de cartes,' being made for Charles the Sixth; and even to the earlier evidence in Anftis's Hiftory of the Garter, of Edward the First playing at cards, ad quatuor reges,' in 1278.

'It seems, however, a ftrong prefumption against Mr. Anftis's ' explanation of the game ad quatuor reges,' adds Mr. Barrington, that cards are not alluded to by fuch an article in the wardrobe rolls; because we hear nothing about them, either in Rymer's Foedera or our Statute-book, till towards the latter ' end of the reign of Henry VIII.' But Mr. Barrington has ftrangely forgotten, what he has faid in the very page preceding, that he has lately had the perufal of Henry the Seventh's private expences, by which it appears that money was issued at three feveral times for his loffes at cards. And, as he ingenuously subjoins in a note to the former remark, whilft I am correcting this page for the prefs, Mr. Nichols (printer to the 'fociety) hath referred me to 4 Edw. IV. Rot. Parl. Membr. VI; where playinge cardes are enumerated amongst several other articles, which are not to be imported.' All unites to fhew the introduction of card-playing in this country, and in France, to be much earlier than Mr, Barrington has stated it to be. In the 4th of Edw, IV, we began to make them ourselves, and therefore forbad them to be imported. And, as Mr. Barrington inconfiftently remarks in the text immediately afterwards, the daughter of our Henry VII. being married in 1502 to James IV. of Scotland, the played at cards foon after her arrival at Edinburgh.' Mr. Barrington even fubjoins with ftill greater inconfiftency in another note, that Dr. Woide refers me to a "German publication by Mr. Breitloff, in which he cites an authority, that cards were used in Germany fo early as A. D. 13€0.' Mr. Barrington has plainly taken up his pen to write, before he had digefted his intelligence. And this, as he very ingenuoufly betrays it at times, ftands in direct oppofition to his conclufions.

Mr. Barrington then proceeds with more steadiness, to point out the Spaniards as the first inventors of cards.' To the Spaniards, we owe-undoubtedly the game of ombre (with its imitations of quadrille, &c.);' the name and the terms being 'all Spanish.' Another evidence arifes, he thinks, from the four fuits being named from what is chiefly reprefented upon them, viz. fpades from Spada a fword;' when the Spade of our cards is no more like a fword than it is an elephant or a wefel, and when, if the names fhould be derived from the king of spades carrying a fword in his hands, the name fhould equally be communicated to the king of clubs, as he equally carries a fword, and just the fame kind of fword too; hearts are called oros, from a piece of money being on each card,' when a real heart is

B 3

impreffed

impreffed upon our cards; clubs, baftos, from a stick or club,' though the club of our cards is juft as like a stick, as the Spade of them is like a fword; and diamonds, copas, from the cups painted C on them,' when the figure upon our cards is fo unlike a cup, and the name is fo compleatly English. Mr. Barrington, therefore, has failed egregioufly in this, his fecond argument. His other arguments alfo militate against himself.The Spanish

packs confift but of forty-eight, having no ten; while ours have a ten, and are fifty-two. The next in degree' to the king is a person on horseback named El Caballo,' or the horseman, in the room of our queen. The third (or knave with us),' who fo properly grafps an halberd, as a ferviens or ferjeant attending the king and queen, and is therefore fo properly distinguished among us in the language of our elder fathers, by the appellation of knave or fervant, is termed foto or footman' in Spanish. And we cannot but think, that Mr. Barrington's reafoning for the Spanish derivation of our cards flies directly in his face; and that our cards appear from the real heart and the real knave upon them, to be (in part at leaft) genuine English. These circumftances unite with the record of Edw. Ift, to prove cards very ancient among us. Even the amusement had become so general, in the reign of King James' the First, that the audience at the playhouses used thus to divert themselves, before the ' play began *.'

Mr. Barrington however perfeveres, and produces a ftill more decifive proof' of the Spanish derivation of our cards. It is what was undoubtedly the cover of a pack of cards, and probably was made ufe of by a French card-maker.' It has thefe words, partly Spanish and partly French, upon it, Cartes finnes (fuperfine cards) are Spanish, which are followed by two of French, (viz. faictes par, or made by),' and are fucceeded by Fe [for Jean] Hauvola,' a Spanish name (we fuppofe, for Mr. Barrington notes it not) Frenchified in the perfonal part of it, and by y-generally used in Spanish for the conjunction and, and by Edward Warman,' an English name inferted in a new piece of wood laid into the original block.' Nor is this all. At each corner are the figures from which the four fuits of cards are denominated in Spain, viz. cups,' a real cup, and totally diffimilar to our diamond, fwords,' a real fword, and equally unlike our fpade, clubs,' a real club, and as different from our club as Mr. Barrington is from Hercules, and pieces of money,' a real piece, quite round, and no more like to an

** P. 141 from Mr. Malone's Supplemental Observations on Shakefpeare, p. 31.

heart

heart than he is to Hyperion; whilft at the top, and at the fide, are the arms of Caftile and Leon. All this decifive proof" proves nothing. It fhews not the Spaniards, to have been the inventors of cards. It fhews them only, to have been in repute at the time, for making fuperfine cards. Accordingly one Juan Hauvola, borrowing a little French, and retaining his old Spanish, set up at Paris for making them, in partnership with fome French houfe; and afterwards engaged with an English house, in London. And the fuperfine cards ufed in England might well, be Spanish, and imported by a Spanish manufacturer at Paris, in, concert with an English fhop-keeper at London; when, as Mr. Barrington himself has fhewn, the Spanish game of Primero was played at court.

On the whole, however, we think a prefent pack of English cards to be partly English and partly Spanish. The club actually, impreffed upon this Spanish cover, a real club, having three ftrong knots at the fide, and ending in a thick and heavy head; fhews the cypher on the Spanish and English card to have been originally a club, though it is now fo different; and to have therefore been called bafto in Spanish, and club in Englifh. The fword alfo on the cover, a real one, with a handle, a guard, and a double edge, fhews the card to have alfo had a fword originally, though it has now fomething fo diffimilar. And the retention of the names among us, when the figures have difappeared from our cards; and the particular retention of the Spanish name, for one of them; clearly point out fomething like a Spanish origin, for two fuits in our cards. But then the impreffion and the appellation of hearts for another, fo diftinct from the Spanish oros and the Spanish pieces of money, fhew this fuit to be English. The diamond too, a diamond fhaped in a lozenge form, proves the fame. And the tens in the English, the queen in the room of the horfeman, and perhaps the knave, again unite to mark the Englifh portion of our cards. Ours, therefore, were originally the diamonds and the hearts, and the Spanish were the fpades and the clubs. Yet, as the knave is nearly fimilar in both, and the king is actually the fame; and as the Spaniards have four fuits, and three court cards, as well as we; this ftriking coincidence in practice, must neceffarily have arifen from fome inter-communion of ideas, that can be referred only to one origin for all. And fince ombre,' the name of a Spanish game, fignies a 'man*,' homo forming ombre, as numerus number, camera chamber, &c.; fince spade, the Spanish efpada for a fword, is only the Latin Spatha pronounced hard, as th in our Thames and in the French

Bibliotheque at prefent; fince the terms for the principal cards' at ombre are alfo Spanish, viz. fpadill, manill, bafto, punto, matadors, and are alfo derived from the Latin spathula, manuale batuo to beat with bafto or a club, punctum, and perhaps metadoron a Greek word Latinized, for the fuperdonation given to the holder of matadors; fince we must derive being codilled from codillo, the winning of the pool from polla, which fignifies the stake, the term of trumps,' fpelt formerly triumph in English, "from triompho, as also the term of the ace, which pervades moft European languages,' from the Spanish word for this card, ast,' all words evidently Latin in their origin, as triumphus, pollubrum the baĵon that holds the stake, and codicillus, and the word as, or ace, pervading moft European languages; fince the • Venetians ftill ufe the Spanifh cards, retaining the Spanish terms, except that of oros, which they render denari, fignifying equally pieces of money,' and equally fignifying so in the Latin only; and fince cards were used in Germany so early as A. D. 1300,' appear fo early as 1278 in England, under the tit'e of the game of the four kings,' and about 1392 are denominated in France by the express title of 'cards' and 'packs of • cards;' we fcruple not to refer them to those from whom the very appellation of charte, cards, or leaves of pafte-boards, is derived, thofe common fathers of language and of ufages, to the Italians, the Southern Germans, the French, the English, and the Spaniards; the antient Romans themfelves. From them the nations of western Europe derived them, we apprehend, varied the names and the figures, according to their feveral fancies; but ftill retain enough of their original fimilarity, to point out their common origin; and, whether Spanish, Italian, French, or Englifh, are all Roman in their commencement.

XVIII. Obfervations on Card-playing. By the Rev. Mr. Bowle?

The defign of this differtation, is to confirm that Spanish origin of cards, which we think we have refuted before. Nor does it prove more in itself, than that many of our games in the reign of Elizabeth were Spanish. And it fhews the modern vingt-un, to be the fame with the Spanish bientuin: though we derived it undoubtedly from the French, and though it hence appears common to both.

[To be continued. ]

* P. 138.

+ Ibid.

‡ Ibid.

ART.

ART. IV. The Art of dying Wool, Silk, and Cotton. Translated · from the French of M. Helot, M. Macquer, and M. Le Pileur D'Apligny. Illuftrated with Copper-plate Cuts exhibiting the Infide of a Dye-House; and the various Implements used in the Prac tice of dying. 8vo. 6s. 6d. boards. Baldwin. London, 1789.

IN

Na country where a great part of the exports is manufac tured from wool, filk, and cotton, the art of dying these materials is a matter of no fmall importance to the state. In this light has the fubject been for many years confidered in France, throughout which kingdom the dyers are fubject to certain regulations, and frequent inspection by the government. The dyers of the true and of the falfe dye, are there diftinct occupations, and some of their best chemifts have been employed in experiments, partly defigned to diftinguish precifely the true from the falfe dye, but ftill with the general intention of improving the art. A circumftantial detail of those experiments, with their various refults, is the object of the prefent volume, which has been tranflated for the ufe, and merits greatly the attention, of the English dyers. In fact, though an illiterate dyer may accidentally stumble on an useful improvement, the art of dying will never attain the perfection of which it is capable, until those who profess it shall make themselves acquainted with the chemical theory on which its operations are founded.

The work begins with fome account of the primitive colours, or rather of those which are fo denominated by the dyers; for they have no affinity with the colours properly termed primitive by Sir Ifaac Newton. The dyers have only given them this name because, from the nature of the ingredients by which they are produced, they become the bafis of every other colour. Those primitive colours are five, viz. blue, red, yellow, fawn or root-colour, and black; each of which furnishes a great number of fhades, whence, by combination, are produced all the colours in nature. Next follows a defcription of the vessels and utenfils used in dying, and an account of the true colours, or those technically denominated in grain.

The following extract prefents us with a philofophical view of the principles on which the difference of colours is fuppofed to depend:

I have learnt, from experiment, the best guide in philofophy, as well as in the arts, that the difference of colours, according to the preceding diftin&tion, depends partly on the preparation of the fubject to be dyed, and partly upon the colouring materials. Hence I am of opinion that it may be received as a general principle, of the art in queftion, that the invifible mechanifm of dying confifts in

dilating