The following table will be appreciated by authors and by all who desire
to become acquainted with the technical marks used by practical readers.
Due attention to the explanations will insure an apt proficiency in the
manual department of proof-reading.
[Illustration: (Transcriber’s Note: showing text marked up by the
proof-reader.)]
[Illustration: (Transcriber’s Note: showing the corrected text, given
below.)]
THOUGH several differing opinions exist as to the individual by whom
the art of printing was first discovered; yet all authorities concur
in admitting PETER SCHOEFFER to be the person who invented _cast metal
types_, having learned the art of _cutting_ the letters from the
Gutenbergs: he is also supposed to have been the first who engraved on
copper-plates. The following testimony is preserved in the family, by Jo.
Fred. Faustus, of Ascheffenburg:
‘PETER SCHOEFFER, of Gernsheim, perceiving his master Faust’s design,
and being himself ardently desirous to improve the art, found out (by
the good providence of God) the method of cutting (_incidendi_) the
characters in a _matrix_, that the letters might easily be singly _cast_,
instead of being _cut_. He privately _cut matrices_ for the whole
alphabet: and when he showed his master the letters cast from these
matrices, Faust was so pleased with the contrivance, that he promised
Peter to give him his only daughter _Christina_ in marriage, a promise
which he soon after performed. But there were as many difficulties at
first with these letters, as there had been before with _wooden ones_,
the metal being too soft to support the force of the impression: but this
defect was soon remedied, by mixing the metal with a substance which
sufficiently hardened it.’]