For private individuals desiring to commu nicate in cipher by letters through the post it is easier to devise a code of 26 letters or signs representing the alphabet. To avoid unauthor ized deciphering of the message, it is advisable not to separate the words into their natural groups of letters; thus instead of arranging the signs or letters representing, say, "Come and see me,* place them in this fashion: corn eandse erne Instead of having a certain sign or letter invariably represent the same letter, it is safer to adopt an arbitrary sentence of 26 letters and place them under the 26 letters of the alphabet. Such a code can easily be carried in the memory. The following example of such a cipher, taken from a book published in London, will explain: ((Hush Money, by Charles H. Ross, Esq." By placing these letters under the alphabet we get H—A; U=B; S=.C; H=D; M--E, and so on. Hence, Ohs ya b sych, oayarsa rr loucys syms, Osrh srore rrhmu h smsmsinah emahyr sums, could only be deciphered by the receiver as Far in a wild, unknown to public view, From youth to age a reverend hermit grew.
Another method, absolutely undecipherable by any "outsider,* is to adopt a method of number ing somewhat as follows: Ignore all vowels, h, y and w, or invent separate signs for them, using these only where absolutely necessary; then replace the consonants with figures like this: L-1; N=2; M=3; R=4; F and V-5; P and B5; T, TH and 1::7 ; SH and CH-8; K and C (hard); S, Z and C (soft). From this
can be made TM RR: "Come and fetch me to-morrow.* This system is specially adapted for writing numbers by words: Ignoring vowels, h, y and w, Kansas200; Srnith37; London-1272; Calif ornia.=91542; 127=cland*; 894=Ixsugar.) The same code can also be used to commit a number of figures to memory: If it is desirable to remember the number 746,527,682; this gives, in code, the letters DRPFNDPSHN. By in serting vowels between these consonants, the sentence can be made, "Drop off and push on.* By mentally repeating the sentence each con sonantal sound suggests a figure, hence 746, 527,682. By using figures for letters and vice versa, the telephone number "Central 3277' would read: "02741 The conso nants must be used phonetically, as in stenog raphy, regarding the in central as The introduction of an occasional "dummy word,' i.e., one not to be reckoned, will serve further to baffle attempts at elucidation. An interesting account of how the cipher dispatches in the Tilden electoral canvass of 1876 were deciph ered by New York journalists is given in The Tribune, 21 Nov. 1878 (Extra No. 44).