d, h, i, m, n, o, r, s, t, u live in the next sized apartments; b, f, g,l, p, v, w, y dwell in what may be termed the bedrooms, while j, k, q, x, z, e and æ, double letters, &c., are more humbly lodged in the cupboards, garrets, and cellars. And the reason of this arrangement is, that the letter e being visited by the compositor sixty times as often as z, (for his hand spends an hour in the former box for every minute in the latter,) it is evidently advisable that the letters oftenest required should be the nearest. Latin and French books devour more of c, i, 1, m, p, q, s, u, and v, than English ones, and for these languages the "cases" must therefore be arranged accordingly.

The distributing of the letters from the type pages into the square dens to which they respectively belong is performed with astonishing celerity. If the type were jumbled, or, as it is technically termed, "in pie," the time requisite for recognizing the tiny countenance of each letter would be enormous, but the compositor, being enabled to grasp and read one or two sentences at a time, without again looking at the letters, drops them one by one, here, there, and everywhere, according to their destination. It is calculated that a good compositor can distribute four thousand letters per hour, which is about five times as many as he can compose; just as in common life all men can spend money at least twenty times as readily as they can earn it. As soon as the workman has filled his cases, his next Sisyphus labor is by composition to exhaust them. Glancing occasionally at his copy before him, he consecutively picks up, with a zigzag movement, and with almost the velocity of lightning, the letters he requires. In arranging these types in the "stick," or little frame, which he holds in his left hand, he must of course place them with their heads or letter-ends uppermost besides which, they must, like soldiers, be made all to march the same way; for otherwise one letter in the page would be "eyes right," one "eyes left," another "eyes front," while another would be looking to the rear. This insubordination would produce, not only confusion, but positive errors, for p would pass for d, n for u, q for b, &c. To avoid all this the type are all purposely cast with a "nick" on one of their sides, by which simple arrange. ment they are easily recognized, and made to fall into their places the right way; and compositors as regularly place the nicks of their type all outermost, as ladies and gentlemen scientifically seat themselves at dinner, with their nicks (we mean their mouths) all facing the dishes. In short, a guest sitting with his back to his plate is not, in the opinion of a compositor, a greater breach of decorum than for a letter to face the wrong way. The composing-stick contains the same sort of relative proportion to a page as a paragraph. It holds a certain measure of type, and as soon as it is filled, the paragraph, or fragment of paragraph it contains, is transplanted into the page to which it belongs. This process is repeated until the pages composing a sheet being completed, are firmly fixed by wooden quoins or wedges into an iron frame, called a "chase ;" and after having thus been properly prepared for the proof press, a single copy is "pulled off," and the business of correction then begins.

As the compositor receives nothing for curing his own mistakes, they form the self-correcting punishment of his offense. The operation is the most disagreeable, and, by pressure on the chest incurred

in leaning over the form, it is also the most unhealthy part of his occupation. "A sharp bodkin and patience" are said by the craft to be the only two instruments which are required for correction: by the former, a single letter can be abstracted and exchanged; by the latter, if a word has been improperly omitted or repeated, the type in the neighborhood of the error can be expanded or contracted, (technically termed "driven out," or "got in,") until the adjustment be effected. But the compositor's own errors are scarcely put to rights before a much greater difficulty arrives, namely, the author's corrections, for which the compositors are very properly paid 6d. an hour.

It can easily be believed that it is as difficult for a compositor to produce a correct copy of his MS. as it is for a tailor to make clothes to fit the person he has measured.

Few men can dare to print their sentiments as they write them. Not only must the frame-work of their composition be altered, but a series of minute posthumous additions and subtractions are ordered, which it is almost impossible to effect; indeed, it not unfrequently happens that it would be a shorter operation for the compositor to set up the types afresh, than to disturb his work piecemeal, by the quantity of codicils and alterations which a vain, vacillating, crotchety writer has required.

A glance at the different attitudes of the sixty compositors working before us is sufficient to explain even to a stranger whether they are composing, distributing, correcting, or imposing; which latter occupa. tion is the fixing corrected pages into the iron frames or "chases," in which they eventually go to press. But our reader has probably remained long enough in the long hall, and we will therefore introduce him to the very small cells of the readers.

In a printing establishment "the reader" is almost the only individual whose occupation is sedentary; indeed the galley-slave can scarcely be more closely bound to his oar than is a reader to his stool. On entering his cell, his very attitude is a striking and most graphic pic. ture of earnest attention. It is evident, from his outline, that the whole power of his mind is concentrated in a focus upon the page before him; and as in midnight the lamps of the mail, which illuminate a small portion of the road, seem to increase the pitchy darkness which in every other direction prevails, so does the undivided attention of a reader to his subject evidently abstract his thoughts from all other considerations. An urchin stands by reading to the reader from the copy-furnishing him, in fact, with an additional pair of eyes; and the shortest way to attract his immediate notice is to stop his boy : for no sooner does the stream of the child's voice cease to flow than the machinery of the man's mind ceases to work-something has evidently gone wrong-he accordingly at once raises his weary head, and a slight sigh, with one passage of the hand across his brow, is generally sufficient to enable him to receive the intruder with mildness and attention.

Although the general interests of literature, as well as the character of the art of printing, depend on the grammatical accuracy and typographical correctness of "the reader," yet from the cold-hearted public he receives punishment, but no reward. The slightest oversight is declared to be an error; while, on the other hand, if by his unre

mitted application no fault can be detected, he has nothing to expect from mankind but to escape and live uncensured. Poor Goldsmith lurked a reader in Samuel Richardson's office for many a hungry day in the early period of his life!

In a large printing establishment, the real, interest of which is to increase the healthy appetite of the public by supplying it with wholesome food of the best possible description, it is found to be absolutely necessary that "the readers" should be competent to correct, not only the press, but the author. It is requisite not only that they should possess a microscopic eye, capable of detecting the minutest errors, but be also enlightened judges of the purity of their own language. The general style of the author cannot, of course, be interfered with; but tiresome repetitions, incorrect assertions, intoxicated hyperbole, faults in grammar, and above all, in punctuation, it is his especial duty to point out. It is, therefore, evidently necessary that he be complete master of his own tongue. It is also almost necessary that he should have been brought up a compositor, in order that he may be acquainted with the mechanical department of that business; and we need hardly observe that, from the intelligent body of men whose presence we have just left, it is not impossible to select individuals competent to fulfil the important office of readers.

Descending from "the readers"" cells to the ground floor, the visitor, on approaching the northern wing of Mr. Clowes' establishment, hears a deep rumbling sound, the meaning of which he is at a loss to understand, until the doors before him being opened, he is suddenly introduced to nineteen enormous steam-presses, which, in three compartments, are all working at the same time. The simultaneous revolution of so much complicated machinery, crowded together in comparatively a small compass, coupled with a moment's reflection upon the important purpose for which it is in motion, is astounding to the mind; and as broad leather straps are rapidly revolving in all directions, the stranger pauses for a moment to consider whether or not he may not get entangled in the process, and against his inclination, as authors generally say in their prefaces, go "to press."

We will not weary our reader by attempting a minute delineation of the wonderful picture before him, or even introduce to his notice the intelligent engineer, who, in a building apart from the machinery, is in solitude regulating the clean, well-kept, noiseless steam-engine which gives it motion; we will merely describe the literary process.

The lower part of each of the nineteen steam-presses we have mentioned consists of a bed or table, near the two ends of which lie prostrate the two sets of "chases" containing the types (technically called "forms") we have just seen adjusted, and from which impressions are to be taken.

By the power of machinery these types, at every throb of the engine, are made horizontally to advance and retire. At every such movement they are met half way by seven advancing black rollers, which diagonally pass over them, and thus, by a most beautiful process, impart to them ink sufficient only for a single impression. As quickly as the types recede, the seven rollers revolve backward till they come in contact with another large roller of kindred complexion, termed "the doctor," which supplies them with ink, which he, "the doctor,"

himself receives from a dense mass of ink, which by the constant revolution of Esculapius assumes also the appearance of a roller.

Above the table, the forms, and the rollers we have described, are, besides other wheels, two very large revolving cylinders, covered with flannel; the whole apparatus being surmounted by a boy, who has on a lofty table by his side a pile of quires of white paper.

Every time the lower bed has moved, this boy places on the upper cylinder a sheet of paper, which is ingeniously confined to its station by being slipped under two strings of tape. It is, however, no sooner affixed there, than by a turn of the engine, revolving with the cylinder, it is flatly deposited on the first of the "forms," which, by the process we have described, has been ready inked to receive it: it is there instantaneously pressed, is then caught up by the other cylinder, and, after rapidly revolving with it, it is again left with its white side imposed upon the second "form," where it is again subjected to pressure, from which it is no sooner released than it is hurried within the grasp of another boy at the bottom part of the machinery, who, illumined by a gas light, extricates it from the cylinder, and piles it on a heap by his side.

By virtue of this beautiful process, a sheet of paper, by two revolutions of the engine, with the assistance only of two boys, is imprinted on both sides, with not only, say sixteen pages of letter-press, but, with the various wood-cuts which they contain. Excepting an hour's intermission, the engines, like the boys, are at regular work from eight A. M. till eight P. M., besides night work when it is required. Each steam-press is capable of printing one thousand sheets an hour. The apartments above the machinery we have described contain no less than twenty-three common or hand-presses of various constructions; besides which, in each of the compositors' rooms there is what is termed a proof-press. Each of these twenty-three presses is attended by two pressmen, one of whom inks the form, by means of a roller, while the other lays and takes off the paper very nearly as fast as he can change it, and by a strong gymnastic exertion, affording a striking feature of variety of attitude, imparts to it a pressure of from a ton to a ton and a half, the pressure depending upon the size and lightness of the form; this operation being performed by the two men, turn and turn about.

Notwithstanding the noise and novelty of this scene, it is impossible either to contemplate for a moment the machinery in motion we have described, or to calculate its produce, without being deeply impressed with the inestimable value to the human race of the art of printing— an art which, in spite of the opposition it first met with, in spite of "the envious clouds which seemed bent to dim its glory and check its bright course," has triumphantly risen above the miasmatical ignorance and superstition which would willingly have smothered it.

In the fifteenth century (the era of the invention of the art) the brief-men or writers who lived by their manuscripts, seeing that their Occupation was about to be superceded, boldly attributed the invention to the devil, and, building on this foundation, men were warned from using diabolical books "written by victims devoted to hell." The monks in particular were its inveterate opposers; and the vicar of Croydon, as if he had foreseen the Reformation, which it subsequently

effected, truly enough exclaimed in a sermon preached by him at St. Paul's Cross, "We must root out printing, or printing will root us out!" Nevertheless, the men of the old school were soon compelled to adopt the novelty thus hateful: in fact, many of the present names of our type have been derived from their having been first employed in the printing of Romish prayers: for instance, "Pica," from the service of the mass, termed Pica or pie, from the glaring contrast between the black and white on its page" Primer," from primarius, the book of prayers to the virgin-"Brevier," from breviary—" Canon," from the canons of the church-"St. Augustin," from that father's writings having been first printed in that sized type, &c., &c.

About the time of Henry II. the works of authors were, it has been said, read over for three days successively before one of the universities, or before other judges appointed for the service, and if they met with approbation, copies of them were then permitted to be taken by monks, scribes, illuminators, and readers, brought up or trained to that purpose for their maintenance. But the labors of these monks, scribes, illuminators, &c., after all, were only for the benefit of a very few individuals, while the great bulk of the community lived in a state of ignorance closely resembling that which has ever characterized, and which still characterizes savage tribes.

The heaven-born eloquence of many of these people has been acknowledged by almost every traveler who has enjoyed the opportunity of listening to it with a translator.

Nothing, it is said, can be more striking than the framework of their speech, which, commencing with an appeal to "the great Spirit" that governs the universe, gradually descends to the very foundation of the subject they are discussing. Nothing more beautiful than the imagery with which they clothe their ideas, or more imposing than the intellectual coolness with which they express them. From sunrise till sunset they can address their patient auditors; and, such is the confidence these simple people possess in their innate powers of speech, that a celebrated orator was, on a late occasion, heard to declare, "that had he conceived the young men of his tribe would have so erred in their decision, he would have attended their council fire, and would have spoken to them for a fortnight!"

But what has become of all the orations which these denizens of the forest have pronounced? What moral effect have they produced beyond a momentary excitement of admiration, participated only by a small party of listeners, and which, had even millions attended, could only, after all, have extended to the radius of the speaker's voice?

From our first discovery of their country to the present day, their eloquence has passed away like the loud moaning noise which the wind makes in passing through the vast wilderness they inhabit, and which, however it may affect the traveler who chances to hear it, dies away in the universe unrecorded.

Unable to read or write, the uncivilized orator of the present day has hardly any materials to build with but his own native talent; he has received nothing from his forefathers-he can bequeath or promulgate little or nothing to posterity-whatever, therefore, may be