11$ Mechanic Arts. [Chap. IX. 



of Great Britain. In this invention the types for 

 printing, instead of answering to single letters^ are 

 made to correspond to xchole xcoi^ds ; a circum- 

 stance which points out the etymology of the 

 name. The advantages of tliis new mode are said 

 to be tliese : that the compositor has less charged 

 upon his memory than in the common way ; that 

 he is much less liable to errour ; that he saves time, 

 hiasmuch as the type of each word is as easily 

 and as readily set as that of a single letter; that 

 the distribution afterwards is more simple, easy, 

 and expeditious ; and that no extraordinary ex- 

 pense, nor greater number of types is required iu 

 this than in the common mode of printing*. 



Another improvement in the art of printing, 

 which belongs to the last age, is the kind of im- 

 pression called Facsimile, or forming the types in 

 such a manner as precisely to resemble the manu- 

 script intended to be copied. The first approach 

 to this method of printing was the Medicean Vir- 

 gil, printed at Florence in 1711. This, however, 

 though an approximation to the plan, was by no 

 means, strictly speaking, what is now meant by 

 JaC'Simile printing, as the resemblance of the ma- 

 nuscript was not complete. The first great work 

 of this kind was the New Testament of the Alex- 

 andrian MS. in the British ^luseum, published by 

 Dr. Woide, in 1786, which exhibits its prototype 

 to a degree of similarity scarcely credible. Since 

 that time a ^^\\ other works of considerable ex- 

 tent have been published on the same plan, parti- 

 cularly Dr. Kipling's edition of the four Gospel^ 



* Encijclopccdla. Art. Logograp/ti/, 



