Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume XIII.djvu/872

 848 PRINTING stands in front of the frame upon which are his cases; his "copy" is before him, usual- ly Iving on the right-hand side of the upper case. Holding the "stick" in his left hand, FIG. 1. Compositor at Case. he reads a few words of his copy, as many as he can readily remember for a few moments, and with his right hand picks up the types one by one and places them in the stick, so that they rest standing against the rule. He does not pick up the required letter at random, but al- most unconsciously fixes his eye upon one which happens to be in a favorable position. He does not look upon the face of the type, but at the " nick " or nicks cut into one edge near the foot, which part is to be placed out- ward- in the stick. When a line is completed he "justifies" it by evenly increasing or di- minishing the amount of space between the words, so as to make it end with a word or syllable. The letters occupy a reversed posi- tion, but the compositor reads them as easily as he would on the page printed from them. The line being justified, he places the rule after it, and proceeds in the same manner until his stick is full. The emptying of the stick is a dexterous process, requiring practice. The rule being placed after the last line in the stick, the forefinger of each hand presses against it, the two thumbs bearing strongly upon the first line in the stick, and the middle fingers upon the ends or sides of the lines ; then by a quick motion, while the stick is held down upon the case by the little finger of the left hand, the matter is lifted out and placed on a " gal- ley." This is a long tray of wood or metal, with the sides and upper end raised, against which the type rests secure. Leads are thin slips of metal placed between the lines to give a more open appearance to the matter, which is then said to be "leaded." When some of the sorts are nearly or quite exhaust- ed, the cases are said to be "empty," and are filled by distributing type which has been printed or stereotyped from, then called "dead matter." The process is one requiring great care and precision, but an accomplished work- man performs it with surprising rapidity, "throwing in" as many as 7,000 or 8,000 separate pieces in an hour. He takes up in his left hand as much as he can conveniently hold upright, with the nicks upward, resting on his rule, supported by the curved little or ring finger at the bottom, and the thumb and other fingers at the sides. With the right hand he takes a word or number of letters between the thumb and forefinger, reads them, and by rapid motions drops each into its own box. Upon the care with which this is done, to avoid " fouling the case" by getting the let- ters in the wrong boxes, largely depends the accuracy and rapidity of his subsequent com- position. When the compositor has filled a galley, an impression is taken from the type called a "proof," and the work of the proof reader begins. The proof is first collated with the copy. Usually an assistant reads the copy aloud, while the proof reader is on the alert to detect any variations between what he hears and what he sees on the slip before him, all of which he indicates by suitable marks on the proof. This proof is given to the com- positor for correction; the proof reader next revises it, by comparison with a new proof, to see that all the errors have been correct- ed, and then reads the revised slip, which is called the " second proof." Sometimes sev- eral proofs are read. In large offices, where there are several readers, the various proofs are usually read by different persons, it being presumed that one may detect some error which has escaped another. Usually a cor- rected proof is sent to the author for his revisal and emendation. For convenience a somewhat elaborate system is in use among printers, in which each .possible error is noted by a special symbol (see CORRECTION OF THE PEESS) ; but for an author it is sufficient to erase anything wrong and to write the correc- tion clearly in the margin. Composing and Distributing Machines. We have thus far considered "composition" as purely manual, and such it has been until recently, and still is with few exceptions. A fair day's work for a good compositor is about 6,000 ems, or a little more than two pages of this Cyclopaedia. During this century several attempts have been made to produce machines by which the work might be accomplished more expe- ditiously. A feature common to all composing machines is that the types, instead of being deposited in boxes as in the case, are placed in lines, each sort by itself, in perpendicular channels at the back of the machine. The ear- liest attempt to invent a composing machine appears to have been made about 1820 by Dr. William Church of Connecticut, who com- bined with it an apparatus for casting the type for it as wanted, thus doing away with the operation of distributing ; this was patent- ed in England in 1822, but does not appear to have come into practical operation. Re- cently the idea has been revived and improved upon by Mr. Westcott of New York, whose