University of Virginia Library

TWO STRIKING CRYPTOGRAMS

At this juncture it will be necessary to allude momentarily to the well-nigh moribund and altogether tiresome Bacon-

Shakespeare controversy — not to establish any truth of history, but to point a way out to misguided enthusiasts who, in their efforts to filch the poet's good name, find themselves deeply floundering in cryptogrammic mire.

Remembering that surnames were in many instances derived from occupations followed by their owners, we find the King in "Hamlet" saying:

Again, this is from "King Lear":

These fateful lines contain two transparent cryptograms, wherein the real author's name is so thinly veiled that he who runs may read, swift Baconite though he be. It requires no arbitrary juggling with figures, no biliteral alphabets, no devious approaches by ways that are dark and tricks that are vain to show from these two passages that "Shakebeard" (Shakberd-Shaxberd-Shakespeare) is the only genuine "concealed poet," the mighty master who was not of an age but for all time.

Here is a revelation that shines like a good deed in a naughty world. In an instant, in the twinkling of an eye, as it were, the foundations of the flimsy Baconian structure are swept away, and the edifice, built up with so much care by its ingenious architects, vanishes like the baseless fabric of a vision, leaving not a rack behind.

After reading George Meredith's "Shaving of Shagpat," Dante Gabriel Rossetti declared that he was strongly reminded of Shakespeare. No doubt the suggestive alliteration of the title had something to do with the remark, but Rossetti had probably been already convinced that Shakespeare was a barber, after carefully studying the cumulative evidence of the plays. It is significant that "Shagpat" so closely resembles "Shagsper," one of the variant spellings of the poet's name.