1919^ A Portable Printing Press for the Ecologist 21 



screw, that he used the regular printer's metal type, and that he used 

 regular printer's ink. The further thought presented itself that if 

 this was a good thing to have in an office why wouldn't it be a good 

 thing to have a portable outfit to be carried into the field. Then the 

 thought occurred to me that this thing ought to be useful to the general 

 ecologist as well as the entomologist and thus in this round about way 

 I have arrived at my reason for presenting this matter here. To dis- 

 cuss the subject briefly it may be divided into two parts; (1) the 

 apparatus (2) the method of procedure. 



My apparatus consists of a font of type, a type box, a compositor's 

 roll, a tube of printer's ink, a bottle of benzine, a glass plate or two, 

 a pair of forceps, and a type holder. The font of type may be of 

 any size desired. Since the entomologist is interested in getting as 

 much into as small a space as possible I use a 4^4 point type which 

 is about one-half the size of ordinary book type and is about as small 

 as can be used with ease. The type box I use is made with small 

 compartments which are just a little wider than the type is high. 

 My box contains 104 compartments because I use capitals, small 

 capitals, lower case letters and a number of other characters. The 

 box is made as tight as possible so that the type cannot become mixed 

 in carrying it about. The lid of the box is lined with two sheets of 

 blotting paper. Ink in a tube is much more convenient than in any 

 other form as it remains much fresher and is more easily worked in 

 this way. The benzine is used in mixing the ink and in cleaning 

 the type. The compositor's roll is used to mix the ink also. The 

 forceps are used to handle the small type, but may be dispensed with 

 when using larger type. The type holder is a small brass box with 

 a width slightly less than type height and with one side entirely want- 

 ing and the lid held in place by means of four set screws and with 

 another set screw at one end of the box to hold the type in place. 

 The box may be of any size and should be high enough to hold as 

 many lines of type as we desire to print at one time and it should 

 be long enough to hold all the characters we think we will ever use 

 and then a few more for emergency. IMy box is liigh enough to hold 

 four lines of 41/2 point tyi)o, about all one ever desires to ]uit on a 

 single pin label. 



