Cards Tricks Article
Harold Evans in the magazine of the Linking Ring (Vol. IX No. 3, 9th May, 1929) wrote the following: “Charles Dickens described all sorts of wandering theatrical folk, such as the immortal Mr. Vincent Crummies and his company of strolling players [from Nicholas Nickleby]; Alfred Jingle, the bête noir of Mr. Pickwick [Pickwick Papers]; Mrs. Jarley and her waxworks in their travelling van [The Old Curiosity Shop]; Grimaldi, the pantomimes [Memoirs of Joseph Grimaldi]; Punch and Judy men; freaks and what not, but he never drew a pen picture of a conjurer. More’s the pity!”
Like much which has been written in the magic literature about Charles Dickens, this isn’t actually so. A very revealing, if admittedly very short pen picture, of a conjurer does occur in The Old Curiosity Shop. We come across him in chapter 19 when, at the inn where Nell and her Grandfather are staying, two travellers arrive. One of them is “a silent gentleman who earned his living by showing tricks upon the cards...”
There is more; but I will stop at this point to analyse the very interesting choice of words that Dickens uses to describe the profession of his character: earning his living by showing ‘tricks upon the cards’ instead of what you might expect to read, ‘card tricks’. At first glance you might have thought ‘tricks upon the cards’ is a uniquely Dickensian expression. But is it?
In fact I’ve found a reference to the expression that goes back to the 16th-century Italian nobleman, and Renaissance court conjurer, Hieronymus Scotto. He performed in front of Queen Elizabeth on 12th May 1602; and a journalist wrote at the time about “an Italian at court that doth wonderful tricks upon the cards”.
There is a further reference in one of the rarest of all magic books A Candle in the Dark by Thomas Ady (1655), when it’s covered by the phrase ‘Tricks upon the cards and dice’. It is also a title heading of the second part of Richard Seymour’s, The Compleat Gamester (1734): “The true Manner of playing the most usual Games at Cards, viz. Whist, All-Fours, Cribbage, Put, Lue, Brag, etc. With several diverting Tricks upon the Cards.”
My favourite reference comes in The London Magazine, dated March 1735, where, for some reason, the writer seemed to think that the “scandalous practice of Ballad singing is a continual nursery for idlers, whores and pick-pockets”. Having lambasted anyone involved in such a nefarious activity, it very “naturally” (although no reason is given for the extremely tenuous connection) “brings to [the author’s] Mind a very ill conduct in many of our Gentry of the middle Sort, who suffer their Children, particularly their daughters, to frequent the Kitchen, to become familiar with the Servants, and so of course to learn their manners.”
This apparently leads onto kissing and dancing and, not just to play cards, but also “to show Tricks upon the Cards.”
After 1800, the phrase is increasingly hard to track down; but there is a mention in Fraser’s Magazine for Town & Country, (June 1845) in an article called ‘A Game of Chess with Napoleon’. “Did you ever see a conjurer at a fair shewing off tricks upon the cards? He shuffles the pack beneath your very nose as he offers them in detail; but while you vainly think you can draw which you will, he adroitly manages to make you select the very card to suit his purpose.”
So, in spite of its rarity, it is clear that the expression was still in common parlance when Dickens wrote his pen portrait in 1841.
What other alternatives were around at the time? Well I’ve found ‘Feats with Cards’ in Parlour Magic, (1838); John Badcock, Philosophical Recreations or Winter Amusments, 1822, has, as part of its title, ‘Tricks with Cards’; but when you turn to the book itself, the heading is ‘Tricks on Cards’; whilst the many editions of the Young Man’s Book of Amusement (first edition 1809) refers to ‘Recreations with Cards’ and ‘Popular Tricks and Changes in Cards.’
So in theory Dickens could have written “a silent gentleman who earned his living by showing tricks with cards...” But somehow “tricks upon the cards” has a much finer resonance about it.
What doesn’t appear to have been in Dickens’ literary armoury is “a silent gentleman who earned his living by showing card tricks...” The first reference I can find to ‘card tricks’ is in New York by Gaslight, 1850 by George G Foster, where he is writing about conning passers-by in New York. “Often card-tricks or thimbles are introduced, and the conspirators bet carelessly and largely against each other - pulling out and showing pocket-books well crammed with counterfeit or worthless bills.”
Clearly, though, it is an expression that caught on; and in 1876 indeed it becomes the title of a book - Cards and Card Tricks by HE Heather. [Below]. The titles of books with card tricks in the title started off as a trickle and then proliferated: Professor Hoffmann, Card Tricks without Sleight of Hand (1877) Roterberg, New Era Card Tricks (1897) and Card Tricks and How to do Them (1902); Howard Thurston, Card Tricks (1901), Professor R Kunard, The Book of Card Tricks (1922); Paul Clive, Card Tricks without Skill (1946) and John Scarne, Scarne on Card Tricks - to name just a few!
Unfortunately it is highly unlikely that we will ever find the originator of the actual phrase 'card tricks'.