The Little Cryptogram:
A Literal Application to the Play of Hamlet of the Cipher System of MR. IGNATIUS DONNELLY.
By J. GILPIN PYLE, Assistant Editor of The Saint Paul Pioneer Press.
“As I do live by foode, I met a foole,
When I did heare
The motley Foole, thus morall on the time,
My Lungs began to crow like Chanticleere,
That Fooles should be so deepe contemplative;
And I did laugh, sans intermission,
An houre by his diall. Oh noble foole,
A worthy foole: Motley’s the onely weare.”
AS YOU LIKE IT: II., 7.
Saint Paul.
The Pioneer Press Co.
1888.
Copyright, 1888.
BY J. GILPIN PYLE.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
Author’s Note.
A considerable portion of the contents of thesepages appeared first as an editorial article in thePioneer Press. By request of many friends, thispractical application of Mr. Donnelly’s cipher systemto six pages of Hamlet is presented, revisedand enlarged, to the general public.
J. G. P.
The Little Cryptogram.
“The Great Cryptogram,” the monumentalwork in which Mr. Ignatius Donnelly essaysto prove that the so-called Shakespeare playscontain a cipher story, discoverable by a systemwhich he has worked out with infinite labor, isat last in the hands of an expectant public. Nobook so thoroughly advertised has appeared formany a year. For months and months the eyehas been assailed by paragraphs and pages in theliterature of two worlds, contending for or againstthe existence in the Shakespeare plays of a cipherthat would assign the honor of their authorshipto Lord Bacon. It has been admitted on all sides,and declared by Mr. Donnelly himself, that theappearance of this volume would rid the world ofa delusion forever, and stamp the successful explorerof the mystery with undying fame, or write[6]him down as the most daring and stupendous literaryfraud that all the ages have produced. Theauthor has challenged the test. It is his due thatthe results of his labor should have a candid andimpartial investigation.
Those who are interested in knowing whether“The Great Cryptogram” is a record of discoveryor a record of ingenious and plausible inventionmay pass quickly over the first book of thevolume, which deals with “The Argument,” becausein this Mr. Donnelly does not lay claim tooriginality. It is devoted to a careful and systematicmarshaling of the circumstantial evidenceused in the past to prove that the historical Shakespearedid not write the plays commonly ascribedto him. There is, as every literary man knows, agreat deal of evidence that will pass muster underthis head. There is an inconsistency between suchfragments of a life of Shakespeare as have comedown to us, and the experiences and the acquirementswhich we should declare indispensable tothe writing of that matchless drama