were cards everywhere. It was considered ill-bred
to read in company. "Books were not fit articles for drawing-rooms," old
ladies used to say. People were jealous, as it were, and angry with them.
You will find in Hervey that George II was always furious at the sight of
books; and his queen, who loved reading, had to practise it in secret in
her closet. But cards were the resource of all the world. Every night, for
hours, kings and queens of England sat down and handled their majesties of
spades and diamonds. In European Courts, I believe the practice still
remains, not for gambling, but for pastime. Our ancestors generally
adopted it. "Books! prithee, don't talk to me about books," said old Sarah
Marlborough. "The only books I know are men and cards." "Dear old Sir
Roger de Coverley sent all his tenants a string of hogs' puddings and a
pack of cards at Christmas," says the _Spectator_, wishing to depict a
kind landlord. One of the good old lady writers in whose letters I have
been dipping cries out, "Sure, cards have kept us women from a great deal
of scandal!" Wise old Johnson regretted that he had not learnt to play.
"It is very useful in life," he says; "it generates kindness, and
consolidates society." David Hume never went to bed without his whist. We
have Walpole, in one of his letters, in a transport of gratitude for the
cards. "I shall build an order to Pam," says he, in his pleasant dandified
way, "for the escape of my charming Duchess of Grafton." The duchess had
been playing cards at Rome, when she ought to have been at a cardinal's
concert, where the floor fell in, and all the monsignors were precipitated
into the cellar. Even the Nonconformist clergy looked not unkindly on the
practice. "I do not think," says one of them, "that honest Martin Luther
committed sin by playing at backgammon for an hour or two after dinner, in
order by unbending his mind to promote digestion." As for the High Church
parsons, they all played, bishops and all. On Twelfth Day the Court used
to play in state. "This being Twelfth Day, his Majesty, the Prince of
Wales, and the Knights Companions of the Garter, Thistle, and Bath,
appeared in the collars of their respective orders. Their Majesties, the
Prince of Wales, and three eldest Princesses, went to the Chapel Royal,
preceded by the heralds. The Duke of Manchester carried the sword of
state. The king and prince made offering at the altar of gold,
frankincense, and myrrh, according t