Englande Ffrance and Irelande Defender of ye
RRCAHX A FCBHXSJSMOQ LC EIXSBPS XCNO MCLO
Ffaith I Bartholomew da Schorno have made
HXWE EOIBOH BOISBL.
thys Secret Record.
Our excitement knew no bounds. It was, after all, a secret record, and without doubt it referred to the treasure! It is always interesting work to decipher an old document, but more especially so one that no man has been able to read for ages. Imagine yourself for a moment in my place, with a fortune attached to the revelation of that secret!
Old Mr. Staffurth’s voice trembled, as did his thin, white hands. As a palæographist he had at times made some remarkable discoveries while delving in the dusty parchment records of bygone ages, but surely none had ever affected him like this. We were learning the place where a fortune lay hidden.
For close on two hours we worked together incessantly, slowly obtaining the right equivalents of the cipher, but very often making errors in calculation with the puzzling threes. The writing was simple after all, but at the same time difficult to decipher, requiring great care and patience. At length, however, I sat with the whole of the secret revealed before me, written down in plain English, surely one of the most interesting documents among the thousands preserved in the national archives.
The record, which we read and re-read a dozen times with breathless interest, was as follows —
ON THYS TWENTY-FIRST DAYE OF MAYE IN YE FOURE and thirtieth yere of ye Raigne of our Souvrigne Ladie Elizabeth, Quene of Englande Ffrance and Irelande, Defender of ye Ffaith, I Bartholomew da Schorno have made thys secret Record.