rtune telling, for which in the hands of the "wise man"
or woman of various countries they are still used, and to which primary
purpose the early "Tarots" were doubtless applied; but, as it is among
the more curious of such cards, we give the Queen of Hearts from a pack
of the immediate post-Commonwealth period (Fig. 31). The figure is
called Semiramis--without, so far as can be seen, any reason. It is one
of a melange of names for cards in which Wat Tyler and Tycho Brahe rub
shoulders in the suit of Spades, and Mahomet and Nimrod in that of
Diamonds! In the pack we find the Knave of Clubs named "Hewson" (not the
card-maker of that name), but he who is satirized by Butler as "Hewson
the Cobbler." Elsewhere he is called "One-eyed Hewson." He is shown with
but one eye in the card bearing his name, and as it is contemporary, it
may be a fair presentment of the man who, whatever his vices, managed
under Cromwell to obtain high honours, and who was by him nominated a
member of the House of Lords. The bitter prejudice of the time is shown
in the story which is told of Hewson, that on the day the King was
beheaded he rode from Charing Cross to the Royal Exchange proclaiming
that "whoever should say that Charles Stuart died wrongfully should
suffer death." Among the _quasi_-educational uses of playing cards we
find the curious work of Dr. Thomas Murner, whose "Logica Memorativa
Chartiludium," published at Strassburg in 1507, is the earliest instance
known to us of a distinct application of playing cards to education,
though the author expressly disclaims any knowledge of cards. The method
used by the Doctor was to make each card an aid to memory, though the
method must have been a severe strain of memory in itself. One of them
is here given (Fig. 32), the suit being the German one of Bells
(Schnellen).

It would seem that hardly any branch of human knowledge had been
overlooked in the adaptation of playing cards to an educational purpose,
and they who still have them in mind under the designation of "the
Devil's books," may be relieved to know that Bible history has been
taught by the means of playing cards. In 1603 there was published a
Bible History and Chronology, under the title of the "Geistliche Karten
Spiel," where, much as Murner did in the instance we have given above,
the cards were used as an aid to memory, the author giving to each of
the suit signs the distinctive appellation of some character or incident
in Holy W