(59) Steinmetz Ode to Mammon.
Some say that the four kings represent those famous champions of antiquity—David, Alexander, Julius Caesar, and Charlemagne; and that the four queens, Argine, Pallas, Esther, and Judith, are the respective symbols of majesty, wisdom, piety, and fortitude; and there can be no doubt, if you look attentively on the queens of a pack of cards, you will easily discern the appropriate expressions of all these attributes in the faces of the grotesque ladies therein depicted. The valets, or attendants, whom we call knaves, are not necessarily 'rascals,' but simply servants royal; at first they were knights, as appears from the names of some of the famous French knights being formerly painted on the cards.
Thus a pack of cards is truly a monument of the olden time—the days of chivalry and its numberless associations.
In addition to the details I have given in the previous chapter respecting the probability of holding certain cards, there are a few other curious facts concerning them, which it may be interesting to know.
There is a difference in the eyes of two of the knaves—those of diamonds and hearts, more apparent in the old patterns, suggesting the inference that they are blind. This has been made the basis of a card trick, as to which two of the four knaves presenting themselves would be selected as servants. Of course the blind ones would be rejected. A bet is sometimes proposed to the unwary, at Whist, but one of the party will have in his hand, after the deal, only one of a suit, or none of a suit. The bet should not be taken, as this result very frequently happens.
Lastly, there is an arithmetical puzzle of the most startling effect to be contrived with a pack of cards, as follows. Let a party make up parcels of cards, beginning with a number of pips on any card, and then counting up to twelve with individual cards. In the first part of the trick it must be understood that the court cards count as ten, all others according to the pips. Thus, a king put down will require only two cards to make up 12, whereas the ace will require 11, and so on. Now, when all the parcels are completed, the performer of the trick requires to know only the number of parcels thus made, and the remainder, if any, to declare after a momentary calculation, the exact number of pips on the first cards laid down—to the astonishment of those not in the secret. In fact, there is no possible arrangement of the cards, according to this method, which can prevent an adept from declaring the number of pips required, after being informed of the number of parcels, and the remainder, if any. This startling performance will be explained in a subsequent chapter—amusing card tricks.
Cards must soon have made their way among our countrymen, from the great intercourse that subsisted between England and France about the time of the first introduction of cards into the latter kingdom. If the din of arms in the reign of our fifth Henry should seem unfavourable to the imitation of an enemy's private diversions, it must be remembered that France was at that period under the dominion of England, that the English lived much in that country, and consequently joined in the amusements of the private hour, as well as in the public dangers of the field.
Very soon, however, the evil consequences of their introduction became apparent. One would have thought that in such a tumultuous reign at home as that of our sixth Henry, there could not have been so much use made of cards as to have rendered them an object of public apprehension and governmental solicitude; but a record appears in the beginning of the reign of Edward IV., after the deposition of the unfortunate Henry, by which playing cards, as well as dice, tennis-balls, and chessmen, were forbidden to be imported.
If this tended to check their use for a time, the subsequent Spanish connection with the court of England renewed an acquaintance with cards and a love for them. The marriage of Prince Arthur with the Infanta Catherine of Arragon, brought on an intimacy between the two nations, which probably increased card-playing in England,—it being a diversion to which the Spaniards were extremely addicted at that period.
Cards were certainly much in use, and all ideas concerning them very familiar to the minds of the English, during the reign of Henry VIII., as may be inferred from a remarkable sermon of the good bishop Latimer. This sermon was preached in St Edward's church, Cambridge, on the Sunday before Christmas day, 1527, and in this discourse he may be said to have 'dealt' out an exposition of the precepts of Christianity according to the terms of card-playing. 'Now ye have heard what is meant by this "first card," and how you ought to "play" with it, I purpose again to "deal" unto you "another card almost of the same suit," for they be of so nigh affinity that one cannot be well "played" without the other, &c.' 'It seems,' says Fuller, 'that he suited his sermon rather to the TIME—being about Christmas, when cards were much used—than to the text, which was the Baptist's question to our Lord—"Who art thou?"—taking thereby occasion to conform his discourse to the "playing at cards," making the "heart triumph."'