Note 177 — Chapter III · THE PROGRESS OF CARD-PLAYING.

Basset would seem to have been a common game at the court of France about the same period. "The King (Louis XIV) now seldom or never plays, but contents himself sometimes with looking on; but formerly he hath been engaged, and has lost great sums. Mons. S. rookt him of near a million of livres at Basset by putting false cards upon him, but was imprisoned and banished for it some years."—Dr. Martin Lister, Journey to Paris in the year 1698. In 1691, Louis XIV issued an ordonnance prohibiting Faro, Basset, and other similar games. Whoever should be convicted of playing at any of those games was to be fined a thousand livres; and the person who allowed them to be played in his house incurred a penalty of six thousand livres. Basset and Flush—il Frusso—appear to have been known in Italy in the fifteenth century. They are mentioned by Lorenzo de Medici in his Canti Carnascialeschi, quoted by Singer, Researches, p. 26.