TYPE-CASTING MACHINES. 191 



accepted as a practical fact. The International Typographical 

 Union, at its last annual meeting in the United States, recom- 

 mended its subordinate unions, in cities in ^vlnch the machines 

 "me into use, to prepare a scale of prices for the -ork done, a.d 

 to urge that union compositors be employed as operatois. Ihis 

 is a sensible acceptance of a new order of things. 



In conclusion, this is to be observed: There are heoretica 

 obiections to the machines in many small details which have no 

 been touched on in this article, partly because I wish to present 

 a clear general idea of the subject unencumbered by triviali- 

 ties- partly because to handle them would require complicated 

 and'technical descriptions likely to confuse those who have not 

 seen the machines, or who are not familiar with type-setting or 

 stereotyping methods and appliances. With regard to such 

 posdblf obiections, it should be remembered that the type- 

 casting principle scarcely now requires to defend itself against 

 fanciful opponents. It has been tried, and not found wantmg 

 As was stated at the outset of this article, a large number of 

 Linotypes have been successfully employed for ye^^s^^/;^ 

 composing-room of a leading New York paper. I have tried to 

 deal with the chief possibilities of failure m the niachme and 

 it has been noticed that these possibilities seem to be chiefly m 

 connection with printing establishments of limited extent and 

 means Few of the drawbacks, it appears to me, would be seri- 

 ous in a large office employing machines, and located m centers 

 where the prompt assistance of expert mechanics can be had, and 

 my conviction of this is borne out by the New York Tribune's 

 experience. Such a test as the Linotype has received m that 

 office during five years is the most conclusive answer to technical 

 or theoretical objections to the principle of type-casting The 

 real problem with a publisher should be, not whether the ma- 

 chines are a success when used on a large scale, but whether his 

 own business is large enough to justify him in introducing them 

 into his own office. To use an exaggerated illustration, there is 

 no question but that a steam-locomotive is an infinitely more use- 

 ful powerful, and, on a proper scale, more economical affair than 

 a wheelbarrow; but a laborer building a bit of roadway may do 

 better with the wheelbarrow. 



Mr Egbert T. Hill has observed, near the springs and water-holes of the 

 Cretaceous of central Texas, many workshops where the Indians manufactured 

 spears and arrow-heads. Near an old Comanche trail in Travis County almost 

 every flint seems to have been broken or tested. In evidence that the miplements 

 have been manufactured in the present century, the author adduces the facts that 

 they are always found on the surface, and that the Indians have actually used 

 them in their warfare with the white men. 



