[328] “Thomas Roycroft died August 10, 1677. In 1675 he was master of

the Stationers’ Company, and in 1677 he gave to them two silver mugs,

weight 27 ozs. 3 dwts. In the rear of the altar at St. Bartholemew’s

the Great is this epitaph:—‘M.S. Hic juxta situs est Thomas Roycroft,

armiger, linguis Orientalibus Typographus Regius, placidissimis moribus

et antiquâ probitate ac fide memorandus, quorum gratiâ optimi civis

famam jure merito adeptus est. Militiæ civicæ Vicetribunus. Nec minus

apud exteros notus ob libros elegantissimis suis typis editos, inter

quos sanctissimum illud _Bibliorum Polyglottorum_, opus quam maxime

eminet. Obiit die 10 Augusti, ann. Reparatæ Sal. MDCLXXVII, postquam

LVI ætatis suæ annum implevisset. Parenti optimè merito, Samuel

Roycroft, filius unicus, hoc monumentum pie posuit.’ ”

[329] _Lexicon Heptaglotton_, _Hebraicum_, _Chaldaicum_, _Syriacum_,

_Samaritanum_, _Æthiopicum_, _Arabicum_, conjunctim; _et Persicum_

separatim, _etc._, _etc._ _Authore Edmundo Castello, S.T.D._, _etc._

_Londini, Imprimebat Thomas Roycroft, L.L._ _Orientalium Typographus

Regius, 1669_. Two vols., fol.

[330] _State Papers, Domestic_, 1665. Vol. 142, No. 174.

[331] _State Papers, Domestic_, 1667. _Ent. Book 23_, p. 337.

[332] In the List of Stewards of the _Brotherly Meeting_ of printers

referred to p. 166, Nicholas Nicholls’ name occurs with James Flesher’s

as a Steward at the 42nd Feast.

[333] _Dissertation_, p. 46.

[334] See _ante_, p. 148.

[335] Nicholas Nicholls’ tiny specimen, printed four years earlier,

exhibited only a few lines specially cut, and dedicated privately to

the King.

[336] In 1677 he published _Geometrical Operations_, London, 4to,

translated by himself from Dutch into English.

[337] _Regulæ Trium Ordinum Literarum Typographicarum; or the Rules

of the Three Orders of Print Letters, viz.: the Roman, Italick,

English,—Capitals and Small; showing how they are compounded of

Geometrick Figures and mostly made by Rule and Compass. Useful for

Writing Masters, Painters, Carvers, Masons and others that are Lovers

of Curiosity; by Joseph Moxon, Hydrographer to the King’s Most

Excellent Majesty. London. Printed for Joseph Moxon on Ludgate Hill at

the Sign of Atlas._ 1676. 4to. (Dedicated to Sir Christopher Wren.)

[338] The theory of the proportion of letters had been dealt with by

several foreign authors in the sixteenth century. In 1509 Fra Luca

Pacioli’s book, entitled _De Divinâ Proportione_, was printed at

Venice, containing woodcut illustrations of the various letters of the

alphabet. In 1525 Albert Dürer published in Nuremberg his _Unterweisung

der Messung mit dem Zirkel und Richtscheit_, reducing all letters to

a combination of circles and straight lines. In 1529 Geofroy Tory’s

_Champfleury_ appeared at Paris, an extraordinary treatise, deriving

every letter of the Latin alphabet from the goddess IO, of the letters

of whose name every other letter is formed; and proportioning each to

the human body and countenance in their various poses and aspects.

Fantastic as his work was, it is credited with having revolutionised

the form of the Roman letter in France. Like Moxon, Tory sub-divided

the square of each letter into a number of minute squares, in which he

constructed his model letters. A somewhat similar work was published

at Saragossa, in Spain, in 1548, by Ycair, entitled _Orthographia

Practica_, containing specimens of alphabets, and intended, like all of

the above-named works, more for the use of the caligrapher and sculptor

than for the printer.

[339] _Mechanick Exercises, or the Doctrine of Handy-Works. Began

Jan. 1, 1677. And intended to be Monthly continued. By Joseph Moxon,

Hydrographer to the King’s Most Excellent Majesty. London. Printed for

Joseph Moxon on Ludgate Hill at the Sign of the Atlas._ Two vols., 4to.

Vol. I (14 numbers). _The Smiths, the Joyners, the Carpenters, and the

Turner’s Trades._ 1677–80.

Vol. II (24 numbers). _Applied to the Art of Printing_, 1683–6.

(Dedicated to Dr. Fell, Bishop of Oxford.)

[340] Mores says that before Moxon’s time letter-cutters worked by eye

and hand only, and practised their art by guess-work (_Dissert._, p.

43).

[341] See chap. iv.

[342] Or rather a hair space, of which seven go to the body; so that

one such space divided by six would give a 42nd part!

[343] See _ante_, p. 109.

[344] Of the eighteen letters of the alphabet, the b, c, h, l, m, n, o,

s, u, are in Roman, the _a_ and _e_ in Italic.

[345] A copy of this rare broadside is in the Library of Corpus Christi

College, Cambridge.

[346] The full title of this rare little tract, consisting of

eight leaves only, is translated as follows:—_Aibidil Gaoidheilge

Caiticiosma, etc._ (_The Irish Alphabet and Catechism, precept or

instruction of a Christian, together with certain articles of a

Christian faith which are proper for everyone to adopt who would be

submissive to the ordinance of God and the Queen of this Kingdom.

Translated from Latin and English into Irish by John O’Kearney . .

Printed in the town of the Ford of Hurdles, (Dublin), at the cost of

Master John Ussher, Alderman, at the head of the Bridge, the 20th of

June 1571, with the privilege of the great Queen._ 1571.) 8vo.

[347] _Tiomna Nuadh, etc._ (_The New Testament of our Lord and Saviour

Jesus Christ, faithfully translated from the Greek into the Irish by

William O’Donnell._) _Séon Francke: a mBaile athá Cliath_ (_Dublin_),

1602. Fol. This work was printed in the house of Sir William Ussher,

Clerk of the Council.

[348] _Leabhar na nurnaightheadh gcomhchoidchiond agus

mheinisdraldachda na Sacrameinteadh, etc._ (Translated from the English

by W. Daniel, Archbishop of Tuam), _a dtigh Shéon Francke, alias

Franckton, a Mbaile athá Cliath_ (_Dublin_), 1608. Fol. Not published

till 1609. In his dedication, Daniel says that, “having translated the

book, I followed it to the presse with jealousy and daiely attendance,

to see it perfected; payned as a woman in travell desirous to be

delivered.”

[349] _A B C_, _or the_ _Institution of a Christian_. _Printed by the

Company of Stationers_. Dublin, 1631. 8vo.

[350] _The Catechism, with the Six points of W. Perkins_, _translated

into Irish by Godfrey Daniel_. Dublin, 1652. 8vo.

[351] “The publication of everything valuable in this language by the

fathers of Donegal was unfortunately prevented by the troubles of the

time of Charles I, by Cromwell’s usurpation. These fathers had procured

a fount for this purpose, which, when forced to fly, they carried

with them to Louvain, where some fragments of this fount are yet to

be found” (_Theoph. O’Flanagan on the Ancient Language of Ireland.

Transac. of the Gaelic Soc._ 8vo, Dublin, 1808, p. 212). Others stated

that the fount had been removed to Douay, and there used to print

several Catholic tracts. No Irish work whatever is known to have been

printed at Douay. Respecting the various foreign Irish founts, the

reader is referred to the account given in chapter ii, p. 75.

[352] _Life of William Bedell, D.D._, by H. J. Monck Mason. Lond., 8vo,

1843, p. 287.

[353] In addition to the _A B C_ _and_ _Catechism_, already referred

to as published by Bedell in 1631, some of his biographers record that

he had printed a later edition about 1641, and at the same time the

following tracts in Irish, viz.: Some forms of prayer, a selection of

passages from Scripture, the first three of Chrysostom’s Homilies on

the rich man and Lazarus, and some sermons by Leo. Copies of these have

not been seen.

[354] Most of the copies were stated to have been bought up, like the

type, by Roman ecclesiastics.

[355] Of this work a copy has not yet been seen.

[356] _Tiomna Nuadh._ (_The New Testament of our Lord and Saviour Jesus

Christ, faithfully translated from the Greek into the Irish by William

O’Donnell_). London. Robert Everingham. 1681. 4to.

[357] “Mr. Everingham and Mr. Whiteledge,” says Dunton (_Life_, p.

331), “were two partners in the trade; I employ’d ’em very much, and

look’d upon ’em to be honest and thriving men. Had they confin’d

’emselves a little sooner to Household Love, they might possibly have

kept upon their own Bottom; however, so it happen’d, that they lov’d

themselves into Two Journey-men Printers again.” Everingham was the

printer, in 1680, of a _Weekly Advertisement of Books_ for some London

publishers.

[358] Writing to Dr. Marsh of Dublin, Jan. 17th, 1681–2, Boyle refers

to a projected Irish Grammar, and offers the use of his type. “I am

glad that so useful a designe as that of frameing a compendious Irish

Grammar has been conceived by one that is so able to execute it well;

but I presume you will want letters for many of the Irish words; in

which case you may please to consider what use may be made of those

I have already, that may be consistent with the printing of the Old

Testament in the language they relate to; for all the designe I had in

having them cut off was, that they might be in a readiness to print

useful bookes in Irish, whether there or here” (Mason’s _Life of

Bedell_, p. 301).

[359] Leabhuir na Seintiomna, etc. (_The Books of the Old Testament

translated into Irish by Dr. William Bedell, late Bishop of Kilmore._

_London._) 1685. 4to.

[360] _An Biobla Naomhtha._ (_W. Bedell’s and W. O’Donnell’s Irish

Bible, revised, and printed at London by R. Everingham._) 1690. 8vo.

[361] Mason’s _Life of Bedell_, p. 305.

[362] _The Book of Common Prayer, Irish and English, with the Elements

of the Irish Language_, by John Richardson. London, 1712. 8vo.

[363] _Practical Sermons._ London, 1711.

[364] _Dissertation_, p. 33. It is worthy of note that at the date when

Mores wrote an almost universal cessation in Irish printing was taking

place at home and abroad. At Louvain no work had appeared since 1663,

at Rome since 1707, or at Paris (with the exception of the specimen in

Fournier’s _Manuale Typographique_, 1764), since 1742. In the few Irish

works issued at home during this period (with the notable exception of

Miss Brooke’s _Reliques of Irish Poetry_, printed by Bonham of Dublin

in 1789, in a new fount, apparently privately cut) the Irish character

is generally rendered in copperplate, or in Roman type. It was not

till Marcel published his _Alphabet Irlandais_, at Paris in 1804, and

Neilson his _Irish Grammar_, at Dublin in 1808, that a revival of Irish

typography took place, both abroad and at home.

[365] _An Essay towards a Real Character and a Philosophical Language,

by John Wilkins, D.D., Dean of Ripon. London, printed . . . for the

Royal Society._ 1668. Fol.

[366] _Dissertation_, p. 43. Mores mentions a James Moxon who in 1677

lived near Charing Cross, and sold Joseph Moxon’s books at his house

(p. 44).

[367] Joseph Leigh (_sic_) served at the sixty-fourth Feast (_i.e._,

about 1675), and Thos. Goring at the sixty-seventh (1678). In the same

List occurs the name of John Goring, probably a relative of Thomas

Goring, at the forty-sixth Feast (1657).

[368] His name occurs in the list of Masters and Workmen Printers, as

having served as Steward at the sixty-ninth Feast (1680).

[369] Mores’ _Dissert._, p. 13.

[370] See _ante_, p. 157.

[371] The names of both occur among the stewards who had served office

at the annual Brotherly Meetings of Masters and Workmen Printers;

James Grover at the sixty-first Feast (1672), and Thomas Grover at the

sixty-third (1674).

[372] See _ante_, p. 96.

[373] See _ante_, p. 90.

[374] See _ante_, p. 144.

[375] “The Arabic (of the _Polyglot_) is Great Primer, in our (_i.e._,

James’s) foundery; and it came from Mr. Grover” (Mores’ _Dissert._, p.

13; and again, p. 63). Mores, however, only mentions an imperfect set

of Double Pica matrices in the summary of this foundry, whereas Andrews

possessed a complete fount of Great Primer. A few odd punches of the

_Polyglot_ Arabic are still in existence.

[376] Mores’ _Dissert._, p. 46.

[377] _Ibid._, p. 67.

[378] This distinguished ambassador belonged to an honourable family,

of whom by no means the least worthy member was Miss Elizabeth Rowe,

who in 1785 married Henry Caslon, and subsequently—first with her

mother-in-law, and afterwards by her own exertions—ably conducted the

affairs of the Chiswell Street foundry. See _post_, chap. xi.

[379] See _ante_, p. 144.

[380] _Gent. Magaz._, vol. 56, p. 497. Nichols’ _Lit. Anec._, ix, 9.

[381] Proposuit quidem D. Junius multis antehac annis MS. hoc typis

evulgare, cujus etiam specimen impressum vidi; sed consilium illius,

multis viris doctis merito improbatum, ejus progressum retardavit;

dum multa pro arbitrio ex MS. detruncaret et mutaret, idque cùm nulla

premebat necessitas, prout ex Catalogo satis magno vocabulorum per

pauca _Geneseos_ capita, quæ ipse mutaverat et expunxerat (quem mihi

ostendit Typographus) constat (_Proleg._, sec. ix, § 34).

[382] _Vitæ quorundam eruditissimorum et illustrium Virorum.—Patricii

Junii. Lond._, 1707. 4to. “Utcunque futuri operis specimen, quod

jam præ oculis meis habeo, primum nimirum caput libri _Geneseos_,

una cum doctissimis Scholiis, edere placuit. Omnes illud certamen

arripiunt, avidisque oculis legunt perleguntque, ac optimâ spe de

promissâ editione, quam cum maximo et vix continendo affectu exspectant

efflagitantque, conceptâ, quasi moram pertæsi, Orbem Christianum hoc

eximio thesauro, quod dudum fuisset locupletandus, nimium diu hactenus

caruisse amicè queruntur” (p. 32).

[383] Parr’s _Life of Usher_, 1686, p. 621. Usher to Boate, June 1651:

“ . . . the Alexandrian copy (in the Library of St. James) which he

intendeth shortly to make publick, Mr. Selden and myself every day

pressing him to the work.”

[384] Wood, _Athen. Ox._, 1691, i, 796; also Edwards, _Libraries and

Founders of Libraries_, Lond., 1865, 8vo, p. 168.

[385] _Lansd. MSS._, No. 231, fo. 169.

[386] See _post_, chap. xvi.

[387] The matrices of all these curious founts have survived to the

present day, and, indeed, lie before us as we write. They bear strong

evidence of having been justified and finished by the same hand.

[388] From this assertion we except, of course, the letter of the

first printers, which, if not imitating the actual handwriting of one

particular scribe, was a copy of the conventional book-writing hand

of the period. Some of the earliest scripts, italics and cursives are

also reputed to have been modelled on the handwriting of some famous

caligrapher or artist. One of the first instances of printing with

facsimile types was the copy of the famous Medicean _Virgil_, produced

at Florence in 1741. The types are for the most part ordinary Roman

capital letters with a certain number of “discrepants” or peculiar

characters. The title of this fine work is:—_P. VergiliI Maronis Codex

Antiquissimus . . qui nunc Florentiæ in Bibliotheca Mediceo-Laurentiana

adservatur. Bono publico Typis descriptus Anno MDCCXLI. Florentiæ.

Typis Mannianis._ 8vo.

[389] This is possibly the printer respecting whom Nichols (_Illust.

Lit._, viii, 464) notes that on Nov. 20, 1732, John Mears, bookseller,

was taken into custody for publishing a _Philosophical Dissertation

on Death_ . . . Meares succeeded to the business of Richard Nutt,

and printed the _Historical Register_. Among the Bagford Collections

(_Harl. MS._ No. 5915) is a _Specimen by H. Meere, printer, at the

Black Fryar, in Blackfriars, London_. No date.

[390] Richard Nutt, printer in the Savoy, died March 11, 1780, aged 80

years.

[391] Grover contributed £2 2_s._ in 1712 towards defraying the loss

incurred by the elder Bowyer on the occasion of the fire at his

printing-house.

[392] His name occurs in the List of Masters and Workmen Printers in

1681; see _ante_, p. 166.

[393] See _ante_, p. 149.

[394] Cotton’s _Typographical Gazetteer_. Second Series, 1866, p. 17.

[395] Vol. ii, p. 120.

[396] Some of the matrices are without sides, which were probably

supplied by a peculiar adaptation of the mould.

[397] Bagford (writing in 1714) states that Walpergen “was succeeded by

his son, who has long since been succeeded by Mr. Andrews.” If this be

the case, the Peter Walpergen whose death occurred in 1714 was probably

the son, of whom nothing is known as distinguished from his father.

[398] We are indebted to the kindness of Mr. F. Madan, of the Bodleian

Library, for our transcript.

[399] _The Holy Bible, containing the Old Testament and the New, etc.

Oxford, Printed by John Baskett, Printer to the King’s Most Excellent

Majesty, for Great Britain; and to the University_, 1717, 1716. 2

vols., folio. The running title of Luke xx reads, “_The parable of the

vinegar_.”

[400] This, in all probability, was the fount used for printing the

“Vinegar” _Bible_.

[401] The contents of this very interesting document were communicated

to the _Athenæum_ of September 5, 1885, by Mr. J. H. Round, in whose

possession the original is.

[402] Timperley’s _Songs of the Press_. London, 1833, 8vo, p. 85.

[403] Nichols’ note on the James family (_Anecdotes of Mr. Bowyer_,

pp. 585, 609) is at variance with the account given by Rowe Mores.

According to the former, Thomas, John and George James were all

brothers, and sons of the notorious half-crazy Elianor James,

whose husband, Thomas James, the printer, was a large benefactor

to Sion College, and died in 1711. On this point, however, Mores,

whose relations with the family gave him special opportunities for

information, may be considered as more correct in representing

Thomas and John as sons of the Rev. John James. George James, the

son of Thomas and Elianor, was City Printer in 1724. His office was

in Little Britain, where he wrote and printed the _Post Boy_. He

was Common Councilman for the Ward of Aldersgate Without, and died

in 1735. His greatgrandfather, Dr. Thomas James, Dean of Wells, was

the first Keeper of Bodley’s Library at Oxford in 1605. Portraits

of this Dr. Thomas James, and of Thomas and Elianor, the parents of

George James, are preserved in Sion College, as is also a portrait of

Elizabeth, their daughter, who married Jacob Ilive, the printer, and

who was herself a benefactor to the College. Nichols mentions another

member of the family, one Harris James, who, he says, was originally

a letter-founder, and “formerly of Covent Garden Theatre, where he

represented fops and footmen.”

[404] _Dissertation_, p. 51, _et seq._

[405] Rabbi Joseph Athias, son of Tobias Athias, who printed a Spanish

Bible for the use of the Jews, was a printer, publisher and typefounder

in Amsterdam. He succeeded to the Elzevir foundry as improved and

added to by Van Dijk. In 1662–3 he issued an edition of the _Old

Testament_ printed in Hebrew type, specially cut by Van Dijk, for

the accuracy and beauty of which he received great renown; and in

1667, when a new edition of the _Bible_ was published, the Government

of the United Provinces signified their satisfaction by presenting

him with a gold medal and a massive gold chain. He is said to have

printed a great number of English Bibles. Van Dijk, whose models were

so warmly applauded by Moxon, was a letter-cutter only, and worked

for various foundries. His founder was John Bus, who cast in Athias’

house, as the title of the following specimen-sheet, issued about

1700, indicates:—_Proeven van Letteren die gesneden zijn door Wylen

Christoffel van Dijck, welke gegoten werden by Jan Bus, ten huyse van

Sr. Joseph Athias woonst in de Swanenburg Street, tot Amsterdam_. Demy

broadside (showing five Titlings, sixteen Roman and Italic, eight Black

and two Music). After passing through several hands, Athias’ foundry

was purchased by John Enschedé of Haerlem in 1767, in whose family it

still remains.

[406] This should be Dirk Voskens of Amsterdam, who bought the foundry

of Bleau in 1677, and was the first Dutch founder who kept types for

the Oriental and recondite languages. Like Athias and others, he was a

founder only, his punches and matrices being cut and sunk by Rolij. The

foundry descended to his great-grandson, and was ultimately put up to

auction in 1780, and purchased by the brothers Ploos Van Amstel, and

subsequently became absorbed by the Enschedé foundry.

[407] Rolij seems to be Rowe Mores’ way of spelling Rolu, of whose

types the following specimen-sheet exists:—_Proeven van Letteren

dewelcke gegooten worden by Mr. Johannes Rolu, Letter-Snyder woonende

tot Amsterdam in de laetste Lelydwars-streat_, _c._ 1710 (probably the

specimen referred to by James further on).

[408] Voskens.

[409] “The matter was first composed in the usual way, then the form

was affused with some sort of _gypsum_, which after it was indurated,

became a complication of matrices for casting the whole page in a

single piece” (_Mores_, p. 59). As early as the year 1705 a Dutchman,

named J. Van der Mey, had, with the assistance of Johann Muller, a

German clergyman, devised a method of soldering together the bottoms

of common types imposed in a forme, so as to form solid blocks of

each page. By this method, two Bibles, a Greek Testament and a Syriac

Testament with Lexicon were produced, the plates of all of which,

except the last named, were preserved in 1801. See T. Hodgson’s _Essay

on the Origin and Progress of Stereotype Printing_, Newcastle, 1820,

8vo.

[410] “Being called into our company,” says Ged, in his _Narrative_,

“he bragged much of his great skill and knowledge in all the parts of

mechanism, and particularly vaunted, that he, and hundreds besides

himself, could make plates to as great perfection as I could: which

occasioned some heat in our conversation.”

[411] Hansard (_Typog._ p. 823), shows an impression of two pages of

a _Prayer Book_, from plates which had escaped “Caslon’s cormorant

crucible.”

[412] _C. Crispi Sallustii Belli Catilinarii et Jugurthini Historiæ.

Edinburgi; Guilielmus Ged, Aurifaber Edinensis, non typis mobilibus, ut

vulgo fieri solet, sed tabellis seu laminis fusis, excudebat._ 1739,

8vo (reprinted 1744). According to the account given by Ged’s daughter

in the narrative above referred to, the _Sallust_ was completed in

1736. No copy of that date is, however, known. Some of the plates of

the work are still in existence.

[413] The story may be read in detail in _Biographical Memoirs of

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

of Block printing_. London, 1781, 8vo. Fenner died insolvent about the

year 1735. James Ged, after working for some time with his father,

engaged in the rebellion of 1745, and narrowly escaped execution. He

ultimately went to Jamaica, a year before his father’s death.

[414] Despite Mores’ prophecy that Ged’s invention, even if at first

successful, would soon have sunk under its own burden, the method was

successfully revived, or rather re-invented, about the year 1781 by Dr.

Tilloch of Edinburgh, in conjunction with Mr. Foulis, printer to the

University of Glasgow, at whose press were printed a stereotype edition

of _Xenophon’s Anabasis_ in 1783, and several chap-books. Messrs.

Tilloch and Foulis did not persevere with their venture, which was

about the year 1800 successfully revived and perfected by Mr. Wilson,

a London printer, aided by Earl Stanhope. In France, Firmin Didot, in

1795, attempted a method similar to that of Van de Mey in 1705; but

abandoning this, succeeded in 1798 in producing good stereo plates by

a system of _polytypage_, as described _ante_, p. 13. The reader is

referred to Hodgson’s _Essay_ for specimens and particulars of the

successive efforts to perfect the stereotype process at home and abroad.

[415] Mores contradicts himself as to this date, giving it as 1738

in one place, and 1736 in another. As, however, he is particular to

mention that John James, in 1736, _after his father’s death_, commenced

his specimen of the foundry, the earlier date may be assumed to be

correct.

[416] Timperley, who quotes this document (_Encycl._ p. 655), gives no

particulars as to the letter in which it is printed.

[417] See _ante_, p. 206.

[418] See _ante_, p. 205.

[419] The Oxford University foundry must, of course, be included as a

fourth foundry existing at this time, but does not rank as a trading

establishment. Cottrell’s foundry was also started in 1757, but it is

doubtful whether he had yet finished cutting his punches. Smith, in

_The Printer’s Grammar_, 1755, in comparing the standard bodies in use

at that time in England, names Caslon and James as the only English

founders.

[420] Smith’s _Printer’s Grammar_, 1755, in referring to the use of

flowers in typography, makes mention of “the considerable augmentation

which Mr. Caslon has made here in flowers, and in which Mr. James

likewise has so far proceeded that we may soon expect a specimen of

them” (p. 137).

[421] Nichols, _Illust. Lit._, viii, 450.

[422] Edward Rowe Mores was born about the year 1729, at Tunstall in

Kent, of which place his father was rector. He was educated at Merchant

Taylors’ School and Queen’s College, Oxford, and being originally

intended for holy orders, took his M.A. degree. He did not, however,

enter the Church, but devoted himself to literary and antiquarian

pursuits. Besides his _Dissertation upon English Typographical

Founders_, he spent some time in correcting Ames, and in other

investigations into the early history of printing. On one occasion, as

he himself narrates, he assisted Ilive in correcting the Hebrew proofs

of _Calasio’s Concordance_ for the press. His latter life was marred

by habits of negligence and intemperance, which hastened his death in

1778 at Low Leyton. His valuable library of books and MSS. was sold by

auction by Paterson in August 1779, on which occasion the eighty copies

of the _Dissertation_, being the entire impression, were bought up by

Mr. Nichols and given to the public with a short Appendix.

[423] _A Dissertation upon English Typographical Founders and

Founderies, by Edward Rowe Mores, A.M. and A.S.S._ (London) 1778. 8vo

(only 80 copies printed).

[424] Consisting of eight founts of Hebrew, four of Samaritan, three of

Arabic, four of Greek, five of Roman or Italic, three of Saxon, one of

Anglo-Norman, and four of Black.

[425] “Such as those which being uniques cannot be perfected without

new punches, and if they were made complete, it would be no more

than _oleum et operam, etc._, because they are either out of use or

the times afford better, as the Antique Hebrew (spec. 7); Leusden’s

Samaritan (spec. 27); 2-line Great Primer Hebrew (spec. 38); the

Runic, Gothic, and some other recondites, the matrices for which

are incomplete or useless. But of the founts which are in daily use

the imperfects will continue, as they mutually aid and help out one

another. For the same reason also will continue those which have been

cast aside (not by their owner) under the name of _waste_.”

[426] In another place Mr. Mores states that the “waste and pye” of the

foundry contained upwards of 6,000 matrices.

[427] This is the old Black from Grover’s foundry; see _ante_, p. 199.

[428] This sly allusion leaves little doubt as to the light in which

Mr. Mores viewed the Coster legend so industriously defended by such

writers of his own day as Meerman, Bowyer and Nichols.

[429] “Excusatos nos habeant eruditi quibus obvenerit typorum

_Jamesianorum_ specimen accuratis perlustrare oculis, quod minus

quam expetendum esset, in linguis præsertim reconditoribus, elimatum

prodeat; in animo erat de dedisse emendatissimum et si sat se fecisse

existiment opifices, si, posthabitis preli, ceterisque maculis,

ostendatur literarum facies—limæ non defuit labor,—at cessante Fusore

cessavit Fornax et defuerunt fusi ad emaculandum typi.”—_Preface to the

Specimen._

[430] _i.e._, [P.] Polyglot, [A.] Andrews, [G.] Grover, [R.] Rolij,

[N.] Nicholls, [S.A.] Sylvester Andrews, [Anon.] “Anonymous.” Of founts

marked *, punches or matrices still exist.

[431] Two sets of Small Pica and two sets of Pearl not shown in

Specimen, were also sold. A Canon, 2-line Great Primer, three Great

Primers, an English, Pica, and Bourgeois, had been lost.

[432] It is to be borne in mind that Andrews’ foundry included that of

Moxon, from whom many of his oldest founts doubtless came.

[433] A Great Primer, Pica, Small Pica and Long Primer had been lost,

but the Long Primer punches remained.

[434] A 2-line English, Double Pica and Pica had been lost.

[435] There were also, not in Specimen, a 2-line Great Primer, Double

Pica, Pica, two Small Picas and a set of 2-line Nonpareil Capitals. A

Paragon, Bourgeois and two sets of Nonpareil had been lost.

[436] This was the fount used in the _Catena on Job_, 1637.

[437] “Remarkably beautifully cut and justified.”

[438] A Double Pica, Pica and Long Primer had been lost.

[439] A 2-line English had been lost.

[440] Also a Double Pica not in specimen.

[441] _i.e._, Black—of which the following sets, not in Specimen,

were also sold:—Double Pica, two Great Primers, two English, four

Small Picas, Long Primer, three Breviers and Nonpareil. A 2-line Great

Primer, Double Pica, Long Primer and Bourgeois had been lost.

[442] Of these, one was a 4-line, to which belonged a set of “leaden”

lower-case matrices.

[443] There is more difficulty in tracing these to their original

sources than in the case of the matrices, as not only are the numbers

not given, but the bodies named may very likely vary from the actual

bodies to which the matrices were justified.

[444] See p. 191. Though the matrices of this fount do not appear in

the Catalogue, they were evidently in James’s foundry, as they are

mentioned in the list drawn up by James in 1767, and are not specified

among the matrices lost. They were acquired at the sale of Dr. Fry, and

may possibly have been included with the Saxons, or with the imperfect

lots.

[445] _Lit. Anec._, iii, 438.

[446] See our facsimiles from the Specimen at pages 200 and 204, _ante_.

[447] In 1703, in the Convocation of Clergy in the Lower House, a

complaint was exhibited against the printers of the _Bible_ for the

careless and defective way in which it was printed by the patentees.

The editions specially complained of were those printed by Hayes,

of Cambridge, in 1677 and 1678, and an edition in folio printed in

London in 1701. The printers continued, however, to print the _Bible_

carelessly, with a defective type, on bad paper; and when printed, to

sell copies at an exorbitant price.

[448] The following sketch of William Caslon is mainly taken, and in

parts quoted, from the interesting particulars of his career preserved

in Nichols’ _Anecdotes of Bowyer_ and the larger work into which that

was subsequently expanded. The elder Bowyer’s intimate connection with

Caslon’s first ventures in letter-founding give Nichols’ work a special

authority in the matter. At the same time there exists a certain

confusion in the earlier part of the narrative which it is difficult

completely to harmonise.

[449] John Watts, a printer of first-rate eminence, for some time

partner with Jacob Tonson II in Covent Garden. It was in Watts’

printing office in Great Queen Street, Lincoln’s Inn, that Benjamin

Franklin worked as journeyman in 1725. Watts died in 1763, aged 85.

[450] William Bowyer, the elder, regarded as one of the foremost

printers of his time, was born in 1663. In 1699 he had his office in

Dogwell Court, Whitefriars. His premises were burnt in 1713, and in

the conflagration he lost all his types and presses. By the liberality

of his fellow-printers, however, this loss (estimated at over £5,000)

was partly made good, and he was enabled to start again and rise

once more to a foremost place in his profession. For all particulars

respecting Mr. Bowyer and his learned son, see Nichols’ _Anecdotes of

William Bowyer_, London, 1782, 4to, and _Literary Anecdotes of the 18th

Century_, London 1812–15, 9 vols., 8vo, a work the foundation of which

is a bibliography of the productions of this celebrated press. See also

_ante_, p. 157.

[451] James Bettenham, husband of the elder Bowyer’s step-daughter, was

born 1683. He printed in St. John’s Lane, and attained to considerable

eminence as a printer, although after sixty years’ labour he left

behind him only £400. “He died,” says Rowe Mores, “in 1774, _ferè

centenarius sanæque mentis et memoriæ_.”

[452] _Anecdotes of Bowyer_, p. 585.

[453] A tradition in the Caslon family that William Caslon began his

career as a letter-founder in 1716, induced the late Mr. H. W. Caslon

to adopt this as the date of the establishment of the Foundry. In the

absence, however, of any testimony in support of the statement, and in

the face of the clear announcement by Caslon himself that his Foundry

was begun in the year 1720, there seems to be no ground for attaching

any importance to the use of this earlier date.

[454] This Society, which was established in 1698, had already

displayed considerable activity in the introduction of printing into

the distant fields of its missionary effort. In 1711 it sent out to

the missionaries of Tranquebar, on the Coromandel Coast, a printing

press furnished with Portuguese types, paper, etc., which, after an

adventurous voyage, in which the vessel was plundered by the French

of all her other cargo, reached its destination and enabled the

missionaries to commence the printing of a Tamulic _New Testament_, of

which the _Gospels_ appeared in 1714, with the imprint “_Tranquebariæ

in littore Coromandelino, typis Malabaricis impressit G. Adler_, 1714.”

It is related that the publication of the remainder of the work was

delayed from a scarcity of paper, their types being very large; till at

length the expedient was adopted of casting a new fount of letter from

the leaden covers of some Cheshire cheeses, which had been sent out to

the missionaries by the Society. The attempt succeeded, and with these

new and smaller types the remainder of the _Testament_ was printed,

the whole being published together in 1719. (Cotton, _Typographical

Gazetteer_, 2nd edit., p. 289.)

[455] _Liber Psalmorum . . una cum decem Præceptis . . et Oratione

Dominicâ . . Arabicè; sumptibus Societatis de Propagandâ Cognitione

Christi apud Exteros._ London, 1725. 8vo.

[456] _Novum Testamentum, Arabicè. Londini. Sumptibus Societatis de

Propagandâ Cognitione Christi apud Exteros._ 1727. 4to.

[457] “This circumstance,” says Nichols (_Anec. Bowyer_, p. 317) “has

lately been verified by the American, Dr. Franklin, who was at that

time a journeyman under Mr. Watts, the first printer that employed Mr.

Caslon.”

[458] Dibdin, in repeating this anecdote, uses rather stronger

language. “Caslon,” he says, “after giving (I would hope) that wretched

pilferer and driveller Samuel Palmer (whose _History of Printing_ is

only fit for chincampane paper) half a dozen good canings for his

dishonesty, betook himself to Mr. Bowyer.” (_Bibl. Decam. II._, 379.)

[459] _Joannis Seldeni Jurisconsulti Opera Omnia, tam edita quam

inedita. In tribus voluminibus. Colligit ac recensuit . . . David

Wilkins, S.T.P. . . . Londini, Typis Guil. Bowyer._ 1726. Fol. (Begun

in 1722.)

[460] Dr. David Wilkins, F.S.A., was Keeper of the Lambeth Library

under Archbishop Wake, and drew up a Catalogue of all the MSS.

and books there in his time. Besides editing the _Selden_ and the

_Coptic Testament_ and _Pentateuch_, he published some important

works in Anglo-Saxon Literature, and edited the learned Prolegomena

to Chamberlayne’s _Oratio Dominica_ in 1715. He died in 1740. Rowe

Mores considers that in his Coptic studies Dr. Wilkins was indebted to

Kircher, the Jesuit, whose _Prodromus Coptus_, published in Rome in

1636, the Doctor had severely handled.

[461] _Quinque Libri Moysis Prophetæ in Linguâ Ægyptiâ. Ex M.S.S. . . .

descripsit ac Latine vertit Dav. Wilkins. Londini_ 1731. 4to. Only 200

copies were printed.

[462] See _ante_, p. 147. Nichols, writing about 1813, mentioned that

the Coptic fount, having escaped the conflagration of his printing

office in 1808, was still in his possession.

[463] _Typographia_, p. 349.

[464] See _ante_, p. 205.

[465] See _ante_, p. 218.

[466] _Anec. Bowyer_, p. 537.

[467] See _ante_, p. 215.

[468] _Psalmorum Liber. (Heb. et Lat.) in Versiculos metrice divisus,

etc. Londini_ 1736. 2 vols., 8vo.

[469] _Moses Choronensis Historiæ Armeniacæ Libri iii. Armeniacè

ediderunt, Latinè verterunt notisq: illustr. Guil. et Geo. Whistoni.

London_, 1736. 4to.

[470] _De Linguâ Etruriæ. J. Swinton. Oxon._, 1738.

[471] This fount may be seen also in Nichols’ Appendix to Rowe Mores’

_Dissertation_, p. 96, and in _Ames’ Typographical Antiquities_, 1st

edit., p. 571.

[472] If these were the matrices which Mores, in his summary of the

Polyglot Foundry (p. 172, _ante_), described as Great Primer, it is

difficult—unless they were duplicates—to determine through whose

foundry they passed into Caslon’s hands. Andrews had a Great Primer,

and Grover a Double Pica and Pica; but all these came to James, in

whose foundry they remained when Mores wrote in 1778.

[473] _Cyclopædia, or an Universal Dictionary of the Arts and Sciences,

etc._, by E. Chambers, F.R.S., London, 1738. 2 vols., fol. (Caslon’s

Specimen faces the article “Letter.”) The first edition of this

valuable work—the first repertory of general knowledge published in

Britain—appeared in 1728. It subsequently formed the basis of Rees’

_Encyclopædia_.

[474] See _ante_, p. 206.

[475] Rowe Mores’ account of the Caslon foundry in 1778, wherein he

attributes several of the founts which originally appeared in the

1734 Specimen to Mitchell, might suggest at first sight that Caslon

had acquired Mitchell’s foundry prior to 1739. Mores is, however,

particular to give the exact date of the purchase, 26th July 1739.

It seems more probable that, finding the bodies in Caslon’s Specimen

corresponding generally with the description of the matrices he was

known to have bought from Mitchell, he concluded hastily that the

founts shown were Mitchell’s, whereas a reference to the Specimen would

have proved that Caslon preferred his own original faces, in most

cases, to those he had bought. See also our notes, _post_, pp. 247, 248.

[476] _Anec. Bowyer_, p. 317.

[477] _Anec. Bowyer_, p. 586.

[478] “Les caractères de Caslon ont été gravés, pour la plus grande

partie, par Caslon fils, avec beaucoup d’adresse et de propreté. Les

epreuves qui on out été publiées en 1749 contiennent beaucoup de sortes

différentes de caractères” (_Man. Typog._, II, xxxviii).

[479] _Typographical Antiquities._ London, 1749, 4to, p. 571. The names

of William Caslon, sen., and William Caslon, jun., letter-founders,

figure among the subscribers to the work; and the plate of facsimiles

of Caxton’s types is dedicated “to Mr. Wm. Caslon, a good promoter of

this work, and as suitable to the principal Letter Founder.”

[480] _An Essay on the Original, Use, and Excellency of the Noble Art

and Mystery of Printing._ London, 1752. 8vo. The work is of little

interest apart from the references to the Caslons, and a curious poem

at the end.

[481] See _post_, chap. xiii.

[482] _The Universal Magazine of Knowledge and Pleasure._ London. Vol.

vi. June 1750, p. 274.

[483] See _post_, chap. xvi.

[484] A copy of this Specimen, dated 1763, evidently an advance copy,

is in the library of the American Antiquarian Society, the gift of

Isaiah Thomas, the printer, and is, as far as is known, the only copy

in existence bearing this date. Copies of the 1764 Specimen occur in

8vo and 4to.

[485] Forty-four new founts appear in all, viz.: 2 Titlings, 15 Romans,

4 Greeks, 9 Hebrews, 1 Ethiopic, 1 Etruscan, 2 Saxons, 8 Blacks, and 2

Music, while the Flowers now number 63 varieties.

[486] “ ‘This New Foundery was begun in the year 1720 and finished

1763.’ So we are told by a note at the end of their Specimen published

in 1764, although the same note tells us that though it was finished,

yet it was not finished, ‘but would (with God’s leave) be carried on,

etc.’ Amen!” (_Dissert._, p. 80.)

[487] Among the relics of the Caslon Foundry is a copy of the 1764

specimen book presented by Mr. Caslon to his friend Phil. Thicknesse

the poet. At the end of the book appears Mr. Thicknesse’s letter of

thanks to the donor, execrably printed by the poet himself, in type

given him by Mr. Caslon.

[488] This Concert Room remains at Chiswell Street in pretty much its

old form, and is now the repository of the interesting collection of

portraits and relics, still preserved, of this venerable Foundry.

[489] _A General History of the Science and Practice of Music._ London.

1776. 4to. Vol. v, 127.

[490] The Rev. Dr. Lyttelton writes to Ames, April 25, 1744, “Some

unforeseen business prevents Dr. Pococke and myself dining with

Mr. Caslon to-morrow. I give you this notice that you may defer

your visit till some day next week, when we will endeavour to meet

there.”—_Nichol’s Illustrations of Literature_, iv, 231.

[491] Copies of which he continued to circulate, erasing with pen and

ink the words “and Son” from the title-page and advertisement.

[492] _A Concise History of the Origin and Progress of Printing, etc._

London, 1770. 8vo. Reprinted in the following year with the title:—_The

History of the Art of Printing, in two Parts, etc., J. P. Luckombe,

M.T.A._ London, 1771. 8vo.

[493] _Dissertation_, p. 81.

[494] Mores calls this “excavated” or “Hutter’s leading-string” Hebrew.

A specimen may be seen in _The Scholars Instructor_. _An Hebrew Grammar

of Israel Lyons_, Cambridge, 1735, 8vo. The open Hebrew is here used to

distinguish the servile from the radical letters. Lyons in his preface

deprecates Hutter’s method of printing the entire _Bible_ in this

character, thereby keeping the learners “too long in leading-strings”

(see also _ante_, p. 63).

[495] Mores omits a Small Pica Hebrew, which is the same as the Brevier

shown in the sheet of 1734.

[496] These founts are not Head’s or Mitchell’s, as Mores states, but

were cut by Caslon I, and shown on the 1734 sheet.

[497] The Pica Greek shown on the 1734 sheet was discarded in favour of

this fount.

[498] “But,” adds Mores, “Mr. Caslon is cutting a _Patagonian_ which

will lick up all these diminutives as the ox licketh up the grass of

the field.”

[499] “Supported by arches.” Doubtless cast in sand.

[500] These were not cut, as Mores states, by Caslon II, but by Caslon

I, and appeared on the sheet of 1734, when Caslon II was but 14 years

of age.

[501] “These,” says Mores, “are one and the same. The Acts of

Parliament are printed in them, therefore we call them as Dr. Ducarel

and the Act call them, ‘the common legible hand and character.’ ”

[502] Mores omits here the Pica Black, cut by Caslon I, and shown on

the sheet of 1734.

[503] Not Cartledge, as erroneously given by Nichols. This lady was

the only child of Mr. Cartlitch, an eminent refiner in Foster Lane,

Cheapside, and was born May 31, 1730.

[504] With the addition of the Long Primer Syriac cut for Oxford

University, the “learned” founts in the 1785 Specimen are precisely the

same as those which appeared in the book of 1764.

[505] The address is a literary curiosity: “The acknowledged excellence

of this Foundry, with its rapid success, as well as its unexampled

Productions having gained universal Ecomiums on its ingenious Improver

and Perfecter (whose uncommon Genius transferred the Letter Foundry

Business from HOLLAND to ENGLAND, which, for above Sixty years, has

received, for its beauty and Symmetry, the unbounded praises of the

Literati, and the liberal encouragement of all the Master Printers

and Booksellers, not only in this Country but of all EUROPE and

AMERICA) has excited the Jealousy of the Envious and the Desires of the

enterprising, to become Partakers of the Reward due to the Descendants

of the Improver of this most useful and important Art.

“They endeavour, by every method to withdraw, from this Foundry, that

which they silently acknowledge is its indisputable Right: Which is

conspicuous by their very Address to the Public, wherein they promise

(in Order to induce Attention and Encouragement) that they will use

their utmost Endeavours to IMITATE the Productions of this Foundry;

which assertion, on inspection, will be found impracticable, as the

Imperfections cannot correspond in size.

“The Proprietor of this Foundry, ever desirous of retaining the

decisive Superiority in his Favour, and full of the sincerest Gratitude

for the distinguished Honour, by every Work of Reputation being printed

from the elegant Types of the Chiswell Street Manufactory, hopes,

by every Improvement, to retain and merit a Continuance of their

established Approbation, which, in all Quarters of the Globe, has given

it so acknowledged an Ascendency over that of his Opponents.”

The address prefixed to the 1785 Specimen Book of the Worship Street

Foundry had evidently been the inspiration of this tirade, which in

turn evoked a spirited reply from the Frys in the following year. See

_post_, chap. xv.

[506] The sheets appear (along with some of Fry & Son’s and Wilson’s)

in _Chambers’ Cyclopædia—incorporated in one Alphabet by Abraham Rees,

London_, 1784–86. 4 vols. folio.

[507] These are sometimes (as in the case of the British Museum copy)

bound up with the 1785 8vo specimen book as folding plates.

[508] See _ante_, p. 200. Hansard observes that besides Queen

Elizabeth’s Ambassador, the same family had produced Sir Henry Rowe, a

Lord Mayor of London; and Owen Rowe, the Regicide.

[509] This celebrated typographer was born at Saluzzo, in the Sardinian

States, in 1740. At an early age he visited Rome, and obtained a

situation in the printing office of the Propaganda, where he gained

great credit for his printing. In 1768 he settled at Parma, where he

published many famous works, and established a European reputation.

His _Homer_ in 3 vols. folio, published in 1808, is his most famous

work. He never visited England, although one or two works were printed

by him in our language, viz., Lord Orford’s _Castle of Otranto_, 1791,

8vo, _Gray’s Poems_, 1793, 4to, _Thomson’s Seasons_, 1794, folio and

quarto. He died in 1813, and his widow finished and published in 1818

the _Manuale Tipografico_, 2 vols., royal 4to, a most sumptuous work,

containing upwards of 250 exquisite specimens of type and ornaments.

A monument was erected to him in Saluzzo in 1872. Of Bodoni’s office

at Parma the following interesting particulars are preserved in Dr.

Smith’s _Tour on the Continent_, 2nd edit., vol. iii: “A very great

curiosity in its way, is the Parma printing-office, carried on under

the direction of M. Bodoni, who has brought that art to a degree of

perfection hardly known before him. Nothing could exceed his civility

in showing us numbers of the beautiful productions of his press, of

which he gave us some specimens, as well as the operations of casting

and finishing the letters. The materials of his type are antimony

and lead, as in other places, but he showed us some of steel. He

has sets of all the known alphabets, with diphthongs, accents, and

other peculiarities in the greatest perfection. His Greek types are

peculiarly beautiful, though of a different kind of beauty from those

of old Stephens, and perhaps less free and flowing in their forms.”

[510] _Typographia_, p. 352.

[511]

2-line Gt. Primer—1803

Great Primer—May, 1802

English 1—August, 1802

English 2—April, 1805

Pica 2 and 3—March, 1805

Small Pica 1, 2, and 3—July, 1804

Long Primer 1, 2, and 3—July, 1804.

Bourgeois 1 and 2—July, 1802

Brevier 1 and 2—May, 1805

Minion—May, 1805

Nonpareil 1, 2—October, 1803.

[512] _The Printers’ Grammar, etc., by C. Stower, Printer._ London,

1808. 8vo. The following note is prefixed to the specimen: “A 4-line

Pica, Canon and Double Pica of a bold and elegant shape, were not quite

ready to introduce with these specimens.”

[513] Savage, in his _Hints on Decorative Printing_, London, 1822, 4to,

chapter ii, shows specimens of Mrs. Caslon’s Roman letter contrasted

with the old models of the Foundry on the one hand, and its more recent

developments on the other.

[514] “Chiswell Street, January 19, 1814. Henry Caslon respectfully

informs his friends and the printers in general, that the term of his

partnership with the executors of the late Mr. Nathaniel Catherwood

having expired, he has entered into a new engagement with Mr. John

James Catherwood, brother to his late partner, and that the firm is

now carried on under the firm of Henry Caslon and J. J. Catherwood.

He embraces this opportunity of expressing his grateful sense of

the distinguished patronage the Foundry has received, and the kind

encouragement he has individually experienced from his friends in the

printing business, since the death of his mother and late partner.”

[515] _Typograpia_, p. 353.

[516] See _post_, chap. xvii.

[517] See _post_, chap. xxi, s.v. Bessemer. In the Directory at the end

of Johnson’s _Typographia_, 1824 (ii, 652), a Catherwood is mentioned

among the Letter Founders, Charles’ Sq., Hoxton.

[518] Cut by William Martin.

[519] This beautiful little fount was cut for Pickering’s _Greek

Testament_ 1826, and for clearness and minuteness eclipses both the

Sedan Greek, and that of Blean of Amsterdam. It was also used in the

_Homer_ of 1831. Dibdin (_Introd. to the Classics_, 1827, i, 166) shows

a specimen of the type.

[520] Cut for Dr. C. Wilkins, Oriental Librarian to the East India

Company.

[521] _The Diary of Lady Willoughby, as relates to her Domestic History

in the Reign of King Charles I._ London, 1844. 4to.

[522] _Particulars of a most valuable property for Investment called

the Caslon Letter Foundry; also a most extensive Modern Foundry on

which has been expended upwards of £50,000, which will be sold by

auction by W. Lewis and Son . . . on Wednesday, Dec. 16, 1846, at 11

for 12 precisely (unless previously disposed of by private contract)._

In the list of matrices catalogued, the cutters’ names are added, those

of Hughes, Bessemer, and Boileau being among the most frequent.

[523] _The History of the Art of Printing, containing an Account of

its Invention and Progress in Europe, with the names of the famous

Printers, the places of their birth and the works printed by them, and

a Preface by the Publisher to the Printers in Scotland. Edinburgh,

printed by James Watson. Sold at his shop opposite the Lucken Booths,

and at the shops of David Scot in the Parliament Close, and George

Stewart a little above the Cross_, 1713, 12mo. Watson’s preface is

stated to have been written by John Spotswood, Advocate. The historical

portion is a condensed translation of De la Caille’s _Histoire de

l’Imprimerie_, published at Paris in 1689.

[524] _Specimen of Types in the Printing House of James Watson._ 1713.

48 pp., of which 26 are devoted to Dutch “Bloomers” or Initials, and

the remainder to Romans and Italics from French Canon to Nonpareil,

with a fount of Greek, one of Black, and a few signs, etc.

[525] See _ante_, p. 218.

[526] _Typographia_, p. 362.

[527] Ireland, during a portion of the eighteenth century appears to

have been well supplied with type from native sources. Of the fortunes

of Wilson’s branch foundry here alluded to, we have no further record,

unless we are to connect the following statement with the enterprise of

the Scotch typographers:—Boulter Grierson in 1764 petitioned the Lord

Lieutenant for a renewal of the Patent granted to his distinguished

father George Grierson by George II in 1731, for King’s printer in

Ireland. Among other reasons in support of his prayer, he states: “That

the art of making types for printing was unknown in Ireland until very

lately, when your petitioner’s father encouraged it by laying out

about One Thousand pounds in that article alone, in order to establish

that art in the said kingdom, and there are now as good types made

here as any imported, by which means there is a great saving to the

public, and great part of the money that would be otherwise sent to

foreign country’s is left in this kingdom.” (We are indebted to the

kindness of a lady descendent of George Grierson for this interesting

extract.) According to a note of Lemoine which we quote at p. 264_n_,

Dublin printers in 1797 were getting their types either from Wilson

of Glasgow, or from London. It is therefore probable that, whether

George Grierson’s enterprise may have consisted in the encouragement of

Wilson’s foundry or in the establishment of another foundry of his own,

the art did not long hold its ground in Ireland, and was discontinued

in the latter half of the century, only to be once revived, and that

for a short period only, by Dr. Wilson’s grandsons in 1840. See p. 265.

[528] For an account of Baine’s subsequent career as a type-founder,

see _post_, chap. xix.

[529] These eminent printers, the most elegant typographers of which

Scotland can boast, produced in their day some of the finest editions

ever printed. Robert was originally a barber, but began as a printer

in 1740. In 1743 he was appointed printer to Glasgow University, one

of his first productions being an edition of _Demetrius Phalereus_ in

that year. In 1744 he brought out his famous “immaculate” edition of

_Horace_ in 12mo at Glasgow. Shortly afterwards his brother Andrew, who

had been a teacher of French at the University, joined him, and the two

together, by great industry and excellent artistic taste, produced a

large number of beautifully printed works, some of which will rank with

the finest achievements of Bodoni, or Barbou, or even the Elzevirs.

Their classics, both Greek and Latin, were as remarkable for their

exactness as for their beauty, and it is recorded that the brothers,

following the example of some of the old masters, were in the habit of

publicly exhibiting their proof sheets and offering a reward for the

detection of any error. Andrew Foulis died in 1775, and Robert in the

following year. The business was carried on under the old name of R. &

A. Foulis for some years by Andrew Foulis, son of Robert. This printer

it was who was associated with Tilloch in his patent for stereotype in

1784. He died in 1829 in great poverty.

[530] _Homeri Opera, Græce (ex edit. Sam. Clarke). Glasguæ; in Ædibus

Academicis excudebant Robertus et Andreas Foulis, Academii Typographi

1756–8_, 4 vols., fol. This work is one of the most splendid editions

of Homer ever printed. Each sheet was corrected six times before being

finally worked. Flaxman’s illustrations were designed for the work.

[531] After stating that it was the ambition of the publishers of this

work to rival the finest productions of the Stephani of Paris, the

preface continues (p. viii):—“Omnes quidem tres regios Stephanorum

characteres græcos expresserat jam apud nos, atque imitatione

accuratissimâ repræsentaverat _Alexander Wilson_, A.M., egregius ille

Typorum artifex, quem et hoc nomine adscripserat sibi Alma Mater.

In his autem grandioris formæ characteribus Stephanianis id unum

desiderari quodammodo videbatur, scilicet, si res ita ferre posset,

ut, salvâ tamen ilia solidæ magnitudinis specie quâ delectantur omnes,

existeret una simul elegantiæ quiddam, magis atque venustatis. Rogatus

est igitur ille artifex, ut, in hoc assequendo solertiam suam, quâ

quidem pollet maximâ, strenue exercet. Quod et lubenter aggresus est,

et ad votum usque videtur consecutus vir ad varias ingenuas artes

augendas natus.”

[532] _Poems of Mr. Gray. Glasgow, printed by Robert and Andrew Foulis,

Printers to the University._ 1768. 4to. This edition was published

simultaneously with Dodsley’s first collected edition of _Gray’s

Poems_, in London; and far exceeded it in beauty of typography and

execution. Writing to Beattie in 1768, Gray says, “I rejoice to be in

the hands of Mr. Foulis (the famous printer of Glasgow) who has the

laudable ambition of excelling the Etiennes and the Elzevirs as well in

literature as in the proper art of his profession.”

[533] “This is the first work in the Roman character which they (A.

and R. Foulis) have printed with so large a type, and they are obliged

to DOCTOR WILSON for preparing so expeditiously, and with so much

attention, characters of so beautiful a form.”

[534] _A View of the Various Editions of the Greek and Roman Classics._

London, 1775. 12mo. Improved editions in 1778, 1782, and 1790.

[535] Renouard, speaking of the twenty volume edition of _Cicero_

printed by the Foulis in 1749, prefers its type to that of the

Elzevirs. _Catalogue de la Bibliothèque d’un Amateur._ Paris, 1819. 4

vols. 8vo. ii, 75.

[536] Hansard states that the Long Primer Greek matrices of the foundry

were “from the type cast in which the Elzevirs printed some of their

editions”—(_Typographia_, 404).

[537] In a later specimen is shown a “New Small Pica Italic” cut for

the King’s printer in Edinburgh, 1807.

[538] Lemoine, _Typographical Antiquities_, 1797, says, “Ireland,

by its connection with London and Scotland, produces some very neat

printing; Wilson’s types are much approved of at Dublin. Alderman

George Faulkner may be considered as the first printer in Ireland in

his time; but it must be remembered his letter was all cast in London.”

p. 99.

[539] This fount (according to Savage, _Dict. of Printing_, p. 320)

was cut after the classical and elegant type of Athias, for Mr. Jno.

Wertheimer, of Leman Street, and was used in printing the Rev. D. A. De

Sola’s edition of the _Prayers of the Sphardim_.

[540] “In conformity,” says the preface, “with ancient immemorial

usage, we have in Part I displayed our Founts in the Roman Garb—the

venerable _Quousque tandem_—but lest it should be supposed we had

adopted the flowing drapery of Rome for the purpose of shading or

concealing defects, we have in Part II shown off our founts in a dress

entirely English.” Mr. Figgins was the first to introduce this practice

in his Specimens.

[541] The following extract from the preface to the 1834 Specimen,

announces the removal: “We had the honour some time ago of announcing

the removing of the Glasgow Letter Foundry to London, and we beg leave

to inform you that we have now carried our intentions into execution,

and are prepared to receive your commands in our establishment in Great

New Street, Gough Square, London. The operative department will be

conducted by Mr. John Sinclair, whose integrity of conduct and thorough

knowledge of his profession we now reward by making him a partner in

our business.” London, Aug. 1, 1834. The London Foundry was carried on

under the old name of Alex. Wilson & Sons, or occasionally Wilsons and

Sinclair; the Edinbro’ branch, and that subsequently started in Dublin,

being styled A. & P. Wilson.

[542] See _post_, chap. xxi.

[543] There still exists, in Mr. Timmins’ collection of Baskerville

relics, a slate tablet beautifully engraved with the words “Grave

Stones cut in any of the Hands by John Baskervill, Writing Master,” in

which the admirable models of Roman and Italic for which he afterwards

became famous are clearly prefigured.

[544] “His carriage,” says Nichols, “each panel of which was a distinct

picture, might be considered the pattern-card of his trade, and was

drawn by a beautiful pair of cream-coloured horses” (_Lit. Anec._, iii,

451).

[545] He appears to have continued his original business to the end

of his days. Writing in 1760, Mr. Derrick, in a letter to the Earl of

Cork, dated July that year, after describing Baskerville’s printing

achievements, adds: “This ingenious artist carries on a great trade

in the Japan way, in which he showed me several useful articles, such

as candlesticks, stands, salvers, waiters, bread-baskets, tea-boards,

etc., elegantly designed and highly finished.” The name of Baskerville

had previously been associated with typography, as we find in the lists

of the Stationers’ Company a Gabriel Baskerville, who took up his

freedom in 1622, and a John Baskerville, who took up his freedom in

1639.

[546] Dibdin (_Intr. to Classics_, ii, 555) says £800.

[547] “Towards the end of 1792 died Mr. John Handy, the artist who cut

the punches for Baskerville’s types, and for twelve years was employed

in a similar way at the Birmingham Typefoundry of Mr. Swinney.” (_Gent.

Mag._, 1793, p. 91.)

[548] “John Baskerville proposes, by the advice and assistance of

several learned men, to print from the Cambridge Edition, corrected

with all possible care, an elegant edition of _Virgil_. The work will

be printed in quarto, on a very fine writing Royal paper, and with the

above letter. The price of the Volume in sheets will be one guinea, no

part of which will be required till the Book is delivered. It will be

put to press as soon as the number of subscribers shall amount to five

hundred, whose names will be prefixt to the work. All persons who are

inclined to encourage the undertaking, are desired to send their names

to John Baskerville in Birmingham, who will give specimens of the work

to all who are desirous of seeing them. Subscriptions are also taken

in, and specimens delivered by Messieurs R. and J. Dodsley, Booksellers

in Pall Mall, London.”

[549] Of the two copies in the possession of Mr. S. Timmins, one is

printed on very fine banknote paper, and the other, more heavily, on a

coarse brown.

[550] _Publii Virgilii Maronis Bucolica, Georgica, et Æneis.

Birminghamiæ Typis Johannis Baskerville._ 1757. 4to. As Baskerville

reprinted this work in 1771 with the old date 1757 on the title-page,

it is necessary to note that, in the genuine edition, among other

peculiarities, the 10th and 11th Books of the _Æneid_ are headed

“Liber Decimus. Æneidos”, and “Liber Undecimus. Æneidos”, whereas in

the re-impression they appear, uniform with the other titles, “Æneidos

Liber Decimus.” “Æneidos Liber Undecimus.” A _Virgil_ was printed in

8vo, in 1766.

[551] “I have always considered this beautiful production as one of the

most finished specimens of typography” (Dibdin, _Introduction to the

Classics_, 2nd ed. II, 335).

[552] “My neighbour Baskerville at the close of this month (March 1757)

publishes his fine edition of _Virgil_; it will for _type_ and _paper_

be a perfect curiosity” (_Shenstone’s Letters and Works_, 1791, Letter

88).

[553] Other type was used for this work.

[554] _Lit. Anec._, ii, 411.

[555] “Η Καινη Διαθηκη”. _Novum Testamentum juxta exemplar Millianum.

Typis Joannis Baskerville. Oxonii e Typographeo Clarendoniano._ 1763.

_Sumptibus Academiæ_, 4to and 8vo.

[556] Some of the Punches were exhibited by the University Press at

the Caxton Exhibition in 1877. Since then, thanks to the energy of

the present Controller, Mr. Horace Hart, to whom we are indebted for

the above extracts and specimens, the matrices of the fount have come

to light as well as the punches and matrices of the two-line letters

and figures belonging to it. These were exhibited at the British

Association Meeting at Birmingham in August 1886, being catalogued as

follows:―

“PUNCHIONS of the Great Primer Greek—a large proportion of the fount,

but not the whole.

“MATRICES of the same.

“PUNCHIONS of the Two-line Great Primer, with Initial Letters. Complete.

“MATRICES of the same, also complete.

“PUNCHIONS of one set of Figures, supplied with the above.

“MATRICES of the same.”

Still more recently, Mr. Horace Hart has been fortunate enough

to discover part of the actual type in its original cases. It is

interesting to note that these types, which are of rather a soft metal,

are cast to the Oxford Learned-Side “height-to-paper.”

[557] _Paradise Lost, etc._, _Paradise Regain’d, etc._ Birmingham,

1758. 2 vols., 4to. The work was also published in the same year in

8vo, and again in 4to in 1759. The 4to edition of 1758 appears to be

overlooked by some bibliographers, Hansard, among others, who refers in

the extract here given to the reprint of 1759.

[558] _Typographia_, p. 310. It is worthy of note that the very high

gloss on the paper which characterised most of Baskerville’s later

works, is not always observable either in the _Virgil_ of 1757, or the

_Milton_ of 1758.

[559] _Catalogue de la Bibliothéque d’um Amateur_, i, 310. After

noticing the folio specimen following, he says: “Un autre essai de

Baskerville, sur une plus petite feuille, contient seulment quatre

caractères romains et deux en italique . . . Outre cette épreuve de

grand essai, j’ai l’un et l’autre réunis à la fin de son _Virgile_

in 4.” The only example we have met with is that bound up with Lord

Spencer’s beautiful copy of the _Virgil_ in the Althorp Library.

[560] Writing to Mr. R. Richardson of Durham on Oct. 29, 1758, Dr.

Bedford says: “By Baskerville’s specimen of his types, you will

perceive how much the elegance of them is owing to his paper, which he

makes himself, as well as the types and ink also; and I was informed

whenever they came to be used by common pressmen and with common

materials they will lose of their beauty considerably. Hence, perhaps,

this specimen may become very curious (when he is no more, and the

types cannot be set off in the same perfection), and a great piece of

_vertû_.” (Nichols, _Illust. Lit._, i, 813).

[561] Amongst which should be particularly singled out the _Horace_

in 12mo printed in 1762, which Dr. Harwood describes as “the most

beautiful little book, both in regard to type and paper, I ever beheld.”

[562] _The Press, a poem. Published as a Specimen of Typography by John

McCreery._ Liverpool, 1803, 4to. p. 19.

[563] An interesting notice of Lord Orford’s famous private press at

Strawberry Hill, with a Catalogue of the—many of them—finely printed

works that issued from it, is given in Lemoine’s _Typographical

Antiquities_, p. 91.

[564] The original of this important letter, with the specimen

attached, is in Mr. Timmins’s possession.

[565] _The Holy Bible, containing the Old Testament and the New,

translated out of the Original Tongues, and with the former

translations diligently compared and revised. By His Majesty’s special

command. Appointed to be read in Churches. Cambridge: printed by John

Baskerville, Printer to the University._ 1763. _Cum Privilegio._ Fol.

The prospectus of this work, with a specimen of the type, appeared

in 1760. The folio _Bible_, printed at Birmingham in 1772, is a much

inferior performance.

[566] _The Book of Common Prayer, Cambridge_, 1760, roy. 8vo, (with

long lines); 1760, roy. 8vo, (in double columns); 1761, roy. 8vo; 1762,

roy. 8vo (with long lines): 1762, 12mo.

[567] He appears always to have kept a large number of hot plates of

copper always ready, between which, as soon as printed, just as they

were discharged from the tympan, the sheets were inserted. The moisture

was thus expelled, the ink set, and the smooth, glossy surface put on

all simultaneously. However well the method may have answered at the

time, the discoloration of his books still preserved in the British

Museum and elsewhere, shows that the brilliance thus imparted was most

tawdry and ephemeral.

[568] “Les caractères sont gravés avec beaucoup de hardiesse, les

italiques sont les meilleures qu’il y ait dans toutes les Fonderies

d’Angleterre, mais les romains sont un peu trop larges.” . . And of his

editions he adds, “Quoiqu’elles fatiguent un peu la vue, on ne peut

disconvenir que ce ne soit la plus belle chose qu’on ait encore vue en

ce genre.” (_Man. Typ._, ii, xxxix.)

[569] “Mr. Baskerville . . . made some attempts at letter-cutting,

but desisted, with good reason. The Greek cut by him or his for the

University of Oxford is execrable. Indeed, he can hardly claim a place

amongst letter-cutters. His typographical excellence lay more in trim,

glossy paper to dim the sight.” (_Dissert._, p. 86.)

[570] _The Life of Benjamin Franklin, written by himself, etc._

(Bigelow’s edition). Philadelphia, 1875, i, 413. Nichols, in error,

gives the date of this letter as 1764.

[571] The apparatus was first offered, it is said, to the French

Ambassador in London for £8,000. Subsequently Baskerville wrote, on

Sept. 7, 1767: “Suppose we reduce the price to £6,000. . . . Let the

reason of my parting with it be the death of my son and intended

successor, and having acquired a moderate fortune, I wish to consult my

ease in the afternoon of life.”

[572] The following works were printed by Martin between 1766 and 1769,

viz., _Christians’ Useful Companion_, 1766, 8vo; _Somerville’s Chace_,

1767, 8vo; _Shakespeare_, 9 vols., 1768, 12mo; _Bible with cuts_, 1769,

4to; and editions of the _Lady’s Preceptor_.

[573] Letter dated 21 Sept. 1773. “You speak of enlarging your

Foundery” (_Works_, viii, 88).

[574] The remaining copies of Baskerville’s impressions, were, after

his death purchased for £1,100 by W. Smart, bookseller, of Worcester,

and publisher of the _Worcester Guide_.

[575] Hutton, _History of Birmingham_, 1835, p. 197.

[576] _Biographical History of England_, ii, 362.

[577]

“Stranger,

beneath this cone, in _unconsecrated_ ground,

a friend to the liberties of mankind directed his

body to be inurn’d.

May the example contribute to emancipate thy mind

from the idle fears of _Superstition_,

and the wicked arts of Priesthood.”

Touching this epitaph Archdeacon Nares has the following note:—“I heard

John Wilkes, after praising Baskerville, add, “But he was a terrible

infidel; he used to shock me!”

[578] “On Friday last, Mr. Baskerville, of this town, was married

to Mrs. Eaves, widow of the late Richard Eaves, Esq., deceased”

(_Birmingham Register_, June 7, 1765). Mrs. Baskerville d. 1788. Two

works exist, printed at Birmingham, with the imprint, Sarah Baskerville.

[579] In 1776, Chapman used Baskerville’s type for Dr. W. Sherlock’s

_Discourses concerning Death._ 8vo.

[580] This preference was so marked, that about this time the

proprietors of Fry and Pine’s foundry, who had begun with an avowed

imitation of the Baskerville models, were constrained to admit their

mistake, and discard that fashion for new founts cut on the model of

Caslon.

[581] As early as 1775, Dr. Harwood, in the preface to his _View of

the Editions of the Classics_, had pleaded urgently for the purchase

of Baskerville’s types, and Wilson’s famous Greek, as the nucleus of a

Royal Typography in England.

[582] _Lit. Anec._, iii, 460.

[583] _Proposals for Printing by Subscription a Complete Edition of

the Works of Voltaire, printed with the Types of Baskerville for the

Literary and Typographical Society_, 1782, 12 pp. 8vo, with 2 pp.

specimens of the type. The French proposal appears to have been put

forward in 1780.

[584] _Beaumarchais and His Times. Translated by H. S. Edwards._

London, 1856. 4 vols. 8vo (iii, chap. 24).

[585] _Œuvres Complètes de Voltaire. De l’Imprimerie de la Société

litteraire et typographique_, (Kehl) 1784–1789. 70 vols. in 8vo; and 92

vols. in 12mo.

[586] Renouard mentions having seen at Paris a broadside specimen of

all the Baskerville types transported to Beaumarchais’ establishment:

“Ce sont les mêmes types,” he adds, “mais quelle différence dans leur

emploi!” (_Catalogue_, i, 310).

[587]

_La Virtu Sconosciuta Dialogo_, 1786, 8vo.

_Del Principe e delle Lettere_, 1795, 8vo.

_L’Etruria Vendicata Poema_, 1800, 8vo.

_Della Tirannide_, 1809, 8vo.

[588] _The Treatyse of Fysshynge wyth an Angle. Attributed to Dame

Juliana Berners, reprinted from the Book of St. Albans. London; printed

with the types of John Baskerville for William Pickering._ (Thos.

White, imp.) 1827. 8vo.

[589] A statement that they were acquired at the beginning of the

century for the printing offices of the Imperial Academy of Sciences at

St. Petersburg, appears, after careful inquiry, to rest on no further

foundation than rumour.

[590] See frontispiece. Cottrell is the figure marked 4.

[591] See _ante_, p. 158.

[592] _Dissertation_, p. 82.

[593] _A Specimen of a New Printing Type, in Imitation of the Law-Hand.

Designed by William Richardson, of Castle Yard, Holborn._ London, n. d.

Broadside.

[594] The Double Pica Script sheet occasionally bound in with this

specimen, is evidently an interpolation of a later date, as it neither

has the border round, nor does it conform to the measure or gauge of

theother sheets. It was not finished in 1778 when Mores wrote. See

_Dissert._, p. 83.

[595] _Manuel Typographique_, ii, xxxviii. This whole notice is so

exceedingly incorrect as to call for mention here. “L’Angleterre a

peu de Fonderies, mais elles sont bien fournies en toutes sortes de

caractères: les principales sont celles de Thomas Cottrell à Oxfort; de

Jacques Watson à Edimbourg, de Guillaume Caslon & Fils à Londres, et de

Jean Baskerville à Birmingham”! It would almost appear as if, having

before him the names of Cottrell, Oxford, James, Wilson of Glasgow,

Caslon of London, and Baskerville of Birmingham, the then existing

foundries in this kingdom, Fournier had taxed his ingenuity to make

four foundries out of six and had succeeded, altering Wilson’s name to

that of his long defunct fellow citizen, Queen Anne’s printer, in the

process. This feat has, however, been eclipsed in his notice of the

Voskens’ foundry at Amsterdam, which, after the death of Dirk Voskens,

passed to his widow and sons. “Cette Fonderie” Fournier informs us, “a

passée à sa veuve et au Sieur Zonen”!

[596] Mores (_Dissert._, p. 83), says he was the first to produce

letters of this size.

[597] _Lit. Anec._, ii, 358.

[598] “R. Thorne, Letter-Founder, takes the Liberty of informing the

Trade in general that he has begun business upon his own account, and

intends serving them at the following old-established prices: [here

follows price list]. He respectfully informs those gentlemen that

choose to favour him with their orders, that they may depend upon the

best workmanship and materials. Barbican, July 1, 1794.”

[599] It appears to have been no uncommon practice in the trade to make

use of a predecessor’s book, corrected on the title-page in pen and

ink. Our copy of Cottrell’s specimen is thus altered to the name of a

broker; and the specimens of the Type Street Foundry are many of them

similarly corrected to adapt them for the frequently changing style of

that firm.

[600] In a note, he says, “R. T. informs those gentlemen to whom he is

at present unknown, that the Types of the Barbican Foundry are cast to

the usual Height and Body; and that great care has been taken to have

the Counterpart deeply cut, by which means they will wear much longer

than any hitherto in use.”

[601] Pica, which in 1798 had been 1_s._ per lb., is raised to 1_s._

2 1/2_d._, and Nonpareil is advanced from 5_s._ to 5_s._ 6_d._ The

other sizes are in similar proportion.

[602] “Sir,—Having published a Specimen of Improved Printing Types, I

have taken the liberty of sending you a Copy, which I hope you will

approve of; and be assured that every possible exertion shall be used

in completing those orders you may favor me with.

“Barbican, 1803.

“I remain, your obedient Servant, ROBERT THORNE.”

[603] See _ante_, p. 117.

[604] See _post_, chap. xxi.

[605] In the Directory at the end of _Stower’s Printers’ Grammar_,

1808, Thorne’s name is given without address.

[606] _Particulars of the Lease and Valuable Plant of the Type Foundry

of Mr. Robert Thorne, deceased, situate in Fann’s Street, Aldersgate

Street,.........which will be Sold by Auction by Mr. W. Davies, at

Garraway’s Coffee House, on Wednesday, the 21st of June, 1820, at

Twelve o’clock, in One Lot._ Besides the lease, plant, and fixtures,

the Catalogue comprised 316 lots of matrices and about 340 moulds. The

matrices were as follows:―

_Roman and Italic._―

5-line (3), 4-line (3), Canon (4), 2-line Double Pica (3), 2-line

Great Primer (4), 2-line English (4), 2-line Pica (1), Double Pica

(4), Great Primer (4), English (5), Pica (6), Small Pica (3), Long

Primer (6), Bourgeois (3), Brevier (5), Minion (1), Nonpareil

Roman (2), Pearl (1)

_Black (plain or open)._―

5-line (5), 4-line (2), Canon (2), 2-line Great Primer (5), 2-line

English (2), Double Pica (2), Great Primer (2), English (1), Pica

(1), Small Pica (1), Long Primer (2), Bourgeois (1).

_Shaded._―

5-line to Brevier (21).

_Flowers._―

All bodies (15).

_Ornamented._―

Canon to 2-line Bourgeois (6).

_Egyptian._―

2-line Great Primerto Brevier (6).

_Script._―

2-line Pica, Double Pica, Great Primer.

_Engrossing._―

2-line English.

_German._―

English.

_Two-line Letters, Signs_, etc., etc.

_Sanspareil Founts._―

14-line to 4-line (24).

[607] He had a brother (?) a printer, in Wood Street, Cheapside.

[608] It is curious to note that the matter of not a few of

Thorowgood’s early specimens has reference to the lucky numbers “always

found in great variety in the Grand State Lotteries.” Such gratuitous

advertisements are no doubt so many grateful acknowledgments of his own

obligations to a time-honoured institution.

[609] The address to the printers, prefixed to this specimen, is as

follows: “I cannot omit the opportunity offered in presenting my first

specimen to your notice, to return my most sincere thanks to the

profession for that portion of their patronage which I have received

since my succession to Mr. Thorne. Although some difficulties presented

themselves in redeeming the pledge I made of renovating my small founts

and casting them of metal more durable than those in common use, yet

I flatter myself that those friends who relied on my professions will

bear ample testimony that they have not been disappointed, and that

the superior facilities of manufacturing types possessed by myself in

common with the other founders of the metropolis has been used to their

advantage,” etc.

[610] This famous foundry, which still exists, was established by

Bernard Christopher Breitkopf in 1719. His son, Johann Gottlieb

Immanuel Breitkopf, was the inventor (simultaneously with Haas of

Basle) of the art of map printing with movable types, and is claimed

also as the inventor of movable music types about 1748. Many eminent

punch cutters were employed on the founts of this foundry, which was in

1800 one of the largest in Germany. The first specimen appeared in 1739.

[611] Hugh Owen. _Two Centuries of Ceramic Art in Bristol_, 1873, 8vo.

[612] Of these books we have one before us—_A Collection of Hymns

adapted for Public Worship_. Bristol, (1769), 12mo, in the Long Primer

of the foundry, showing, besides, several varieties of title-letters

and flowers.

[613] _Catalogue_, i, 310, “Grande feuille collée sur une toile ou

batiste fine.”

[614] Rowe Mores, after quoting the above, adds drily: “Their letter is

neat. We _do_ ‘set aside the influence of custom,’ and call it the law

of fools, but we must recommend to the consideration of the proprietors

the difference between scalping and counterpunching.” (_Dissertation_,

p. 84.)

[615] “The Inventors, sensible of the great utility of their

Discovery, have mentioned it to several of the Trade, who have made

very considerable offers to encourage the laying open the Secret:

But as their desire is, that every Printer in the Kingdom might be

benefited by it they propose to make the Discovery as universal as

possible, by making an honourable and generous present of it to the

whole trade: To many of whom they are under some Obligations for the

kind encouragement of their new Foundery. And as that is an object

they desire here to recommend, they would further propose, (as they

have nearly compleated all their founts, and can serve the Trade on

as good Terms as any in the Kingdom, and with Types they will warrant

to wear as long) that every Printer who shall give them an order for

Ten Pounds worth of Type or more (Five Pounds of which to be paid on

ordering and the Remainder on the Delivery) shall be made acquainted

with the above improvements. So that the whole Advantage proposed is

the selling some Founts of Letter which every Printer does or will

want. And as they expect that the Trade in general will approve of

their Plan, they beg that the Encouragers of it would send their orders

with all convenient Speed to the above Foundery; (as they intend as

soon as they have got a sufficient Number to lay open the whole) which

they hope will not be less universal than the desire of being made

Partakers of so interesting a Discovery: for it merits nothing less

than the most cordial Encouragement of every Printer in Europe, though

here so freely offered. And it will appear when laid open to be of such

Service as nothing like it has been discovered in Printing for some

Centuries. . . . The whole expence of altering the present presses to

the above Improvement will be but about forty shillings.” A notice of

this invention, as well as of a patent type-case designed by the same

partners, is found in the _Abridgments of Specifications for Printing,

1617–1857_, London, 1859. 8vo, p. 88.

[616] _History and Art of Printing_, p. 244.

[617] After commending Caslon and Jackson, he says: “As to the

productions of other Founderies we shall be silent, and leave them to

sound forth their own good qualifications, which by an examiner are not

found to exist” (p. 230).

[618] _The Holy Bible, containing the Old and New Testament, with Notes

Explanatory, Critical and Practical, selected from the Works of several

Eminent Divines. London, I. Moore and Co., Letter Founders and Printers

in Queen Street, near Upper Moorfields._ 1774. Folio.

_The Same_, in 5 vols., 8vo:—_Vols._ 1, 2, 3, 1774; _Vol._ 4, 1776;

_Vol._ 5 (_Apocrypha_) 1775.

[619] _A Commentary on the Holy Bible, containing the Whole Sacred Text

of the Old and New Testaments, with Notes, etc. Bristol, Printed and

Sold by William Pine._ 1774, 12mo.

[620] _The Holy Bible, containing the Old and New Testament, with Notes

Explanatory, Critical and Practical, selected from the Works of several

Eminent Authors. London. Printed and Sold by J. Fry and Co., Letter

Founders and Printers in Queen Street, near Upper Moorfields._ 1777.

Folio.

_The Same_, 4 vols., 1777. 8vo.

[621] Amongst other works printed by him there is preserved a tract,

entitled _An Answer to a Narrative of Facts . . . lately published

by Mr. Henry Burgum as far as relates to the Character of Wm. Pine.

Bristol. Printed in the year 1775._ 8vo. This is a letter of rejoinder

addressed by Pine to Burgum, repelling charges relating to the

publication of an offensive pamphlet. Pine also printed several works

for the Wesleys.

[622] See p. 226 _et seq._

[623] The pedigree of the matrices is indicated, as far as can be

ascertained, by the initials (see our note 2 at p. 227); but in

several cases, particularly in the case of the Blacks, the origin

is considerably more remote than the foundry named. The error of

inferring anything as to their origin from the names of famous old

printers appearing on the drawers in which they were stored at James’s

foundry has already been pointed out—see _ante_, p. 230. Several of

these founts Dr. Fry appears to have received in a defective state,

necessitating in some cases a complete re-justifying of the matrices,

and in others the cutting of a considerable number of punches, and

casting on bodies which did not always agree with those named in the

sale Catalogue. This circumstance will account for many of the apparent

discrepancies between the original founts and the renovated founts as

they appear in the Type Street specimens.

[624] “It affords them”—the proprietors—“great Satisfaction to observe

that the original Shape of their Roman and Italic Letters continues to

meet the Approbation of the Curious, both in and out of the Printing

Trade: nevertheless, to remove an Objection which the difference in

Shape, from the letters commonly used here, raised in some, whereby

their Introduction into several Capital Offices have been prevented;

they have cut entire new sets of Punches, both Roman and Italic;

and they flatter themselves they have executed the Founts, as far

as they are done, in an elegant and masterly Manner, which in this

Specimen are distinguished by the title NEW, and which will mix with

and be totally unknown from the most approved Founts made by the late

ingenious Artist, William Caslon.” For Caslon’s acknowledgment of this

compliment, see _ante_, p. 249.

[625] “However desirous the proprietor of another Foundery may be to

persuade the public into an idea of a superiority in his own favour,

owing to _Rapid_ improvements for upwards of _Sixty_ years, a little

time may, perhaps, suffice to convince impartial and unbiassed Judges

that the very elegant Types of the WORSHIP STREET MANUFACTORY, though

they cannot indeed boast of their existence longer than about _Twenty_

years ! will yet rank as high in Beauty, Symmetry, and intrinsic Merit

as any other whatever, and ensure equal approbation from the Literati

not only in this Country but in every quarter of the Globe.”

[626] For a short time following Mr. Fry’s death his widow is

said to have been associated with her sons in the conduct of the

letter-foundry. Mrs. Fry lived at Great Marlow, and afterwards in

Charterhouse Square, London, where she died, Oct. 22, 1803, aged 83.

[627] _The Printer’s Grammar. London, printed by L. Wayland._ 1787. 8vo.

[628] We have the following volume very beautifully printed:—_C. Plinii

Cæcilii Secundi Epistolarum Libri x. Sumptibus editoris excudebant M.

Ritchie et J. Samuells. Londini_, 1790. 8vo. At end:—_Typis Edmundi

Fry_.

[629] This excellent artist was a Scotchman, and printed in Bartholomew

Close in 1785. He was one of the first who started in emulation of

Baskerville as a fine printer; his series of Mr. Homer’s Classics

(_Sallust_, 1789; _Pliny_, 1790; _Tacitus_, 1790; _Q. Curtius_;

_Cæsar_, 1790; _Livy_, 1794) established his reputation. His quarto

_Bible_ and the _Memoirs of the Count de Grammont_ are also celebrated.

He printed on Whatman’s paper with admirable ink and most careful

press-work, and is stated to have produced most of his books by his own

personal and manual labour.

[630] From this press the following elegantly printed volume was issued

in 1788:—_The Beauties of the Poets, being a Collection of Moral and

Sacred Poetry, etc., compiled by the late Rev. Thomas Janes of Bristol.

London, printed at the Cicero Press by and for Henry Fry, No. 5 Worship

Street, Upper Moorfields._ 1788. 8vo. At one time Henry Fry appears to

have had a partner named Couchman.

[631] _A New Guide to the English Tongue in five parts by Thomas

Dilworth . . . Schoolmaster in Wapping. Stereotype Edition. London.

Andrew Wilson, Camden Town._ 8vo. Contains portraits, tail piece and 12

fable cuts.

[632] _Pantographia; containing accurate copies of all the known

Alphabets in the World, together with an English explanation of the

peculiar Force or Power of each Letter; to which are added specimens of

all well authenticated Oral Languages; forming a comprehensive Digest

of Phonology. By Edmund Fry, Letter Founder, Type Street, London,

1799._ Roy. 8vo. A few copies were printed on vellum, one of which is

in the Cambridge University Library.

[633] _The Printer’s Grammar or Introduction to the Art of Printing:

containing a concise History of the Art, etc., by C. Stower, Printer.

London. Printed by the Editor._ 1808, 8vo. The same work also shows

extracts and specimens from _Pantographia_.

[634] Hazard was also the designer of a pair of cases, a plan of which

is shown by Stower, p. 463.

[635] The Rev. Samuel Lee, B.D., Regius Professor of Hebrew at

Cambridge, was a constant visitor at Type Street, and personally

directed the cutting of many of the founts.

[636] Dr. Fry’s system was virtually that first introduced by Mr.

Alston, of Glasgow, to which reference is made _ante_, p. 78, where

details are also given as to the other principal systems of type for

the Blind. A “lower-case” was subsequently added to Dr. Fry’s fount

by his successors, and in this form the type was largely used by the

various Type Schools following Mr. Alston’s method. Full particulars of

this award, with specimens, maybe seen in Vol. I of the _Transactions

of the Royal Scottish Society of Arts_.

[637] Hansard mentions a Two-line English Engrossing, two sizes of

Music, and the matrices of Dr. Wilkins’ _Philosophical Character_; none

of which, however, formed part of this Foundry.

[638] Of the supposed antiquity of this interesting fount an

account has already been given at pages 200–5, _ante_. By a curious

confusion of names and dates, Dr. Fry, in his specimens stated that

“this character was cut by _Wynkyn de Worde_, in exact imitation

of the _Codex Alexandrinus_ in the British Museum” ! This absurd

anachronism—the more extraordinary as emanating from an antiquary of

Dr. Fry’s standing—appears to have arisen from the fact that at the

sale of James’ Foundry the matrices lay in a drawer which bore the

name, “De Worde.” This circumstance misled Paterson, the auctioneer,

into advertising the fount as the genuine handiwork of De Worde, a

printer who lived a century before the Codex was brought into this

country. The further coincidence that Dr. Woide of the British Museum

was, at the time of the sale, engaged in producing an edition of

the _Codex_, with facsimile types prepared by Jackson the founder,

doubtless added—by the similarity of the names De Worde and Dr.

Woide—to the confusion. After its purchase, the fount first appeared

in Joseph Fry and Sons’ Specimen of 1786, without note. But, in the

subsequent specimens of the Foundry, bearing his own name, Dr. Fry

introduced the fiction, which remained unchallenged for a quarter of a

century.

[639] In addition to which Dr. Fry possessed, in an imperfect condition

(many of the characters having been recut), the Great Primer Arabic

of Walton’s _Polyglot_. According to Hansard he also had a set of

matrices, English body, from the first punches cut by William Caslon;

but this seems to be an error.

[640] Used in Bagster’s _Polyglot_. The same fount was cast on Long

Primer with movable points. Hansard is in error in stating that Dr. Fry

cut a Nonpareil Syriac.

[641] An error still less explicable than that of the Alexandrian

Greek, but which not only Dr. Fry’s successors, but Hansard himself has

copied. The following seems to be the “good authority” on which the

assertion is based. In 1819, Mr. Bulmer, the eminent printer, printed

for the Roxburghe Club, Mr. Hibbert’s transcript of the MS. fragment of

the translation of _Ovid’s Metamorphoses_, made by Caxton about 1480,

and preserved in the library of Pepys at Magdalen College, Cambridge.

The body of the work was set in the English Black bought by Dr. Fry at

James’ Sale—but in two places a smaller size of type was required to

print passages omitted in Caxton’s translation, but supplied by the

Editor in the original French of Colard Mansion’s edition. For these

passages the Pica Black was selected, and as the French text contained

several accents and contractions, these had to be specially cut. This

task Dr. Fry performed, and understanding that the letter was to be

used for printing a work of Caxton’s, he appears, without further

enquiry, to have assumed that the work in question was a fac-simile

reprint, and that his old matrices had been discovered to bear the

impress of the veritable character used by that famous man. Had he seen

the book in question he would have discovered that not only was it a

transcript from a MS. of which no printed copy had ever been known to

exist, but that the very passages in which the boasted type was used,

were passages which did not even appear in a work of Caxton at all. The

matrices are very old. They were in Andrews’ foundry about 1700, and in

all probability came there from Holland, as they closely resemble the

other old Dutch Blacks in James’ Foundry.

[642] In the Small Pica, No. 2, was printed _The Two First Books of the

Pentateuch, or Books of Moses, as a preparation for learners to read

the Holy Scriptures. The types cut by Mr. Edmund Fry, Letter Founder

to His Majesty, from Original Irish Manuscripts, under the care and

direction of T. Connellan (2nd Edit.) Printed at the Apollo Press,

London, J. Johnson, Brook Street, Holborn, 1819._ 12mo.

[643] Whatever singularity M. Didot may have indulged in in the first

strikes from his famous punches for his own use, the matrices now

in the possession of Dr. Fry’s successors are of most unmistakeable

copper throughout. And it does not appear that more than one set of the

strikes was needed to meet all the demands made upon this complicated

letter by the printers of the day.

[644] _Gentleman’s Magazine_, May, 1836.

[645] Nichols’ _Lit. Anec._, ii, 358–9; and _Gentleman’s Magazine_,

1792, p. 93.

[646] _Dissert._, p. 83.

[647] Probably as a rubber, in which occupation he is represented as

engaged in the View of the Caslon Foundry given in the _Universal

Magazine_ for June 1750 (see frontispiece).

[648] _Dissertation_, p. 83.

[649] Mr. Halhed thus refers to this circumstance in the introduction

to his _Bengal Grammar_ (see post): “That the Bengal letter is very

difficult to be imitated in steel will readily be allowed by every

person who shall examine the intricacies of the strokes, the unequal

length and size of the characters, and the variety of their positions

and combinations. It was no easy task to procure a writer accurate

enough to prepare an alphabet of a similar and proportionate body

throughout, with that symmetrical exactness which is necessary to the

regularity and neatness of a fount. Mr. Bolts (who is supposed to be

well versed in this language) attempted to fabricate a set of types

for it with the assistance of the ablest artists in London. But, as he

has egregiously failed in executing even the easiest part, or primary

alphabet, of which he has published a specimen, there is no reason to

suppose that his project when completed would have advanced beyond the

usual state of imperfection to which new inventions are constantly

exposed.”

[650] This distinguished scholar and self-made typographer was born

in the year 1751. He entered the East India Company’s Civil Service,

where he devoted himself not only to the study of the Oriental

languages, but to the actual production of the types necessary to

extend the study of those languages among his fellow-countrymen, with

extraordinary skill and perseverance. He succeeded in cutting the

punches and casting the types for Halhed’s _Grammar of the Bengal

Language_, published at Hoogly in Bengal in 1778, 4to. In his preface

to that work, Mr. Halhed, after referring to Mr. Bolts’ failure,

in the passage quoted in the preceding note, thus describes the

undertaking:—“The advice and even solicitation of the Governor-General

prevailed upon Mr. Wilkins, a gentleman who has been some years in

the India Company’s Civil Service in Bengal, to undertake a set of

Bengal Types. He did, and his success has exceeded every expectation.

In a country so remote from all connection with European artists, he

has been obliged to charge himself with all the various occupations

of the Metallurgist, the Engraver, the Founder, and the Printer. To

the merit of invention he was compelled to add the application of

personal labour. With a rapidity unknown in Europe, he surmounted all

the obstacles which necessarily clog the first rudiments of a difficult

art, as well as the disadvantages of solitary experiment; and has

thus singly, on the first effort, exhibited his work in a state of

perfection which in every part of the world has appeared to require

the united improvements of different projectors and the gradual polish

of successive ages.” Mr. Wilkins persevered in his noble undertaking

of rendering the Oriental languages available to the English scholar

through the medium of typography. With this view he compiled from the

most celebrated native Grammars and Commentaries a work entirely new to

England on the Structure of the Sanskrita tongue. Of the difficulties

and discouragements attendant on the execution of this self-imposed

task he thus speaks in his Preface:—“At the commencement of the year

in 1795, residing in the country and having much leisure, I began to

arrange my materials and prepare them for publication. I cut letters

in steel, made matrices and moulds, and cast from them a fount of

types of the Deva Nagari character, all with my own hands; and, with

the assistance of such mechanics as a country village could afford, I

very speedily prepared all the other implements of printing in my own

dwelling-house; for by the second of May of the same year I had taken

proofs of 16 pages, differing but little from those now exhibited in

the first two sheets. Till two o’clock on that day everything had

succeeded to my expectations; when alas! the premises were discovered

to be in flames, which, spreading too rapidly to be extinguished, the

whole building was presently burned to the ground. In the midst of

this misfortune, I happily saved all my books and manuscripts, and the

greatest part of the punches and matrices; but the types themselves

having been thrown out and scattered on the lawn, were either lost or

rendered useless.” About ten years afterwards the Directors of the East

India Company encouraged Dr. Wilkins, then Librarian to the Company, to

resume his labours and cast new types, as the study of the Sanskrita

had become an important object in their new College at Hertford. Dr.

Wilkins complied, and the _Grammar of the Sanskrita Language_, London,

1808, 4to, duly appeared from Bulmer’s Press, and was allowed to be a

monument at once of beautiful typography and erudite industry. Dr.,

subsequently Sir Charles, Wilkins died May 13th, 1836, at the advanced

age of 85. Specimens of his Bengali and Sanskrit may be seen in

Johnson’s _Typographia_, ii, 389–94.

[651] _A Vocabulary, Persian, Arabic, and English, containing such

words as have been adopted from the two former of these languages, and

incorporated into the Hindvi; together with some hundreds of compound

verbs formed from Persian or Arabic nouns and in universal use. Being

the seventh part of the new Hindvi Grammar and Dictionary._ London,

1785. 4to.

[652] The Domesday letter of Cottrell and Jackson may be seen in

juxtaposition in Fry’s _Pantographia_, 1799, pp. 50 and 314; also in

Stower’s _Printer’s Grammar_, 1808, p. 253. Jackson’s also appears in

Johnson’s _Typographia_ (ii, p. 248), from which work our account is

chiefly taken.

[653] _Domesday Book seu Liber Censualis Willelmi primi Regis Angliæ

inter Archivos Regni in Domo capitulari Westmonasterii asservatus.

Jubente Rege Augustissimo Georgio Tertio prelo mandatus. Londini. Typis

J. Nichols._ 2 vols. Folio. 1783.

[654] _Domesday Book Illustrated._ London. 1788. 8vo.

[655] Dr. Woide was appointed Assistant Librarian at the British Museum

in 1782.

[656] See _ante_, p. 200–5.

[657] A specimen of this letter may be seen in Dr. Fry’s specimens,

also in his _Pantagraphia_, p. 126.

[658] Gough, writing in the _Gentleman’s Magazine_, vol. lvi, p. 497,

says:—“It was reserved, therefore, for the industry and application of

Dr. Woide . . . to rescue this valuable MS. from the fate which befel

a MS. of the Septuagint in the Cottonian Library of equal antiquity,

type, and, value, of which a very few fragments escaped the fire in

1733, by adopting the facsimile mode of reproduction, which, from the

great expense attending it, has unfortunately been adopted in so few

instances.” The facsimile of the Laudian Codex, comprising the _Acts

of the Apostles_, published by Hearne at Oxford in 1715, had been the

only previous successful attempt of this kind in England. Hearne’s

facsimile, however, was engraved, and not from type. A list of the most

important subsequent facsimile reproductions from Codices of the Holy

Text is given in Horne’s _Introduction_ (edit. 1872), iv, pp. 682–3.

[659] _Novum Testamentum Græcum è Codice MS. Alexandrino qui Londini in

Bibliothecâ Musei Britannici asservatur, descriptum a Carolo Godofredo

Woide . . . Musei Britannici Bibliothecaria Londini. Ex prelo Jeannis

Nichols. Typis Jacksonianis, 1786._ Folio.

[660] _Psalterium Græcum è Codice MS. Alexandrino qui Londini in

Bibliothecâ Musei Britannici asservatur Typis ad similitudinem ipsius

Codicis Scripturæ fideliter descriptum. Curâ et labore H. H. Baber.

Londini, 1812._ Folio.

[661] _Vetus Testamentum Græcum è Codice MS. Alexandrino qui Londini

in Bibliothecâ Musei Britannici asservatur, Typis ad similitudinem

ipsius Codicis Scripturæ fideliter descriptum. Curâ et labore H. H.

Baber, Londini, 1816–21._ 4 vols., Folio. Mr. Baber, the better to

preserve the identity of the original in his fac-similes, introduced a

considerable number of fresh types as well as numerous woodcuts.

[662] _Codex Theodori Bezæ Cantabrigiensis, Evangelia et Acta

Apostolorum complectens, quadratis literis, Græco-Latinus. Academia

auspicante summâ qua fide potuit, adumbravit, expressit, edidit,

codicis historiam præfixit, notasque adjecit T. Kipling. Cantabrigiæ è

prelo Academico, impensis Academiæ, 1793._ 2 vols., Folio.

[663] _Gent. Mag._, 1793, p. 733.

[664] Mores’ _Dissert._, Appendix, p. 98.

[665] _Prosodia Rationalis, an Essay towards establishing the Melody

and Measure of Speech by Symbols._ London, 1779. 4to.

[666] _An Essay towards Establishing the Melody and Measure of Speech,

to be expressed and perpetuated by peculiar Symbols._ London, 1775. 4to.

[667] _The Holy Bible, embellished with Engravings from Pictures and

Designs by the most eminent Artists. London: printed for Thomas Macklin

by Thomas Bensley, 1800. 7 vols._ Folio.

[668] See p. 336, _post_. Jackson’s fount is used to the end of

_Numbers_.

[669] _Lit. Anec._, ii, 360.

[670] _The History of England from the Invasion of Julius Cæsar to the

Revolution in 1688. By David Hume. London: printed by T. Bensley, for

Robert Bowyer, 1806._ 10 vols. Folio.

[671] _Gent. Mag._, 1792, p. 166.

[672] John William Pasham, originally of Bury St. Edmund’s, where he

published the _Bury Flying Weekly Journal_. He removed to Blackfriars

in London, where, in 1776, he published a beautiful pocket edition

of the _Bible_ in 24mo, which obtained the title of the _Immaculate

Bible_, on account of the rarity of its errors. It had foot-notes,

which could be cut off in the binding if required. Of this _Bible_,

Lemoine says “it is spoiled by being dried in a kiln, which has

entirely changed the colour of the paper; besides, the colour of the

print is uneven, one side being darker than the other.” This _Bible_

is said to have been printed in a house on Finchley Common. Mr. Pasham

died Dec. 1783.

[673] See _ante_, p. 250.

[674] The prefatory note to this specimen runs as follows:—“Sir, Having

completed my new Specimen, I take the opportunity of sending you a

copy, and flatter myself it will meet with your approbation. I shall

be happy to receive your future orders, and you may be assured of

every possible attention being paid to the execution of those you may

favour me with. I remain, your obedient humble servant, William Caslon.

Salisbury Square, Jan. 1, 1798.”

[675] He made an offer in 1817 to travel on commission for the founders

generally, but his services in this direction were not made use of.

[676] The Circular announcing this improvement is dated Salisbury

Square, Jan. 1, 1810. The new types are offered at 1_s._ 10_d._ per

lb., and, as an encouragement to buyers, 1_s._ per lb. is offered for

old metal.

[677] See _ante_, p. 120. This appears to have been intended as an

improvement on the invention of Nicholson, who was the first (in 1790)

to suggest the casting of types wedge-shaped, for fixing on cylinders.

(p. 119.)

[678] Considerable prominence is naturally given to the large letters

“cast in moulds and matrices” by the new “Sanspareil” method.

[679] See _ante_, p. 281.

[680] George Nicol was born in 1741, and was for many years bookseller

to King George III. He married a niece of the first Alderman Boydell

in 1787. The idea of the Boydell _Shakespeare_ originated with him. He

was a prominent member of the literary clubs of his day, and a personal

friend of the Duke of Roxburghe. He died in 1829, aged 88.

[681] A history of this celebrated Press would almost involve a history

of fine printing in the first quarter of the present century. Dibdin,

in the second volume of his _Bibliographical Decameron_, has given a

list of its most famous impressions. Bulmer was a personal friend of

Thomas Bewick, the engraver, many of whose blocks were cut for his

books. He spared no pains to render the typography of his press the

most correct and beautiful England had hitherto known. He retired in

1819, leaving Mr. Wm. Nicol, only son of his friend George Nicol, to

carry on the business. Mr. Bulmer died Sept. 9, 1830, in his 74th year,

greatly honoured and respected.

[682] _The Dramatic Works of William Shakespeare. Revised by G.

Steevens._ London: 1792–1802. 18 parts in 9 vols. Atlas folio. With 100

engravings.

[683] _Bibl. Decam._, ii, 384.

[684] _The Poetical Works of John Milton, with a life of the Author by

William Hayley._ London: 1794–7. 3 vols. Folio.

[685] See _ante_, p. 251.

[686] _Bibl. Decam._, ii, 384.

[687] _Poems by Goldsmith and Parnell._ London: 1795. 4to. This work

was illustrated with woodcuts by Bewick. It is said that George III

ordered his bookseller to procure the blocks of the engravings for

his inspection, that he might convince himself they were wood and not

copper.

[688] _Typographia_, p. 311.

[689] Nichols, _Illust. Lit._, viii, 485.

[690] _Musæus. The Loves of Hero and Leander. (Greek and English.)

London. Printed by W. Bulmer & Co. Typis Gulielmi Martin._ 1797.

4to. This work was privately printed by Mr. Bulmer for Mr. Grosvenor

Bedford, the translator.

[691] _The Press: a Poem. Published as a Specimen of Typography by John

M^cCreery. Liverpool: printed by J. M^cCreery._ Houghton Street, 1803.

4to.

[692] _Typographical Antiquities, &c., greatly enlarged, with copious

notes, by T. F. Dibdin_, London: 1810–12–16–19. 4 vols. 4to. The work

was not completed. The first volume was not printed at the Shakespeare

Press.

[693] _Bibliotheca Spenceriana; or, a Descriptive Catalogue of Books

printed in the XV Century, and of many valuable First Editions in the

Library of George John, Earl Spencer._ London: 1814–15. 4 vols. 8vo.

[694] _The Bibliographical Decameron; or, Ten Days’ Pleasant Discourse

upon Illuminated Manuscripts, and Subjects connected with early

Engraving, Typography and Bibliography._ London, 1817. 3 vols, 8vo.

[695] Amongst which were the early publications of the Roxburghe Club,

instituted by Earl Spencer, in 1812, for the republication of rare

books or unpublished MSS. M. Renouard censures Bulmer for the use of

worn type in the Edition of _Ben Jonson’s Works_, 1816. 9 vols. 8vo.

“L’habile M. Bulmer aurait dû jeter à la fonte les caractères usés

dont il a fait usage pour cette volumineuse édition, et les libraires

entrepreneurs n’auroient pas dû lui en permettre l’emploi.”

[696] _Illust. Lit._, viii, 485.

[697] An early specimen of Thorowgood’s shows a Black, the matrices of

which, it is stated, “were purchased by Messrs. Fry & Steele at the

breaking up of the Cleveland Row Foundry.” As, however, Messrs. Fry

& Steele’s partnership terminated about 1808, we consider the whole

statement doubtful.

[698] _Lit. Anec._, ii, 361.

[699] Hansard. _Typographia_, 359.

[700] See _ante_, p. 323.

[701] _The Seasons. By James Thomson. Illustrated with Engravings by

F. Bartolozzi, R.A., and P. W. Tomkins, Historical Engraver to their

Majesties, from original pictures painted for the work by W. Hamilton,

R.A. London: Printed for P. W. Tomkins, New Bond Street. The letter

press by T. Bensley. The Types by V. Figgins._ 1799. Folio.

[702] _Typographia_, p. 360.

[703] _Paradise Lost, by John Milton, with Notes and Life of the

Author. . . . By Samuel Johnson, LL.D. Engravings by Heath, &c. London:

Printed for J. Parsons, 1796._ 2 vols. 8vo.

[704] Sir William Ouseley was born in 1771, and accompanied his

brother Sir Gore Ouseley, the ambassador to Persia, to that country as

secretary. He published _Persian Miscellanies_ in 1795, and _Oriental

Collections_ in 1797–1800. In the advertisement at the close of the

1st volume of the latter work, he states, “I have employed a few

leisure hours in superintending the execution of a new Persian Type,

which will, I trust, exhibit as faithful a representation of the

true Taleek character as can be effected by any imitative powers of

the Typographick Art.” Of this new fount he shows a single line as

specimen, which, however, if cut by Mr. Figgins, is not the Paragon

Persian which subsequently appeared in his specimen books. Nor did

it appear, as promised, in the _Oriental Collections_ of 1798, the

quotations in which continued to be printed in Arabic characters.

[705] _The Persian Moonshee, by Francis Gladwin, Esquire. Calcutta.

London, reprinted 1801._ 4to.

[706] This important enquiry was the result of an address of the

House of Commons to the King, in 1800, setting forth the necessity of

a better provision for the arrangement, preservation and use of the

various Public Records scattered among the numerous offices of the

kingdom. The Commission thereupon appointed were empowered to take all

necessary measures to “methodize, regulate and digest the records,

etc.”, preserved in all Public Offices and repositories, and “to

superintend the printing of such calendars and indexes and original

records and papers” as it should be deemed desirable to print. With

this large task before them, the Commissioners went actively to work,

and in 1800 and 1806 published their first Reports. The following

important publication, issued under the Direction of the Commission,

was commenced in 1800:—_Reports from the Commissioners appointed to

execute the measures recommended by a Select Committee of the House of

Commons respecting the Public Records of the Kingdom, etc._, London,

1800–19, 2 vols., folio. The appendix forming the second volume

contains facsimiles of all the Charters (including Magna Charta) and

Inrollments from Stephen to William and Mary, with the Seals inserted

in the several works printed under the Commission. The list of the

subsequent publications of the Commission is very extensive, and

includes verbatim copies, with all abbreviations and contractions, of

the most important documents in the kingdom.

[707] The first important work in connection with the Scotch Record

Commission was _Inquisitionum ad Capellam Domini Regis retornatarum quæ

in publicis Archivis Scotiæ adhuc servantur Abbrevatio cum Indicibus_,

Edinburgh, 1811–16, 3 vols., folio, and a Supplement.

[708] These types perished in the fire of Mr. Nichols’ printing office

in 1808, see _ante_, p. 321.

[709] _Lit. Anec._, ii, 361.

[710] _Biblia Sacra Polyglotta, Textus Archetypos, Versionesque

præcipuas ab Ecclesiâ Antiquitùs receptas complectentia._ London:

1817–28. 5 parts, 4to, 4 vols., 8vo. This Bible comprises the original

Hebrew text of the Old Testament, the Samaritan Pentateuch, the

Septuagint Greek version of the Old Testament, the Vulgate Latin and

the Authorised English version of the entire Bible, the original Greek

of the New Testament, and the venerable Peschito or Syriac version

of it. This _Polyglot_ was republished with the addition of Spanish,

French, Italian, and German versions in 1831, with learned prolegomena

by Dr. Samuel Lee.

[711] See _ante_, p. 308.

[712] _Novum Testamentum Syriace denuo recognitum atque ad fidem

Codicum MSS. emendatum. Impressit R. Watts._ London 1816, 4to.

Dr. Buchanan was born in 1766 and went to India in 1796, where

his researches led to the discovery, among other things, of some

interesting Hebrew Manuscripts of portions of the Bible, on goat skins

and tablets of brass. He died in the year 1815. The Syriac _Testament_

was corrected by him as far as the _Acts_, and completed by Dr. Lee,

Arabic Professor at Cambridge. See _ante_, p. 68.

[713] _Typographia_, p. 360.

[714] The matrices of the Long Primer and Brevier cut for the Scotch

Record Commission were given up to the Government.

[715] Hansard omits the Double Pica Greek cut for Oxford University,

the matrices of which were retained by Mr. Figgins. A specimen appears

in the book of 1823.

[716] The fount for Bagster’s _Polyglot_.

[717] The punches, matrices and moulds of this fount were deposited in

the East India Company’s Library.

[718] It would be an omission not to mention here Mr. Vincent Figgins

II’s interesting reprint of the 2nd Edition of Caxton’s _Game of the

Chesse_, London, 1855, sm. folio. Mr. Figgins cut a fount of type

after the original, “which” he remarks, “is a mixture of black-letter

and the character called secretary,” the black predominating. The

“Caxton Black” so produced has been the only attempt made to approach

a facsimile of Caxton’s letter by means of type. In his remarks, Mr.

Figgins gives his reasons for concluding, from the variety in the

form of the letters, that they were not cast from a matrix but cut

separately by hand. This theory Mr. Blades, in his “_Life of Caxton_,”

disproves, pointing out that the Type No. 2* used in the second edition

of Caxton’s work is really an old fount originally cast from matrices,

and, when worn, trimmed up by hand to form the punches for a new

fount—a circumstance amply sufficient to account for the irregularities

observed. These irregularities are, of course, sufficient to prevent

the absolute possibility of anything like an exact facsimile by means

of type. It is, however, interesting to note that John Whittaker’s

famous restorations of Caxtonian and other early printed works, were to

a certain extent accomplished by means of typography. Mr. Dibdin, in

his _Bibliographical Decameron_ (ii, 415), describes the operation as

follows:—“He has caused to be engraved or cut four founts of Caxton’s

letter. These are cut in the manner of binders’ tools for lettering,

and each letter is separately charged with ink, and separately

impressed on the paper. Some of Caxton’s types are so riotous and

unruly that Mr. Whittaker found it impossible to carry on his design

without having at least twenty of such irregular letters engraved.

The process of executing the text with such tools shall be related in

Mr. Whittaker’s own words:—‘A tracing being taken with the greatest

precision from the original leaf, on white tracing paper, it is then

laid on the leaf (first prepared to match the book it is intended for)

with a piece of blacked paper between the two. Then by a point passing

round the sides of each letter, a true impression is given from the

black paper on the leaf beneath. The types are next stamped on singly,

being charged with old printing ink prepared in colour exactly to

match each distinct book. The type being then set on the marks made

by tracing, in all the rude manner and at the same unequal distances

observable in the original, they will bear the strictest scrutiny

and comparison with their prototype; it being impossible to make a

facsimile of Caxton’s printing in any other way, as his letters are

generally set up irregularly and at unequal distances, leaning various

ways,’ ” etc.

[719] See _ante_, p. 241.

[720] _Printers’ Grammar_, p. 31.

[721] See _ante_, p. 212, _n._

[722] Mr. Ilive the elder is named in Samuel Negus’s list of Printers,

published by Bowyer in 1724, as one of those “said to be high flyers”.

He was a benefactor to Zion College, and printed the classical

catalogue of their library from the letter P.

[723] _Marius de Calasio. Concordantiæ Bibliorum Hebr. et Lat. edente

Guil. Romaine_, 4 vols., Lond. 1747, folio.

[724] _Anecdotes of Bowyer_, p. 130.

[725] “Emboldened by his first adventure, he determined to become the

public teacher of infidelity. For this purpose he hired the use of

Carpenters’ Hall, where for some time he delivered his Orations, which

consisted chiefly of scraps from Tindal and other similar writers”

(Chalmers’ _Biog. Dict._, xix, 228).

[726] _The Book of Jasher. With Testimonies and Notes explanatory

of the Text. To which is prefixed various Readings. Translated into

English from the Hebrew, by Alcuin of Britain, who went a Pilgrimage

into the Holy Land, etc. Printed in the year 1751._ 4to. The fraud

was immediately detected and exposed. The work was reprinted, without

acknowledgment and with some variations, at Bristol in 1829, by a Rev.

C. R. Bond. Both editions are now rare.

[727] _Dissert._, p. 65.

[728] These are enumerated in Gough’s _British Topography_, i, 637.

[729] _British Topography_, i, 597.

[730] See _ante_, p. 260.

[731] _A Specimen of the Printing Types and Flowers belonging to John

Reid, Printer, Bailie Fyfe’s Close, Edinburgh, etc._ Edinburgh, 1768.

8vo. All the other founts shown are either Wilson’s or Caslon’s.

[732] _History of Printing in America. 2nd Edit. Albany_, 1874. i, 31.

[733] The first attempt to introduce type-founding in America had been

made by Mitchelson, a Scotchman, in 1768, and failed. In 1769, Abel

Buel, of Connecticut, succeeded in casting several founts of Long

Primer. Christopher Sower, in 1772, brought over a foundry from Germany

to Germantown in Pennsylvania. John Bay also founded in the same town

about 1774. Benj. Franklin and his grandson Bache brought over a

foundry from France in 1775 to Philadelphia, which, however, had ceased

its operations when Baine and his grandson, some ten years later,

established their foundry in the same city.

[734] See _Abridgments of Specifications relating to Printing_, p. 87.

See also _ante_, p. 78.

[735] _Typog. Antiq._, p. 81. This appears to be the person whom Gough,

in his list of departed worthies of the eighteenth century, includes

among the letter founders, as “Jurisson, d. 1791”. (_Gent. Magaz._,

lxxiii, part i, p. 161.)

[736] See _ante_, p. 269.

[737] “British Foundry. S. & C. Stephenson respectfully submit the

present edition of their Specimen to the public with the hope that they

shall continue to experience the flattering encouragement hitherto

received, and for which they beg to return their most sincere thanks.

“To those of the Trade who have not hitherto used the Types of the

British Foundry, it may be necessary to observe, that they are composed

of the very best Metal, and that they are justified to paper and body

agreeable to the usual standard.

“As the Establishment of this Foundry comprises eminent engravers on

wood and brass, orders in either of these branches will be executed in

the best stile of the Art. _February_, 1797.”

A first part of the specimen appears to have been issued in 1796, and

the whole book in 1797.

[738] _Bibliography of Printing_, ii, 42.

[739] _Typog._, p. 366.

[740] _Ibid._, p. 361.

[741] A specimen of this type “the smallest ever manufactured in this

country,” was exhibited, and contains the whole of Gray’s _Elegy_ in 32

verses, in 2 columns, measuring 3 3/4 inches each in depth.

[742] _Dictionary for the Pocket; French and English; English and

French, &c., by John Bellows, Gloucester, from type cast specially for

the work by Miller and Richard, Type founders to the Queen, Edinburgh._

1873. 24mo.

[743] Sheffield, 3rd edit., 1841, 12mo. A similar proposal, only with

Nonpareil as the standard, was made about 1824 by James Fergusson,

whose scheme is quoted _in extenso_ by Hansard in his _Typographia_, p.

388.

[744] _The Printer’s Assistant, containing a Sketch of the History of

Printing, etc. London, 1810._ 12mo.

[745] _Typog._, p. 382.

[746] See _ante_, p. 253–4; also Johnson’s _Typographia_, ii, 652.

[747] Mr. Branston was an engraver, and resided at Beaufort Buildings,

Strand, in 1824. He attempted a new system of printing music, by

striking the punches deeper than usual in the plate, so that when a

stereo cast was taken from it, the notes appeared sufficiently in

relief to be printed at a type press.

[748] See _ante_, p. 121. M. Didot’s invention had been previously

tried by Henry Caslon, but unsuccessfully.

[749] This appears to be an anachronism. There was no association of

Type Founders between 1820 and 1830.

[750] Hansard, _Typog._, p. 361.

[751] Johnson, in 1824, gives a list of nine founders (including

Pouchée), at that time trading in London. (_Typog._, ii, 652.)

TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE

Original spelling and grammar have generally been retained, with some

exceptions noted below. Original printed page numbers are shown like

this: {52}. Original small caps are now uppercase. Italics look _like

this_. The transcriber produced the cover image and hereby assigns

it to the public domain. Original page images are available from

archive.org — search for “historyofoldengl00reed”. Single superscripted

letters are shown like this: “M^cCreery”. Superscripted groups of

letters (e.g. “er”) are shown like this: “I^{er}”.

Footnotes have been renumbered 1–751 and converted to ENDNOTES. Anchors

and labels for endnotes are shown as numbers within square brackets,

e.g. “[751]”. However, there are two exceptions: on page 256, “[11]”

and “[2]” do not reference footnotes or endnotes, but are shown as

originally printed.

Ditto marks have generally been eliminated, using text replication

when necessary. Large curly brackets “{ }” used as graphic devices to

combine information over two or more lines have been removed from the

text everywhere. Example: in the table on page 35, first column, 9th

and 10th rows, there was a two-row bracket “{” suggesting that “9.”

applies to both rows. Herein, “9.” was simply duplicated to indicate

that fact. The row headed by “17. Pearl” contains in the second

column, in the original printed book, two rows containing “Parisienne

or Sedan.” and “Perle.”, enclosed in two-row brackets “{ }”. Herein,

table-cell borders have been drawn to suggest this combination.

Page xi, CONTENTS. Chapter 3 page reference was changed

to 83, from 13.

Page 32n. “fromer” to “former”.

Page 35. “Grobe” to “Große”, in two places in the table.

Page 38. “Geeek” to “Greek”.

Page 49. The left double quotation mark in ‘observed in 1825, “have

left’ has no closing mark. Several other puzzling usages of quotation

marks elsewhere have also been retained.

Page 51n. The proofreading code “[*pro]” is used herein to represent a

symbol originally printed as a latin small p with a hook, used as an

abbreviation for _pro_.

Page 52. The proofreading code “[*Q]” on this page represents the

stylized Q originally printed.

Page 138. The proofreading code “[*Q]” on this page represents two

glyphs, a Gothic Q, and the same glyph turned about 90° clockwise.

Page 156. The illustration has been changed from number 41

to 31, to agree with the List of Illustrations.

Page 159. The proofreading code “[*AT]” on this page represents a glyph

that appears to be a ligature of T and A.

Page 190n. The phrase _or here (Mason’s_ was changed to _or here”

(Mason’s_, by inserting the missing right double quotation mark.

Page 205n. The phrase “P. VergiliI Maronis Codex” is retained as

printed.

Page 274n. A matching right double quotation mark was inserted after ‘Η

Καινη Διαθηκη’.

Page 320. Changed “emploeyd” to “employed”.

Page 369 INDEX. The use of punctuation, particularly semicolons,

colons, and the 3-em dashes that function as ditto marks, seems often

inconsistent or strange. It is generally retained herein as printed.

The organization and structure of the original index is retained as

well.