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CIPHER WRITING 506 CIRCASSIA portant letters were sent by courier, and thus the weightiest secrets were often at the mercy of any one inclined to be dis- honest. Hence there came into extensive use the art of writing in cipher, called also cryptography, from two Greek words kpvtttSs, "secret," and ypd<peiv, "to write," Under this term are included all private alphabets, or systems of characters for the safe transmission of secrets. A fig- ured cipher is one in which the letters of the alphabet are numbered, and these numbers compose the cryptogram. To insure secrecy it is, of course, necessary that the particular series of numbers chosen shall be known only to those who use the cipher. Another plan consists in choosing a certain book — a dictionary ap- pears to have been the favorite — and by a simple citation of the number of the page, of the column, and of the line, sentences were constructed, the key to which was extremely difficult of discovery by one not in the secret. The opening years of the second half of the 19th century found the world in amazement over the then recent inven- tion of telegraphy. Immediately a new want made itself felt. Secrecy had been sacrificed at the shrine of speed. If the mail was slow, it afforded privacy, but the contents of a telegraphic message are of necessity known to others besides the sender and the receiver. So the diplo- mat, the banker, and the merchant soon began to send cipher dispatches. It was quickly discovered, however, that existing methods of Cipher Writing were un- adapted to telegraphy; the costliness of the new invention necessitated brevity; and thus it was not long before there went whirling over the wire messages of 10 words that, properly deciphered, in- cluded from 30 to 50. A great proportion of commercial mes- sages are similar in their terms, and hence it is that a single word represent- ing three or four words in frequent use is the plan on which our present cable ciphers are based, whereby there is an- nually a large saving in expense. Then, too, as trade increased and competition became fierce, every firm wanted its own cipher-system, distinct from any used by other houses in the same business; and reflection will enable us to appreciate the vast number of separate ciphers in use in a great commercial center like New York City. Therefore, in course of time, the preparation of cipher systems for mer- chants and others using the telegraph largely came to be a regular calling. At one of these offices a person may be accommodated with a code of from 50 to 5,000 words. Most of these codes are al- phabetically arranged in parallel columns, like shipping signals — the English words and phrases in one column, and their cipher equivalents in another. The cipher codes of the State Depart- ment at Washington are frequently changed. The special code is intrusted to the personal custody of diplomatic offi- cials embarking on a mission, who retain possession of it and destroy it if their lives are endangered. CIRCASSIA, or TCHERKESSIA, a mountainous region in the S. E. of Euro- pean Russia, lying chiefly on the N. slope of the Caucasus, partly also on the S., and bounded on the W. by the Black Sea. Since the Russian revolution this terri- tory forms part of the republics of Kuban and Georgia. The mountains, of which the culminating heights are those of Mount Elbruz, are intersected every- where with steep ravines and clothed with thick forests, and the territory is principally drained by the Kuban and its tributaries. Its climate is temperate, its inhabitants healthy and long-lived. The people call themselves Adighe, the name Tcherkess (robbers) being of Tartar origin. They are divided into several tribes speaking widely-different dialects. While they retained their independence their government was of a patriarchal character, but every free Circassian had the right of expressing his opinion in the assemblies. They possessed none but traditional annals and laws. Polygamy was permissible in theory, but not com- mon. The duties of hospitality and vengeance were alike binding, and a Spartan morality existed in the matter of theft. Their religion, which is nomi- nally Moslem, is in many cases a jumble of Christian, Jewish, and heathen tradi- tions and ceremonies. As a race the Circassians are comely, the men being prized by the Russians as warriors, and the women by the Turks as mistresses, a position generally desired by the women themselves. The early history of Circassia is ob- scure. Between the 10th and 13th cen- turies it formed a portion of the empire of Georgia, but in 1424 the Circassians were an independent people, and at war with the Tartars of the Cfrimea, to whose khans, however, some were occasionally tributary. In 1705 the Tartars were de- feated in a decisive battle, but shortly after the territorial encroachments of the Russians on the Caucasian regions began, and in 1829 the country was formally annexed by them. A heroic resistance was made by the Circassians under their leader Schamyl, and on being reduced to submission numbers of the inhabitants emigrated to the Turkish provinces. In the N. and E., however, tribes of the Cir-