Anagrams are curious and frequently clever examples of formal literary trifling. Camden, in his “Remains,” gave to the world a treatise showing that in his day anagrams were endowed with an undue and superstitious importance, being regarded as nothing less than the occult and mysterious finger of Fate, revealed in the names of men.
“The only quintessence,” says this old writer, “that hitherto the alchemy of wit could draw out of names, isanagrammatismeormetagrammatisme, which is the dissolution of a name, truly written, into the letters as its elements, and a new connection of it by artificial transposition, without addition, subtraction, or change of any letter, into different words, making some perfect sense applicable to the person named.” Precise anagrammatists adhere strictly to these rules, with the exception of omitting or retaining the letterhaccording to their convenience, alleging thathcannot claim the rights of a letter; others, again, think it no injury sometimes to useeforæ,vforw,sforz,cfork, and contrariwise, and several of the instances which follow will be found variously imperfect. Camden calls the charming difficulty of making an anagram, “the whetstone of patience to them that shall practise it; for some have been seen to bite their pen, scratch their head, bend their brows, bite their lips, beat the board, tear their paper, when the names were fair for somewhat, and caught nothing therein,—yet, notwithstanding the sour sort of critics, good anagrams yield a delightful comfort and pleasant motion to honest minds.”
Camden places the origin of the anagram as far back as the time of Moses, and conjectures that it may have had some share in the mystical traditions, afterwards called the “Cabala,” communicated by the Jewish lawgiver. One part of the art of the cabalists lay in what they calledthemuru—that is, changing—or finding the hidden and mystical meaning in names, which they did by transposing and fantastically combining the letters in those names. Thus of the letters of Noah’s name in Hebrew they madeGrace, and of the Messiah’sHe shall rejoice. Whether the above origin be theoretical or not, the anagram can betraced to the age of Lycophron, a Greek writer, who flourished about 300B.C.
Among the moderns, the French have most cultivated the anagram. Camden says: “They exceedingly admire the anagram, for the deep and far-fetched antiquity and mystical meaning therein. In the reign of Francis the First (when learning began to revive), they began to distil their wits therein.” There is a curious anecdote of an anagrammatist who presented a king of France with the two following upon his name of Bourbon:
That is, “Bourbon good to the world;” or “Bourbon destitute of good;” while on another celebrated Frenchman we have—
Southey, in his “Doctor,” says that “anagrams are not likely ever again to hold so high a place among the prevalent pursuits of literature as they did in the seventeenth century. But no person,” he continues, “will ever hit upon an apt one without feeling that degree of pleasure with which any oddcoincidence is remarked.” In that century, indeed, the artifice appears to have become the fashionable literary passion of the day—the amusement of the learned and the wise, who sought
While Andreas Rudiger was yet a student at college, and intending to become a physician, he one day pulled the Latinised form of his name to pieces, Andreas Rudigeras, and borrowing ani, transposed it intoArare Rus Dei Dignus(“Worthy to cultivate the land of God”). He fancied from this that he had a divine call to become an ecclesiastic, and thereupon gave up the study of medicine for theology. Soon after, Rudiger became tutor in the family of the philosopher Thomasius, who one day told him “that he would greatly benefit the journey of his life by turning it towards physic.” Rudiger confessed that his tastes lay rather in that direction than to theology, but having looked upon the anagram of his name as an indication of a divine call, he had not dared to turn away from theology. “How simple you have been,” replied Thomasius; “it is just that very anagram which calls you towards medicine—‘Rus Dei,’ the landof God (God’s acre), what is that but the cemetery—and who labours so bravely for the cemetery as a physician does?” Rudiger could not resist this, returned to medicine, and became famous as a physician.
An anagram on Monk, afterwards Duke of Albemarle on the restoration of Charles II., forms also a chronogram, including the date of the event it records—
In this anagram thectakes the place of thek.
The old Puritan biographer, Cotton Mather, claims for John Wilson—the subject of one of his lives—the kingship of anagrammatising. “Of all the anagrammatisers,” he says in the third book of his “Magnalia Christi Americana,” “that have been trying their fancies for the 2000 years that have run out since the days of Lycophron, or the more than 5000 since the days of our first father, I believe there never was a man that made so many, or so nimbly, as our Mr. Wilson; who, together with his quick turns upon the names of his friends, would ordinarilyfetch, and rather thanlose, would evenforce, devout instructions out ofhis anagrams. As one, upon hearing my father (Increase Mather) preach, Mr. Wilson immediately gave him that anagram upon his name ‘Crescentius Matherus,’Eu! Christus Merces Tua(Lo! Christ is thy reward). There would scarcely occur the name of any remarkable person without an anagram raised thereupon.”
This said John Wilson “forced instruction” out of his own name—first rendering it into Latin, Johannes Wilsonus, he found this anagram in it, “In uno Jesu nos salvi” (We are saved in one Jesus). This mode of Latinising names was common enough among those who liked this literary folly; thus we have Sir Robert Viner, or Robertus Vinerus, rendered “Vir Bonus et Rarus” (a good and rare man). The disciples of Descartes made a perfect anagram upon the Latinised name of their master, “Renatus Cartesius,” one which not only takes up every letter, but which also expresses their opinion of that master’s speciality—“Tu scis res naturæ” (Thou knowest the things of nature).
Pierre de St. Louis became a Carmelite monk on discovering that his name yielded a direction to that effect:
And, in the seventeenth century, André Pujom, finding that his name spelledPendu à Riom, fulfilled his destiny by cutting somebody’s throat in Auvergne, and was actually hung at Riom, the seat of justice in that province.
Occasionally when the anagram of a name did not make sense, there was added a rhyme to bring out a meaning. Thus, in a sermon preached by Dr. Edward Reynolds upon Peter Whalley, and entitled “Death’s Advantage,” every letter of the name is to be found in the first line of this verse:
In this sermon Peter Whalley is also anagrammatised intoA Whyte Perle—this would not be a bad one, if orthography were of as little consequence as many of the old triflers in this way used to account it.
We read that when Alexander the Great was baffled before the walls of Tyre, and was about to raise the siege, he had a dream wherein he saw a satyr leaping about and trying to seize him. He consulted his sages, who read in the word Satyrus (the Greek for satyr), “Sa Tyrus”—“Tyre isthine!” Encouraged by this interpretation, Alexander made another assault and carried the city.
In a “New Help to Discourse” (London, 1684), there is one with a very quaint exposition:
Toast—A Sott.
It will be seen, however, that anagrams have chiefly been made upon proper names, and a reversing of their letters may sometimes pay the owner a compliment; as of the poet Waller:
George Thompson, the well-known anti-slavery advocate, was at one time solicited to go into parliament for the more efficient serving of the cause he had so much at heart. The question whether he would comply with this request or not was submitted to his friends, and one of them gave the following for answer:
This clever instance was given in “Notes and Queries” a short time ago:
The following are additional instances.
When, at the General Peace of 1814, Prussia absorbed a portion of Saxony, the king issued a new coinage of rix dollars, with their German name,Ein Reichstahler, impressed on them. The Saxons, by dividing the word,Ein Reich stahl er, made a sentence of which the meaning is, “He stole a kingdom!”
A good one is—
If we take from the words,La Revolution Française, the wordveto, known as the first prerogative of Louis XIV., the remaining letters will form “Un Corse la finira”—A Corsican shall end it, and this may be regarded as an extraordinary coincidence, if nothing more. Many anagrams were made upon the name of Napoleon by superstitious persons, as—
A very apt anagram is the one founded upon—Sir Edmundbury Godfrey,I find murdered by rogues.
Evil.
The following are very apposite—
Acrostic is the Greek name given to a poem the first letters of the lines in which taken together form a complete word or sentence, but most frequently a name. The invention of this kind of composition cannot be traced to any particular individual, but it is believed to have originated on the decline of pure classic literature. The early French poets, from the time of Francis I. to that of Louis XIV., practised it, but it was carried to its greatest perfection by the Elizabethan poets. Sir John Davies has no fewer than twenty-six poems entitled “Hymns to Astræa,” every one of which is an acrostic on the words, “Elizabetha Regina.” Traces of something akin are to be found in the poetry of the Jews,—for example, the 119th Psalm,—and also in the Greek “Anthology.” Here it may be noted that in Greek the wordAdamis compounded of the initial letters of the four cardinal points:
and that the Hebrew word, ADM forms the acrostic of A[dam], D[avid], M[essiah].
It is hardly necessary to give many specimens of this kind of literary composition in these days, since there are so many periodicals continually giving acrostics and relative verses, and a very few instances may suffice. The following old verses were originally written in a copy of Parkhurst’s poems presented by the author to Thomas Buttes, who himself wrote this acrostic on his own name:
A Song of Rejoysing for the Prosperous Reigne of our most Gratious Soveraigne Lady, Queene Elizabeth.
The next is from Planché’s “Songs and Poems:”
To Beatrice.
Mdlle. Rachel was the recipient of the most delicate compliment the acrostic has ever been employed to convey. A diadem was presented to her, so arranged that the initial of the name of eachstone was also the initial of one of her principalrôles, and in their order formed her name—
The following is an ingenious combination of acrostic and telestic combined:
Edgar A. Poe was the author of a complicated poem of this class, in which the first letter in the lady’s name is the first in the first line; the second, second in the second line; the third, third in the third line, and so on—
A Valentine.
(Frances Sargent Osgood.)
There are some clever lines which illustrate this style on the Bunker Hill Monument celebration:
Prince Charles after Culloden.
An Animal Alphabet.
Of affected alliteration as used by modern poets, there is a very good imitation of Swinburne’s style in Bayard Taylor’s “Diversions of the Echo Club,”[9]where Galahad chants “in rare and rhythmic redundancy, the viciousness of virtue:”
The Lay of Macaroni.
The above reminds of the anecdote told of Mrs. Crawford, who is said to have written one line of her “Kathleen Mavourneen,” on purpose to confound the Cockney warblers, who would sing it—
and again, in Moore’s “Ballad Stanzas”:
Or—
In the number of “Society” for April 23, 1881, there appeared several excellent specimens of alliterative verse, in compliance with a competition instituted by that paper for certain prizes—the selected verses all begin with the letterb:
Mr. Swinburne, of whose style there has been given an imitation, is not the only poet who is prone to alliteration—in fact, all poets are given more or less to it, though not to the same extent. When used excessively it is as disagreeable as any other excess, yet its occasional use unquestionably adds to grace and style.
Pope says on this point in the following lines, which are also alliterative—
We find this example in Tennyson:
Crabbe also used this ornament profusely, as:
Take also this from Shelley’s “Ode to a Skylark:”
In the numbers of “Truth” for November 1881, there appeared a variety of excellent examples of alphabetic verses in the course of a competition, and of these there follows one:
A Yacht Alphabet.
The following lines have been kindly sent us by Professor E. H. Palmer, who wrote them after a cruise on a friend’s yacht, and are an abortive attempt to get up a knowledge of nautical terms.
The Shipwreck.
Mr. Charles G. Leland sends the following, with the remark that he thinks the lines “the finest and daintiest nonsense” he ever read:
A short time ago in the new series ofHousehold Words, a prize was offered for the writing of Nonsense Verses of eight lines. Of the lines sent in by the competitors we give three specimens:
The curious style of some versifiers has been well imitated in the following
Ballad of the Period.
W. S. Gilbert has some verses which are true nonsense, of which this is one:
Mr. Lewis Carroll’s “Hunting of the Snark”[10]is a very curious little book, full of the most delicate fun and queer nonsense, with delightful illustrations. It gives an account of how a Bellman, Boots, Barrister, Broker, Billiard-marker, Banker, Beaver, Baker, and Butcher go a-hunting after a mythical Beast called a “Snark.” It is difficult to detach a passage for quotation, but the following few lines will show how the “Quest of the Snark” was purposed to be carried on:
The verses which follow are from the “Comic Latin Grammar,” and if they are not nonsense they show at least how thin the partition line is between true nonsense verse and many of those pieces which were wont to be known by the name of Album Verses:
Lines by a Fond Lover.
The reading of Lope de Vega’s five novels, in each of which a different vowel is omitted, led to Lord Holland writing the following curious production, in which no vowel is used bute:
Eve’s Legend.