Page:The practice of typography; correct composition; a treatise on spelling, abbreviations, the compounding and division of words, the proper use of figures and nummerals by De Vinne, Theodore Low, 1828-1914.djvu/205

 The half-diamond and the lozenge-shaped indentions are unwisely neglected in open display work. Compositors frequently use paragraph indention for sentences of two or three lines, even when the last line ends in a turnover of five letters. It is always a blemish to allow an irregular white line at the end of a line of text and over a line of display.

In the title-pages of books half-diamond indention can be used with good effect for all groups of words that do not need special display. It prevents the useless display of many lines, with their spacewasting catch-lines, and makes a pleasing variation in the composition by its systematic irregularity of outline. It is not a favored style for dedications, in which words are seldom found that will allow of. this treatment without the making of bad spacing or of divisions that are equally offensive.

This form of indention is troublesome, for it requires some preliminary calculation of the number of words to be so treated. The compositor begins the work by setting one word in the centre of the measure, and gradually increases the number of words in each succeeding line until the measure is filled. The indention in all following lines is increased until the matter closes in the last line with one word only. The lines may have to be repeatedly reset and justified before the proper shape is