Mr. Turner's remark, that "the ballad shows that Napes was a term of derision, signifying a Knave, and must therefore be the Saxon Cnapa," does not appear to be well founded; for if it were derived from Cnapa, and merely signified a Knave, or Cheat, it is difficult to conceive why it should be written Napes, and not Knave, or Knape, as required, according to Mr. Turner's etymology; besides, it is evident from the context, that, in the mind of the writer, the idea of a Jac Napes was associated with that of a monkey, or an ape, with his clog and his chain. That this was not the primary signification of the term, may be confidently asserted; and no writer who has derived it from Jack and Ape, has produced any authority to show that it originally meant a man who travelled about with apes or monkeys. In the following passage, from a tract printed about 1540,[271] the term "_Yack an napes_" evidently refers to a mummer or buffoon in a particoloured dress, like that of a knave of cards. The writer, after having noticed the assembling of the poor on holidays, at the "personis barne,"[272] and there committing "ydolatre in mayntenynge his ambision, pride, and bestly lyvinge," thus proceeds: "Nobyl statis were better to hunte the bull, here, hert, or ony othere thynge lyke to suckure the powre with the mette, then to here Sir Jhon Singyl Sowle stombel a payer of mattens in laten, slynge holy water, curse holy brede, and to play a caste lyke _yack an napes_ in a foles cotte." When John Bale, in his work entitled, 'Yet a Course at the Romish Foxe,' speaks of Jack-a-Naipes "swearing by his ten bones," it would seem that he in some manner or other associated the term with the Jack-a-Naipes, or Jack of Cards; for his ten bones can only be supposed to relate to the numerical value of the Jack of Naipes, as a coat card. In Bale's time a "card of ten" would appear to have been a general expression for a coat card, as well as for a card distinguished by that number of pips. Fyrste pycke a quarell, and fall out with hym then, And soo outface hym with a carde of ten. _Skelton's Bowghe of Court._ From the following passage in Pulci's 'Morgante Maggiore,' it would seem that, in Italy, in the fifteenth century, the King of cards was occasionally referred to as the type of a presumptuous person: "E com' e' giunse, gridava il gigante; Tu se' quì, Re di Naibi, o di Scacchi, Col mio bataglio convien ch'io t'ammachi." "And when the two together came, the giant shouted out, And here you are, my King of Cards, or e'en of Chess, pardie! My club then with your shoulders must without delay make free." In Scotland, about 1508, the Knave of cards was the representative of a forward impertinent person,--a very Jack-a-Naipes,--as is evident from the "Flyting of Dunbar and Kennedy," where the latter, among other bad names, calls the former "Valet of cards": "Waik walidrag, and verlot of the cairtis."[273]