[161] Towards the close of Elizabeth's reign, Edward Darcy obtained a patent for the manufacture of cards; and in the reign of James I the importation of cards was prohibited, after 20th July, 1615, as the art of making them was then brought to perfection in this country. As a duty or tax of five shillings for every twelve dozen packs was levied about that time by the authority of the Lord Treasurer, the statement that such a tax was first levied in 1631, in the reign of Charles I, is erroneous. This tax was one of the impositions complained of by the Commons, in the reign of Charles I, "as arbitrary and illegal, being levied without consent of Parliament." I am informed that the first act of parliament imposing a tax on cards was passed in 1711, in the reign of Queen Anne. The company of card-makers was first incorporated by letters patent of Charles I in 1629.--See Singer's Researches, pp. 223, 224, 226, 365. [162] Observations on the Antiquity of Card-playing, Archæologia, vol. viii. [163] Etudes Historiques sur les Cartes à jouer, p. 30. Mons. Leber had in his collection some cards of Jean Volay's manufacture, which were discovered in the boards of a book. Those cards are described in the Catalogue of his books, tom. i, p. 241, Article xvii. There are also cards manufactured by Jean Volay preserved in the Bibliothèque du Roi, at Paris. [164] The Netherlands seem to have been famed at an early period for the manufacture of cards. Albert Durer, in the journal which he kept during his visit to those parts in 1521, notes that he bought half a dozen packs for seven stivers: "Item hab umb ein halb dutzet Niederländischer Karten geben 7 Stüber."--Albrecht Dürers Reisejournal, in Von Murr's Journal zur Kunstgeschichte, 7ter Theil, s. 96. From a passage in Ascham's Toxophilos, 1545, quoted by Singer, it would appear that the price of cards was then about twopence a pack: "He sayd a payre of cards cost not past ii.d." [165] The Four Knaves: a series of Satirical Tracts by Samuel Rowlands. Edited, with an Introduction and Notes, by E. F. Rimbault, Esq. Reprinted for the Percy Society, 1843. For the loan of the cuts of the Four Knaves the publisher is indebted to the Percy Society. [166] On the word mandilions, Mr. Rimbault has the following note: "Mandiglione, a jacket, a Mandilion?--Florio's _New World of Words_, ed. 1611. Stubbes (_apud_ Strutt, _dress and habits_, vol. ii, p. 267) says that it covered the whole body down to the thighs; and Randle Holme describes it as 'a loose hanging garment, much like to our jacket or jumps, but without sleeves, only having holes to put the arms through; yet some were made with sleeves, but for no other use than to hang on the back.'"