I had a free hour before me.

Why not employ it in an endeavor to pick out the meaning of those odd Hebraic characters?
I had in a way received her sanction to do so--if I could; and if I should succeed, what shadows might it not clear from the path of the good man whose interests it was my chief duty to consult?
Ciphers have always possessed a fascination for me.

This one, from the variety of its symbols, offered a study of unusual interest.

Collecting the stray specimens which I had picked up, I sat down in my cozy little room and laid them all out before me, with the following result: __________________________ [transcriber's note: the symbols cannot be converted to ASCII so I have shown them as follows:] [] is a Square [-] is sides and bottom of a square, C is top, bottom and left side of a square, L is left side and bottom of a square,, V is two lines forming a V shape.

appearing before a symbol should be inside the symbol ) appearing before a symbol means the mirror image of that symbol ^ appearing before a symbol means the inverted symbol ?
is a curve inside the symbol all other preceding symbols are my best approximation for shapes shown inside that symbol.
; is used to separate each symbol __________________________ 1.