SCIENCE IN THE INDUSTRIAL WORLD 



two hundred revolutions a minute. The period of 

 contact between the paper and the plate-cylinders is 

 therefore inconceivably brief, and how in that fractional 

 space of time a perfect impression is made, even to the 

 reproduction of such fine lines as are shown in the illus- 

 trations, is one of those things which, to the man who is 

 not 'up' in mechanics, must forever remain a mystery. 

 But that it does it you know, because you have the evi- 

 dence of your own eyes. 



"A double folder forms part of this machine. A 

 single folder would not be equal to the task imposed upon 

 it. As it is, this double folder has to exercise such celer- 

 ity to keep up with the streams of printed paper that 

 descend upon it that its operations are too quick for the 

 eye to follow. 



"The press has two delivery outlets. At each the 

 papers are automatically counted in piles of fifty. No 

 matter how rapidly the papers come out, there is never 

 a mistake in the count. It is as sure as fate. By an 

 ingenious contrivance if I should attempt to describe 

 it more definitely most people would be none the wiser- 

 each fiftieth paper is shoved out an inch beyond the 

 others that have been dropped onto the receiving tapes, 

 thus serving as a sort of tally mark. 



"Truly it is a marvelous machine this sextuple 

 press. Nowhere will you find a more perfect adaptation 

 of means to ends; nowhere in any branch of industry 

 a piece of mechanism which offers a finer example of 

 what human skill and ingenuity is capable of." 



From this it will be seen that at least one desideratum 

 of the printing-press, speed, had been attained. But 



[134] 



