Daines Barrington, English antiquary and naturalist, says that Ombre was probably introduced in England by Catherine of Braganza, the Queen of Charles II, as Edmund Waller, the court poet, had a poem entitled "On a Card Torn at Ombre by the Queen". She was such a keen player, as were so many members of English high society by the end of 1674, that the Lower House of Parliament proposed to pass an Act against the playing of Ombre, or at least to limit the stakes at £5, a proposition received as "ridiculous" at that time. But a small book of rules, "The Royal game of the ombre written at the request of divers honourable persons", published in London in 1660, would support the inference that the game was known in England before the Restoration.