S5fii Mr J. Clerk Maxwclfs Plan for comUnin^ 



Wo have alsfd had the pleasure of conversing with Mr Cowpcr junior, who 

 mentioned that, when lately at Paris, he saw the self-inking apparatus actu- 

 ally attached to the common press, and at work, in the lloyal Printing-office 

 there ; but that the inking-apparatus was ultimately abandoned, in conse- 

 quence of the imforeseen obstacle in pulling, wliich it is one particular ob- 

 ject of Mr Clerk MaxwelPs invention to remove. Were this part of wA 

 latter gentleman's improvement also to be carried into practical effect, no^ 

 only would equality of colour by the self-inking apparatus be obtained, but 

 also a no less important desideratum be supplied — equality of pressure by 

 stcnra-power. At present very great muscular exertion is in general required 

 to produce good work, even with very powerful presses ; and, therefore, 

 should one or both of the pressmen be unable, or find it difficult, to take a 

 sufficiently strong pull, several devices are apt to be resorted to for lessening 

 the labour, such as drowning^ instead of merely damping, the paper, increas- 

 ing the soft substance between it and the point of pressure, applying too 

 much ink, &c., but in all of which cases, however sharp and new the typei., 

 may be, nothing but a very irregular, blurred, or blunt impression is pro- 

 duced. Hence it will be obvious, that were the means of obtaining a steady,} 

 regular, and more or less powerful pressure by steam-power at the common 

 press once procured, it would essentially contribute to the beauty of typo- 

 graphy ; and hence will likewise be perceived the very great importance o^a 

 this part of the plan now proposed. 



It is curious that, on the other side of the Atlantic, the application ^fAn^tt 

 self-ink-ing apparatus to the common printing press has at the same era 

 been thought of, and carried into effect. In the number of the Christian 

 Instructor for February last, it is stated, that an American Journal, speak- 

 ing of the improvement in printing, remarks, that '* the introduction of the 

 Napier nxiehine into this country, together with the Treadwell press, made . 

 at Boston, has been the means of producing quite a revolution in printing*' 

 A great variety of machine presses have subsequently been invented here, 

 and tite self-inking apparatus has been improved and applied to the common press.** 

 " The most rapid machines can be made to strike 5000 impressions in an hour. 

 This is equal to the work of twenty hand presses ; or, to express it diffiirent-^ 

 ly, it wiU enable us to print the eomnM>n 18mo Bibles at the rate of 75 copies 

 an hour. A hundred presses at this rate, could supply every family on the' 

 earth with a Bible in three years.** v\ 



For the printing of publications having a large circulation, it has always 

 been obvious that the machines possess a decided superiority over the com- 

 mon presses ; but work of this kind is wholly confined to large towns, and 

 even in these to comparatively few printing-offices. By far the pjreatest propor^ 

 tion of tlie printing business everywhere consists of work of a miscellaneotk^ ^'^' 

 nature, and of which comparatively few copies are required. On this account 

 very few printers, indeed, could keep a single machine in constant employ- 

 ment, even were it otherwise applicable to such work, which, neither for ge-^ 

 neral economy nor for very fine work, it is universally admitted not to heUr 

 Besides, six good presses can be obtained for the price of one machine, and 

 the great majority of printers throughout the kingdom have seldom or never 

 occasion for so many. These, too, can be applied to a variety of purposes at 

 the sKtme time, and one or more only be used as circumstanees may require. 



