My “Memoria Technica” is a modification of Gray’s; but, whereas he used both consonants and vowels to represent digits, and had to content himself with a syllable of gibberish to represent the date or whatever other number was required, I use only consonants, and fill in with vowels ad libitum, and thus can always manage to make a real word of whatever has to be represented.

    The principles on which the necessary 20 consonants have
    been chosen are as follows:—­

    1. “b” and “c,” the first two consonants in the alphabet.

    2. “d” from “duo,” “w” from “two.”

    3. “t” from “tres,” the other may wait awhile.

    4. “f” from “four,” “q” from “quattuor.”

    5. “l” and “v,” because “l” and “v” are the Roman symbols
       for “fifty” and “five.”

    6. “s” and “x” from “six.”

    7. “p” and “m” from “septem.”

    8. “h” from “huit,” and “k” from the Greek “okto.”

    9. “n” from “nine”; and “g” because it is so like a “9.”

    0. “z” and “r” from “zero.”

    There is now one consonant still waiting for its digit,
    viz., “j,” and one digit waiting for its consonant, viz.,
    “3,” the conclusion is obvious.

    The result may be tabulated thus:—­

|1  |2  |3  |4  |5  |6  |7  |8  |9  |0  |

|b  |d  |t  |f  |l  |s  |p  |h  |n  |z  |
|c  |w  |j  |q  |v  |x  |m  |k  |g  |r  |

When a word has been found, whose last consonants represent the number required, the best plan is to put it as the last word of a rhymed couplet, so that, whatever other words in it are forgotten, the rhyme will secure the only really important word.

    Now suppose you wish to remember the date of the discovery
    of America, which is 1492; the “1” may be left out as
    obvious; all we need is “492.”

    Write it thus:—­

      4 9 2
      f n d
      q g w

    and try to find a word that contains “f” or “q,” “n” or “g,”
    “d” or “w.”  A word soon suggests itself—­“found.”

    The poetic faculty must now be brought into play, and the
    following couplet will soon be evolved:—­

      “Columbus sailed the world around,
      Until America was F O U N D.”

    If possible, invent the couplets for yourself; you will
    remember them better than any others.

    June, 1888.

The inventor found this “Memoria Technica” very useful in helping him to remember the dates of the different Colleges.  He often, of course, had to show his friends the sights of Oxford, and the easy way in which, asked or unasked, he could embellish his descriptions with dates used to surprise those who did not know how the thing was done.  The couplet for St. John’s College ran as follows:—­

      “They must have a bevel
      To keep them so LEVEL.”