The Game of Mythology: Roman and Greek.

Copyright R. H. Howe, 1885. 4pp instructions and 100 playing cards, presumed complete. Printed single-sided in red and black, some with small illustrations.  Retaining only the box base and lid panels (4.5 x 6"), else Very Good with scuffing to the lid and select cards with heavier soil. Not in OCLC; one in the collection of the Strong National Museum of Play.

Very "on brand" for the Chautauqua Movement, which aimed to bring liberal arts education to a broader range of communities outside the urban elite. Played along the same scheme as "Authors," it was positioned as a prerequisite to understand the works of the great writers in those games: "THE value of a knowledge of Mythology is self-evident. There is scarcely a writer of either Prose or Poetry of any note, in whose Works allusions to mythological characters are not constant. In Milton's short poem, "Comus," for instance, there are more than thirty; in his "Ode on the Nativity," half as many; and through "Paradise Lost," they are scattered profusely. One cannot visit a Picture-Gallery or an Art-Museum, and not find himself at a loss to understand the subjects treated, or even to recognize a statue, unless he has acquired some knowledge of Mythology. Indeed, without it we cannot engage in polite conversation, and not be ignorant of the meaning of many of the sayings that are in common use."