It was long ago said that silver printing was doomed, that in a
few more years it would be among the things that were.
Other processes have been introduced, have had their little day
and have passed off, some of them of much merit, and, it was
supposed, possessed of every element of permanency, but they were
found wanting in some very important respect, and so not being
able to hold their ground they passed into the limbo of neglected
things.
Silver printing, however, still maintains the field against all
comers, and does so by its intrinsic merits alone. No other
process has equalled it in ease of production and in beauty of
finish, and it is doubtful if any process has results of greater
permanence, taking the best products of the process as samples.
The one defect of the process is the possibility of its products
fading, but we must not judge of a process by its poorest
examples, but rather by its best; if such should be the decision,
there are at this day thousands of silver prints that are
co-existent with the process and remain as perfect as it is
possible for anything on paper to be after such a lapse of time.
A process that is so simple and easy that it can be [p071]
acquired in a few hours, is predestined to careless working,
slovenly manipulation, and to endless scamping at the hands of
careless workers. What wonder then if prints fade which were only
half made.
Suffice it that the process, intelligently and conscientiously
worked, would never suffer from such an imputation.