24 Hincks on Secret Writing. 



alphabet, accompanied by the several vowel points that may 

 belong to them, would also aiFord an amply sufficient number 

 of characters ; but the difficulty of dictation by the person 

 holding the key to his amanuensis, is no small objection to 

 the use of these. A friend of mine has composed a cipher con- 

 sisting of nine radical characters, those composing the well- 

 known figure i^ ,) which, with one, two, three, or more points at 

 pleasure, above, below, or in the body of the character, com- 

 pose a sufficient variety of symbols for any purpose ; but the 

 last-mentioned objection applies with even greater force to this 

 system. Besides, the use of any of tliese sets of symbols, and 

 especially of the two last, requires very complex characters to 

 be frequently written ; while, at the same time, it affords none 

 of that additiojial secrecy, which the employment of professedly 

 complex characters will often confer on a cipher. I shall return 

 to the consideration of this additional secrecy. I now proceed 

 to describe some of the principal ways in which cipherers "have 

 sought to procure a multiplicity of symbols, by combining to- 

 gether characters of a few different kinds. The varieties of the 

 complex symbol will always be in number that power of the 

 number of varieties in each part, whose exponent is the number 

 of parts. In Lord Bacon's cipher there were five parts, and 

 two varieties only in each part. This gave for the number of 

 symbols 32, the fifth power of 2. In the line writing, (Plate 2, 

 Cyclopjedia, Art. Cipher,) there are three positions of the line, 

 and three lines to a symbol, which gives 27 symbols. In the dot 

 writing, (plate 3,) four dots composing a symbol, we have 81 

 symbols. Symbols composed of two letters are in number 676 ; 

 if with the letters be mingled a point, as Mr. Blair has done, 

 there will be formed 729 different symbols, the square of 27 ; 

 and so in other cases. To commence with Lord Bacon's cipher. 

 From the smallness of the number of possible symbols, 32, (of 

 which, if my memory do not fail me, but 26, or 24, were in 

 use,) it is plain that his lordship looked to elude the vigilance, 

 rather than to defy the skill, of a decipherer. His professed 

 object, if 1 recollect rightly, (but I have no access at present to 

 his work,) was to express omnia per otnnia, that is, to write 



