Page:De Vinne, Invention of Printing (1876).djvu/34

24 truly square as to body, so that they can be fitted to each other with precision, and can be interchanged with facility.

The expense of combining types in words is trivial, as compared with the cost of engraving for lithographic or for copper-plate printing. An employing printer's price for the composition of a page like this would be, at the high rates of New- York city, $1.10. The engraving of such a page, by any method, would cost at least three times as much as the types and their composition. If never so carefully done, the engraved letters would not be so uniform, nor so satisfactory to the general reader, as the types. The engraved letters would cost more, but they could be used only for the work for which they were made. In typographic printing, there is no such restriction as to use, and no such loss of labor. It is only the labor of composition which need be lost; the types remain, but little more worn, or little less perfect, than when they were first put in use.

The labor of composition is not always lost. A page of movable types can be used for a mould, from which can be made a stereotype plate of immovable letters. Stereotyping is a cheap process. A plate of this page of type can be had for about one-half the cost of the composition. The stereotype plate has all the advantages pertaining to an engraving on a lithographic stone, and it is more durable and portable.