One of the more cunning and effective codebreakers of the seventeenth century was a Belgian countess named Alexandrine, who upon the death of her husband in 1628 took over the management of an influential post office, the Chamber of the Thurn and Taxis, which routed mail all throughout Europe. The countess had a taste for espionage and transformed the Chamber into a brazen spy organization, employing a team of agents, scribes, forgers, and codebreakers who melted the wax seals of letters, copied their contents, broke any codes, and resealed the letters. This was an early example of what the
