Page:Historic printing types, a lecture read before the Grolier club of New York, January 25, 1885, with additions and new illustrations; by De Vinne, Theodore Low, 1828-1914; Grolier Club.djvu/78

 74 HISTORIC PRINTING TYPES. Lacking in legibility. Types made to suit new methods of printing. mathematical line: it has extension, but no appreciable width. When printed, as much of the book printing of America has been done for the past twenty years, on dry calendered paper, after an inking from hard rollers filmed with stiff ink against a hard surface that would not thicken the line, it showed a faintness and feebleness that had been seen only in a print from copper or steel plate. Here it may be necessary to show, although somewhat out of the order of time, how the fashions of types have been changed to suit different methods of printing. Before 1845, all kinds of book and job printing had been done, in America, on dampened paper, by flat platen press- ure against thick woolen blankets, or other elastic resisting surface. About, and perhaps a little before, 1850, calen- dering rollers were used in American paper-mills, and book papers of smooth glossy surface, that did not require damp- ening, were to be had in every paper-warehouse. On this smooth paper it was not necessary to make use of an elastic resisting surface to sink the types in the fabric, as was necessary on all rough papers. It was only for the pur- pose of making rough paper pliable and susceptible to impression that it had been dampened. Job printers who made use of small platen job-presses, and wood-cut printers who printed wood-cuts from the wood on hand-presses, found that they got the cleanest and sharpest impressions on smooth dry paper against an inelastic impression sur- face. In 1850, cylinder presses were used with marked