Fun with Baconian Ciphers
15) Being alerted to possible clues in the text to a hidden signature earlier researchers knew that a number or the word ‘name’ or ‘count’ can indicate that one of Bacon’s significant numbers is very close by. In the ‘Rossilion’ candidate we have the words ‘name’ and ‘count’ together along with the number ‘one’.
Now in the play Twelfth Night, soon after Act 1, Scene 4 begins, on page 257 of the Comedies, in the first column, we have this exchange:
Enter Duke, Curio, and AttendantsVio. I thanke you: heere comes the Count.
Duke. Who saw Cesario, hoa?
Now, the word “count”, or “Count” as the title of a character is used often in the plays. There’s no suggestion that each one would be a signal of some cipher or code. It’s just that sometimes the text is such that it seems to hint at this and so stands out from other instances. Here, the line count reveals nothing, but the name Cesario, being emphasized with “Who saw….” appeared to be the best place to test. This question of "seeing" the person whose identity is in question is similar to the earlier example in which we found "His face I know not". In this case, the simple count for “Cesario” is 67, the same count as for “Francis” in the simple alphabet. This finding wasn’t identified by earlier Baconians, nor was the Count Rossillion example but searching through the options with the key word ‘count’ led to them as promising candidates. To judge whether or not they are unlikely to be by coincidence we need to look at more examples.