PRINTING. 



POINTING. 



763 



the whole, the average work of the French printers is superior to that 

 of the English. It attributes this partly to the better quality of their 

 paper, which is farther improved by being passed through powerful 

 rollers, thus creating a more even surface, partly by using dry paper 

 instead of wet, partly by the use of silk instead of parchment for tym- 

 pana in their hand-presses and flat-pressure machines ; and other little 

 niceties, the results of long practice based upon scientific investigation. 

 II. Dutartre's double-cylinder machine has been introduced into 

 England ; and a patent has been taken out for an improvement in the 

 manufacture of paper, by which the necessity of wetting it to enable 

 it to receive the ink will be removed : we believe, as far as this experi- 

 ment has been carried out, that it has been successful. 



M. Dutartre also exhibited a machine for printing in two colours, 

 for which he received the silver medal. Others were exhibited for 

 printing newspapers ; but their rapidity was not equal to ours, as it 

 appears from the report, 6000 sheets perfect being the highest number 

 stated ; but several ingenious adaptations and movements are noticed 

 in Mr. Fairbairn's report. 



In England, however, the demands of the newspaper press had not 

 been met by even such improved machines as above described. The 

 ' Times ' could not be produced sufficiently early at the rate of 5000 or 

 6000 an hour. Mr. Applegath again employed his inventive faculty, 

 and produced a printing-machine on the vertical cylindrical system, 

 which could produce on one side from 10,000 to 13,000 copies an hour. 

 With such machines the 'Times' has been worked since 1843; and 

 the machine has been used for the production of the ' London 

 Illustrated News,' and other newspapers having a large circulation. 



In this machine a central drum 200 inches in circumference, or 

 64 inches in diameter, turns on a vertical axis. We copy the following 

 description from C. Tomlinson's ' Cyclopzedia of Useful Arts and Manu- 

 factures ' : " The inking- table and the columns of type are secured to 

 the surface of this drum ; the columns of type are placed vertically, 

 not conforming to the curve of the drum. This is contrived in the 

 following manner. A slab of iron is curved on its under side, so as to 

 fit the large cylinder, while its upper "surface is fitted into facets, or 

 flat parts, corresponding in width and number to the width and num- 

 ber of the columns of the newspaper. Between each column there is 

 a strip of steel, with a thin edge, to print the ' rule,' the body of this 

 strip being wedge-shaped, so as to fill up the angular space left between 

 the columns of the type, and to press the type together sideways, or in 

 the direction of the lines ; the type is pressed together in the other 

 direction by means, of screws, and is firmly held together. The surface 

 of the type thus forms a portion of a polygon, as already noticed ; and 

 the regularity of the impression is obtained by pasting slips of paper 

 on the paper cylinder. The large central drum is surrounded by eight 

 cylinders, each about 13 inches in diameter, also with vertical axes. 

 They are covered with cloth, and upon them the paper to be printed is 

 carried by means of tapes. Each of these cylinders is so connected 

 with the central drum, by means of toothed wheels, that the surface of 

 each must move with the same velocity as the surface of the drum. 

 It will thus be evident that if the type on the drum be inked, and each 

 of the cylinders be properly supplied with a sheet of paper, a single 

 revolution of the drum will cause the eight cylinders to revolve also, 

 and produce an impression on one side of each of the sheets of paper. 

 But for this purpose it is necessary that the type be inked eight times 

 during one revolution of the drum. This is accomplished by means of 

 eight seta of inking- rollers one for each paper-cylinder. The ink is 

 held in a vertical reservoir (supplied from above), formed of a ductor- 

 roller, against which rests the two straight edges connected at the back, 

 so as to prevent the ink running out. It is conveyed from the ductor- 

 roller by one of the inking-rollers in the following manner : As the 

 inking-table on the revolving drum passes the ductor-roller, it receives 

 from it a coating of ink, and then coming immediately in contact with 

 the inking rollers, it inks them; the types next follow and receive from 

 the inking-rollers their coating of ink ; and the drum, still revolving, 

 brings the inked type into contact with the paper-cylinders, and 

 the sheet is printed. It must not be forgotten, as one of the distin- 

 guishing features of this machine, that the various processes which 

 have just been enumerated for one set of inking-rollers and one paper- 

 cylinder are repeated eight times for every single revolution of the 

 central drum, so that in this period eight sheets are printed and turned 

 f the machine. For this purpose it is necessary to supply the 

 eight cylinders each with a sheet of paper. Over each cylinder is a 

 sloping desk, upon which a number of sheets of white paper are placed. 

 The layer-on stands by the side of this desk, and pushes forward the 

 paper a sheet at a, time toward the tape-fingers of the machine. These 

 tapes seize it and draw it down in a vertical direction, between tapes, 

 in the eight vertical frames, until its vertical edges correspond with 

 the position of the form of type on the drum. When in this position 

 its vertical motion is arrested for a moment ; it then moves horizon- 

 tally, and is carried towards the printing cylinder by the tapes. 

 Passing round this cylinder, it is instantly printed. It is then con- 

 Teyed horizontally, by means of tapes, to the other side of the frame, 

 and is moved along to another desk, where the taker-off pulls it down. 

 As soon as the sheet is thus disposed of, accommodation is made for 

 nether ; and as each layer-on delivers to the machine two sheets every 

 five seconds, sixteen sheets are thus printed in that brief space ; and 

 thj ia continued for any length of time, supposing no accident occurs, 



such as a sheet going wrong, in which case it is the duty of the taker- 

 off to pull a bell-handle, and the machine is instantly stopped by the 

 engine-man. As the type-form on the central drum moves at the rate 

 of 70 inches per second, and the paper to be printed moves at the same 

 rate, if by any error in the delivery and motion of a sheet of paper it 

 arrive at the printing cylinder l-70th of a second too soon or too late, 

 the relative position of the columns on one side as compared with 

 those on the other side of the paper will be out of register by l-70th of 

 70 inches, namely, one inch, in which case the edge of the printed 

 matter on one side will be an inch nearer to the edge of the paper than 



on the other side All the layer-on has to do is to draw 



forward the sheets so as always to have the edge of one ready for the 

 machine to take in. If the steam-engine which works the machine be 

 put on a greater speed, the central drum, and all the attendant appa- 

 ratus, would work with greater rapidity ; and such a speed might 

 easily be obtained as to render it impossible for the layers-ou to pre- 

 sent the paper fast enough to satisfy the improved appetite of the 

 machine ; but in any case the machine would not take in the sheets as 

 the layers-on choose to present them, but only at those periods, rapidly 

 recurring though they be, which are provided by the peculiar functions 

 of the machine." 



Another machine, likewise on the vertical principle, has been invented 

 by the Messrs. Hoe, of America, and several of these have been brought 

 into use in London. 



Stereotyping. The art of stereotype printing is the printing from 

 cast plates of type-metal in lieu of moveable letters or types, and 

 derives its name from the Greek <TTpe6s, firm or fixed, and rinros, a 

 figure or type. This art is a remarkable illustration of the tendency 

 of some inventions to return, after a long course of improvement, very 

 near to their original simplicity. In the commencement of the art of 

 printing, solid blocks of wood were used, containing, in one piece, all 

 the words of which a page was composed. A great improvement upon 

 this plan was the use of single letters or types, which might be com- 

 bined into words and pages, and, after being printed from, might be 

 distributed and re-arranged for another work. Then followed the 

 process of type-founding, or casting the letters individually in moulds, 

 by which they might be multiplied with facility, and being engraved 

 originally upon steel punches, might be executed with greater neatness. 

 Whether the early printers employed logotypes, that is, types for 

 printing whole syllables or words, to any material extent, is not very 

 certain ; but it is well known that many persons have proposed, since 

 the introduction of moveable types, the use of such logotypes for the 

 purpose of facilitating the operation of printing; while others have 

 adopted processes which approach more nearly to the old plan of 

 printing from page-blocks, either by fusing the types composing a page 

 into a solid mass, or, as in the modern art of stereotyping, by taking a 

 mould from the page or form of moveable types, and using it as the 

 matrix in which to make a solid cast or plate of metal. The face of 

 such a cast is a fac-simile of the types from which the mould is taken, 

 and may be printed from in the same manner as the original form or 

 page. 



Many of the accounts of the various projects which bear an affinity 

 to the art of stereotyping, as practised by modern printers, are very 

 indistinct ; and the claims of some of the projectors are exceedingly 

 perplexing. Those readers who desire minute information may consult 

 works which enter at length into the history of printing, and especially 

 a very interesting * Essay on the Origin and Progress of Stereotype 

 Printing,' published in 1820, by Mr. Hodgson, of Newcastle. The 

 subject is also treated at considerable length in Haneard's ' Typo- 

 graphia ; ' but much of the history contained in that work is derived 

 from the volume before mentioned. 



One of the earliest schemes which claims notice in this brief sketch 

 is that which was tried at the beginning of the last century by a 

 Dutchman named Van der Mey. The booksellers Luchtmans, of 

 Leyden, in a letter dated 1801, which was printed by M. Camus, in his 

 ' Histoire et Proce'de's du Polytypage et de la Ste're'otypie,' described 

 some plates or blocks formed by Van der Mey, which had been used 

 in their establishment ever since 1711. These were the forms for a 

 quarto Bible; but a few other works were executed in the same 

 way. They were not cast solid, but consisted of ordinary types, which, 

 after being set up in the usual way, were converted into a solid 

 mass by soldering them together at the back. The great expense of 

 forms prepared in this way, as well as their inconvenient weight and 

 bulk, is quite sufficient to account for the plan having fallen into 

 disuse. It was indeed only applicable in those very rare cases in which 

 it was desirable, in order to meet a constant demand, to keep the forms 

 of type standing ; and was preferable to that practice only inasmuch as 

 it avoided the risk of some of the letters being accidentally loosened 

 and misplaced. 



William Ged, a goldsmith of Edinburgh, if not absolutely the first, 

 was one of the first to practise stereotyping, according to the common 

 acceptation of the word. His claim to this honour is recorded in a 

 rare pamphlet published by Nichols in 1781, and reprinted in 1819 by 

 Hodgson of Newcastle, entitled ' Biographical Memoirs of William 

 Ged, including a particular account of his progress in the art of Block- 

 printing.' From this work it appears that Ged invented a process for 

 casting whole pages about the year 1725, and that a few years after- 

 wards he and others who were associated with him attempted to apply 



