BEAUMONT and FLETCHER--Vol. VIII. p. 137.]
[Footnote 18: The ingenuity of ancient cooks in raising pastry fortifications has been already noticed. In the text we have not only fortresses of paste, but castles made of custards, furnished with eatable artillery, on a triumph-day, that is one of the greatest festivities at the Mansion-house. Another similar device of march-pane is mentioned in "Witts and Fancies"--1595, 4to.: "At a nobleman's banquet a ship of march-pane stuff was set upon the board, wherein was all manner of fishes of the like stuff."
At a banquet given by Cardinal Birague to Henry III. King of France, his queen, and mother, "A collation was there served upon two long tables, consisting of between eleven and twelve hundred dishes composed of confectionary and dried sweetmeats of various kinds, constructed in the form of castles, pyramids, and other elegant figures."--WRAXALL'S "_History of France_," vol. II. 449.]
This game is noticed by SHAKESPEARE, in "_The Merry Wives of Windsor_:"--
"I never prospered since I foreswore myself at primero."
"And left him at primero, with the Duke of Suffolk."
In BEAUMONT and FLETCHER also, mention is made of this celebrated and once fashionable game--in vol. II. p. 185, in "_The Scornful Lady_," and likewise in "_The nice Valour_," in vol. IV. p. 273.
Primero too is noticed in STRUTT'S "_Sports and Pastimes of the People of England_," p. 291. There is a poem by the celebrated Sir John Harrington, the translator of _Ariosto_, which affords an admirable illustration of the game: it is entitled, "_The Story of Marcus' Life at Primero_." But as it amounts to upwards of forty lines, it is considered as too long for insertion here.
Extract from Harris's "_History of the City of Dublin_," (now become a very scarce work,) chap. VI. p. 114:--
"We shall have little here to do but barely to transcribe the several forms used by the citizens in riding their franchises at different periods, as the same has been transmitted to posterity either by authentic records or ancient manuscripts, whose evidence is not to be controverted at this day; more especially as the reader will readily perceive, by comparing each form, how little variance there has been therein from the beginning to the present times, except in the names of places, which yet are but few. It would indeed be a difficult task for the citizens to have at any time stretched their rights beyond the just limits within the city or suburbs, as they were surrounded on most parts by vigilant neighbours, namely, the ecclesiastics of St. Mary's Abbey, Kilmainham, Thomas-court, and St. Sepulchre's, or the liberties of the Archbishop of Dublin, who were upon all occasions ready to procure papal anathemas and censures against those who offended them in less momentous matters than the loss of their lands. Several of the instruments we shall have occasion to cite are written in Latin; but to show our fidelity, we shall transcribe them verbatim, and for the sake of the English reader, translate them literally into our own language.