on the arrangement of the matter on the pages of that first Folio of 1623, took pains to see that the printers, in reprinting the Plays, copied the exact arrangement of the text found in that Folio of 1623. It is not within the human possibilities that any printer, unless peremptorily instructed so to do, would or could repeat the arrangement of the matter found in the first Folio:— with three hundred words in one column and six hundred in another; with the stage directions, as I have shown, in one case taking up two or three inches of space, and in another crowded into the corner of a speech of one of the characters. And on either supposition that all the editions were really printed in 1623, from the same type; or that the printing of the editions of 1632 and 1664 was supervised and directed by some intelligent person with a purpose; -on either supposition, I say, it shows there was some mystery about that first Folio. Surely Heminge and Condell would not print copies of the Folio in 1623 to be put forth forty-one years thereafter; and surely no person in 1632 or 1664 would insist on repeating the exact arrangement of type in the edition of 1623, if he did not know that there was something of importance attached to and depending on that arrangement. But, after the edition of 1664, that directing intelligence had passed away, and the Plays were left to take their natural course; and hence the folio edition of 1685 departed altogether from the standard set by the 1623 Folio; and ever after, until we reach the modern era of fac-similes, the arrangement of every edition as to paging, etc., has been utterly unlike that of the first Folio. Francis Bacon was determined that his name and writings should not perish from the face of the earth; hence in his will he left especial directions that copies of his philosophical works should be presented to all the great libraries then in existence; and with the same profound prevision he may have arranged with Sir Thomas Meutis, Harry Percy, Sir Tobie Matthew and other friends, who were doubtless in the secret of the Cipher, that editions should be put forth after his death, with the same arrangement of the text, on which the Cipher depended, so as to increase the chances of the work continuing to exist and of the Cipher being found out. 939 VII. IN CONCLUSION. But it must be a source of gratification to the countrymen of Francis Bacon, if the wreath of immortal glory is to be taken from the head of Shakspere and placed on the brow of another, that there was one Englishman with sagacity enough to look through the illusions so cunningly constructed around the subject, and perceive the hidden truth, as early as any other; and that for the first steps of this great revelation they are not altogether indebted to foreigners. It must be the hope of all men that this patriarch may long live, in hale old age, to enjoy the honors justly belonging to him. It was my intention to have given, in this work, Miss Bacon's famous Putnam's Magazine article in full and also Mr. Smith's original letter to the Earl of Ellesmere, but I find my book already too large, and I am reluctantly constrained to omit them. I would say in conclusion that I possess copies of the original essays, and I consider them worth a good deal more than their weight in gold. I CHAPTER III. THE BACONIANS. I count myself in nothing else so happy Richard II., ii, 3. AM sure that if the spirit of Francis Bacon could stand at my side and speak, it would say: "In the day of my rehabilitation let not those who have maintained my cause be forgotten; do you justice to the clear heads and kind hearts that have labored to bring me to the possession of my They have endured abuse and mockery for my sake: let own. them be set right in the eyes of mankind." In this spirit I have given the two preceding chapters; in this spirit I shall briefly refer to a few of the leading advocates of the theory that Francis Bacon wrote the Plays. I. WILLIAM D. O'CONNOR. The first book ever published, subsequent to the utterances of Delia Bacon and William Henry Smith, in which the Baconian theory was advocated, was a work published in 1860, entitled Harrington: A Story of True Love. By William D. O'Connor. Boston: Thayer and Eldridge. 12mo, pp. 558. I quote from Mr. Wyman's Bibliography' the following extracts, descriptive of this book: Hawthorne, in his Recollections of a Gifted Woman (title 27), says of Miss Bacon's book: I believe it has been the fate of this remarkable book never to have had more than a single reader. But since my return to America, a young man of genius and Bacon-Shakespeare Bibliog., p. 23. enthusiasm has assured me that he has positively read the book from beginning to end, and is completely a convert to its doctrines. It belongs to him, therefore, and not to me-whom, in almost the last letter that I received from her, she declared unworthy to meddle with her work—it belongs surely to this one individual, who has done her so much justice as to know what she wrote, to place Miss Bacon in her due position before the public and posterity. The "young man " referred to (in 1863) is the author of this novel. The story itself is of the times of the Fugitive Slave Law. Mr. O'Connor introduces his own Baconian theories through the dialogue of his title-hero, Harrington. He also renders an acknowledgment to Miss Bacon as their source, in a note at the end of the book: The reader of the twelfth chapter of this book may already have observed that Harrington, if he had lived, would have been a believer in the theory regarding the origin and purpose of the Shakespearean drama, as developed in the admirable work by Miss Delia Bacon, entitled, The Philosophy of Shakespeare's Plays Unfolded, in which belief I should certainly agree with Harrington. I wish it were in my power to do even the smallest justice to that mighty and eloquent volume, whose masterly comprehension and insight, though they could not save it from being trampled upon by the brutal bison of the English press, yet lift it to the dignity, whatever may be its faults, of being the best work ever composed upon the Baconian or Shakespearean writings. It has been scouted by the critics as the product of a distempered ideal. Perhaps it is. "But there is a prudent wisdom," says Goethe, and there is a wisdom that does not remind us of prudence;" and, in like manner, I may say that there is a sane sense, and there is a sense that does not remind us of sanity. At all events, I am assured that the candid and ingenuous reader Miss Bacon wishes for, will find it more to his profit to be insane with her, on the subject of Shakespeare, than sane with Dr. Johnson. A personal friend of Mr. O'Connor has, at my request, written for me the following interesting account of his life: WILLIAM DOUGLAS O'CONNOR has long been known as one of the most earnest and determined of the Baconians. He was born in Boston, Massachusetts, in 1833. His earliest aspiration was to be an artist, and several years of his youth were devoted to the life of the studio. Finding, at length, his projected art career impracticable, he applied himself to business occupations for a living, keeping an eye meanwhile on literature as a possible profession, and maintaining the habit of an omnivorous reader. His early days witnessed the memorable deepening of the anti-slavery struggle, and he was one of many who threw themselves into the gallant movement of resistance to the Slave Power, which then shook the Northern centers, and had a notable arena in his native city. In 1851 he became associate editor of the Free Soil newspaper in Boston, The Commonwealth, and took an active personal part in the stirring scenes of the place and period, such as the rendition of Burns. The eventual suspension of The Commonwealth caused his migration to Philadelphia, where from 1854 to 1860 he was connected editorially with a weekly journal of large circulation, The Saturday Evening Post. In 1861 he became Corresponding Clerk of the Lighthouse Board at Washington, of which in 1873 he became Chief Clerk. He resigned in 1874 and became Librarian of the Treasury. A year later he entered the Life-Saving Service, then extremely contracted in its functions, and an appendage of the Bureau of Revenue Marine. Under the able management of Mr. Sumner J. Kimball, it gradually expanded, until in 1878 it was formally organized by law as a separate establishment, thus entering upon the career of splendid usefulness which is known to the whole country; and Mr. O'Connor was promoted to the responsible position of its Assist |