Page:Explanatory notes of a pack of Cavalier playing cards.djvu/19

Rh 9. III of Hearts.

"Cromwell pypeth unto Fairfax."

Cromwell is here represented playing the pipe and tabor to Fairfax, who is performing a Morris dance. This dance was brought to England in the reign of Edward III., it is said by John of Gaunt. It was originally a military dance, in which bells were jingled, and swords clashed. The word Morris is a corruption of Moorish. In ancient times it used to be danced by five men and a boy, but in the reign of Elizabeth, we have an instance of Kempe, one of Shakespeare's colleagues at the Globe Theatre, having danced alone all the way from London to Norwich.—(Kemp's nine daies wonder, reprinted in Goldsmid's Collectanea Adamantæa, No. 29). Thomas, Lord Fairfax, warmly espoused the cause of the Parliament when the rupture with the King took place. He was, however, opposed to the execution of the King, and became a warm advocate of the Restoration. He died in 1671.

10. III of Clubs.

"Bulstrod and Whit lock present to Oliver the instrument of Government"

On the 26th of June, 1657, the ceremony of conferring the protectorate on Cromwell took place. "After a short speech, Withrington, the Speaker, with the Earl of Warwick and Whitlock. vested him with a rich purple velvet robe lined with ermines;  then the Speaker presented him with a fair Bible of the largest edition, richly bound; then he, in the name of all the people, girded a sword about him; and lastly, presented him with a sceptre of gold, which he put in his hand, and made him a large discourse of those emblems of government and authority. Upon the close of which, there being little wanting to a perfect formal Coronation but a crown