Shang Da Ren cards 2 - Hubei

"Shashi Excellent Shang Da Ren cards" , Shashi, 96c.
《沙石精品上大人》,沙石, 96 副

These cards are popularly used in Wuhan, a place in Hubei. Unlike the cards featured previously These cards have a variant form of the text. The text is identical to the standard version, except the last line/ This reads Fu Lu Shou 福祿壽 "Fortune, Rank and Longevity" instead of the usual Ke Zhi Li 可知禮 "And hence understand courtesy and manners" . Decks that possess such an alteration are called 'Fu Lu Shou cards"; indeed, a game bears this name

The altered text thus reads as follows:

Ch	Pinyin	Translation, after Hans Steinmüller
上大人	Shang da ren	His greatness,
孔乙己	Kong Yi Ji	Confucius,
化三千	Hua San Qian	has taught three thousand children,
七十士	Qi Shi Shi	of which Seventy became virtuous scholars.
爾小生	Er Xiao Shen	A young scholar like you,
八九子	Ba Jiu Zi	should study from eight or Nine sages,
往作仁	Wang zuo ren	should learn to be benevolent,
福祿壽	Ful Lu Shou	Fortune, Rank, Longevity"

N.B. The author has altered The last line of Hans Steinmüller's translation to reflect the Deck's composition. 

It is tempting to read the altered last line, as describing the benefits of being benevolent. Or it could be an attempt to inject an added layer of auspiciousness to the cards.

N.B. The numbers are ordered from Right to Left 

1:上   2:大   3:人   4:孔  5:乙   6:己

The First Six cards. The most notable feature of the cards, is they are coloured. The colours follow a consistent pattern-- Red for the first character of each line, Green for the second, and black for the third. 

The other notable feature of this deck in particular are the 'indices' In the top left-hand corner, rendering the cards in a more legible font. This is rather helpful. Note the great variance on the way the character on card 4 ("Confucius")  is written, and its standard form 孔. 

 7:化   8:三   9:千 10:七   11:十   12 :士   

The next six cards. Note card 8 ("Three"), written in a manner that suggests brushstrokes. 

13:尔(=爾) 14:小 15:生   16: 八   17 :九  18 :子

Card No. 13 ('You') is written using the cursive form of the character 爾. 

19: 佳 20: 作 21:仁 22:福 23:祿  24:壽

The last two lines. Cards 22-23 are particularly stylized. 

As mentioned above, the last three characters read "Fortune, Rank and Longevity" instead of the usual "And hence understand courtesy and manners“。 

The box contains the delightful inscription

严禁賭博

仅供娛乐

Yan Jin Dubo
Jin Gong Yu Le

Gambling strictly prohibited;
For leisure only