top of page

Plain Text

 

The Plain text underlying the cipher (with my punctuation added for the sake of clarity) is:

 

Part 1 (38 chars)

Forle Malv'rn. Aliss hath Edwareo met stake tuT

 

Part 2 (49 chars)

P eighty six. Wed at Brompton Ora C. Cry rane pfog ufeletharge

 

Explanatory notes:

 

1. Forle Malv'rn

The correct spelling is Forli, the house in Malvern that the Elgars were renting at the time the message is said to have been written

Here the e is a cue letter and tells the intended recipient how to correctly set up the Key text - only the F,O,R,L are significant in Part 1.

 

2. Aliss hath Edwareo met stake tuT P eighty six

Trans: Alice had met Edward as his piano tutee in '86

Alice used the name Eduardo - abbreviated to Edu; the e is another naughty E (probably cueing the next letter 'O', which is the 2nd letter of the message-setting phrase)

Michael Kennedy, in his 'Portrait of Elgar' (OUP 1968), notes on p23 that Alice had become one of Elgar's Malvern pianoforte pupils on 6 October 1886; and on p24 adds that 'it is not known exactly when they first met but from 1886 onwards her friends noticed a marked increase in her musical activities, especially in her piano playing'

 

3. Wed at Brompton Ora C. (the dot or period follows cipher char 65)

C.= a cryptic crossword clue abbreviation, C=Conservative or Tory - hence, Brompton Oratory, where the Elgars were wed in 1889

 

4. Cry rane pfog ufeletharge

Cry (='Sounds' or 'heard as' - again, as in a crossword-like clue) rain, pea* fog, you feel lethargy - a brief comment on the weather and its depressing effects

* in Victorian times, thick smog resulting from air pollution was a common occurrence in London - and was often referred to as a pea-souper because of the yellowish or greenish hue of the swirling fog (caused by the presence of the poisonous gas sulphur dioxide)

 

 

bottom of page