32 ANNUAL OF SCIENTIFIC DISCOVERY. 



perhaps the most extraordinary feature. Such is the astonishing ra- 

 pidity with which impressions may be multiplied, that at an ordinary 

 speed 20,000 imperial sheets may, with great ease, be printed on both 

 sides, folded, and cut neatly from a continuous sheet, in one hour's 

 time. Thus 40,000 impressions can be made, besides the folding and 

 cutting of the sheet, in one hour, by a single machine, without the aid 

 of the human hand. It can be worked by any ordinary power, one 

 man or active boy only being required to attend a press, place the roll 

 of paper upon the machine, and carry away the printed and folded 

 sheets as fast as they are thrown from the machine. 



NEW PRINTING-MACHINE. 



SEVERAL gentlemen connected with the press in Paris, and the head 

 of a large printing establishment in Scotland, assembled, on Saturday, 

 at the manufactory of M. de Coster, to witness the performance of a 

 new printing-machine, invented by M. Worms. It occupies a much 

 smaller space than the machines now in use in the great printing es- 

 tablishments of Paris and London, costs less than half the price at 

 which one of those can be had, and is free from the tapes and other 

 guiders, which frequently get out of order, and occasion consider- 

 able delay. It requires only the labor of three men to feed it, and 

 receive the work as it is thrown off. This new machine, which is 

 called rotative, does not print from the types, but from stereotype, and 

 this is the most extraordinary part of the process. In the ordinary 

 process of stereotyping several hours are required ; for the material 

 used for receiving the impression of the type, and which serves as the 

 mould in which the stereotype is cast, must be carefully and slowly 

 dried. The mould for the stereotype, by this new process, is made 

 of a few sheets of tissue-paper, with a couple of sheets of common 

 paper at the back, to give a certain degree of strength. The paper is 

 wetted to the proper degree, and then pressed upon the type. The 

 impression is perfect. The mould is then dried, which is the work 

 of only a few minutes, and placed on a cylinder, with a sufficient 

 space between it and an outer case to receive the metal. This metal, 

 which is very liquid, and which is prepared in a peculiar way, flows 

 rapidly and evenly over every part of the mould, and, by the applica- 

 tion of a cold, wet sponge to the exterior, it becomes almost instantly 

 solid. The plate is then removed and transferred to the cylinder oif 

 the machine, ready for printing. One part of the plate fits in exactly 

 to a groove made to receive it, and the other part is held by screws. 

 The whole of the stereotyping does not occupy more than from fifteen 

 to twenty-five minutes. 



The action of the machine differs entirely from any thing hitherto 

 invented. There is no laying on of the sheets to be printed. A con- 

 tinuous sheet of paper, equal to 2,000 or more sheets of a newspaper, 

 is rolled on a cylinder, and, as the machine tarns, the plate on the 

 printing cylinder is fed, and, by the action of the machine itself, the 

 paper is divided at the proper place into sheets of the desired size, and 

 each sheet is folded at the same time. The paper which receives the 



