BACONIAN CYPHER.
To the Editor of the Times:
Sir:—Prompted by Mr. Marston’s letter, one of your leader writers makes an insinuation against Mrs. Gallup “which gallantry forbids us to state.”
The lady, unlike R. L. Stevenson, is alive and able to deal with innuendos of this sort.
That Pope had access to the MS. of Lord Bacon’s version is not unlikely, or that he saw an earlier deciphering from theAnatomy. Both Rawley and Ben Jonson were alive in 1628 and wrote the Cipher.
Apart from this, the phrases in the passage in question which are common to both poets were not new at the date Pope wrote.
“Silver fountain” is in the Shakespeare Play ofRichard II., Act 5, Sc. 3; “hoary-headed” inMidsummer Night’s Dream, Act 2, Sc. 1; and “Titan rays” inTitus Andronicus, Act 1, Sc. 2.
May I humbly correct your “leader”?
The Cipher not only mentions a marriage ceremony in the Tower, but a ceremony in September after the death of Dudley’s wife, at a time when, according to Mother Dowe, of Brentwood (see “Calendar of State Papers for August, 1560”), marriage was very necessary.
The Cipher does not say it took Francis four decades of interval to get over his affection for Margaret of Navarre, but that: “Not until four decades or eight lustres o’ life were outlived did I take any other to my sore heart. Then I married”—that is to say, did not marry until after his 40th year.
If Mr. Marston had imitated the caution of Mr. W. H. Mallock, instead of rushing into print directly he believed himself in a position to impugn Mrs. Gallup’sbona fides, your leader writer would have been less fluttered.
Yours obediently,Parker Woodward.
King-street, Nottingham.