Transcription: The professor then read out to me a list of letters, taking a letter at a time from each column, which I then wrote down. But it still makes no sense, he cried. I took up the execrable puzzle and tried every imaginable way of grouping the letters. It was enough to drive one mad. My eyes strained with looking at the parchment. I was stifling. I wanted air. I fanned myself with the document, seeing first the back and then the front. my surprise when suddenly I clearly made out Latin words. I had discovered the secret. All you had to do to understand the document was to read it backwards. Uncle, ...
