale. One thing more. — We are fully confirmed in the use of our phonetics. The " cues " — these six moulds, matched with their unparalleled yet per- fect dies on the old gravestone — give us, not 64 THE TALE OF THE merely the opinion, but the very hand and seal, as it were, of the distinguished gentleman who hitched together, as counterparts, the Shakspere epitaph and the Bacon cipher. He did not prophesy, it appears, any prolonged attention to the innocent gigglers of the future press who were to laugh at his effective whim of writing a little short-hand. Why the epitaph itself, as very doggerel, is not orthographic. The words " Frend," " Blese," " Encloased," are misspelled and ungrammatical. They are phonetic. But possibly some one may imagine that de- liberate phonetic writing is too modern for Bacon. Directly in connection with the biliteral cipher, he seems fairly to wink at the sharp reader as he says this : " But here a question arises about the common ortho- graphy ; viz., whether words should be writ as they are pronounced, or after the common manner ? Certainly that reformed kind of writing, according to the pronuncia- tion, is but an useless speculation, because pronunciation itself is constantly changing, and the derivations of words, especially from the foreign languages, are very ob- scure. And lastly, as writing in the received manner no way obstructs the manner of pronunciation but leaves it free, an innovation in it is to no purpose." Conservatism in orthography preserves the history of language, and Baron Verulam's remarks are certainly in the straight line of his scientific writings. But, if he had run through the Shake- speare plays a cipher depending on his orthogra- phy, and even his punctuation, there was one SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 65 more reason, which it was not time to give, for clinging to the forms of language. As for the epitaph and its cipher, too much " changing " of "pronunciation," proceeding from a "reformed kind of writing," would in time obscure, if not in- validate, the phonetics themselves — which he had carefully considered in connection with ciphers. " Fra Ba(y) " had a long head, with no end of short turns in it. I must recall, once more, the fact that each application of the cipher to the epitaph is not only double, but that each double (or half) has two forms, owing to the construction of the first line of the epitaph, which parts a segment of the biliteral alphabet, as I have explained, throwing the significants into two positions. I tabulate the first illustration in full : s A E H R A Q E E P R H T A 1 Z 1 1 R A W A R F Y X S A E H E B A Q E R H T A R A W A R F Y X E P Z A S A E H R A Y E E P R F T AX R A W A R Q H Z S S A E H R E » B A Y E R F T A R A W A R Q H Z X A 66 THE TALE OF THE By this quirk Bacon designates himself in two letters, as the subject of various anagrams, and at the same time leaves the two letters free for use in the predicates of various other anagrams, under Shakespeare or Shakspere as a subject. I have said that " Ba " was the familiar desig- nation of Bacon by Shakspere. With the same letfers Bacon calls himself " a bee " (" A B "), and makes the one letter, " B," a -general form, both singular and plural, for the expression of " is " and " are." The very irregular verb, to be, is hardly yet established in popular use, and Bacon's syntactic forms, though the requirement or his alphabetic compression, are not without a tongue even yet in some parts of old and new England. They are common enough in Shake- speare. Hamlet for instance, says : " Where be his quiddits now ? ' ' In " Love's Labor's Lost," Katharine says : " Fair as a text B in a copy-book." The " B " of this line can be taken as either a verb or noun, and the pun is a part of the fine- cut wit. "Love's Labor's Lost," indeed, con- tains so many corroborations of our present bit of work that the play was probably revised, the lastf time, with special reference to it. The alert reader has doubtless perceived that the " cues " which Bacon has given us are most wonderful things. He has made them such a mar- vel, in fact, that they not only designate the sub- SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 6/ jects of our work as we go along, but, by inter- change of position among themselves, they re- peat in outline all the leading feattires of his whole story. In connection with them I must here state, as a pointer and beacon, a little of what I will ?,oo\\ prove' va. detail. We have seen that the letters Y.F.X. Q.H.Z. present themselves as cues, through the structure of the epitaph itself. Bacon soon attaches four of them to persons, whom he makes the letters designate. Y is con- stantly used with both its sounds (Y and I), and, as I, designates Bacon, just as it naturally would, anywhere in his works. By means of it he speaks in the first person. F. stands for Fran- cis, as given, too, on the outside of the epitaph. Bacon uses X as the short of " Shaq " and " Pere " (Shakspere) and says so in the funniest of ways. Q represents both the nam de plume " Shakespeare " and the man, Shakspere. Now, if these cues are set to talking among themselves, they exhibit a good 'deal more life than the signs of algebra, or any others, I fancy, that were ever put in print. Y FX QHZ. Why ! (the hyphens) Fix Cues. Y (I) FX HZ Q. I fix his cue (the whole Shakespere matter). Y. F. X. H., QZ The letters Y, F, X, H, are cues. F. Y. X. HZ Q. Francis, Why Shaq was his cue. 68 THE TALE OF THE X., Y, F, HZ Q. Shaq, Why Francis was his cue. HZ Q X : FY ! His cue (or mark) was X. Fie ! FY, X! ZH, Q! Fie, Shaq ! Hush, Cue ! Such are a few remarks by Bacon's cues — enough for the moment, as we can understand them better by-and-by. But the most general exoteric meanings for the last diagrams are sim- piy : F YX: " Here is the Shakespere Fix." And the Q HZ. " Here are the cues of the performers in this drama." But Shakespeare and Bacon ("Shaqzpere, Ba," or " Shaxpere, Ba.") are given, at the start, as these performers, independently of the cues m their closer and more separable meanings. I don't remember that Shakespeare ever used the word " fix " as a noun ; but I do remember that he always coined a word when he required one. In the present use of the substantive. Ba- con appears to have anticipated De Quincey's " almighty fix," and the modern Yankee's " pretty fix." Nearly all the information that we have now to deal with is exceedingly scornful and explo- SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 69 sive. The anagrams show, at once and through- out, that Bacon and Shakspere were " at war," and that Bacon's " raw heart " was very raw. To such an organ, in such a condition, the whole Shakespeare-Bacon industry was a "tear" and " roar " ; but " Shaq " himself was a " baa " ! a " bay," a " bray," a " rat," a " roarer, rearer, and tearer," not to mention synonyms more disre- spectful still. The following anagrams come from figure i, of the last tables, the subject being " Shakspere and Bacon." Shaqzpere, Ba. Hate : Ar A Warr. Shaqzpere, Ba. Are At War : 'Rah ! (Hur- rah !) Shaqzpere, Ba. Are At Warr : Ha ! Shaqzpere, Ba. Tare, Rawar : Ah ! (or Ha!) Shaqzpere, Ba. Ar Raw^A Hater. Shaqzpere, Ba. Rare, Rawa, Hat(e). Shaqzpere, Ba. Ar, War, Ar Hate. Shaqzpere, Hate Ba ; 'Ra, Rawar. Ba. Hate Shaqzpere — A Rawrar. Shaqzpere 'Ate Ba : Ra, Rawar, Eh ? Ba. 'Ate Shaqzpere : He 'Ra, Rawar. Shaqzpere Tahr Ba : Are A War. Ba. Tahr Shaqzpere : Are A War. Shaqzpere, Ba. Are A Art — A Whr (Whir). Shaqzpere, Ba. Are A Raw Hart. These sentences need little interpretation. They declare exactly what we find on the outside 70 THE TALE OF THE of the epitaph — that Shakspere " hated " Bacon, and was constantly jeering and laughing about him. Bacon has " roofed and earthed him," and now returns the " ravvar " the " ha ! 'rah ! baa ! " and " he-he ! " in general. Let us scrutinize figure 2. — Shaqzpere — A ! E B A Tahr, A Rawar. Shaqzpere Be A Rhat, A Rawar. Shaqzpere A Taber : Ha ! Rawar ! Shaqzpere BA(y), Rawar, He A Art. Ba. Rawar : Shaqzpere A Art ? He ! SriAQzPERE A War ?— A Har(e), Rabet ! Shaqzpere B A Rat, Hare, Rawa. Shaqzpere Be A 'J'ahra, Rawra. W. Shaqzpere Be A Hart, A Rara. Shaqzpere Be A Hart, A Raraw. Shaqzpere, Beware Art ! 'Ra ! A(h), ha ! Figure 3 is not easy to handle, though quite plain enough. But its meanings are synonyms and repetitions of the preceding diagrams : Shaxpere, Ba. Are A Art ? Fy ! — War ! Shaxpere, Ba. Are A Art — Wy, Fra. W. Shaxpere, Fra. Ba. Are A Art — Y (I). W. Shaxpere, Fra Ba. Are A Rat : Y ! W. Shaxpere, Fra Ba. Are A Atyr. (Hater.) What Bacon means by using so many animals for metaphors — just as Shakespere was always doing — will be explained as we go along. Here are a few of the anagrams in figure 4 : — SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 71 Shaxpere Ba(a), Rawar E Ayt Fra. (He hate Francis.) W. Shaxpere, Fra-Ba., Ye Ar A Art. Shaxpere, Ba — F. A Art ; W. A Reyar. (Background.) Shaxpere, Ba: — W. A Art; F. A Reyar. (William's real cue.) Shaxpere, Ba — Ye A Art, W. Afarr. (Wil- liam being absent.) Shaxpere, Ba — Ye A Art, 'Af Rawr (Half Roar.) Shaxpere Be A Rawar. A Art ? Fy ! But the curious reader must work out the rest of these phonetic asseverations for himself. They ring about as many changes as Shakespeare does in his sonnets on "Will." But they state the case, if Bacon wrote the plays and poems. The dramatic art of his time was a " rawar," and a roar on stilts at that, though he made the most of it. Even where he says that William was an art, and Francis himself a background, he gives one notable phase of the situation. Are we sure, however, that we have reached the true meanings of the Baconian anagrams? Well, let us give the question the benefit of its doubt, and put into full practice Bacon's in- ductive method. Let us make a closer and more separable analysis, that is, going as far as we can in that direction. We will cut our four-line anagrams in two; for with each two lines cues Jl THE TALE OF THE are given, and the lines and their cues may ex- plain each other. This, now, is our first array of significants : S AEHR B A Q E E P— Y Remembering Bacon's derivation of Shak- spere's name, and the pronunciation of the French roots, we have, instantly, Shaq-Pere (Jack-Peter). But Shakspere is not the subject of the sentence, if the cues fix the subjects : for Y — which is also I — is the cue, and must mean, of course, the man who is telling the story. " Ba " is in the anagram, and " Ba " has been given to us, by the construction of the epitaph and the cipher, as Bacon. So let us place it as our substantive. But now: when " Ba " and " Shaq-pere " come out of the significants, only one letter is left. This letter is E (or He with a dropped H). The construction and meaning, therefore, are both fixed, and the sentence, with the cue to prove it, is Ba., E Shaq-pere — Y (I). Bacon, He is Shakespeare — I. Or we may say equally well : Shaq-pere, Y, Ba, E. Shakespeare, Why, Bacon is He. Just once more I respectfully. suggest that no Englishman — none at least who ever drops his SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 73 H — will abuse his great master of science, art and literature, for a necessary omission of the same letter. Our two lines of significants belonging with the preceding ones are R H T A Z A— F. X. R A W A R. Bacon's alert phonetics say for themselves that the Shakespeare cues (QHZ) are Y, F, X. —Why, F. (Francis) and X ; or I, (F). X.— I (Francis) and X. Thus the I and F being fixed for Bacon, X must stand for the other party to the case, Shakspere. Let us see if the present anagram says so. The line to which the cues are attached — if we take that alone — resolves itself into Art ; H'zA ! An Art and a Shout. Rat; H'za! A Rat and a Hurrah. Hart; 'Za! A Soul and a Sound. Francis has made just these distinctions be- tween Shakspere and himself in our preceding work. He was an art, and "Shaq" was a " rawar." But let us take the two lines together : Art Haz Rawra : F X. Art has a Roarer — Francis has Jack. Bacon's " rawra" (roarer) converts itself into 74 THE TALE OF THE raraw (rearer), and we have two words of Eng- lish just as " she is spoke " to-day by our Anglo- maniacs of the Fifth Avenue in New York. Another assertion of the foregoing significants is this : Rawra a Zatar Roarer a Satyr. I hasten to take the first two lines of the epi- taph, with the hyphens as small counters — or rather their products : S AEHRB ■ A Y E E P— Q Q is the subject of these significants. But Bacon's cue, he has explained to us, was Shake- speare or Shakspere. " Pere " and " Ba " both come out of our anagram — " Pere " as the sub- stantive and "Ba^'as the predicate. The five other letters are Y A S H E :— Pere has a Be : Y — Q. Pere has a bee : Why, the cue, Shakespeare — I in my nom de plume. Pere Has Ba.: Y, E— Q. Pere has Bacon : Why he is the cue (the little secret). Pere Has Ba.: Y (I) E— Q. Pere has Bacon : I am He — Shakespeare. But— Pere Say He Ba.— Q. Shakspere said he was Bacon — Bacon's cue, that is, Shakespeare. SMAKSPERE EPITAPH. 75 In the next anagram that follows in order, Bacon contradicts Shakspere with all the wit and coarseness of FalstafE or Trinculo. R F T A X A— H Z (Q). RAWAR Rawar A Flat ; + His Mark. The reasonable reader will have to pardon me for not making this statement quite so gusty and truculent as it really is. The exact word that Bacon employs, in this instance, as a synonym for all the roaring, braying and baying that he attributes to Shakspere, would not have tripped the tongue of " good queen Bess," and was once Latinized by the prayerful orthodox Puritan, Oli- ver Cromwell, in a short poem on Magna Charta; but it has now become esoteric, if not obsolete, and would be understood only by the learned. But the directness with which Bacon establishes + as the cue of " Shaq," leaves no question, cer- tainly, on that point. Take the line, alone, to which HZ (Q) is at- tached : R F T A X A— H Z (Q) Knowing at the start that + is the cue for Shakspere, we have only to transpose + here, from our anagram to our cues, (algebraically), and then see what it " equals." R F T A A— + H Z (Q) H A Flat : + HZ (Mark or Cue)— or ^ 76 THE TALE OF THE 'AF Art (Half Art) : X HZ (Mark). Fat 'Ra (Fat Hurrah) X HZ (Mark). ART ? Fa ! (An Art ? Fa !) X HZ (Mark). Mr. W. H. Burr, of Washington, has written a book to prove that William Shakspere could not write. He never wrote his name, certainly, so that any one can see how it was spelled — a fact I have already mentioned. But the Viscount St. Alban appears to have discounted Mr. Burr. I must make one more remark here. — It is only necessary to open " Shakespeare " at any play, to see that he was at once the grandest genius and the greatest blackguard of all litera- ture. His qualities are not changed in Shak- spere's obituary. Bacon loathed and hated the very memory of his former mouth-piece, and went so far as to couple his contempt with even the Shakespeare works, while unreservedly claiming them. But, of all men living or dead, the author might the most naturally take such a stand. Bacon's inductive method appears to work pretty well in connection with the Shakspere epitaph. But we are not yet at the end of our analysis — not quite. Let us scrutinize each sep- arate line of the Baconian significants. In the following tables, which I arrange for that pur- pose, it will be observed that some of the lines have cues given for them, and some have none ; none, that is, except as such lines are connected with those next them. But it will be found that SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. TJ the lines without cues almays have some meaning in the natural order of the letters. All we have got to do is to look out for English phonetics and peculiarities — the great British vulgate — and to take hints from our index in the external con- struction of the epitaph. " SA EHR " (say here) is one meaning of the first line of the first table. " SA EHRB " (say herb)— the first line of the sec- ond table — will instantly have some meaning to the close and retentive reader, and a good deal more in the future. The lines with cues — the cues placed by the tables in the order given — dictate the subjects of these lines, and thus explain them, whether the letters have meaning or not in the regular order. And this is the general secret of construction — of manner and method — that we have to deal with in " The Tale of the Epitaph." Is it not plain and simple enough, after all ? SIGNIFICANTS* OF THE EPITAPH IN LINES, ACCORDING TO THE READINGS OF THE HY- PHENATED LETTERS, AS LARGE OR SMALL, AND WITH THE TWO DIFFERENT DIVISIONS OF THE FIRST LINE: s A I E H R B A Q E E P. R H T A Z A.' S A 2 E H R R A Q E E P. - R H T A Z A- -Y -F X. A W A * The word, " significant," as a noun, is now put down in the dictionaries as obsolete. Did Bacon coin it? He used it as a technical term for the alphabetic products derived from the work- ings of his biliteral cipher. Yet Shakespeare employs this same dry-as-dust word. In Henry VI., Plantagenet says: 78 THE TALE OF THE s A E H R B A Y E E P. K F T A X A.' S A E H R B A Y E E P.— Q R F T A X A- — Q -H Z RAWAR RAWAR Nowhere in the world, out of Shakespeare, have I ever found so many quips, twists and con- ceits, as here. One reading of the first diagram is tliis : "Say here Ba. peeks" — "I;" or Y ! " (Your surprise at the the fact) — "as a rat," fixed (looking around) — " R ! " (the sound cut short) Aw! A(H)r! As Tennyson has imitated the running and rippling of water in the syllables and metre of his " Brook," so Bacon has taken the fancy to imitate, in sounds, the motions of a rat, with his head just out of a hole, and to give at the same time the vowel-shadings used in the words " Since you are ton^e-tied, and so loth to speak, In dumb significants proclaim your thoughts ; Let him that is a true-born gentleman, From off this brier pluck a white rose with me." Bacon, again, used the word, ''alphabet" in the same queer sense as " significant." And Shakespeare, through Titus Andrpni- cus, exclaims to Lavinia : 'Thou shalt not sigh, nor hold thy stumps to heaven,, Nor wink, nor nod, nor kneel, nor make a sign, But I of these will wrest an alphabet, And by still practice learn to know thy meaning." As Bacon was Shakespeare, such unparalleled parallels as these are easily accounted for, SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 79 " roarer " and " rearer " (rawra and raraw). With this "peek "* he begins his cipher and his pho- netics, and gives one reason why he calls him- self (and Shakespeare) a rat. Francis was a microscopic observer of nature : he died one day, from stuffing a chicken with snow, to test an antiseptic. We will look at these tables again. But one important matter must come first. In each con- junction of the biliteral alphabet with the epitaph, a few extra significants come out by a backward reading of the .sections, after the forward read- ings are exhausted. These exceptional segments carry anagrams which " sum -^up " each case. " Ba " was a lawyer. I will tabulate the epitaph with the additional significants, inclosing them in brackets. S A E H R[b1 B[r] _GoodF-rendf-ofJes-usSAK-Eforb-eareT. A I U 1 E E P stEnc-loAse-dHE Re. T ODIGG- R [B] Blese T-EDu Y Fol H seT-E F Iw] [K] A -ManTs-pares- R[B] W[f] R •TEsS X A ■TONES B] Andcu-rstbe-HeTmo-vesmy-Bones. In one sense — or in one line of analysis — the * This child's-word, " peek," is pretty old English, evidently. So. THE TALE OF THE most general diagram of these extra significants presents itself thus : B r] B K [-o B F B J W Shakspere's initial, W, is now given for a cue, corresponding with that of Francis, which we have already. This W comes from the same segment of the epitaph as F, and, in its biliteral formation, is F, read by indirection, or back- ward, just as Francis Bacon is, covertly and by indirection, William Shakespeare. Bacon's cues are funny wigglers in many ways. O and W fix the general meanings of the figure and its anagrams. These two letters say, to be- gin with, O, W ! (Oh, William !) They say, in phonetics,, the orthographic words, Oh, Woe, Owe. The inside letters contain Bacon's initials, with, an extra B. The diagram is a harmless little picture, at first, sight, but is far less pretty than it looks. By the time I had reached it I had come to see, with the utmost clearness, that a man had been talk- ing to me from the very roots of the English tongue, and, at times, in the most compact possi- ble phonetics. I had seen why he could not do otherwise, with the purpose before him. So I was prepared to analyze his work on phonetic SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 8 1 principles, inspecting every letter for each and all its powers. The moment we do so, here, we run against such ugly words as Beek, Bier (or Beer), Buck, Burr (or Barr), Cub, Cur, and even Herb, which does not promise to be a wholesome herb in such company. I suppose that no one intelligent enough to deal comprehensively with this book need stop here for a lesson in phonology. It has become too cheap and familiar. As a part of phonography, and a tassel to the type- writer, it is the knack of some clerk in every counting-room. Besides, any dictionary will give the diverse sounds, or "powers,"' of our English vowels and consonants, with examples of their use ; and that is all we require. B, long, and K, short, spell " Beek," for the ear, just as well as all the four letters. B and K, both short, spell " Buck ; " and, if marks indicating the short sounds of these letters should be attached to them, the " U C " could be left out — excepting always, as Bacon has insisted, for derivative and preservative purposes. K and C, of_ course, often have the same sounds. So with C and S and Z. Let us return to our diagram. We have Francis Bacon's initials in it, and with them, in the same line, a " B." The bee is' an industrious insect that stores honey. 6 82 THE TALE OF THE Woe Be F. B., Beek. and Bier ! Woe! Francis Be Bee, Buck, Burr. F. B. Be a Cub and Herb : Woe ! These confessions, in their full import, are pe- culiar, and quite as suggestive as any of Rous- seau's. Francis declares l.e was a live museum of animals and things, and that even the respectable and active honey-bee was not sufficient to save him from the rest of them. Bacon has been well hated. But the most imaginative of his foes — even the great poets, like Alexander Pope and Col. IngersoU — have not yet intimated that Francis was an " herb " and a " bier." He tells us himself, however, that he carried a certain dead man on his mind, to whom he stood, in Shakespearian metaphor, as an " herb " which led to a " bier." I will tabulate our last significants in detail, as they are fixed by the epitaph : I 2 3 4 5 BK BR I BR ) W BR^ BK J wo. BFB ) BR ..fo O O BK BKW BFB The second line of the epitaph gives only one biliteral representative, and that is a cue. So the letter O constitutes both a line and a cue, though it cannot be both at once. Hence, in SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 83 figures 3 and 5, it comes under the other key- " W." The first of these figures has no significance that we will dwell on, except that the arrange, ment gives one meaning of O as empty — nothing —and presents William as a " buck," while the last line, in its unkeyed order, tells us that Bacon was a "bee." (Bee Francis be). Number 2 gives "burr,"* with the exclama- tion, " O ! " A burr is a thing that pricks and sticks ; or, as Shakesi^eare says : " They are burrs I can tell you ; they'll stick Where they are thrown." t Figure 3 gives " rob," " orb," and " borrow," with William as the subject ; W. ORB; W. ROB; W. BORROW. The fourth figure is the one of animals and woe, already explained, with the busy " bee " as its partly redeeming feature ; and " F.B." says he was the whole of it. Shakespeare, also, describes a similar character in " Ajax.'' " This man, lady, hath robbed many beasts of their par- ticular additions ; he is as valiant as the lion, churlish as * I use the word "burr" for these two letters — which stand equally for " bar " and "bier" — because Bacon ultimately gives '' burr " spelled out, phonetically, in full (" birr "), for his most gen- eral meaning. Shakspere was a " burr " that once fastened on him, he never got rid of, until the burr was shaken oft by an " herb " and a "bier." t Pandarus in '" Troilus and Cressida." 84 THE TALE OF THE the tear, slow as the elephant; a man into whom nature h'ath so crowded humors that his valor is crushed into folly, his folly sauced with discretion. There is no man hath a virtue that he hath not a glimpse of; nor any man an attaint but he carries some stain of it." We have reached the last of our diagrams — figure 5. It has its web of sentences, like figure 4, with the difference of an O. W. Be, Ro, Bk Bf, B. William was a Roe, a Buck, a Beef, a Bee. W.B Fb, Kb, Br, O. William was a Fib, a Cub, a Burr, a Zero. W. B Bf, Bk, Br, O. William was Beef, Buck, Beer, and a Cipher. Shakespeare uses the letter O — and indeed all other letters — just as Bacon does in his " Tale of the Epitaph." Lear's " fool " says to him : " Thou wast a pretty fellow when thou hadst no need to care for her frowning; now thou art an O without a figure: I am better than thou art now : I am a fool, thou art noth- ing." To Juliet, her " nurse " says : " Why should you fall into so deep an O ? " Rosaline (of " Love's Labor Lost ") exclaims to Katharine : " O that your face were not so full of O's I SHAKSPKRE EPITAPH. 85 By O's, she means orifices ; for Katharine retorts : •' A pox of that jest; and I lieshrew all shrews." But did Shakspere "rob" and "orb'' Bacon, and "borrow" without paying? In that case, the natural consequence was this: B., F.B., B Brok : W. (the cue). The Bee, Francis Bacon, is Broke ;* William Shakspere was the cause. Or, another reading is : ^^■. Bk, Rob, Fb B. William beeked Bacon (plucked the Shake- speare work out of him) ; robbed him besides ; and then fibbed him out of his reputation in " art." At the close of " Troilus and Cressida," Pan- darus sings thus : " Full merrilv tlie humble-bee doth sing Till he hath lost his honey and his sting And, being once subdued in armed tail. Sweet honey -ind sweet notes together fail." But the time has come for a rec.ipilulation, showing the separate powers and the general unitv of an " i'w;//<7-/.v-()w'.;.j phonetic cipher. Let us look at all the tables together, and all their cues. * '* He that puts all upon adrentures doth oftentimes h-ej k, and come to poverty." — Baco.n. 86 THE TALE OF THE The complete tables of the first double appli- cation of the Baconian Biliteral Cipher to the Shakespeare Epitaph : z A. — F X A W A R 3 E H R E E P. — Q A E H A Q E 7 A E H AYE 9 F Y X 4-" S A E H R B A Q E R H T A E P Z A R A W A R II Q H Z S A B A Y E R F T A E H R E P X A Z A. — F X X A. — H Z R A W A R A W A R 6 R H T A Z A 1^ R A W A R ) R F T A X R A W A I '}-■ 10 Y F X s A E H R A Q E E P R H T A Z OE R A \V A R R A W A R 12 Q H Z S A E H R A Y E E P R F T A X R A W A R SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 87 13 B R 0. B K.- -W IS F B l6 B R B K B F B 14 B R I I'll BR] " \ B K I I suppose the learned and occult among my readers may readily conceive, by this time, that I should have no difficulty in making a somewhat fuller explication of these tables than would be advisable. There is one good thing about Bacon's confessions, besides the explosion of a fraud. He has not made them for children, or for those they can huKt. They are in such form that they can be given in outline by an offi- cial interpreter, and the particulars be filled in by any reader of capacity who cares to make a close study of them. I will only add that Bacon says, of Shakspere and himself, that they had some faults, — " vices " he terms them — which the world's perennial and abundant blockheads shall not have the satisfaction of charging up to my imagination. Partly for this reason, and partly because I think it the best way, as literary method, I omit constructing one whole series of anagrams, running through all the applications of the cipher to the epitaph. These consist of the second and 88 THE TALE OF THE third lines of the significants, taken together. In figure I, for example, the two middle itnes are B A Q E E P— Y. R H T A Z A— F. X. Such anagrams are all under full keys — which I use to lock them out of this modest and pious little volume. I have said that, in the final analysis of our significants, the lines without cues can be read, phonetically, as they stand, and the others by the ordering of the cues. But, like everything in Shakespeare, these cues have double and treble meanings, with corresponding anagrams, the cues and the anagrams all confirming and explaining each Other. I have given one reading of the first two tables — the " peek " and the " rat." A second reading of these same lines describes the genesis of Bacon's cue, Shakespeare. Francis is exceed- ingly contemptuous in this description — the only person, it would seem, who has ever been so — and says the work was as easily and fluidly performed as running off beer through a faucet. He insists, further, in finishing the statement, that Shake- speare was a satyr — the representative of " Fra." and " Jack " — and was a rearer and roarer. Tables 3 and 4 partly repeat this information and criticism, but make it more personal to Shak- spere, the man, and give Jack-Peter's special cue and synonym. SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 89 Tables 5, 6, 7, and 8, have been sufficiently dissected, and need only to be recalled. They assert that Bacon was Shakespeare ; that he said so most emphatically ; that Francis, an art, had Jack for a roarer ; that Shakspere claimed Shake- speare, with Bacon as only a cue ; but that the roarer was an ignorant explosion, whose cue, or mark, was X. The diagrams 9, 10, 11, and 12, tell about the " war," the " art " and the " raw heart." They and their cues are too muddy and bitter for anything but reality. They are loaded with Bacon's hatred of Shakspere ; and, if we read them in one way, we learn that Francis " abhorred the ass." I am sorry. But it is not my funeral : I am only at- tending it.* The last tables — 13, 14, 15, 16, and 17 — have been pretty carefully dissected, if not quite com- pletely, and. need little further remark for any pious purpose. Bacon does not spare himself in these confessional philippics, which that queer Protestant meant to reveal, not to a priest, but to the whole world. Still, he makes distinctions. He wishes it understood, in a line by itself, that F.B. was a bee, if he was likewise a beek and a buck, a cub and a burr. William was a like dic- * But all this is exactly like Shakespeare. It is nothing for al- most any one of his characters to call another a " preposterous ass." The word " abhor " was so pronounced in his mind that one of his impersonations— the executioner in " Measure for Measure " — was nam. d "Abhorson." 90 THE TALE OF THE tionary of animals; but he was utterly a "satyr," and to rob, orb and barrow, were his unredeemed functions and specialties. It is he who is de- clared the cause of Bacon's many brutish meta- morphoses, with their final catastrophy and end. And " Jack " had not even the sense to shut his mouth, but only to " ra, ba(h), za," perpetually. I have spoken of Bacon's short backward ana- grams as his summaries or "briefs." Incorpo- rated with the forward anagrams, they constitute his "case." And all the significants, taken to- gether contain the full names of Shakespeare, Shakspere, and Bacon, in such a way as to record and preserve the exact sounds of all of them — which appears to have been one distinct purpose Bacon had in mind, before proceeding, in future applications of the cipher, to give both Shak- spere's name and his own, orthographically as well as phonetically. It will be observed that any of the full forward tables — nuinber 9, 10, 11, or 12 — can be com- bined either with number 16 or 17 of the back- ward tables. If, with number 16, there is one more cue, and one less letter for the anagrams. If, with number 17, there is one less cue, and one more inside significant. Suppose we take 9 and 17. The cues, joined together, designate the '• W-FYX," or the " W-Y FX," (The Shakespeare or the Shakspere — Bacon predicament.) Straight in their order, as we read these lines, they declare : SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 9I Shaqzperk — Ba(^h^ :^ E Tarah, R.a.wra, Br, O, Bk, Bf B. Shakspere — Bah ! He Fearer, Rawra, Rurr (and Bar), Zero, Buck (axd Cub), ^eef (^and Fib) is. Or, again : Sa.\qzpere, a Bae, Tahr, Rawar, Brok B — B, F. B. Shaqzpere, a Bay, Tear, Roar, Broke Bacon — the Bee, Francis Bacon. Here is one of the combinations of tables 10 and 17 ; — Shaqzpere-Ba. Be A Art, Rawar, Bohr, Bk. Fb. Shakspere and Bacon are an .Art, a Roar, a Boar, a Beek and a Fib. If we please, we can take two of the cues, F. and W., — which have been given to us as stand- ing for Francis and Willi.im — and use them for initials. They will not be missed in connection with any anagrams that come under them ; for the remaining cues will be their duplicates, in the other forms of Y and X. — * When Bacon uses Ba. (Ba(a) ! or (B.uhl l\ as an exclamation, it may not be quite in our modern sense — of contempt extending to nausea— but rather in imitation of the '* silly sheep." as Shake- speare gives it in Love's L.abor's Lost. The modern " ball 1 " is said, by de (^uincey and others, to be a che.*p and nasty upstart of our own daj-s. But, since I £:ot well acquainted with Francis Bacon. I have had my doubts about it. 92 THE TALE OE THE \V Shaqzpere Hate F. Ba. ; 'Ra, Rawar ; Rob, Bk, Fb, B. William Shakspere hated Francis Bacon ; he hurrah'd and roared about him ; he beeked the bee out of his industry ; robbed him besides ; and then fibbed him out of his reputation as Shakespeare. We can construct our anagrams under " W. Shaqzpere " and " F. Bakon " as the subjects, if we like. Then we have both names as good as in full, and both orthographic, with the excep- tion of one letter. Our " N " is obtained by re- tiring " abbaa " back from the significants into the biliteral alphabet, in exchange for their equivalent : — W. Shaxpere, F. Bakon wer .\rt Fyr, B. Bfr. William Shakspere and Francis Bacon were an Art, a Fire, a Bee, and a Beefer — (an ox). W. Shaxpere, F. Bacon B Fret, Fyr, War, Rb. William Shakspere and Francis Bacon are a Fret, a Fire, a War and an Herb. F. Bacon B Art, Fyr : W. Shaxpere, Bewr Fr! Francis Bacon is an Art and a Fire : William Shakspere, Beware Francis ! But the process here indicated, and under the various subjects that have been given to us — SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 93 " Shaxpere," " Shaxpere-Ba." etc. — we could easily reproduce, in a new form, all the work we have been over, and find many new " develop- ments." But such elaboration is unnecessary to my purpose. Before taking leave, however, of these talking Baconian diagrams, let us glance at the complete cues — both the backward and forward ones — by themselves. As the special compendium of all our tables, so far, they say : Y (1) FX QHS— WO ! They say, also, Y (I) FX HZ Q : O, W ! (or) WO ! This is a statement as bitter as any "herb," and Francis appears to have arranged William's very fate and end in accordance with it. The primary assertion of these cues — the self-pre- sented assertion that they are cues — is this : O, Y (I), F (Francis), X (Jack), W. (William) QHS. Beginning thus, they continue to talk, by com- bination, with exceedingly glib and varied pow- ers : — Some of their information we want, and some we can spare, thankfully. But here they go : — 94 THE TALE OF THE W— HZ Q, I. F. X. O. William — His cue : I (Francis), X (his mark) and Zero. F— HZ Q, Y, X, WO. Francis — His cue : W'Y Jack and Woe. W— HYZQ: FOX. William — His cue (power behind) was a Fox. F— HYZ Q : W. OX. Francis — His cue (mask and appendage) was William, an ox. W. X. O F., HYZ Q. William-Jack owed Francis, His cue. Or, William-Jack was indebted to Francis for the cue of Shakespeare. Or, William-Jack-Zero — Francis was His cue. After a sufficient interchange of statement and compliment — which I barely touch — F'rancis says for himself : Y (I) XQHZ R— WO. I excuse Francis : His Woe is sufficient. But of William he says : XQHZ W ? O FY ! The " fox " never forgave the "ox," alive or dead. It would have been much better for " Shac " to have kept still, SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 95 CHAPTER III. We have now done all we can do, I think, as far as method is concerned, in the first forward application of the Bacon cipher to the Shak- speare epitaph. We have got thoroughly on the trail of the sly " fox." But a fox is apt to double on himself. We will fit the cipher to the epitaph backward, as the external index, for one thing, with its reverse readings, palpably dictates.* Besides, we have found, by experience, that Bacon's method of procedure permits no waste. He exhausts his biliteral counters, in every pos- sible way, as he goes along. * That every prominent feature of " The Tale of the Epitaph " is paralleled by Shakespeare, in one way or another, has been a matter of astonishment, even to me ; particularly as I found nearly all of these parallels suhseq-uentty to working out Bacon's story, and to that extent independently of it. In "The Merchant of Venice," we have thfe complete idea and suggestion, though not of course the whole method, of reading; and conning the Shakespeare epitaph backward. On his visit to Portia and the caskets left by her dead father, the ^' Prince of Morocco '* says : " I will survey the inscriptions back again : What says the leaden casket ? " He then reads the three inscriptions from last to first in their order. 96 THE TALE OF THE B[Rl F[wl B[R] Ss|-T senoB-ymsev-om!JeH-ebtsr-ucdnA A SENOT- A K [t] -serap-s^naM- ~P E E eREH d-es Aol-cn Ets- R [b] B [r] H E H 3-Teb [f] W uDh-1 O M B[R| -eselB -GGIDO S Terae-brofE-KASsu-seIro-fdner-FdooG And hereafter we can proceed more rapidly by reversing our analytic process, as we shall be at work no longer in the dark, and sporadically, but in the light, with a rule and gauge. So let us tabulate our Baconian significants; first, in lines, with their cues ; next in the two-line anagrams; then as full ones. They will stand thus : B A I F A B A Z A K H B- P E E Q A — O B A F 2 A B A Z A K H B P E E Q A R- 3 F A A K W B — Z H 4 FAB K W B — Z H O A R — Q B H E A P E E Q A I RHBEASjQ SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 97 B A F A B A X A K W B |z H E E O A B H E A B A 9 F A B A Z A K H B P R E B E H Q E A A S X w o II A I X I A K W I B E E I O I A B H E E S Z H Q 10 B A F A B A Z A K H B P E E Q 1 A 1 R B H E A S B A 12 F A B A X A K VV B P E B H A 1 R K A S Z H Q The first line of figure i, having no cue, is to be read as it stands, if the rules of our " induc- tive method " hold good. The line consists wholly of " Francis Bacon's " initials and abbre- viations ; but recalling all those animals and things of former lines, and with them the dropped English " H " this line gives us B. AF A B. (B. half a bee.) It repeats and emphasizes the fact that the " bee," Francis, was only half a bee, and the last line explains why : — R, B ! He As. Ah, Bacon ! He was an Ass ! In the light of his revelations, I agree with 7 98 THE TALE OF THE him. He was an ass ; and even Lord Byron would ha\e conftnned the verdict. But W. X. A Zhak B. William X was a Jack. One of William's cues, too, has been given as O. — A form " without a figure " — a nothing. O A Peeq. This " Zero " was a " peek." So says the third line and its key, in the most gilt-edged way I can translate it ; and, in figure 2, he was that old-fashioned object, a " rack-heep." O — Raq-eep. A pry and a zero himself, and a mud-pile, he brought ruin to Francis. B., Af a B. Ax : " A, Kwb, Zh. Bacon, the half-bee, asked : " Ah, cub, hush ! " But, in another turn of the same line, A X Bawk (the Jack balked.) Francis was a furious scold (like Shakespeare) and I should decline to present these epithets, if he had not affirmed and repeated them over and over, and made them the excuse for his own mis- conduct and crime. His word " ax " is, of course, the old Saxon for " ask " once in ap- proved use, and made even biblica) by John WyclifTe. Let us look at figure 5. The keys are W. X. (William Jack.) Zhak B Af Ba-Ba. SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 99 So Shakpere was half a sheep, with all the rest ? The other half was in two quarters, it seems ; for, if we look for him as a predicate in the anagram, as well as the subject, we are told that F. B. Haz a Kb, A Ba; or A Bk, A Ba. A buck, a cub, and a sheep, must have been a strange combination — say for Hamlet's ghost, though there are very palpable suggestions of such mixtures in the " Mid Summer Night's Dream " and '^T/ie Merry Wives of Windsor." Our sixth anagram has O for its cue, or Zero — Nothing. Three possible subjects are pertinent to it " Pere," " Ba," and " Q." Let us try them. Pere— He B(e), As A Q,— O Ba Has Pere : (H)e, Q,— O Q Has A Peer . B. (H)e— (or) Be(e)— O ! These phonetics, which ought to be read, easily enough, by this time — and are about as good English, anyhow, as that of many recent " litter- ateurs " — assert that " Pere," as a cue, was a cipher ; that although Bacon certainly had him, he was of no legitimate worth ; that the cue had a " peer," and that Bacon was he — " O ! " It is evident, however, tliat Bacon does not refer to a member of the House of Lords as this " peer ; " but to a subject with more syllables, who was a fluent genesis of plays and sonnets, and that the letter " O " is added by way of exclamation and surprise. Shakespeare was full of just such tricks and double meanings. lOO THE TALE OF THE The seventh figure has been explained in the separate lines. If the first line is read with a slight twist, under the cues, " B " is designated as himself half a " ba " or sheep. Fortunately a knowledge of Latin roots is essential here to full comprehension, and the cue is " hush ! " So be it. " Pere " has been roundly abused, we have seen, as a " balker.'' The last of the two-line anagrams finishes the tirade very amusingly : Q is the subject — one with " Pere " — who is in the significants. Pere Be A Hos— A ! (Hey) ! Pere Be A As— Ho ! (Hoa) ! Or, remembering that an American is apt to spoil English, probably this is a little nearer to Bacon's phonetics : Pere is an " Oss "— HA(y) ! Pere is a Hass — Own ! It appears to have been hard to drive the "balker" Jack, and hard to hold him. We have reached figure 9 — the first full ana- gram. The keys are XWO. They have several exoteric meanings. " Jack, woe ! " " Jack, w(h)o(a) ! " " William— Jack— Zero," and " Wil- liam-ox " are among them. " Shaqzpere " SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. lOI comes out of the significants as the subject des- ignated, and has various predicates :* Shaqzperf, B a Bhka ; E B Af A Ba. Jack Peter was a Buck-haw ; he was half a sheep. Here of course, the final " a " of " Bhka " has the " aw " sound, and the needless " h " of a British ox-driver is left off. By changing the let- ters a little for further sentences the "buck-haw " (or " haw-buck ") is seen to have been a " bucker," a " balker," and finally the " buck " was a " cub " that was half " ba-ba." But he, too, was half a " bee." William was industri- ous — too " thrifty " says Francis, to be " square " : and he put money in his purse, say the histo- rians. Shaqzpere B a Baka ; He B 'Af Ba, (Or) Af A B. Shaqzpere B A Khb ; E 'Af A Ba-Ba. Shbqzpere B a Bhk ; A Baa 'Af Be. One of Bacon's constant subjects for the ana- grams is the " Shaqzpere-Ba," meaning himself * There is almost no end to the use of animals, birds, etc., by Shakespeare, for purposes of description, abuse, metaphor and simile. The following are some of them, picked up at random : — The fox, lion, goose, rat, dog, ape, buck, cub, fox, hog, swine, goat, ewe, lamb, calf, hawk, horse, hart, sheep, bee, nit, crab, wolf, wasp, spider, bug, bull, ram, rabbit, deer, roe, cat, cur, beef, boar, heifer, babboon, ox, mouse, toad, blood-sucker, ass, herring Guinea-hen. 102 Till'; TALI': ()!'' TlIK in the Shakcsperc work. Jf we now take him in this way, we find that : Shaqzperk-IU. IJk A HAK(Hack). Shaqzi'ere-Ba. I!k a Akii (Ache). Some of Shakospeic's plays certainly confirm the opinion that hi' was soniulhiiig of a hacker and acher, as well as a nearer, tcarer and rearer. IJut that lop line of the figures — which we have left out of the last two anagrams — ke F Y B R ) E R J Io8 THE TALE OF THE But these supplements only emphasize what we have gone over. The outward meaning of the first diagram is simply that Francis was a " roar " and a " tear " in Shakespeare, and a " burr " — convertible into " herb " — begging and sticking for place and emolument as a person — Y — (I). He was a " roar-art," says number 3 ; and number 7 deprecates the situation with the word " Fy ! " Bacon insists on having these matters — and others — seen and remembered. I will accommodate him, within the bounds of pro- priety. The backward and forward readings can again be put together, in various ways and with numer- ous results, all giving some phase or shade of the story. The same may be said of the cues. — W O X Z H Q FY. X— Qhz, Fy. Wo. F— Qhz, Y, X, O. Jack's cues were " Fy ! " and " Woe." Those of Francis were — " W'y, Jack " and " Zero " ; or " I " (myself), an ignorant roarer (X his mark) and nothing more. But these meanings are gen- tle and delicate in contrast with many others. SIlAKSl'ERE Kl'ITAHI. IO9 CHAPTER IV. Francis, you " be " a " bee," and a " whizq," and a " fox " ; but, when we gel a little used to you, we can follow your buzzings and windings — just as you meant we should. When we once find that such a man as Bacon wrote the Shakspere epitaph, and wrote the four lines to pack a volume into them, they begin quickly enough to ravel themselves. His mono- grams, for instance, — the " ^'s " of the epitaph — he constructed in such a way that they are each, literally and visually, both large, single counters for his bilitcral alphabet and four small letters combined. The '1', on its side, makes an H ; the foot of it crosses the V-part of the V, making A; and the lower part of the Y, crossed by its base, mak(.'s a second T. The " X " is " that " in mon- ogram and in piece-meal.* Herjcc we have eight extra counters for a second application of the ( ipher. Hut we need ten, to come out even with the five-letter segments. 'J'his calls attention to • SJiakcHpcarfr li;itl exactly tliiM sort of iliinff in mind, as wc can canily ticc I'y iiirriini;' to one of tlioHc latent plays of Iiis, " Antony and (."leopatra." He putH these words into Uic mouth of the Holdi'^r, " Si-aruft": " I had a wound lirrr that was lilcc a T, rtut now 'tiK made an II." no THE TALE OF THE the punctuation of the epitaph. Some of the old cuts give none at all. Charles Knight gives a period at the end of the second line, and one to close the epitaph. I have explained that Bacon himself ultimately dictates the punctuation through the cipher ; but we will follow Knight for the present, simply because punctuation points are absolutely required where he puts them, and be- cause no scholar could possibly omit them, unless for the purpose of having some one else supply them. The two periods,* with the eight counters of the monograms, bring us to the next important application of the cipher, and give two biliteral significants beyond our former number. — Thus : S A E H R (B) B (r) GoodF-rendf-orJes-usSAK-Eforb-eareT A ODIGG- [cl I . Bles- T-EDu V [o] D ebeT-I C [.] E E P -stEnc-loAse-dHERe ■EManT-thats-pares- T-EsS A TONES [R] R W [f] [R] B Andcu-rstbe-HeTth-atmov-esmvB-ones. * The periods must be used as sjitall counters — like the hVphens when taken alone — for the simple reason that they «rt' small marks not large ones, and were made so. In other words we are to stick to facts. SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. The tables are these : III s A E H R B A Q E E P.— Y. I D V A A Z A. E E P. — Y. A W A B s A E H R B A Y E E P.— Q. I C V A A X A.- E P. — Q. X A. — D. Z. A W A B R A W A B S A E H R B A Q E E P I D V A A Z A RAW ABA S A E H R B A Y E E E P I C V A A X A R A W A B A { ' s A E H R A Q E E P I D V A A Z R A W A B A II S A E H R A Y E E P I C V A A X R A W A B A Q D Z 10 S A E H R B A Q E E P r D V A A Z A R A W A B A 12 s A E H R E P B A Y E I C V A A X A R A W A B A 112 THE TALE OF THE In the first two of these tables, " Say Here " and " Say Herb " are still the overt meanings of the first line. In connection with the " herb," the Q of the second line has its K sound, as in quay (key), and the A has the broadest roll of that letter in Warwickshire. We frequently hear the English " yeoman " speak of himself, or another as "Ah," with the slightest possible suggestion of an I at the end. " Sa Ehrb A qeep " (say herb I keep), is the significance of the first two lines, in the order of their letters. Shakespeare is excellent authority for this mode of expression, especially in the third person. It appears throughout his works. But it is pro- nounced and persistent in two very suggestive characters, the " Pandar " and "Thersites" of " Troilus and Cressida." Says " Cressid " of Hector, "O, a brave man." " Is 'a not ? " replies Pandarus. " It does a mangood. Look you what hacks are on his helmet." Thersites says to Achilles and Ajax : " Hector shall have a great catch if he knock out either of your brains : a 'were as good crack a fusty nut with no kernel." Hector bids Menelaus " Good-night, sweet lord." "Sweet draught!" [exclaims Thersites]. "Sweet quoth 'a ! Sweet sink, sweet sewer.'' SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. II3 But one purpose that Bacon has in these diagrams is to mock the pronunciation of Shak- spere ;* and the cues C, X. (See, Jack !), are in one significance, a taunt over his dead body. Francis had a streak of " Lady Macbeth " in him, mixed with softer but still more scarlet pas- sions. He talks here like what Shakespeare calls a " trull." But he is very angry, and has had provocation enough. He is married now; or, if he is not, he is attached to the woman whom he married later. * Mr. Donnelly's comprehensive and erudite researches enable me. at the last moment, to add a strikinjj confirmation of my dis- covery in regard to the sort of "education " tl-ut Shakspere must have had at Stratford, and his manner of pronunciation. Mr. Donnelly quotes thus, from the learned Shakespearian, Applelon Morgan ; *' In The Complete Gentlemen^ edition of 1634, the author says a country school teacher by no entreaty would teach any scholar further than his (the scholar's) father had learned before him ; as, if he had but only learned to read English, the son, though he went with him seven years, should go no further. His reason was that they would otherwise prove saucy rogues, and control their fathers. * * " In 1771, when Shakspere had been dead a century and a half, things were about as he left them. John Briton, who attended the provincial grammar school of Kingston, St. Nicholas Parish, in Wilts, about 1771-80, says that he was taught the " criss-cross row," imparted by the learned pedagogue as follows : Teacher: — " Commether Billy Chubb, an' breng the horren book. Ge me the vester in. the wendow, you Pat Came. What ! be a sleepid ? I'll wake ye ! Now, Billy, there's a good bwoy ! ston still there, and mind what I da za ta ye, an' whan I da point na 1 Criss-cross girta little A, B, C. That's right, Billy ; you'll zoon larn criss-cross row ; you'll zoon averg it, Bobby Jiffry ! You'll zoon be a schoUard ! A's a purty chubby bwoy, Lord love en \ " 8 114 'i'HE TALE Oi' THE He has parted from Sliakspere, who has proba- bly retired to Stratford. In the third line of the 3d diagram, Shakspere threatens to call on him : "I C U, AAx A." I see you, I ask her. — Well, it was not a polite question, and it referred to Bacon's worst days. I must leave it in its phonetics. Francis understood " herbs " (in all sorts of orthography), and " Rare Ben Johnson " was a very sour joker, as he has been handed down to us. William Shakspere was indeed " half a sheep " — very simple and impru- dent, if Bacon is telling us the truth. The first two lines of figure 2 are Sa Ehr Ba Qeep. The reference is to the lady with whom Bacon resided, and who was a part of the tragedy. The Q, in one of its doubles, is K. Remembering that in Bacon's time, our V and U were the same letter, we will proceed. The third line of the first and second figures reads, literally, I Du A Az A— C, X ? I do A (you, or another) as A — See, Jack ? SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. I15 It turns into A (I) D-viz (devise) A, A ! (ha, ha) See, Jack! But this sentence can be read, " I devise," or " her device," with the " see Jack," thrown back as a taunt to Shakspere, for his threatened im- pertinences. I think Bacon means to say, in this double lingo, that he devised William's death, but that the stealthy way of accomplish- ing it, was " her device." We can probably find somewhere in the later narrative, the settlement of this point.* The fourth line of these first and second fig- ures contains our familiar " Rawa," (the very broad " A " now standing for the final " Ar ") with " Ba," as the end : — " Rawa, Ba " (Roar Ba). It is yet, also, in one meaning " R ! Aw, A.(h'), Ba ! " This line was a part of " Shac's " War- wickshire mutterings, and is converted into Bacon's laugh now : — R ! AwA Ba ! (or) Ba Awa ! Ah r Bacon is away from you (sheep). — He is not at home ; he has stepped out ! * " Devise " and " device " are used tliroilgliout Shalcespeare in precisely the same general sense as here. Their most frequent and pronounced occurrence is in " The Merrie Wives of Wind- sor," in connection with Mrs. "Alice Ford." The lady whom Bacon married — late in life — was Alice Barnham, the daughter of a London alderman. Il6 THE TALE OF THE The third line of figure 3 (and 4) is as smart and as wicked as can well be imagined. The V, again, is used for both its old sounds, V and U : — A Vic, A, A, X ! A vice, Ah, Ah, Jack ! A Civ, A, A, XI A sieve. Ah, Ah, Jack ! Ic, U, A, X, A, A! Ice you are. Jack Ah, ha I I C U, X: A, A, A! I see you Ex : Ha, ha, ha ! In all these confessions, the C has its soft sound, but the sense is " lough." " Shac " was a " vice," says Bacon, and a " sieve " — an imple- ment that leaks hopelessly, and keeps nothing to itself. For these reasons he turned into "ice," and Bacon saw him an " ex '' — a departed X, who had made his last exit from the life that Shakespeare calls a " stage." And Francis was glad — ha, ha, ha ! (A, A, A !) with the dead English H.* But, at this point, let us make one more rigid * The sieve is a frequent metaphor in Shakespeare, with the same meaning. Listen to Leonato in " Much Ado About Nothing" t " I pray thee cease thy counsel, Which falls into mine ears as profitless As water in a sieve." SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. II7 analysis of all the cues, at the expense, even, of a little repetition. Francis and William have been dead too long to be injured by any inquiry into their dispositions and characters. If they exist at all to have any interest in their case below — as, believing in immortality, I think they do — they doubtless want the truth spoken, and are more interested in that result than anybody else ; for a lie — especially so big a lie as the Shakespeare myth — must be a painful abomina- tion to immortal souls, who are said to subsist, not as we now do on earth, mostly by theft and humbug, but by truth and light. It would, how- ever, be a blunder — about as bad as a crime — to set down Francis Bacon as a poisoner, and William Shakspere as a " satyr," without reason In " All's Well that End's Well,'' "Helen" confesses to the '* Countess " : " Yet in this captious and intenable sieve I still pour in the waters of my love." One of " Macbeth's " witches exclaims thus against " the rump- fed ronyon " who had offended her : " But in a sieve I'll thither sail, And, like a rat without a tail, I'll do, I'll do, and I'll do!" I have before me eight casual quotations from Shakespeare touching the word " vice " ; but one must do here : "Thus, like the formal vice, Iniquity, I moralize two meanings in one word." G tost cry in Kirig Richard III. " Who calls so coldly ? " asks " Curtis " in " The Taming of the Shrew." " A piece of ice," replies Grumio. But 1 could write a book of quotations from Shakespeare in con- nection with my present task. Il8 'Hll-; TALK OI< TIIK and authority, Wc will try, iUi-.n-Aiirn, y, tnak'; no serious rnisi;ike, except in tlic eyes of iIjosc who wear glass ones, or of critics who are in some way retained and fecfl not to see. Considering all the peculiarities of the Sfiak- speare epitaph, and the various ways in which the biliteral alphabet covers atjd ex[)lain» them, it seems to me that to doubt the connection be- tween the two — after the facts are before us — is an evidence of " iruiij/ination " exalted pretty nearly to the height of delirium Iremens. iJui, as soon as we are satisfied that iJiicon and " Shake- speare " are connecterl, we t);ive iJacon's own declarations — whether true or false — for all the rest. '1 lie Kn;,'lish Iangu;i^e has changed since his time, not greatly, but to some extent, mA we may thus be led into an exceptlorjal error In our anagrams. Such an error would be the kind of thing that really conies under the term, "coinci- dence." But that all the rest could be coinci- dence — as Shakespeare says, " I'ish '" '1 he specially black, doited, hyphenated .e;;- ments of the epitaph, haie never been explained, and can in no v^ny l/e explained, except by |,ot- ting them under the b. literal alphabet; but, when there, the.se segments themselves explain and de- clare that they f- vx Qhs. While this expression is perfect in its commu- nication of intelligence, it is phonetic, Tfiu» it SHAKSPEKE EPITAPH. II9 commands us — if we have any understanding to be commanded — to treat the business on phonetic principles ; that is, to scrutinize Bacon's signifi- cants for all their various powers, or sounds. We place the cues in their first direct order — the order given by the epitaph and cipher themselves —and we have Y Fx Qhs which avers of the segments under them : " Why, these segments fix the cues.'' On the face of the epitaph (cut up into phonetics) Bacon — or the devil if not Bacon — uses Y for I, in an index or summary of the whole story ; or, in other words, he gives the Y its second, and not infrequent sound, of I. This form gives, from Bacon him- self, — I Fx Qhs. Once tnore : although " cue " is a theatrical word — a suggestion in itself of the whole drama and whatever is connected with it— Shakespeare (with everybody else, indeed) uses it precisely as Bacon does here, for the hint, the pointer, the subject in hand. Othello gives an instance where both meanings are combined : " Were it my cue to fight, I should have known it with- out a prompter." It is Francis Bacon himself, therefore, — claim- ing to have been " Shakespeare " as well — who I20 THE TALE OF THE asserts unmistakably, in the first person — and none the less because through the forms of pho- netics — which is as regular and comprehensible a science as anything else — "I Fix Cues." And he goes straight on to "fix" them — by themselves alone as indicators and epitomes, and with the anagrams as subjects or subject-matter — as far as we have followed him. " Coincidence, this ! All coincidence ? " It will be — when the human mind becomes coincident with the mon- key's tail, and the sceptic wha doubts that he thinks, while at the same time he is " jawing " about it, becomes all in all. Our only apology, then, for trusting and follow- ing Francis Bacon, should be our utter contempt for those who may abuse us for doing so. Y C X Q D Z. These letters are our present indicators, in their various combinations ; and, so far as the combinations have any significance at all in the work in hand, just so far they are simply loaded with hate and homicide. I have translated Y C X in one way, as " I see, X (Jack)." " W'y see. Jack 1 " would come first in sound, and the two interpretations mean about the same thing in their context : each is a taunt, which I have ex- SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 121 jslained. X. CY (Jack sighs, or Sigh, Jack !) ; X. YC (Jack hies, or Hie, Jack!); X. YC=IC (Jack lee) are further combinations. Then the cue (Q), as a whole, is Y, C, X DZ (W'y see. Jack " dees "). The last two letters are D (dee or die), and Z (the end, the final thing, in the alpha- bet). These two letters, again, if put together, are ZD (Zed), a word which seems to owe its cur- rency, if not its coinage, to Shakespeare. It has two meanings — the last mark of the alphabet, and a contemptible fag-end. In " King Lear," Kent says to Cornwall's steward: "Thou whoreson Zed-! thou unnecessary letter! My lord, if you will give me leave, I will tread this unbolted villain into mortar, and daub the walls of a jakes with him." Bacon applies " Zed," among our present cues, not only in its first sense (finality, death) but also in the second, " roaring " sense, special to Shak- spere. Once more : X Cyq; Dz. Jack sick ; dies. X, C: Q Dyz. Jack, see ! — the cue dies. C, Q, X Dyz. You see my cue, Shakspere, dies. X. Dz Qyc. Jack dies quick. 122 THE TALE OF THE C, X Qydz. See, Jack quits. Q Dyz : C— X. My appendage dies : see, be is ex. There are still more of these death-clots by-and by. Bacon pronounces himself a '' Richard," and sums up the black letters as D Y C X QZ. Figure 5, of the last tallies is one of our old acquaintances, with a new key. This time "Y," (I), " Ba," is the subject. We have now also that broad Warwickshire A, that is used for a mock- ing I :— A Qeep a Herb, S. I keep an herb, Shac. Or, if we take the cue itself for the subject of the anagrqm, it says : I Qeep A Herb, As. I keep an herb, Ass. " Ba " is in the significants, too, and, with him, as the subject, we find again that Ba. Qeeps a Her. Again the Q has the K- sound, and the mode of expression is " Shakesperian" and " Elizabe- thian." Francis keeps house, " Shac" — resides- regularly and conventionally, with a lady. SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 1 23 The fight over the authorship of Shakespeare would come back here again, if we- should qhange the keys : Pere Sa Ba— He Q. Ba Sa Pere— He Q. But this ground has been traversed, and is merely to be remembered. The quarrel develops and terminates in figure 6, with its ever taunting cues " C, X." (see Jack). Jack had leaked like a sieve, he had " roared," and bleated, and " bayed," and " bahd" — and this was the end of it : U Di Az A Rawa, a Ba (h) ! You die as a Roar, a Sheep ; (or as a Blat.) U Di : Rawa, 'Za, Baa-a ! You die : Roar, shout, blat ! U Die : ' Za ! A, A ! Ba A War ! You die Huzza !— Ha, ha ! " Ba " is a WaR. William Shakspere died of fever, we recollect; not quietly, one would say, in so sharp and quick a case, but with moans, and groans, and pain. That "device," Francis says, was his — or " hers." Let us reduce these anagrams to their lowest proportions, by exchanging five A's for one, with the biliteral alphabet. After employing all the 124 THE TALE OF THE significants, in the direct way, it is always well to try this change, and to see what will come of it. The reduced list of letters is this : BARAWZIV D— C. X. See Jack ! — Ba Raw; Ziv D. " Ba " is Raw ; the sieve dies. Ba D-viz War. " Ba " devises War. B. A-Raw ; U Di. Z ? B. a-raw ; you die. See ? B. Driv A-waz. B. drives always. B. Drivz Awa. B. drives Away. Our next is figure 7. Q is its Key. Pere Say He Ba. Y, Pere Be A Has. Q say E Be Her Pa. Q Sa E Pay Her Be. Q, Ye Sap A Herbe. Q, Ye Pas A Herbe. Q, He Be A Payser. Q. Y, He Be A Baser. William had stopped talking, according to Francis, and had become a " pacer " and a " pas- ser" — from the top of the earth. And his gait and going were laughed at. Yes, " Ba " was a " Richard ! " SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 125 Let us proceed to figure 8 : A Vic, X, A, A ! Ba. A War. A vice, Jack, ha, ha ! Ba is a war ! X. B A Civ, A Rawa, A-A ! Jack is a sieve, a Roar, a laugh. X. B A Vic, A Rawa : A-A ! Jack is a vice, a roar — Ha, Ha ! A, A, X! U ArIc; Ba. Awa. Ha, ha. Jack, you are ice ; Ba. is away ! Retiring four A's into the biliteral alphabet — five for one) — we have : X. Vic ; B. War. Jack vice ; B. War. X. Vic (and) Civ. B-war ! Jack, vice (and sieve), Beware ! X. U Ic; B. Raw. Jack, you are ice : " Ba " is raw. The 9th diagram repeats one of our previous findings in a new and very ludicrous way. The subject (on the outside of the anagram), is " Shaqzpere-Ba." U, I, Be a Rawa — Ad A, A. You and I are a roar, with a double-rolling stage " a " at the end. Here, too, again. Bacon describes Shakspere and himself as what the Bible and Garlyle term 126 THE Ti*LE OF THE a " scarlet woman," but what Shakespeare was wont to sum up without distinction of gender. The word that Bacon uses is frequent in Shakes- peare, but has become nearly obsolete in modern literature. In " Troilus and Cressida," Thersites describes Patrochus, to his face, as precisely what Bacon constantly pronounces Shakspere. Some of the further anagrams of figure 9 are as follows : Shaqpere, a, U Die : Ba. Rawar, A, A ! Shakspere, Ah, you die : Bacon now roars and laughs. U Baa, Rawar, A-A, Die ! You Blat, Roar, Laugh and Die ! A, A, A, U Die! Ba. A War. Ha, ha, ha ! You die ! Bacon is a War. The loth diagram, with " Ba " on the inside of the figure, only echoes the gth, but more fiercely still : Shaqzpere Bae : " I Du a ; a, a ! Rawar Ba !" Shakspere Barked : I Do You (and Her) : Ha, ha ! Roar, Bacon ! Ba. Du Shakspere. A, A, A ! E Rawa, Bai ! Bacon Did Shakspere, Ha, ha, ha ! H4 Roared and Barked. SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 1 27 Shaqzpere Vie Ba. Ha, ha, ha, — D. Ba. A-RAW. Shakspere vies Bacon [the old^ active verb]. Ha, ha, ha — Die ! Bacon is sick and sore. Shaqzpere Rawa, Ba(y) E Ivd A B — A, A, A ! Shakspere Roared and Bayed, he " Hived a Bee — Ha, ha, ha ! " Ba. Ivd Shaqzpere. Bea Rawa : A, A, A ! Bacon hived Shakspere. The Bee roars now : Ha, ha, ha ! Shaqzpere, U Rawa, Bae : " I Ba." D ! A, A, A ! Shakspere, You Roar, Bay : "I am Bacon " (as Shakespeare). Die ! — Ha, ha, ha! Shaqzpere, U Di a Bae, Ba, A-A, Rawa ! Shakspere, You Die a Bark, Blat, Laugh, and Roar! Figure II says : Shaxpere-Ba, Ye A Vic, A-A, Rawa, Ba. Shakspere-Bacon, Ye are a Vice, Laugh, Roar, Bieat. Shaxpere, You are Ice — A, A, A ! Ba. B Away. Shakspere, You are Ice — Ha, ha, ha ! Bacon is away ! The last diagram can be read in one signifi- cance just as it stands : " Shaxpere Baye : ' I C U— A, A, A ! Rawa, Ba ! '" (Shaxpere bayed : " I see you — Ha, ha, ha ! Roar, Bacon.") What " Shaxpere bayed " here, in the full 128 THE TALE OF THE breadth of Warwickshire English, was one of those things, as I have said, that turned William into " ice," and was thrown back at him over his "bones." The backward brief of extra significants, for our present application of the cipher, is this : — If we have learned to read Bacon's short- hand, these tables tell their own story. The " BR " (burr) that stuck to Francis, and was at the same time an " ox," has been shaken off. "Burr — O, see, I beef her." Or, " Burr— O see, I be Fr." — (Francis — myself again — free !). No. 5 repeats the strain, with the first touch of sadness I have found, unless it is meant only for weariness. " Br— See her, F. B : lo 1 The Burr — See her, Francis Bacon !— Heigh ho! SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 1 29 No. 6 gives the finale of the first backward tables* we found in our work, with " B F B " changed into " B F R, " and with " C " instead of '• K." I, Fr., B Broc. I, Francis, am Broke. The deed was done. Still, Francis, was a ruined man. There are other meanings in the tables ns be- fore ; but these are the outward and utlerable ones. And now the forward and backward tables, can be put together in many ways, with various re- sults. Take figure 10 of the former tables and figure 6 of the latter, changing "abbaa.'' with the biliteral alphabet, for '' X " Then we have : Shaqzpere, Bacox Aid U R-AWar, Bfr ! Shaqzpere, Bacon aids you to roar, Beefer ! W. Sha^izfere, Fk. Bacox ar A Bad Vib. William Shakspere and Francis Bacon are a bad Fib. \V. Shaqzpere, Fr. Bacox b a Ba-R.\ : U Di. William Shakspere and Francis Bacon are a noise and Shout ever)' way. You (Shac) Die. The cues are : Y, C. I X. (^W'v see. I am clear of you ! ) * See page 86. 130 THE TALE OF THE Or, YC , X (Hie Jack) ; CV, X (sigh, Jack) I ! Hie Jack , sigh Jack : I did it !. Bacon seemes to have been ahnost insane with anger and disgust. If we take figure 12 of the forward tables, and figure 6 of the backward, putting them together as we did with 10 and 6, we have the full names, " Bacon " and " Shaxpere " — this time in correct orthography; as we know, that is, that both were spelled while the men lived. The full subject of the anagram, of course, is still SHAXPERE, BACON. But Shaxpere has departed by " sapping an herb'' and Bacon, though "broke," remains to do the talking. He says : Aye, Rawra ; I C U B Fr. (or) Bfr. Aye, Rawar : I see you be Francis ! (or) a dead ox — a Beefer ! Yu Ar Ice; F. B. Rawar. You are Ice ; Francis Bacon roars now. The keys that go with these statements are : Q DZ : I. The cue dies. I am the cause, and the re- maining Q. SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 131 Q DIZ. My appendage in art dies. I QIDZ. I quit the connection and business. Or, I QID Z. I quit Z, the zed — the fag end. But Francis will give a further account of it, in his character of " Richard." 132 THE TALE OF THE CHAPTER V. We have now reached the second full applica- tion of the cipher to the epitaph, backward. The table is subjoined : [B]R [wJF [R]B .seno-Bymse-vomta-htTeH-ebtsr-ucdnA A ^ SENOT- SsE-T X -sarap-staht-^naM E- D I-Tebe [1] c selB. PEE eREHd-esAol-cnEts- uDE-T O [v] A -GGIDO [b]R [RJB H E A S Terae-brofE-KASsu-seIro-fdner-FdooG The analysis of the significants, according to lines and keys, is this : A R A F A B A Z A A V D P E E Q A C — X I. • o A ■2 R A F A B A X A A V I P E E O A 3 RAF Z A A P E R B 4 E Q A H E A S ) SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 133 A R A F A X A A A B ) „ > 2 D. V I C ) P E E O A R B H E A A A R Z E B A F A A A B V D C P R E Q A H E A S A R A F A B A A V I C E O A H E A S Bacon is determined to have it borne in mind, through the lines without cues, that " Shaqzpere- Ba " are (or is) half a bee (" Ar Af A B ") — one half of a busy though strangely immoral man's industry ; and that Francis was, also, in one sense, an ass— (R ! B— He As !). The second line of figure one can be read, this time, almost as it stands, in one of its meanings : Za, A-a, U D ! C — I X. Old Huzza and Ha-Ha, You die ! See — I am Ex (out), . Or, X, Za ! A-A, U D ! C — I. Shout and vaunt. Jack ! Ha-ha, you die ! See, (I "do't"). The subject of Jack's shouting, baying, roaring and blatting — one subject at least a good deal more exasperating than even his claim to Shake- speare — is explained (to the learned in languages) 134 THE TALE OF THE in the third line of this first figure, and the corre- sponding line of figure 2. But the mixture of French, Saxon and Sanscrit is very difficult to translate for the modern ear, and will have to be left as it is. The second line of the second figure refers to the corresponding line of the first figure, and its first direct meaning is this : X., Vic, A-a, A, 'Zd ! Jack, you vice and wind bag. Ah, shut up ! (hist !) These interpretations are not a bit " nice," and I am well aware of it. They are true, and are filled with history and biography. That is their sole virtue. The subjects of figure 3 are X, I — Jack and I ; or I X — (I ex Jack — make an end of him) ; or X I (exit I — I finish the scene and am out). Ba, Fa, Ra, Za, A-A, U D ! C — I X. Blatter, singer, shouter, vaunter, laugher, you die! See, I ex you (I'put you out). Or, Ba, Fa, Ra, Za, X : A-A, U DI ! C .? Blat, sing, shout, vaunt. Jack : Ha-ha, you die ! —See? Another reading is : Ba. D-cv Fa, Ra, Za : A, A ! Bacon deceived the pipe, shout and brag : Ha, ha! SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. I 35 Shakspere was a " Gent." In broad Warwick- shire, he called himself a " Sar." Bacon says that Jack was very proud of the distinction, and died boasting of it : — Ba, Fa, Ra, Za, U D a Cr ! (or) U D Car ! Noisy Jack, you die a " sar " ; or you die " sar " ! Then comes the final turn : C, X, I Ba, Fa, Ra, Za, A-A : U D ! See Jack, I bay, sing, shout, vaunt and laugh now. You die ! This is all bad enough, certainly, but I take it for the fact in the case. Bacon's failings and troubles had seriously affected his nerves and emotions, though his intellect may have been strong enough for any strain. The dispute over the authorship of Shake- speare is again touched, here, but incidentally : U Fra Ba., a?— D, Ac:— Za-a! You Francis Bacon, hey ? — Die, Ass ! — Za-a ! B. A D-z-VA, A Farc ?— A, A ! Bacon a Deceiver, a Farce, was he } — Ha, ha ! U B A Farc :— D ! Za ! A, A, A ! You be a Farce : — Die ! Za ! Ha, ha, ha ! Diagram No. 4 has O (or naught, nothing) for its subject-matter. "Pere" and "Q" are both in the anagram. They were one, Bacon has said, and both were substantially nothing. 136 THE TALE OF THE Pere, Q— He B A(n) As. Peter, the cue — he was an ass. Pere— He As A Q B O. Pere — He as a Cue was Naught. Pere's Q — O : Ha, A ! Pere's cue is zero (death) : Ha, ha ! Q, Aperes, Be O : Ha ! The cue appears to be nothing : ha ! Q Sap A Herbe : E O. The cue sapped an herbe : Zero He ! , He Pas A Erbe : O, Q! He passed an herb : Oh, Cue ! He Aperes A B-Q : O ! He appears to be the victim of a bee — stung to death : O !* Shakspere, as " Pere " and " Q," " Ra'd " and " Ba'd " various things that explain the man peculiarly — provided always that Bacon does not lie ; and they show, too, what a bad " fix " Bacon himself was in. It has always been par- ticularly dangerous for gentlemen (or loafers either) to speak ill of ladies, near the ears of iheir lovers or husbands, even if the ladies have not always been strictly conventional in all their own private business. " Shack " was unusually reckless, according to this narrative, and he was suddenly "earthed " and " roofed." * *' If I be waspish, best beware my sting !" — Taming 0/ The Shrew, SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 1 37 Table 5 bears the key, " Zd." It is " zed " or " dees " ; it is also hist — hush ! Fra. Ba. Ax a Vic(e) or Civ(e)— A, A, 'Zd ! A Vic(e), (or Civ(e) ) Ax Fra. Ba— A, A, 'Zd ! Fra. Ba. 'Zd A Vic(e)— A-a ; A-a ! X. Ba(h) Ra, Fa a Vic(e) : A, A, 'Zd ! X. U Ic(e) : Ra, Fa, Ba— (H)a, A, A ! Francis Bacon asked a " vice " (and sieve) to keep still. The vice (and cive) made the same request. Francis kept the promise faithfully. Jack shouted, sung and laughed the bad, aban- doned episode. He was warned again to " zd." The warning failed, and he was turned into "ice." Cue's" zed "-q was to "dee" (" dz ") and then at last it was hush (" zd ") sure enough. And how like Shakespeare is all this ! — who was forever ringing the changes on his words and sentences. We will not stay long in the company of the 6th diagram. Q, Pere, He, Br. [Bur or Bar], and one or two other things, can be made the subject of the eleven or the twelve letters — as we please — and our previous information can be extended, tho' not always politely or agreeably. He Be A Paq-Orse. He is a Pack-horse. He Be A O— 's Paq. He is the burden of an OldTestament, scarlet- woman. 138 THE TALE OF THE Q — A, He A Beer-Sop. The Cue — Ah, he was a beer-sop. Q Sa Ba. Pore : E, He ! The cue says : Bacon pores [studies hard,] "he, he ! " — and the dolt of a pack-horse laughs. Q Sa He Be A Rope. The Cue says he is a Rope. Q Sa He Rope Ba.-— [H]e ! (with a Jaugh) Shakspere said he roped Bacon. But He Sap A Erbe- O, Q ! He saps An herb — Oh, Cue 1 And then A Boar's Heep (H)e. * I have selected, too, the mildest epithets, and have toned them down to modern usage. If the reader wants " spades " that are " called spades," with no handles or ornaments, " the Shaqzpere- Ba." will furnish them at wholesale. The two complete tables are 7 and 8. But there is not much for them to say except as sum- maries of what we have been over. The keys of number 7 are X I O — Jack, heigh ho ! Jack, I, and a zero (a lump of ice), etc. Shaqzpere Be Fra : Baa-a D, U C : A, A, A ! Shakespeare is Francis now : the blatter dies, you see ; ha, ha ha I SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 1 39 Shaqzpere B Afar. Baa, A-a : U A Cfid ! (seed). Shaqzpere is wide apart from you. Blat, Lauglier ! You are planted in tlie ground. Shaqzpere-Ba. B A. D-cevar : Fa — A, A, A ? Shaqzpere- Ba. B A Farce, A ? — D, U A- A-A ! Bacon as Shaqzpere is a '' deceiver," you sing and laugh, do you ? He is a Farce, is he .' Die, You lying song and laugh ! The 8th table says : Shaxpere B A Vice (and cive) ; A Roa ; A Ba— Fa— A ! Shaxpere, U B Ice, O Ba— Fa— Ra, A-A-A ! Shaxpere Be A Rava : A, A, A ! — Fi, Baco ! Shaxpere-Baco, U Are A Fib. Shaxpere as Bacon (the real " Shakespeare.") You are a Fib. The significants from the backward reading of the present application of the cipher to' the epitaph are these : I 2 B W R B w R ;!• 140 THE TALE OF THE 3 4 B W K I > c y B R The translations are easy: BwR I, C ; Y Br ! You are the Burr, I see ; W'y Burr ! BwR I : C ! I am the Burr now : See I have pricked you ! Y. C, BwR, I Br. Burr, W'y see, I am the bar, the herb, the beer, the burr that pricked your Hfe out, and I am your Bier. C ? I BwRY Br. See ? I Bury the Burr. The cues are Y.C., (I see); Cy (sigh); Yc (hie) ; Yc (Ice). They fit the tables as beau- tifully as the cloven-foot fits Satan. The reader who wants further iteration or par- ticulars can combine the forward and backward tables, under the keys '• CY, X — I-O! " — (Sigh, Jack— heighho !) ; or " CY, ZD Q" — ("Sigh, Zed-Cue ") ; " C, Q DYZ " — (" See, Cue Dies "), etc. Here is one comparatively harmless example : Shaxpere, Bacon — U, I, Are A War, Fibr : Q Dyz, C ! You, Shaxpere, I, Bacon, Are A War, Fibber : The Cue, You See — My Appendage — Dies ! SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 14 1 Those wicked, but corroborative cues squirm among themselves again, and repeat the outlines of our whole chapter. X Cy Io! — Zd Q. X Sighs "heigho ! "—His last cue. X Ycz Io! D, Q! X Hies. " Heigho " : Die, Cue ! I Zyc X: O, Q, D! I am sick, Jack : O Cue, die. X Zy, Di ; C, O, Q ! X Sighs, dies : See, O Cue ! (or) Coq (soaked.) X Icy: O, Q Dz! X is Icy : O the Cue dies ! X Cys : " O, I Qd ! " XCys: "0,1 quit!" Jack "sighed" and " hic'd " many things, says the remorseless Bacon, until finally there was the last sigh, " I quit." 142 THE TALE OF THE CHAPTER VI. In deciphering Francis Bacon's " Tale oi. Me Epitaph," one needs to divest himself of iK,jgi- nation, but to put on all his capacity for tnaivsis and synthesis, and then to observe and follow every fact, large and small. " Shaqzpere-Ba." had imagination enough himself, and has put as much of it into his obituary of Shakspere as he did into "The Tempest"; but the province of his translator is to open the eyes, look, and see. In narrating the murder of Shakspere — such appears to be the exact word for the deed — Bacon was determined that no mistake should be made. He would have no misunderstanding. He tells it over and over again, before he will proceed to anything else. The present chapter depicts him as a " Richard " — a poisoner — and as turning Shakspere into an " acid-jar." Fran- cis gives this addition to the story, with various shades, details, and bits of conversation, by the simple device of having so constructed the ^ monograms of the epitaph that, when his bilitreal alphabet is placed on it, one cannot tell, with the monograms under strict mental dissection, whether they should be read " I^that " or SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 143 "thatT" Before the eye there stands a large counter for the alphabet, and, composing it, are four small ones. But which should be set down first, when the monograms are cut up .'' One cannot answer the question : hence he is obliged to apply the cipher in both ways just as the hyphens at the start necessitate two applica- tions. Thus Bacon forces his particulars on us by a change of only three letters in his anagrams. The forward table, with the large counters of the two T's following the small ones, is this : S A K H [b]R B [r1 GoodF-rendF-orJes-usSAK-EForB-eareT A I o I E E P -stEnc-lo Ase-dH ERe ODIGG - [cl I . Bles- Q T-EDu [o] Y D ebeT-I [I] c D [I] c A EMant-hatJs-pares -T-EsS X A TONES. [b]R a [b]R [c]I [rIB a Andcu-rstbe-Hetha-tJmov-esmyB-onps. There is no change, of course, in the first two lines of the significants here. We have been over them. So we need only to scrutinize the anagrams of the last two lines, and then the com- plete ones. These are the, diagrams: D R D c A R A Z A I IB A I I C D C A X A R A R I B A [ D. Z. 144 THE TALE OF THE 3 s A E H R B Y A Q E E P C I D D C A Z I X R A R J B A S A E H R B Q A Y E E P D I C D C A X A Z _- R A R I B A The keys of the first diagram are still C. X ! (''see, Jack!"), (or See X — observe the exit) and those of the second are " DZ " (" Dies "). Combined, they are " See, Jack dies ! " But they are " DX' CZ " (Dick's Keys) the moment we give the C its K-sound ; and in figures 3 and I we have the plain terms, " DYC'X QZ," (Dick's Cues ") :* We will look at No i : — C, X, Ba. Ad Ricjard : Za ! See, Jack, Ba. adds Richard : Huzza ! * The parallels between Shakespeare and " The Tale of the Epi- taph " are, as I have said, almost innumerable. Here Bacon pro- nounces himself a " Richard," whom he nicknamed '^ Dick." In " Henry the Sixth," Gloster, afterwards " Richard the Third," is treated in exactly the same way : ^'' Prince. I know my duty ; you are all undutiful : Lascivious Edward, and thou perjured George, And thou mis-shapen Dick, I tell ye all, 1 am your betters." * + * Again, Queen Margaret says: " And where's that valiant crook-back prodigy, Dicky your boy, that, with his grumbling voice, Was wont to cheer his dad in mutinies ? " Just before the battle on Bosworth field, the Duke of Norfolk finds fastened to his tent a paper which he reads to King Richard: '' Jockey of Norfolk, be not so bold, For Dickon thy master is bought and sold." SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 145 C, X,— I Az A Die: Ad Rar B. See Jack, I am as A Richard : Add Rare Ben. Rar B., J., I, A Dc-Zada : C,X? Rare Ben Jonson and I are a " Dick-Satyr " (an Herb-trust, a Homicide-syndicate) : Do you see, Jack } Ba-Za D. — C, X, A Ricjard. Ba-Za Dies. You see. Jack, — a Richard ! Ricjard Cdz A Baa, X. Richard seeds a sheep. Jack ! X, C, Za ! A-A ! Rar B. J. Dicd. Jack, you see, shouted and laughed that Rare Ben diced. Ra-Ba-Za Ar Diced, I, C, X. The shouter is diced himself, I see Jack! Rar B. J. Ic'd a Zada : C, X ? Rare Ben iced a Satyr ; see. Jack ! Rar B. J. Adz A Acid ; C, X ? Rare Ben adds an acid. You see. X And those terrible cues outline even the " di- cing." CX — Six; See 10; 90; no, etc. Y(I) C X — W'y, Six ! I Six ; Six-one, etc. Let us turn to figure 2. Here, to begin with, is more mimicry of Shak- 10 146 THE TALE OF THE spare's Warwickshire. If we are to trust it, he used " seed " for " saw," and made some of his proper names very broad and short. The name AUce, for instance, he pronounced " A-a'ce." He used WickUffe's " ax " for " ask " and 'A (Ar) for "her." I cannot interpret these things fully, though they are plain enough both here and in the story as a whole. The present mockery de- scribed " Shac " as saying that he saw Alice, and asked after Bacon and Jonson, but with exces- sive discourtesy. In the conversation, D Z stand for d'ze (does he). But one of the anagrams re- lating this matter can be read almost direct : I Cd, Ca, Ax Rar B. J. A ! I said, sir, ask Rare B. J. — Ha ! (with a laugh). The question that Shaxpere desired should be asked reflected unspeakably on Bacon and Jonson. And now the whole sentence is strung together as the subject of the cue — William's " Zed cue " : — I SAID — SIR — ASK — Rare — B.-J. ha — dies ! ! In the old Testament, Lot's wife is turned into a pillar of salt for looking back at an improper city. " William-Jack-Peter " was turned into a pillar of " ice," according to Bacon, for talking about things that were not best as the subject of general remark, but which he had cherished, and which he was forever " roaring " about. SHAKSi'ERE EPITAPH. 147 Die Ax Rar B. J. C A-A Dz. Dick asks Rare B. J. to see that Ha-Ha Dies. Rar B. J. IcD X : Ca A-A Dz. Rare B. J. iced Jack : Sir Ha-Ha Dies, (or) the laughing Ass (Ac A-A) dies. Rar B. J. A Acid, Ca X ! Rare B. J. was an Acid [pretty sour] " Sar " Jack! X Rag, Bark : A, Acid ! Jack raged and barked' Ah, it was the acid! Ba a Acid-Jar, Ac X. " Ba " was a jug of vitriol, you ignorant ass. X Ra, J a, Dic(e), Rac(k) Ba. Jack screamed and jar'd : He cheated and racked Bacon. X. B A Jar Acid-Rac : — Dz. But the Jack became a jar of poisoned " Rack," and died. So continues figure 3 : Shaqzpere-Ba. a Ricjard : A, ED! The Shaqzpere-Ba. is a Richard : Ha, he (Shac) dies ! Or, Shaqzpere-Ba. — E Ad Ricjard. The Shaqzpere-Bacon adds the Shakespere 148 THE TALE OF THE character, King Richard the poisoner, to Bacon's own personal career. Shaqzpere Raje, Ra, Ba, Ci : A Ba, DID! Shackspere raves, shouts, bleats, sighs : Ah, sheep, die, die ! Rajer Ad Acid — Ba.-Erb. The Rager drinks more of the poison — the Bacon-herb. E Bar Ba ? A, Raja Dicd. He threatened to " bar " Bacon, did he ? The rager is diced. We are informed that Shakspere was con- stantly holding himself up as a " bar " to Bacon's purposes. Among other things he had threat- ened to "bar Ba.'s marriage." Bacon was At- torney-General of England when William died, and the present foolish and idle threat to " bar" him, as I understand the matter, was to oblige him, in his official capacity, to hush up the "Overbury and Somerset Case." A "bar" in law, is " a special plea constituting a sufficient answer to the plaintiff's action ; " and to " bar " in general is to obstruct, prevent, or exclurle. " Rare B. J." says, a little laitr, that " red-acid " was a "bar'' to Shakspere himself — a frightfully "grim joke " that has not hitherto appeared in the records of those times : SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. I49 Shaqzpere Jabkard : " 'A Die a Car." Shakspere jabbered : "I die a Sir'' (a Gent.) Acip-Jar Be a Bard, A? The acid-jar presumed to be a bard, did he? B. J. Bar, Ced, Raja : A- A D ! Ben Jonson bar'd and seeded the Raja : " Ha- ha," died one day. B. J- CED Raja-Bard. Ben Jonson seeds the Raja-Bard. But Shaqzpere-Jabbara Died A Car. The Shakspere jabberer died a sir — (William Shakspere, Gent). It appears from the fourth table that Shak- sjjere, in his last moments, suspected Bacon of foul play. But the "roarer" was probably con- sidered drunk and crazy, and no attention was paid to him. Shaxpere Raj ; E Cay : " Acid ! R, Ba ! Ba ! " Shaxpere Raged ; He said : Acid ! Ah, Ba, Ba ! B. J. Cav E 'Ra: "Acid; Ar, Ba ! " Ben Jonson said he rah'd : " Acid ! Ah, Ba ! " B. J. cay E B Acid : A.'Ra, 'Ra ! Ben Jonson said he ^i;,"; acid : Ha ! 'Rah, 'Rah! I50 THE TALE OF THE Shaxpere-Raj, A-a, Baye, Barc, Ic, D ! Shaxpere raged, laughed, bayed, barked, hic'd, died. In this table Bacon insists again that he was a " Richard," in this whole matter under the head of " Shaxpere " or " Shaxpere-Ba." " Ba. Cay E A Ricjard." Ba. Cay E B A Ricjard : A ! (Ha !) B. Cay E B A Ricjard : A, A ! (ha, ha \) Bacon hereby declares (variously) that he is a "Richard." Nor does Francis stand at all on saying that he rejoiced in William's suffering. The revenge was none too sharp, he thought. Acid-jar Rac Ye, Ba. The Acid-Jar Racked you, Ba. Ba. Rac ye Acid-Jar. Ba. racked the acid-jar. Thus the account was considered balanced. We will glance, as usual, at the reverse signifi- cants : I B R — O C I — I B B C R B 2 R O C 1 — • I SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 15 I 3 BR ) CI > O B C r) I 4 B R O C B C KJ There is one indirect touch of pity, at last, in these little anagrams and their keys. Burr, I sigh. Oh Bee-Bacon, See her.* But the bitterness returns soon enough. In 1603 Bacon had been made "Sir Francis." In figure 3, he says : Jo, Br, Ci : B B Cr. Heigho, Burr ! Sigh : The bee is the " Sir " now : the one that stays alive. But Broc, I, B, B, Cr. I, the bee, be " broke," sir. Or, I, Bacon, be broke, sir. The syntheses of the forward and backward tables will be found numerous and instructive enough to any one who has time to play Bacon's great literary game of spider-web anagrams. Here is one example : * Bacon had his own reasons for speaking" of the "burr" (or " bar ") in a German way, as if the nettlesome annoyance, always gossiping about him, had been feminine. i;2 THE TALE OF THE Shaxpere, RA.COX. Are Jbr-Yc, Die: Zd Q ; I. Shaxpere and Bacon are Jabbcr-hic and Poi- soner-Dick : Zed-cue (or the cue that dies) ; and I. OX-Y DICZ Q. So sav the cues. The ox-eye was Richard's flower. His "■ acid " was " oxj-ic." It was a ■• ZD Q ' — a key to death. SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 153 CHAPTER VII. And now one more reading of the epitaph, un- der the cipher, finishes, I am glad to say, the " ox-eye zed-cue." It is our last process reversed. We read backward and have this table : [B]R [i]C [RlB lR]B seno-Bvmse-vmoTt-ahteH-ebtsr-ucdnA A SENOT- [i]C -selB. z ssa-l X [C]I D -serap-sTtah-tnaM E- D I-Tebe Ifcl P E E eREHd-esAol-cnEts- Q uDa:-T- [v]0 A GGIDO [b]R [r]B H E a S Terae-brofE-KASsu-seIro-fdner-FdooG Here we need pay no attention to the last two lines by themselves, as they repeat what we have attended to. But we will put down the diagrams of the first two lines, and of the table as a whole : — A R C B A B a Z A I D D cf . ARC A X A 2 BAB I D I ■}l '54 THE TALE OF THE A R C B A B Z 1 A I D D C _l K I E Q A B 1 H F, A S A R C B A B A X A I D I C P R H B E O A H E A S J All these tables are fertile in anagrams. The following are some of those in ninnber i. Ba B Die ; Ca (or Ac) a Zadr. — X. I. Bacon is a Dick — a Life-destroyer ; The " sar " (or Ass) is a Satyr. — Such are Jack and I. A, C ! Ba B A Dic-Zadr ! Ba B A Dic-Sadr, Ca. Ba B A Die Sadr, Ac ! Ah, see ! Bacon is a Dick-Saiyr — an herb- Gloster. So mourns the strain. But it instantly converts itself into satire and blackguardism : Bacon is a Dick-Satyr, " sar." Bacon is a Dick-Satyr, Ass ! Another meaning is this : " Ba." B a Dic-Sadh-Ac. Bacon is a Dick-Saiyi-Ass. — He has made an ass of himself, that is, and your blatting, Jack, has constrained him to become a poisoner. SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. I 55 " Ba." B Rcjad, C, Zada ! Bacon is Richard, you see, Satyr ! " Ba." B Rcjad : Ca 'Za, D ! Bacon is Richard : Sir Shouter, Die ! " Ba." B Rcjad : Cdz A-A ! Bacon is Richard : He seeds Ha-Ha (the Laugher). Rcjad Cdz A Ba-Ba. Richard Buries a Sheep. Die B AB ; C'd A 'Ra-'Za. Dick is a bee. He was an industrious grave- digger, and he " seeded " a " 'Ra-'ZA." 'Ra-Za Cd " Ba." B A Die— Ix. The roarer said that Bacon was a Dick-Glos- ter. Jack suspected it ; but he was drunk, then, and said it with " IX " — the hiccoughs. B. J. BA Cdr : Cdz A a-a. Ben Jonson is a seeder : He seeds " Ha-ha- ha " — plants Laughing-Jack low in his grave. Cd Za-a B B a Dicar.— L X. The seed shouted and laughed that Ben was a Dicer. — One-ten ! B Dic'd Ra-Za : C, Baa,— X. I. Ben diced the Blatherskite : See, Sheep, — ten- one. J 56 THE TALE OF THE Ba. B., Dic'd Za-a : Rac !— IX. Bacon and Ben Diced (or Dick'd) the "Huzzah-a": Rack, my boy! And hiccoughs the cues ! Ba., B., Dic'd 'Ra-a : Zac ! Bacon and Ben Diced the roaring Hurrah ; It was done with sack. Eleven (the throw), or ix (hies) the result. What we now, in America, sum up under the general head of " rum," Shakespeare had two words for — " sack " — literally a kind of Sherry wine — and " rack " — a contraction for "arrack." Both words crop out, phonetically, in this part of " The Tale of the Epitaph." B. J. Cd Ba. Zac'd A, 'Ra. Ben Jon son said Bacon wrapped up a noise in a winding-sheet — put it in a sack. B. J., Ba., Rac'd, Zac'd A Ix ! Ben Jonson and Ba. racked and sacked a drunkard, Or Ba. B. J. Caz'd, Car'd 'A ! Bacon and Ben coffined and hearsed. " Ah " or " Ha " — the exclamatory nuisance. Zada CD : " C, I Bar Ba " : Ix ! The Satyr said : " See, I Bar Bacon."— (Hic- coughs. SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. I 57 •' Ba." Bard /apa : Ic'd Ix : See ? Bacon Barred the Satyr : he ' iced the hic- coughs. See .? Ba-Za, dlS B a Dicar : X, I. The Roarer, do you see, was a dicer : 10, i. But Ba-Za Cn H a Dicar : IX ! The noisy rub-a-dub said that Bacon was the l^icor : Nine ! Dicar, " Ba " CDZ Ba-a ! XI. Dicer " Ba " seeds a sheep — Eleven ! Zapa Barc B .\ Die— X. T. B Barc Zapa A Ced. — X. I. The Satyr barked that Bacon was a Dick. Now Bacon barks that Satyr is a seed. B.4-Ra-Za Cn : " I C 'A, B.— D. X— I. Ba-Ra-Za said : " I see her. Bee." — DIe, Jack —1 (•• do't ") Ba-Ra-Za B Ic'p— a Cd : I, X. Drum-and-Cynibals is iced — has become a seed : I am " e.\ " — absent from home. Or, Ba-Ra-Za, Ac, B Dic'p : X, I. The roaring ass is diced (or Dick'd) : 10, i. 158 THE TALE OF THE " Ba." B a Acid, C, Zadr-Ix. " Ba " is ah Acid, you see, Satyr-Hic's. Acid-Ba. Cdz Ba-Ra Ix. " Acid-Ba." Seeds the shouting Hiccoughs. So far, we have hardly more than touched the bitter and homicidal information contained in the significants of this marvellous web of anagrams. But we will proceed, for the moment, to figure 2. I, Die, Ax Cr Ba-Ba : " A, Zd ! " I, Dick, asked Sir Ba-Ba, the sheep : Ah, 'st ! [hist]. CiR Ba-Ba Ax Die : " A, Zd ! " Sir Ba-Ba Asked Dick : " Ah, hist 1 " But we remember that Bacon's " Sir " for Shakspere is always in derision ; and here " Sir Ba-Ba " would turn into cur-Ba-Ba (sheep-dog) by merely giving the C its K-sound. Bacon was too deep not to mean all such twists in his phonetics, and he has to be constantly watched for them. C ? RiejAD Ax Ba-Ba : " Zd ! " You see Richard Asked Ba-Ba to keep still. Ba-Ba Ax RiejAD, 'Zd, C. And the sheep asked Richard to keep still, you see. SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 1 59 Ba-Ba 'Ra, 'Ic. I Cd : " A, X, Zd ! " But the "Ba-Ba" hurrah'd and bic'd.— Then again I said : " Ah, Jack, hist ! " X Ba,'Ra, 'Ic, A-A : I, Bcd ! Zd! Jack bawled, hurrah'd, hic'd and laughed : Aye, the beast ! — the Zed ! I Ic'd X : Ba-Ra, A-A, C, B— Zd ! I iced Jack. — The roar and laugh, you see, be now 'zd ! (hushed !) Ba-Ra, A-a, Ci, Di ! C, X. B 'Zd. The shout and laugh sighs and dies. See X is hushed. X B A Raja ; B 'c Acjd, Zd. Jack is a Rager : It is Bacon's Acid, Zed ! B. J. Acid-Rac X : A, Ba, Zd ! B. J. Acid-Racked Jack : Ah, Bacon Zed (was the cause). B. J. Acid-Rac X : " B " A-A— Zd ! B J. Acid-Racked X : Bacon laughs, now. You zed ! X Badjar Ba : Ca, Ic. Jack Badjer'd Bacon. He talked (said) and Hic'd. Ba. Bajard X : Ac Ic Bacon Badgered Jack : the Ass is Ice. l6o THE TALE OF THE B. J. Rac X : Ba Ic Ad A. B. J. Filled Jack with " Benzine " : the sheep hic'd : " Add A " — take another. X Ca : " Bad Rac, B. J : All " Jack said : " Bad Rack, B. J ; Aye ! " B.J. Ca: "Ai, X, Rac Bad." Ben said : Aye, Jack, the rum is bad." Bad Rac Caj X : A, B. J ! Bad Rum caged Jack : Ha, B. J ! Rac Bad, Ca I : Ax B. J., Zd. The Rum was bad, say I : Ask B. J., you zed ! Bad Cac Raj X : A, B. J ! Bad Sack crazed Jack : Ah, B. J ! A-A Di : Rac Bac X, B. J ! " Ha-ha " dies : Rack Backed Jack, B. J. It put him on his back, and he stayed there. X Barc'd I b a Ci : " a a ! " Zd ! Jack Bark'd that I was a sigh — was loaded with wretchedness : " Ha, ha ! " — And he laughed at it, the Zed. I Barc X B Ic'd : A-A-A, Zd. I Bark that Jack is iced : Ha-ha-ha, Zed ! — I go you and your laugh one better. I SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. l6l Barca B Acid : Ai, X, 'Zd ! The Barker has turned into Acid : Aye, Jack, say nothing about it ! (St !) It would appear safe to say that all the impor- tant particulars of Shakspere's death, with the causes of it, are woven together in the series of anagrams we are now at work on. Having found the various subjects of them, let us take the fifteen letters that alike constitute tables i and 2, and use them, including the cues both as subjects and as significants in genera). " Ba." B a Acid-Zadr : X, Ic ! Bacon is an Acid-Combination : Jack, Hie ! X Ic Ba B A Acid-Zadr Jack hic'd that Bacon was a poison-monstrosity. " Ba B A Acid-Zadr ; X Ic(e). It is all true : Bacon is an Acid-trust, and Shakspere is Ice — frozen stiff forever. X. B A Zadar ; I B A Die : C ? Jack was a satyr — not a homicide-syndicate, but of the " rack-heep " order — and I am the death of him. Don't you see it ? X B A Zadar ; B. J. A Die : C ? Jack was a satyr ; Rare B. J. was a Dick, too, on that account. Do you see the point? 1 62 THE TALE OF THE X B A 'Ba-Za" ; I A Die : D, Cr ! Jack is a rattling, roaring " sieve " with his mouth. I am a Dick with a hump of homicide. Die, " Sar." X Ba-Za ; Die, B, cd Raja. Jack Bah-zah'd ; Dick, the bee, seeded the Rajer. Die CDZ A Ba-Ba : Raj, X ! Dick roofs and " erfs " a sheep. Rage away. Jack ! X, Zada, CD : " Ic, I Bar ' Ba.' " Jack, The Satyr, said : " Hie, I Bar Bacon." " Ba." Bard Zada : Ic, X ; Ci ! "Ba" Barred the Satyr: Hie, Jack; sigh. Di, Zada : Ba. B Rac : C .' Die, Satyr : Bacon is Rack : See ? Di, Zadar : Ba. B Cac. Die, Satyr: Bacon is Sack. B. J. Cd: "Acid Barz A X." Rare Ben said : " Acid ' bars '-A Jackass." Ra-Za X Ca Ba. B. J. Dicd. Screaming Jack said Bacon and B. J. Diced. B. J. Ca " Ba." Dic'd Ra-Za. X. Ben said that Bacon " Diced " the Screamer, anyhow. shakspere epitaph. 163 Ba-Za X Ic : " I A Bard, D'c ? " Ba-Za Jack hies : " I am a Bard, do you see ? " I Ic'd Ba-Za X, A Bard, C. I iced Ba-Za Jack, the Bard, you see ! B. J. Ca : " 'A ICD Bard X : Za ! " K J. says: 'A iced the Bard Jack : Huzza! B. J. Ad Acid ; Bar Za-X : C ? B. J. Adds Acid [to the " Rack "], and " bars " Huz2a-Jack : See ? B. J. Ad Acid X Bar-zac. B. J. added Acid to Jack's bar-sack. Ba. B. J. AD Acid X'z Rag. " Ba." and B. J. added Acid to Jack's Rack. B. J. Cz. Bard-X a Acid. B. J. sees " Bard "-Jack, An Acid (as " Ba " re- quested at the start). Or B. J. says that the Bard, Jack, is now an Acid B. J. C. Acid Bar'd X'Z "A!" B. J. saw that Acid Barred Jack's " Ha ! " B. J. C X's " A ! " Bar'd : Acid. B. J: sees Jack's " Ha " barred : Acid did it. 164 THE TALE OF THE X Za : " B. J. Bard ? Ca Dica ! " Jack said (or shouted) : " Ben Jonson a Bard ? Say Dicer ! " B. J. Za X B Dic'd : A, A ! Rac ! Ben says : Jack is Dic'd : Ha, ha ! Rack did it! Or B. J. 'Ra : X B Dic'd : A, A ! Zac ! Ben hurrahs now that Jack is diced. Ha, ha, the trow was made with sack. B. J. Cz " X A Bad Dicr : A, A ! " Ben says : " Jack was a bad Dicer : Ha, ha ! " B. J. Cz : " Ba " A Dicr, X : A, A ! D ! B. J. says : " Ba," now, Jack was the Dicer for you ! Die ! Or B. J. Cd : A, " Ba " A Dicr, X : 'Za ! B. J. said : Ah, " Ba." was the Dicer, Jack : Huzza ! Ba. B. J. Dic'd cr X : 'Za ! A, A ! Bacon and B. J. Diced " Sar " X : Huzza ! Ha, Ha ! Ba. B. J. Cd Cr X : Za, A-A 'Id. " Ba." and B. J. seeded Sir Jack : Huzza and Ha-Ha is Hid. SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 165 Ba. B. J. CA X Iz D'd : A, Rac ! Bacon and Jonson say Shakspere is " dead :" Ah, Rack was the sad cause. Or, Ba. B. J. CA X di'd— Ar, Zac ! Bacon and Ben said that Shaxpere died, alas, from sack. They exclaim that sack was the cause. B. J. Ca X Di'd— A, Bar-Zac! Jonson said Shaxpere died. — Ah, that bar. sack ! that " benzine " they sell at the rum-hole bar in Stratford ! X. B. Ba'z Acid-Jar ; A cd. Jack is Ba's Acid-Jar, and a Seed. He is planted — buried. X. B Acid-Jar Bad Zac. Jack is an acid-jar of Bad Sack. X B Acid-Rac : Baa Di'z. Jack is turned into a mixture of poison and rack, and the sheep (or blatter) dies. X Rac Ba.; Za-a B. J. Dic'd. Jack Racked Bacon, and was perpetually shouting that Ben Jonson diced. Ba. B. J. Acid-Rac X : 'Za D. Ba. and B. J. Acid-Rack Jack, and the shout dies. 1 66 THE TALE OF THE Or, Ba., B. J., Acid-Rac'd X-Az. Bacon and Ben. poisoned the Jackass. Ba. B. J. Rac, Zac X : 'A Di'd. Ba. and B. J. Rack and sack Jack: He died. A ! Ba., B. J. DID Rac, Zac X ! Ha ! Bacon and Ben Jonson did rack and sack Shakspere. They filled him with " acid- rack," and then they " sacked " him — brought him to his shroud. And the word " zac " turns into " caz " (case), and suggests also, a coffin. A ! X B A BzD ; I A Rac-Dic. Ah, Jack was a beast ; I, a Rum-Bedeviler. I Acid-Rac X — Baa-Bzd. I poisoned Shakespere — the blatting beast. I Ca I Rac X— A Bad Bzd. I confess I poisoned Jack — A Bad Beast. I state the fact explicitly. The two full figures, 3 and 4, tell the same story, of course, with some variations in the form of it. We will glance at Number 3 : Shaqzpere, Ba., Ar A Die, A Be, A Bcd. Shakspere and Bacon are a Dick, a Bee, a Beast. SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 167 Shaqzpere-Ba b a Rcjad, Becd : A, A ! The " Shaqzpere-Ba." is a Richard, Beast : Ha, ha! " Ba." Be Acid, Shaqzpere — A Bad Rac. Bacon is Acid, Shakspere, — A Bad Rack. Shaqzpere B A Ded Ci : " Ba " Rac Ba-a ! Shakspere is a Dead Sigh : Bacon Racked the Sheep ! " Ba " Erbd, Ic'd Baca, Shaqzpere : A, A ! Bacon herbed and Iced the Backer, Shakspere : Ha, ha ! " Ba " Iced Barjj Shaqzpere : Ac, Baa. Bacon Iced " Bard " Shaqzpere : the Ass, the Sheep ! B, " Ba.," Iced, Bar'd Ca A-a ! The Bee, Bacon — the alert and active man of expedients — barred and iced " sar " Ha-ha ! Shaqzpere B Diced : " Ba." Crab A-A-A. Shaqzpere is Diced : Bacon crabbed the jeerer. " Ba.," B. J. Rac'd, Bac'd Shaqzpere : Ha, ha, he! Bacon and Benjamin racked and backed Shakspere : " Ha, ha he ! " — they laugh and chuckle last. 1 68 THE TALE OF THE " Ba." Bac'd, Berid, Shaqzpere : C ? — A, a, a ! Bacon Backed and Buried Shakspere — laid him on his back, once and for good, and then roofed and " erfed " him. Ha, ha, ha ! ' Ba." B. J. Cacd, Berid Shaqzpere : A, a, a, X. O! Bacon and Ben Jonson cased and Buried Shakspere : Ha, ha, ha. Jack is a Zero ! So the "full particulars," as it were, come out, by taking the letter J from the cues, and using it directly for a subject in this last anagram. The reader can use all the cues in this way, from the beginning to the end of our work. The only limit is that the anagrams must come under the general given subjects Shakespeare and Bacon, or the other subjects designated by the keys, and all the letters must be employed. We will now give a moment's attention to our last table, figure 4. It gives us, as it stands, " Shaxpere " and " Baco." Exchanging the bilit- eral constituents of N for the letter itself, we have the full names, again, of Shaxpere and Bacon, in correct orthography. Then the re- maining significants, used phonetically, exactly use themselves up in forming the word : " RiCJADE." Shaxpere, Bacon — Ricjade ! Shakspere, Bacon, Richard — Here, you see, SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 169 are summed up the subjects we have been talk- ing about this long time. Shaxpere-Bacon — E Ricjad. The Shakespeare-Bacon — He was a Richard — that bad king of the play, who killed people that stood in his way. Shaxpere-Bacon are Die — I. Yes, the Shakespere-Bacon combination are a poisoner — a Dick Gloster — and I am that syn- dicate. So I repeat the fact by Gloster's nick- name, as well as the full one. Shaxpere, Ra : " I dice Bacon ! " Shaxpere hurrah'd : " I dice Bacon " — cheat him. Bacon Iced Shaxpere : I 'Ra. Bacon Iced Shaxpere, and I hurrah. Shaxpere ced : " I Raj Bacon. Shaxpere said : " I Rage Bacon." Bacon Raj ; Shaxpere Die ! — C ? Bacon does Rage, but Shaxpere dies ! — See ? The cues of our anagrams repeat, as usual, the substance of the anagrams themselves. As given in their first order, by the full table of significants, they stand thus : Z D Q X I O. Z (the last) D (die) Cue — X. (ex— out), I, and O (zero — nothing). I/O THE TALE OF THE In this order, they say, also, — The Zed Cue is " Jack, heighho ! " Again : 1'he Zed Cue is Jack, I, and a hole (in the ground — a grave). The I is equally J — was the same letter, we remember, in Bacon's time — and thus Jonson comes under the outlined narrative told by the cues : The Zed Cue was Jack, Jonson, and O — the latter a ghost walking in the " sweet by-and-by " — Lear's " form without a figure." Another summary of the key, as a whole, I have explained as The Ox-eye Zed Cue. Ox-I Z'd Q. Ox-eye Zeed (finished) Shakspere. But this combination of the cues, I suppose, has the double meaning that goes with the letter Q — which stands sometimes for Shakspere the man, and sometimes for Shakespeare the nom-de- plume. Ox-eye killed " Shac," according to Bacon, and it evidently " Z'd," or ended, Bacon's claim to the plays during his life. It made the question too dangerous for discussion. I Z'D X : O, Q ! I ended Jack : Oh, the cue I SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 171 I X'D O-Z Q. I ex'd the Zero-end cue (of my "art.") Ox-Q Diz. The Ox-Cue dies. I Qdz O-X. I Quit empty Jack. I DiQ X-O : Z ? I Dick Jack-zero : See ? I ZOQD X. I soaked Jack. DiQ X'z O. Dick exes Zero. DiQ O'z X. Dick Zero's Jack. X IQ'D Zo. Jack Hic'd so. Zd Iqx O. The Zed Hic's nothing now. Iq'zX'd, O! The Hie is exed, O ! X'z Q, O Di! Jack's Cue was O, Die I 1/2 THE TALE OF THE X Diz ; Q, O. Jack dies ; the cue is out. Bacon's Algebra, in his " Tale of the Epi- taph," is one of. its most shocking as well as re- markable features. It is quite as intelligible, however, as the regular mathematical sort ; for the functions and powers of the signs are given, to begin with, in both, and then the combinations and uses take care of themselves. We will return to the cues in a minute, with a reinforcement of their information. But we must take one glance at the backward movement of our present appli- cation of the cipher. Here are the tables : c I— c — Y B R 3 B I R R C I — C B 2 I R R C I — C Y B R B 4 R — y B R J ( c I > — c B R ) — Y It will now be apparent to the reader why I have chosen the word, " burr," for the most general meaning of the two letters B R, which have constituted the upper line of our reverse SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 1 73 tables. The word now comes out, phonetically, in full. But B R stand equally for " Bar " and " 'Erb " and " Bier " (or " Beer "), and they have still another meaning, which I have kept in the shadow. All these words depend simply on the combination of the two letters in their different powers, and are excellent illustrations of the scope that Bacon found possible in our language for the construction of his work. Birr, Ci ! C ! Y, Br ! Burr, sigh ! See ! W'y, Burr ! Burr, sigh ! See ? I am the Burr now. — I stick last. Rb, Y, C, Ic R Rib ! An 'Erb, w'y, see. Iced Her Rib — froze the old gossip. Such are some of the confessions and taunts of figures i, 2, 3, and 4. Birr, Ic, Rb, Cy ! Burr, Hie and Herb, sigh ! Y, C, Birr ic 'Rb 1 W'y, see ! the Burr is an Herb ! Or, W'y, see the Burr hie ! The herb did it. Birr ic Br. — Yc. The Burr is Beer.— Hie ! 1/4 THE TALE OF THE Thus figure 5 sums up the others, and all the forward tables as well. " Woe " was the first cue of these reverse briefs ; and a " sigh " (cy) — a " dead-sigh," as Bacon calls Shakspere, — con- cludes them, as far as we have gone. If now the forward and backward tables are combined under the various keys, they will repeat all the information we have gained, and a good deal more. But it all tends to the same point, and covers the same general ground. Shaqzpere, Ba, B. J., Ar A Becd, Ricjard, Crabb. Shakspere, Bacon, and Ben Jonson are a Beast, a poisoner, and a sour-joker with claws.* Shaxpere, Bacon, B. J. — Cr, Birr, Ricjade. Shaxpere, Bacon, E. J. — A " Sir " (or cur), a pricker — tantalizer — and a Gloster with an " acid- jar " : such were our triad. Bacon, B. J. Acid Shaxpere — Crier, Birr. Bacon and Ben Jonson poison Shaxpere — the shouter and tormentor. Bacon B. J. Jar'd Shaxpere — Berri Iccer. Bacon and Ben Jonson put Shaxpere in a jar — his last case and coffin — and they bury the hicker — the blatant drunkard. ♦"Why, here's no crab ; and therefore look not sour,' — 77/c Taming 0/ the Shrew, SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 1 75 But the " 'iccer " is also " 'isser " — hisser — the goose and snake that was always hissing at them. In every way they are turiud, these ana- grams go straight to the bad. Our closing summaries — the full cues — are these : X, lo, Zdq, Cy. Jack, heigh-ho ! Zed Cue, Sigh ! Jack heigh-ho'd : He was aweary. His Zd cue — his last death cue — was a sigh. X Diz : Q-CY O. Jack dies : the cue-sigh is nothing. X Icy : Q Doz. Jack is icy : the cue is " Doze." Diq'z Cy, O, X. Dick's sigh — his grief — was O, Jack ! Diq'z Cy, X, O. Dick's sigh. Jack is now naught. O, I X'z Dyq, C. Oh, I am Jack's Dick, you see ! Dyq'z X Ic(k), oh ! Dick's Jack hic'd, oh ! Dyq'z X O-Ic(e). Dick's Jack is empty. Ice. 176 ': THE TALE OF THE Y, I ZoQ, Cd X. W'y, I soak and seed Jack. J., Y., (I) X'D ZOQ, C. Jonson and I ex'd the sot, you see. I Dyc, Oqz X. I Dice and hoax Jack. I Dyc(k) Oqz, X. I poison the humbug, Shakspere. Y, C, Dx' JQZ. W'y, see Dick's Jakes. CxYz, O DiQ ! Sixes, O Dick, is your throw (Jack is " Diced"). O, Q Iz Cyxd. O, yes, the Q is sixed ! Y, X IZ COQD. W'y Shakspere is soaked. COQY Iz X'D. Soqy is Ex'd. > X IZ YOQD, C. ~ X (the " ox " I told you of) is yoked. Icy Ox Qdz. The Icy Ox quits. SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 1 77 C, Ox Iz Dyq. See ? the ox — the backer, the bucker — is Dick now. Dyq, J. Zoc X. Dick and Jonson soak Shaxpere. O, J, Y, C, Q-X, Dz. O Jonson, W'y See, Cue-Jack dies. O, I, C, Q, X, Dyz. O, I see that Cue-Jack dies. O, X, Diz Qvc. O, Jack departed this life suddenly. I QYC ; X'z O'd. I am quick ; Jack's zeroed. 0-X Dyzc Q-I. Empty Shakspere disc'd, or represented Shakespeare — the real cue that was I. I Dyzc Oqx. I now disc the Hoax : make him a dead back- ground, Ox-I Dyzc Q. Ox-eye disc's the cue : discs and " dishes " Shakspere. Ox-I Dyc'z Q. Ox-eye was Dick's Cue. i;S THE TALE OF THE Oqz-I Dyc X. Ox-eye Dick'd Shakspere. Q Dyz, C : Ox-I. My cue dies, you see : Ox-eye did it. SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 1 79 CHAPTER VIII. Bacon's " Tale of the Shakspere Epitaph " ex- tends much farther, in many directions, than I have gone with it. But, with this short chapter, and then a few closing observations, my present task must come to a halt, if not finally to an end. I have said that Bacon dictates, through his biliteral alphabet, the punctuation of the epitaph, and I have promised to show his manner of doing it. This accomplished, the epitaph will stand authenticated and established for further investi- gation and translation. So far, in my own work, I have taken no liber- ties with the recognized punctuation of the four doggerel lines. Every scholar who has dealt with them at all — for sense alone, to say nothing of following the picture of the text — has neces- sarily used a colon or a period at the end of the second line, and a period at the end of the last one. So much, the rules of punctuation abso- lutely require, and there can be no question about it. But our analysis of the construction of the epitaph in general has shown that Bacon has taken very remarkable means to multiply and en- rich the possible conjunctions between the epi- taph and the cipher. He has done so, however l80 THE TALE OF THE in such a way that every extension of the biliteral counters is in fives — each five counters yielding one new significant — the cipher and the epitaph thus fitting each other perfectly, with no re- mainder. In our own work, we have now pro- ceeded as far as we can go on this line with the unmistakable assurance, given in our process, that we have gone right. Here, we are obliged to pause and experiment. But we have Bacon's inductive method to help us ; and, according to that, sufficient experiments will bring us a com- plete test. The most uncomely and exceptional feature that has been derived from the original text of the Shakspere epitaph is the period that Charles Knight's researches in the Shakespeare records led him to place between the " HE" and " Re " at the close of the second line. I have not found a Steevens or Malone cut that gives this period — or whatever the mark was — though it may be given in some of the drawings which I have not been able to see. But the space in the word " HE Re " is more or less conspicuous in all that I have inspected ; and that something has always been understood to belong there has been about as good as demonstrated by the new grave- stone, which has the letter A inserted in the old space, turning the orthography into " H-e-a-r-e." What Knight has placed as a period. Bacon terms a "mark" and a "hack." I think, from the explanations of the cipher, that Knight's two SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. l8l periods were short upright marks, like hyphens on end, and that the " mark " was thus literally a " hack." In that case, they must have ap- peared so utterly accidental or preposterous that 'tis no wonder they were not preserved even by the intended ^^fac similes " of the old Shakespe- reans. The division of " He. Re " converts the last two letters into the Latin reflex, " Re " — which, in English words, always has the sense of repeat, return, multiply, etc. Now, if we re the " Re " — repeat it under the cipher, according to the ap- parent assertion " He, Re " — He (Bacon) repeats here (at the division marked oiif where he says so) — we can get five counters for the biliteral alphabet beyond those we have used; for we have the "hack" in "HE. Re," not yet used; and the punctuation of Shakespeare, amply left on record, would permit a comma at the end of the first and third lines of the epitaph. A comma, indeed, belongs in the latter place, and a scholar would use it, though the average American news- paper of to-day would not — the general and ut- terly preposterous custom being never to put a comma in a sentence before the conjunction "and." However, no one need go further than the table of contents (the " catalogue ") of ihe original Folio Shakespeare, to find perfect author- ity not merely for this correct punctuation, but for placing a comma even at the end of \\\& first line of the epitaph. " All is Well, That Ends Well." IS2 THE TALE OF THE is one of the titles in the Shakespeare " Cata- logue " — a comma being put after the first " well." This comma is certainly not necessary, yet, ac- cording to the use of it, Bacon would have placed a comma in the epitaph after the word " for- beare." In the light of these facts, I observed that he might have meant to extend the applica- tions of his cipher by using commas at the end of the first and third lines, the period in " HE. Re," and repeating the reflex, " Re," that appears a command in itself to be repeated. I should not have dared to base Bacon's story on so irregular a foundation ; but the indications were sufficient, I thought, to warrant a test : so I made it — find- ing to my great astonishment — though I was pre- pared for almost any surprise — that the result was an express dictation of the thing I was testing. The following is the table arising from the experiment : S A E H R A GoodF-rendf-orJes-usSAK-Eforb-eare, C C H E ustEn-clo As-edH ER-E. R e. Man^t-hatsp-aresT- R TODIG- gT-^D- M R Blese- H BeT-E- M HEsSt- L A ONES. w B Andcu-rstbe-Heyth-atmov-esmyB-ones. SliAKSPERE EPITAPH. 183 The diagrams of the significants and cues are these : I H R H T A B M A — F L R F T A B L A — H M R jf W A B A s A E H 2 E A R M C C H E- R F T A B L 3 4 SAEHRA JIHTABM A — F L R Q C C H E — M R A W A B A 5 6 SAEHRA RFTABL A— H M R M C C H E — Q R A W A B A 7 8 SAEHRA 1 SAEHRA . RQCCHE I RMCCHE.j^ RHTABMAJ RFTABLA( RAWABA J RAWABAJ I do not purpose to dissect these tables be- yond my immediate design of establishing the text and punctuation of the epitaph. But there is no difficulty in working out the anagrams, under the rules that have been discovered and explained. The cues are Q H M M F L 1 84 THE TALE OF THE In the external index to our story, "M" stands as a contraction for"hil-n," and "F" has been given in our work for Francis. "L" is evidently a new character. It is simply the key for "Lady" — whoever the lady was — and the three letters, taken together in orTe of their com- binations tell of a "FML" — a Female, but with the pronunciation rather of the French '■'■ Fe- melle" than of the word as we now commonly sound it in America. Bacon's phonetics, how- ever, are much neater the Latin root than we are, and the word is spoken yet, by many people, about as he gives it in his three letters. " Q)" we know, represents Shakspere— and sometimes " Shakespeare." In the index, and throughout our work, " H " has both the H and the A sound. Here, I think, it's power is A. standing for Alice. The second " M " as a cue, if H'd, is " hem ! " — which is one of Shake- speare's constant words, both of exclamation and description, and which here sums up the outline and substance of all these keys. They are the Him, Francis, Lady, Shaksperr, Alice, Hem Cues. They say first : Q HM 'M, F. L. Cue-Jack hems (talks about) Himself, Francis, and the Lady. SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 1 8$ Q HM FML. Shac Hems Female — He talks woman. Q HM,-'M, LF. Shac b-im-hems (blats perpetually) and laughs. Q HM, FLM. The Key is Hem and Pleghm. Evidently the key is not a delicate or righteous one, however much history, biography, and gen- eral instruction it may cover. But we have to do only with the third diagram and the fifth, which are the ones containing the significants of the first two lines of the epitaph, under our present application of the biliteral alphabet. It is they that cover the division and punctuation of that strange word, " HE.Re." Figure 3 has the double cue, " Hem " and "Him." Corresponding to this key as "him," we find at once, for subjects of the anagrams, " Shac " or " Shaq," " He," and " Q." The burden of the story, as hitherto, is the tongue, the wide mouth, the "roar," of Shaks- pere. According to Bacon, "Shaq" had no mercy as a scandal-monger, and not the smallest fig-leaf of shame for his own vices. Each dia- gram of our new significants starts out by giving him another harsh epithet. He was a " cracker," says Bacon, and a " marker ; " and he spared neither man nor woman. 1 86 THE TALE OE THE SAEHRA RQCCH E— 'M Shac — CRAQEK He : Or, Shaq — Cracer He. Jack was a Cracker — A " Tearer,'' a " Bah-rah- zah ! " Now " Cracker " is one of Shakespeare's words for just this sort of personage. There are various illustrations, the most notable of which, perhaps, is applied in " King John," by the Arch-duke of Austria to Philip Faulconbridge : — " What cracker is this same that deafs our ears With his abundance of superfluous breath .■' " Shac Craq Here. Jack cracked here : at this part of the story he did his worst, and went to pieces. Crac Here Has Q. The cracked "HE Re," or the division in the word, " HE Re," has meaning. Craq, Hacs, HE, Re, A crack and Hacks — a division and punctua- tion cuts — are here ; and Ihe picture of them is before you in the word " He , Re , " He (Hacs Craq) Re,. He (Bacon) hacks, or dots, the division be- tween " He " and " Re." SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 187 He Re-Hacs Craq. He punctuates a second opening — hacks the Crack after the " Re," as well as the one before it. He Craq, Hac, " Re's." He repeats the crack and hack — " re's " both of them. S— He Craq, Re-Hac. Shakspere breaks and recuts, or " re-hashes," his scandal. The pictorial illustration is this : " He Re , " Hac Craqs Here. Punctuate the spaces in and after " HE , Re , Shac — He Craq Er. Jack attacks the Lady's Deportment and character. Re-Craq, Eh, Shac ? Keep on cracking, will you. Jack ? She Hac Craqer. She Hacked the Cracker. And She Craq Hacer. — M.' She cracked the Hacker. — Hem ! Yes, it was " her device," as we thought, some time ago — that stealthy infusion of the racking, maddening " acid " into Shakspere's liquor, at lS8 THE TALE OF THE his last " merrie-meeting." The " acid " was dis- tilled by a learned masculine chemist, and was administered by a strong, sour masculine poet; but our sadly torn and broken heroine — such as she was in this " Tale of the Epitaph " — suggested the sly feline manner of William Shakspere's "taking-off" — that remarkable event so com- pletely hidden these three hundred years. Shaq Ca He Rec 'R. Jack said He wrecked Her. She Raq, Hac, Rec 'M. She Racked, Hacked and Wrecked Him. But we can now turn to figure 5. Strangely enough — marvellously, in fact — it repeats and re- asserts, in still another form, the substance of the work we have just been over. SAEHRA RMCCH E— Q. Shac — A Marcer He. Jack — A Marker was He. Shac Mark Here. And the Jack-Mark is Here — in the word " HE , Re " — where any one can see it by looking. Marc Here-Hacs. Mark the punctuation points in " HE Re " SHAKSPE.RE EPITAPH. 1 89 " HE , Re " Has Marc : C ? This peculiar word " He , Re " has a Mark, 30U see. Hacs Ma«k "HE, Re," Hacks Mark It : there are two of them. Hacs Mar He , Re , : C. And the Hacks Mar as well as mark you see. He Hac Remarks. He hacked Remarks — according to the Pleghm Cue — which were exceeding vile ^remarks. And " He , Re , " is a picture of the statement. " Here " with a chasm in the middle of it, is He, Hac, Re ; and then there are two marks. He Marc Re-Hacs. He — Bacon, the Shakespere Cue — rehacks, or repeats, the mark in " HE , Re , " — at the end of it. Mark Er ?— Hac Eh, S.? So we can read backward, and construct, or rather find, the verbal picture. ScM, Hac, ar Here. A Seam and a Hack are " HE, Re " Cm, Hacs, ar Here. A Seam and Hacks are " HE , Re , " igo THE TALE OF THE Ha! Cm, Scar, Here. Ha ! A Seam and Scar are " HE . Re " Ha, C he , Re. Marks ! Ha, see the " He " and " Re " Marks ! Shac — He Remarc. Jack Remarked. Yes, Jack remarked altogether too freely; and his remarks led to all the strange marks and re- marks of his epitaph. Marc ! He Hacs 'Er. Mark you ! He defames and Injures the Lady. He Scar Er : A-Hm ! He Scars Her with his noisy " Ah-Hem ! " So, finally. She Rac-Rec "A! Hm!" She Rack-Wrecks Jack, the exclaimer. She has an "herb " put into his rack, and it tore him to pieces. -I cannot but think that every intelligent reader viust now see the marvellous correspond- ence between the punctuation of the Shakspere epitaph and the present group of biliteral signifi- cants which cover it. Though unparalleled in manner, this correspondence could hardly be SHAKSPERE EPITArH. I9I closer or fuller even in the specifications of a patent. What imbecility it will be to attempt an explanation of it by " coincidence ! " But now, what if Shakespeare, in one of his plays, gives a correspondence both to our last anagrams and their picture in the epitaph ? He does so. In " Love's Labor's Lost," there is a frolicsome conversation on archery, between Rosaline, Boyet, and Margaret. It is in reference to hitting the central point of a target — what we now term the bull's-eye, but what in the ancient and differently constructed target was called the " pricke." Says Rosaline : " Thou canst not hit it, hit it, hit it, Thou canst not hit it, my good man." Boyet replies : " I cannot, cannot, cannot : And I cannot another can." " A mark marvellous well shot," says Katha- rine. Then Boyet exclaims thus : " A mark, O marke but that marke : a marke sais my Lady. Let the mark have a pricke in't to meat at, if it maybe." A " pricke " is of course a " point,'' and, in one of its oldest definitions, is literally a punctuation point, as any dictionary will testify. The word " HE , Re , " in the Shakspere epitaph was apparently the hidden target at which this conversation aimed. Look at that anomalous 192 THE TALE OF THE " hack," or cleft, that "marks" the word as it was never marked before or since. Then see the punctuation-point for the word " to meat at." This is the queerest parallel to the epitaph that I have found, so far, among many, in the Shakespeare Folio. And the parallelism runs throughout both, in double meanings and in every other way. It is such as to render coinci- dence, between the play and the cipher exceed- ingly improbable, though not quite impossible. Whoever may wish to go on and reconstruct the various sentences that Bacon has shut up in our last eight diagrams will come more or less upon matters that are bad enough for the bot- tomless pit. If Shakspere was guilty of a small part, even, of what Bacon attributes to him, he was indeed a " satyr " — as coarse, noisy and vulgar a human brute as ever lived. Francis here echoes and re-echoes about all the harsh names he has called " Shaq," and adds many more. Cracker, Marker, Racker, Scarer, and Wrecker are the mildest selections I can make, to suggest the special complaint at this part of the story. I know nothing of the truth or false- hood involved in it. But, if the facts were as given, Bacon and Jonson did about right in getting Shakspere and his mouth under the ground as soon as possible. If the facts were not as given, the man who constructed the Shakspere Epitaph, was the one incarnate devil of the world's literature. SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. I93 CONCLUSION. In accepting the play-actor, William Shakspere, for the one great poet of the human race, Shake- speare, the world has been perfectly honest. Nor can it fairly be said to have been even stu- pid ; for sometimes there is hot the least discredit in being deceived. When a man's monument is tet up, especially that of a public character, we take it for granted that the right man was put under the stone. Our idea may be an assump- tion, but, in general, how can we help it ? Now on just this assumption, and nothing else, we have identified Shakspere with Shake-speare. But if Francis Bacon and " Ben " Jonson erected the Shake-speare memorials, not exactly to lie on their face, but to imply one thing and mean an- other, then all our innocent but natural faith "goes for nothing." It has been a Rip Van Winkle's drink. I have shown that the Shakspere epitaph de- clares, both on its face and by means of a cipher- narrative in Bacon's biliteral alphabet, that Shakspere was not Shake-speare, and that Bacon and Jonson ended, " cased " and " buried " him. I have shown, also, that this confession must have come from Francis Bacon himself. But is 13 194 THE TALE OF THE the confession true ? That is the next inevitable question. Well, I don't know. I think it is ; for I con- clude at once that the reputation of writing Shake- speare would not be worth to -any sane man, much less to Francis Bacon, what he knew it must cost him — the record of being the " wisest " and " greatest," perhaps, but in a certain way, the " meanest " (the most shameful and pitiable), of all inspired mankind. For Pope's famous line of iambics is no mere swell of the poetic breast, if "The Tale of the Epitaph" be true. In one of Bacon's letters, he complained to the younger Cecil that Coke had publicly insulted him in the Exchequer : " Mr. Attorney kindled and said : ' Mr. Bacon, if you have any tooth against me pluck it out, for it will do you more hurt than all the teeth inyour head will do you good." I answered coldly in these very words: ' Mr. Attorney, I respect you ; I fear you not, and the less you speak of your own greatness the more will I think of it.' He re- plied : 'I think scorn to stand upon terms of greatness toward you, who are less than little ; las than the leasts And other such strange light terms he gave me, with such insulting which cannot be expressed. * * Then he said it were good to clap a capias vtlcj^atum upon my back I To which I only said he could not, and that he was at fault ; for he hunted upon an old scent. He gave me a number of disgraceful words besides, which I answered with silence." In " The Great Cryptogram " Mr. Donnelly wonders if Coke referred to Bacon's disgrace in having been a " clerk " for vagrants — a pen for SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. I95 actors. I doubt it. The ambitious young aris- tocrat could not afford to be identified with the stage in any public way, simply in justice to what we should now term, his "political pros- pects" and his "social standing." But to have written a play for a theatre, and even to have taken " the money of the rabble " for it, would not. have reduced Bacon, even in the age of Eliz- abeth, to something "less than little; less than the least;" and to '■'■such insiiltiiig which cannot be expressed." Besides those legally " vagrant no- bodies," like Shakspere, were getting settled^ were building play-houses in the large towns — were growing rich, and approximately respecta- ble.* Bacon's present work, if translated beyond the limits which I have deemed proper for the gen- eral reader, casts the one wretched shadow which (necessarily for ought I know), accompanied a mind and body universal in its organization. Bacon seems to have felt it were better to tell the truth than to rest forever in history under charges of judicial corruption, which he had for- mally and technically admitted, but had really denied. Shakespeare says : t * Commonly, of course, this elevation was not rapid. Pope, in his Shakespeare-criticising, explained the general situation ; "The best play-houses were inns and taverns (the Globe, the Red Bull, the Fortune! : so the top of the profession were then mere players, not gentlemen of the stage. * * They had no in- timacy with people of the first condition." t Launceloty in " The Merchant of Venice.'" 196 THE TALE OF THE "** truth will come to light; murder cannot be long hid ; a man's son may ; but, in the end, truth will out." "The Shakespere Bacon " however, like Byron, Swift and Rousseau, but more signally than all of them together, was put in the world to talk. Expression was his life-blood. He was made of it, that he might do his work. And what the tyranny of his times would not let him say in the regular way, he has yet said, I doubt not, in spite of all the Elizabeths, the Cecils and the Cokes — handing down to us, perhaps, a picture of those very worthies, as they lived in their hidden motives and actual traits. But such a man had to tell of himself, as well as of others, however much he might have " sauced " his tell- ing with the " discretion " of postponement and of ciphers. If I am not greatly in error, we shall yet know the real Shakespeare and his age somewhat better than we know our own. But, returning to " Mr. Attorney Coke " — that ancient barrel of sour-kraut on a grand ferment — he never insulted Bacon, so vitally and mon- strously, on account of a poet's pen and a drama. Coke had a close, hard, technical mind, pinned to facts ; and he was not making something out of nothing : Shakspere must have begun to " bay " and " roar," even before 1601. I said that Shakspere's identification with Shake-speare rests wholly on the Stratford memorials, which, according to Bacon, he and SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 1 97 Jonson handled to suit themselves. For Shak- spere himself never claimed the plays. He " brought out " some of them, under his stage- name, as he did many others. He was responsible for them as a theatrical manager, and that was all. He was not supposed to have written them by the playwrights of his time — Greene for in- stance — who called him an " upstart crow,'' beautified with " feathers " not his own. To Greene, Shakspere was a "tiger's heart wrapped in a player's hide," a ^^ Johannes fac totum" and a " Skakescene," but certainly not a poet or a dramatist. We know positively that William Shakspere was a hard, close money-lender — a usurer and huxter, who would sue a neighbor for a shilling, or the price of a bag of malt ; who owned the tithes of Stratford, yet charged the town with a drink of claret furnished to a preacher: and who entered a "trust" of those days to inclose in his estate the " commons '' of the people. When he came to make his will, this man who always had his eye on a penny — who was careful of a " second-best bed " and a few personal trinkets, never mentioned thai he had written a book (though a dozen and a half of the best Shakespeare plays then lay unpublished), and never mentioned, indeed, that he had a book in his house. There could have been but one possible reason for it. He had never written anything, and he cared so little to read that no book was there. Bacon says in his cipher, we igS THE TALE OF THE recollect, that " Shaq " was nothing but a mal- odorous noise, and that + was his mark — his real " cue." Before I knew anything about this cipher-state- ment, however, the conclusion that '" William Shakspeare could not write " had been reached through circumstantial evidence, and the result published, by Mr. William Henry Burr, a gentle- man of Washington.* With all the Shakespeare writings, the only remains of Shakspere, in his own chirography, arc these five signatures — the first one evolved when he was nearly fifty years old : * "Proof that William Shakspeare Could Not Write." By Wm. Henry Burr. — Brentano Bros. i366. SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. I99 The -first general feature of these curiosities is their " old style." It was behind the age in the days of Shakspeare— was a relic of the parish- clerk and the fossil-lawyer. Bacon, Jonson, Inigo Jones— all the live scholars and writers — used precisely the same pliant and easy script we use to-day, except three letters. The S was often though not always made long, and the J and U had not the fixed distinctions that we now give them. But William Shakspeie, we see, did not write in the script of his generation. There was a reason for it. Let us study the signatures — looking straight with our eyes, not with our prejudices. The first one in order is Wm. Shalspar or Wm. Shalspat . The Second is William Shaksper, if we can imagine a K from the thing that stands for it, and will read a sort of capital " I " as if it were a small " e." The " h " and " a " are all right : thev are merely antiques. The omission of the dots over ^^'illiam's i's is of no consequence, and need only be observed, not criticised. To the eve, and under anything like rule, this signa- ture is William Shatspir. 200 THE TALE OF THE The third is comparatively clear. It is William Shockspozd. Bat the gentleman turned the end of his " K " to the left, across the upright line ; made a bad V for an S; and inserted the crotch of a tree for his p. The fourth signature is Willin Sha— and the rest of it is unmitigated chaos. There is not the semblance of another letter in it, old style or new, in any language, living or dead. The last of these Shakspere "signatures" is surely not much of anything, but, so far as it is anything at all, it is William Shalspezer. No wonder the Shakespearean s have never known how to spell the Shakspere name, and have gone different ways about it. William him- self fully established the authority for complete ignorance on that subject. Yet this was the man, according to " John Heminge " and " Henry Condell " in their pref- ace to the great Folio, whose " mind and hand went together ; and what he thought he uttered with that easiness that we have scarce received from him a blot in his papers." SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 20I Did John Heminge and Henry Condell know who the real Shakespeare was — the one who could write ? Were they merely figure-heads for him ? Or did they entirely scorn the truth in connection with those beautiful, unblotted manu- scripts ?* The man who left the five chirographic abor- tions, called the " Shakespeare autographs " never produced a legible manuscript : that is certain. A magnifying-glass shows, at once, that almost every stroke of his pen was snail-like, broken, and painfully indefinite. He was blun- dering along in mental darkness. But he had as- sumed in his latter years to be the real Shake- speare, and he could not bear to sign his will with a cross. Mr. Burr's indirect evidence is al- most as good as Bacon's direct, unfastidious testi- mony. Shakspere could not write, and in those " autographs " he was simply pretending that he could, by trying to follow a copy of his name set for him by some ancient periwig. And here, as a general picture of him and his age, I must quote a passage from Greene, who * The statement supposed to have come from Heminge and Condell has always been laughed at ; only the laugh was without its real " cue." Pope said this of it : " Players are just such judges of what is right as tailors are of what is graceful. By these men it would be thought a praise to Shakespeare that he scarce ever bioited a line. But in reality there never was a more groundless report, or to the contrary of which there are more undeniable evidences." 202 THE TALE OF THE was criticising a play called " Fair Em," which has been attributed to Shakespeare in 1587. " Others will flout and overread every line with a frump and say 'tis scurvy, when they themselves are such scabbed lads that they are like to die of tWfazion ; but if they come to write, or publish anything in print, it is either distilled out of ballads, or borrowed of theological poets^ which, for their calling and gravity being loth to have any profane pam- phlet pass under their hand^ get some other Batillus to set his name to their verses. Thus is the ass made proud by this underhand brokery. And he that cannot write true English without the help of clerks of parish churches will needs make himself the father of interludes." This quotation, of itself, shows one reason, of many, why Bacon wrote his light literature be- hind a mask. Shakespeare's foxy joke on Shakspere's hand- writing — for it was Bacon who edited that " Folio of 1623 " — shows us that we must take the rest of his statements — and those of his friend Ben- jamin — mostly by inversion. Here are the Fo- lio's first ten lines — To THE Reader. This Figure, that thou here seest put. It was for gentle Shakespeare cut; Wherein the Graver had" a strife with Nature to outdoo the life : O, could he but have drawn his wit As well in brasse as he hath hit- His face, the Print would then surpasse All, that was ever writ in brasse. But, since he cannot; Reader, looke Not on his Picture, but his Booke. SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 203 204 THE lALE OF THE 'I'hese lines are signed " B. I." which stand equally for Bacon (/) and Bat Jons on. In "The Tale of the Epitaph," Bacon employs the letters in the same way. There is a plenty of meat here, but I cannot write a second book in this chapter. We will stop a moment, however — long enough to read the large letters of Shakespeare's intro- duction to his Folio as we have read those of the Shakspere epitaph. T' RT? FI, S: W! G. NO A HP, A BR, NP B. Otir experience will enable us to translate easily : The Art.' Fi, Shaq : Double, You! [You are a Double]. G Knows A(n) Ape, A Burr, Nipped Bacon. And we will read these same letters backward : B PN, RB AP : HA 1 ON G. W. S. (I) F T. — RT. Bacon Penn'd d Herbed the Ape : Ha ! On G., W. S. [William Shake-speare] (I) Fit. — Art. Oh, yes. Bacon fitted pretty well over G— the same G of the epiiaph — " Ben" Jonson. And Francis seems to have been justified in SHAKSPERE EriTAPH. 20^ signinj; hiinsclf ■" Art." His majosty, Nicholas (."lovenfoot himself, has seldom been more pro- foundly and cunningly artistic* Hut apart from their hidden recesses, those in- troduotorv rhvmes of the Folio, bear a double meaning on their most palpable outside, and fixed unmistakably by their very punctuation. t Thev praise an egg-headed, diiU-eyed, sheepish- looking picture — a most horrible print — and at the same time, say, virtually, that the face beat in the world "in brass." Bacon certainly held that opinion in '• The Tale of the Epitaph." From beginning to end, " Shaq " was a blustering shameless " roar." The great Folio's " Epistle Pedicatorie" (^to Pembroke and Montgomery) is the next in order of the literaiT monuments to Shakespeare. It will bear much more dissection than I can now give it. Outwardlv, it shows the exceeding hum- bleness of Heminge and Condell — the actors, that is, of the day — in approaching such perfumed sacredness as " the order of the Garter." It savs : " Countrv h.inds re.iih forth milk, cream, fruits, or ♦ .\n\i the " Reader." iv> whvMii the anist appeal^ should panic- u^arlv nv>:ice that a tv.i.1 mistake is apparently a:ade in the fbunh line oi these iii.^s: c\>ns;-;oiK>us ten lines in the lK»k. The first let- ter ot that fourth line is ..-j«rf/.". «,-.- .i .%>/:.-.=."- Hut if Francis had mH made ii s.^, he c\->uK1 not have toKl ;he little story of the rii'.insr of B, I. over B, I . That capital '" \V. ' would have broken him all up- t Xtr. IMnnelly h.»s observed this point. 2c6 THE TALE OF THE what they have; and many Nations (we have heard) that had not gums and incense, obtained their requests with a leavened cake. It was no fault to approach their Gods, by what means they could: and the most though meanest of things are made precious, when they are dedicated to Tem- ples." Heminge and Condell here ? — in such English as this ! Not a bit. This is the irrepressible prose-poetry of Francis Bacon, who wrote to Vil- liers thus : And now, because I am in the country, I will send you some of my country fruits, which, with me, are good medi- tations. But Mrs. Pott* and others have shown (except to such as have not looked), that Bacon was so full of Shakespeare's thoughts, words, metaphors and similes, that they crop out at everj- turn, even in his dryest and dustiest law-papers. And now for "Rare Ben." When the " Shakespeare canon " came to be published as the celebrated Folio, " B. I." — Bacon himself — introduced it over what appeared to be Ben Jonson's initials. But Jonson signed his full name to his own poem in memory of " my beloved, the author, Mr. William Shakespeare : And what he hath left us." This poem has been taken for proof positive that Bacon could not have been " Shake-speare." * In her "Promus." SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 20/ But, when we consider a thing or two, it is pretty nearly proof positive the other way. " To draw no envy (Shakespeare) on thy name, Am I thus ample to thy Booke and Fame : While I confess thy writings to be such, As neither Man nor Muse can praise too much. " I therefore will begin. Soule of the Age ! The applause ! delight ! the wonder of our stage! My Shakespeare, rise ; I will not lodge thee by Chaucer or Spencer, or bid Beaumont lye A little further. * * * "And though thou had'st small Latine and less Greeke, From thence to honor thee I would not seeke For names ; but call forth thundering ^schylus, Euripides and Sophocles. " Or when thy socks were on, Leave thee alone, for the comparison Of all that insolent Greece or haughtie Rome Sent forth, or since did from their ashes come. "Nature herself was proud of his designs, And joyed to weave the dressing of his lines ! W hich were so richly spun, and woven so fit. As since she will vouchsafe no other wit." Shakespeare, certainly, has never been praised with more justice and capacit)', with keener, closer analytic scrutiny, than in those lines of " Ben " Jonson's. They rest on the most exact appreciation, combined with the most solid sense. They were never rattled off to please somebody. 208 THE TALE OF THE Thev show they were bunched and weighed for all time. Did Jonson ever forget them ? No, no ! But, after his death, it was told in his '• Discoveries" what man they really went with. " Rare B. J." was still careful not to let out too much of a dangerous matter. But, in one of those papers, he left the " discovery " — which then meant, especially, an uncoi'ering. an exposing, — ihnt, among all the great men of his age — Shakspere not being mentioned at all — Francis Ba- con 'm he that hath filled up all numbers, and performed that in our tongue which mav be com- pared or PREFERRED either to insolent Greece OR HAUGHTY RoME.* Slv. Smart, grim old " Ben ! " He really gave it all away — the whole secret — in the very words he had used in his Shake- speare lines. I have no purpose to enter the general field of historical fact which explodes the great Shake- speare "fib," as Bacon calls it. But the remark- able bits of literature, that introduce the folio of 1623, are supplements to the epitaph. Thev confirm its story, either directly, like the ten lines '■ To The Reader," or indirectly in other wavs. They turn most ludicrously against Shakspere. the moment we have the key that unlocks what has always been their mysteries and their con- tradictions. For this reason I have just touched them. * "Ben Jonson's Discoveries" were first printed in 1640, three years after his death. SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 209 And I must give another moment to that ad- hesive cobweb in the popular inind, the supposi- tion that Bacon could not have been the real Shakespeare because he did not directly claim to be. It is told of Col. Ingersoll that some one asked him, a while ago, what it cost him to pub- lish his " Gods." " The governorship of Illi- nois," replied the Colonel, who is a firm " Shakespearean," but who thus explained, by a parallel, one phase of Bacon's situation in 1590. It would have cost him the Chancellorship of England, and the titles of Verulam and St. Alban, to have been known as the ribald poet who deposed " King John " for the stage, and put a hump on the back of the dead "Gloster " to ridicule the living Cecil. In the words quoted from Greene, he has told us that people of " gravity " could not afford to write plays in their own names, but hid behind the safe insignificance of some Shakspere. But even Shakspere him- self, if we suppose him to have been Shake- speare, wept over the shame and disgrace he suffered from being a dramatist and actor.* " Alas, 'tis true I have gone here and there, And made myself a motley to the view,\ Gor'd mine own thoughts, sold cheap what is most dear, Made old offences of affections new. * Sonnets CX and CXI. t This line is very suspicious. The " Shakespeare-Bacon " was exceedingly literal at the base of even his most ethereal or fan- tastic poetry. Bacon's careful, patient, persistent biographer, 14 2l6 THE TALE OF THE " O, for my sake, do you with Fortune chide, The guilty goddess of my harmful deeds. That did not better for my life provide, Than public means which public manners breeds. Thence comes it that my name receives a bcand, And almost thence my nature is subdued To what it works in, like the dyer's hand. Pity me then, and wish I were renewed." Now according to the best information of William Shakspere that the most patient, plod- ding history has been able to show, he was a Stratford butcher-boy, stage-struck from the start, who, when he " kill'd a calfe, wold doe it in a high style, and make a speeche." So John Aubrey was told " by some of William's neigh- bors." The boy was full of coarse vitality and vulgar sport. He tried lo outdo the " Bidford topers " as a beer-tank, and got dead-drunk in the ambitious feat. He took to hunting and poaching with such jolly vigor that he was whipped, time and again, for " deer-stealing," by a gentleman, named Lucy, who fell thereby into " the speaking-trump of fame.'' At eighteen, William was married — managing to get the Mr. Spedding, has been unable to find any trace of him, at times in his early life, and has been surprised at it. For a while, Bacon and Shakspere were " two hearts that beat as one." Bacon was then young, poor, and crowded to the lips with thunder and lightning. Was he actually "on the boards" himself, now and then, in a blonde wig and other disguises— partly for money and partly for "deviltry." 1 sus/eci it. But I don't pretend to know it. SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 211 ceremony performed five monihs before he' was blessed with offspring. It was at this time that his name took the picturesque form of " Shag- spere," as twice entered in his marriage bond.* Two or three years later he " absconded frofti Stratford," to elude Sir Lucy's whip, and other legal institutions of his native village. Presently, this promising " poet " turned up in London, as the hostler of a theatre. He cul- tivated, so industriously, the art of holding and stabling horses for gentlemen, that he became a favorite with the public, and was obliged to or- ganize a corps of grooms, who were known as " Will Shaxpere's boys." Thus he became con- nected with " the drama " ; and he rose step by step to be a theatrical stockholder, and a shrewd rich, business manager. To any play, or poem, '■^ with money hi it" he was perfectly willing to attach the honor of his name ; and he " fathered," among various productions, such of the Shake- speare works as were known before his death. f * In the last instance, a pictorial illustration is thrown into the middle of the name, as anyone can see by consultinfj Halliwell- Phillipps, who gives a beautifulyflc j//Kr7i^ of the bond. The wit of Shakspere's contemporaries, and the gravity of his worshipful successors, are in amazing contrast. + Appleton Morgan, the president of The New York Shakes- pere Society, has recently published, in an article abjuring Bacon, the following " list of thirty-six plays known as Shakespeare's dur- ing his lifetime." Seven of these are not in the Shakespeare canon, as it was finally established by the " Folio." But there are still other plays — a variety of them — which the learned Shake- speareans attribute to the " Swan of Avon " ; — 212 THE TALE OF THE Now, according to the logic of the SAax-pert- NamecfPlay. ^'."^ Mention, Record o" Ap- ■^ -^ pearance inFrtni prior to\(i\ti. Love's Labor's Lost Mentioned by Meres, 1598. Antony and ^Cleopatra Entered in Stationer's Register, 1608. Macbeth Mentioned by Forman, 1610. Henry V Quarto, 1600. Twelfth Night Mentioned by Manningham, 1602. As You Lilce It Entered in Stationer's Register, 1608. Troublesome Raine of King John. Quarto, 1591. The Tempest Mentioned by Ben Jonson, in " Bartholemew Fair," in 1614, The Winter's Tale Mentioned by Forman, who saw it performed in 1611. The Contention of York and Lancaster Quarto (now the Henry VI., part 11.) 1594. The True Tragedy of Richard, Duke of York Quarto (now the Henry VI., part III.) 1595. The Merry Wives of Windsor. . .Quarto, 1602. The Taming of a Shrew Quarto, 1594. Romeo and Juliet Quarto, 1597. Titus Andronicus Quarto, 1600 J^'^hardll Quarto, ,608. •^''hardlll Quarto, IS97. A Midsummer Night's Dream... Quarto, 1600. The Merchant of Venice Quarto, 1600 I. Henry the Fourth Quarto, 1598 II. Henry the Fourth Quarto, ,600. °"'^"° Mentioned in diary of Von Ven- derhagan, attach^ of Duke of Wurtemburg, etc., as played at the Globe Theatre, April 30, 1610. ^""""^ Quarto, "W.S." on title page, p • I '^'^' '^"""^^ Qnarto, " William Shakespeare" on title page. Much Ado About. Nothing Quarto, 1600. Troilus and Cressida Quarto, 1609. SHAKSPERE EPITAPH. 21 3 ans* — for these fetish-worshippers should have ,7- ^ n. First Mejition. Record or Ap- Name of Flay. pearance in Frint prior to 1616. Hamlet Quarto, 1603. Lear Quarto, 1608. A Comedy of Errors Mentioned by Meres in 1598. Love's Labour's Won Mentioned by Meres in 1598. The Two Gentlemen of Verona. Mentioned by Meres in 1598. Sir John Oldcastle Quarto, " William Shakespeare," on title page, 1600. Thomas, Lord Cromwell Quarto, '' W. S." on title page, 1613 ; ist ed., 1602. The Puritan Widow Quarto, ** W. S." on title page 1601. The London Prodigal Quarto, "William Shakespeare" on title page, 1605. The Yorkshire Tragedy Quarto, " W. Shakespeare" on title page, 1608. *Mr. W. H. Burr, in his very interesting monograph to which I have referred, classifies twenty-five of the various spellings of the Shakspere name in accordance with dates when they were used. — Shakspere 1558, '62, '63, '64, "66, '6g, '71, '79, 80, '83, '85, '90, '96, 1616, '17. (John Shakspere and all his offspring so registered, except Richard Shakspeer, baptized 1574. Shaxpere 1558, '79,1607, '08. Shakspeyr 1567, (" Mr.," meaning John.) Shakysper 1568, (" Mr, John.") Shackespere 1573, ^89, 1602. Shakespere 1575, '79, '96, '971 '98, '99, 1602, '04, 'oe, '08, '09, '10, 'n,' 13, Shackspere 1579, (Deed. " Joannis Shaxpere-)-.") 1608. Shagspere 1582, (Marriage bond— twice so written,) Shake-scene 1592, (Greene, the playwright, in derision.) Shakespeare 1593-1594, (Poems,) 1596, '98, 1003, '05, '13, (and al- Plays from 1598 to 1623.) Shaksper 1598, '98, 1613, (Signature,) 1616. Shakesper 1598, (Owner of corn.) Shacksper 1598, (Letter from Quiney to Shakspere.) Shakspeare 1601, '03, '07, '12, '13, '14, 1623. Shackespeare 1603, '14, (Agreement.) Shexpere 1604, (Suit for malt sold.) Shaxberd 1604, '05, (Dramatist, Whitehall.) .Shakespear 1605, (Conveyance.) Shakesphear 1605, (Same conveyance.) 214 THE TALE OF THE the precise name, hereafter, for their sect — the runaway butcher and groom * of Stratford, when he fell from the slaughter-house and the stable into authorship and acting, " made himself a motley to the view," his " name received a brand," and his "nature" itself was "almost subdued." Well, perhaps — not 1 But if William could have been injured in that way, Francis, surely, — the " young lord keeper " of Queen Elizabeth, the chum of Southampton, the bosom-friend of Essex, and, with all the rest, the most ambitious lawyer in England, had some pretty good reasons for putting his dramatic recreations under a bushel. His chief reasons were these three : First. He had a good Puritan mother — a fond, devout, cultured woman — strong and deter- mined, too — but aristocratic, as all women are by nature, and necessarily narrow to the view of a son like Francis Bacon. In 1594, she said of her two boys : " I trust they will not mum, nor mask, nor sinfully revel." In the same year Anthony, the elder, moved from Gray's Inn to Bishopgate Street. It was Shackspeare 1608, '12, '14, 'r6. Schackspeare 1612, '14, (Complaint and agreement.) Shakspa 1613, (Signature.) Stiakspear i6i4,{Cousin's letter.) Shaksp * * * 1616, (Signatures to Will. Shaxper 1616, (" Bell and pall for Mr. Shaxpersdawghter, viii. Si.; *< ' f ^H