riddle, cipher, mask

Looking closer at the criticism of G. P. R. James quoted in the last post, we can't help but notice how trenchantly our Captain of U. S. Dragoons breaks down the plot and characters in the novel by Melville's neighbor. And how all the key terms are exampled in Melville's writings.

"The hero is a lad of seventeen; old enough to fall in love, and but little else. St. Medard is a mere abstraction, De Langy a cipher, Artonne a riddle, Monsieur L. a man in a mask who puts himself in the way sufficiently to give some interesting trouble and help out the plot." --Scenes Beyond the Western Border, Southern Literary Messenger 18 (January 1852): 49; and Scenes and Adventures in the Army. Spelled "cypher" in the 1852 magazine version; "cipher" in the 1857 book version.

LAD OF

"... a lad of about sixteen" (Redburn)

"...a lad of Pierre's own age." (Pierre)

ABSTRACTION

"...far from furnishing an example of the high, humane abstraction; the Pequod’s carpenter was no duplicate…” (Moby-Dick)

“I keep my love for it in the lasting condition of an untried abstraction.” (The Confidence-Man)

A RIDDLE

"His ruminations were a riddle." (Mardi)

“Queequeg in his own proper person was a riddle to unfold.” (Moby-Dick)

"thou wert a riddle to me…” (Pierre)

“In short, the entire ship is a riddle.” (The Confidence-Man)

A CIPHER (CYPHER)

“The captain—a mere cipher—was an invalid in his cabin;” (Omoo)

“that man, to others, too often proves a cipher.” (Mardi)

“He who on all hands passes for a cypher today, if at all remembered hereafter, will be sure to pass for the same.” (Mardi)

IN A MASK

“In a mask, he dodges me.” (Mardi)

“I am the Vailed Persian Prophet; I, the man in the iron mask; I, Junius.” (Mardi)