Smartcard login for webpage?

I have a simple intranet management system that I need to make the login via a smartcard access. I've looked around and am having a hard time finding some open source api's or toolkits to develop a process to read a smartcard and authenticate access via a browser. I'm not familiar with Java but from what I have read this looks like the best method for allowing the browser to access the smartcard reader is to push down an applet that installs and gives access to the browser(page).

I'm looking for some sample source code that will allow me to create this within our intranet. The functionality I'm looking for would have the user access a login webpage which would push down the applet and authenticate access to the pages as long as the authenticated smartcard is inserted.