good work to put an excess of blanket into the tympans, to lessen the pull for the purpose of easing the pressmen's arms, and to enable them to be more expeditious: the consequence is, that the impression will show more than the surface of the types or engraving; and thus what is gained in ease and expedition, is more than counterbalanced by the imperfect and rough impression that is produced. See FINE PRESSWORK, and ENGRAVINGS ON WOOD. An old pressman, who was a good workman, gave me the following directions for making ready a form: "In making ready, I will only speak of a form of fine work; if a pressman can do that, he surely can make common work ready. "Lay the form on the stone, centrically under the platen; quoin it all round; fold the tympan sheet according to the form laid on the press; lay it even on the form, and stretch it as much as it will bear; pull it, for the purpose of attaching it to the tympan; paste it all round to the tympan, at the same time keep stretching it; screw on the points; make them fall in the channel of the short cross; make good register with white paper, whether the form be whole or half sheet work. "This is one of the good old customs, and the best that I know of; because the pressman is sure to have the points centrical; he perceives whether all the furniture be put in right or wrong, even to a single scaleboard in leaded matter, which should be line upon line, he ascertains whether the form be locked up evenly or not, and whether the leads be all put in right; also, whether the pages that begin chapters, or other divisions of the work, have the proper whites; he can likewise discover if any of the pages be made up too long, or too short: any of these errors, that may have occurred, must be amended in the white paper form, otherwise the reiteration will have the same faults, in order to make register. On fine work, I make ready the white paper form of a sheet in the same manner as I do a half sheet, on purpose to discover those errors, by which process I gain more time in making ready the reiteration than I lost in the white paper form. 66 For fine work, use the finest cloth that can be procured, and not thick flannel blanket: if the form be light, one thin cloth blanket will be sufficient; and if it be very light, that is to say open leaded matter, sheets of paper are preferable to either flannel or cloth in the tympans. Be sure to have one sheet of stout paper, which will cover all the parchment, in the inside of the outer tympan. Pull a dry even sheet of paper; look carefully on the back of the impression; if it be not equally even, the light parts must be overlaid with tissue paper, or India paper; if some parts be very heavy, cut or tear out the heavy parts. The overlays should be pasted only slightly on the impression sheet, in case any of them should have to be taken off; paste the four corners of this sheet upon the thick sheet; let the overlays be uppermost, that you may see them; then pull another impression sheet, with the first in the tympans, and if the impression still be not even, overlay the first impression sheet again; and continue pulling impression sheets, and overlaying the first impression sheet, until you have an even and regular impression on all parts. "As you go on with the form, if any of the overlays require to be taken off, do so; if bits are required to be taken out, or rubbed off, the tympan sheet, it must be done. In some works the outer tympan cannot be too dry, but the pressman must be the judge of this, according to the work he has to do. "Having a good black ink well brayed on the surface of the ink block, he takes a small quantity on the balls, and distributes it well; he takes time to beat the form well and carefully, and then pulls a sheet of the right paper, dwells on the pull, or keeps down the bar a short time by means of a catch or hook, in order to make the paper take the ink clean off the types, and look a clear black upon the paper. The impression must not be too deep, as nothing must appear but the shape of the face of good types. If the impression be too deep, or too much ink on the form, more than the real shape will appear, and the work will not be fine; but if the work be fine, he goes on gently and regularly until the white paper be off. He then lays on the reiteration form; and having the overlays ready that he made before, he has very little trouble in making it ready: he makes such good register, that line falls upon line. After the reiteration is off, if he does not go on with the same work, or work of a similar size and imposition, he carefully puts by the tympan blankets, cloths, or tympan paper, and overlays, till they are again I wanted for the same work. All other works must have their own over lays made purposely for them. "After the first overlays are made for their respective works, there is not so much trouble in making ready the future sheets of the same work as they are put to press; indeed, if the pressman carefully preserves his overlays, tympan paper, or cloths, he seldom has occasion to do more than alter a few of the overlays, as the paper sometimes varies in thickness, which may want a few overlays on the tympan sheet. India paper is the best for this, as it is of a soft and pliable nature, and as it lies on the tympan sheet the pressman can easily perceive if one part of it has a deeper impression than another. "It is to be observed, that fine work cannot be made upon bad paper, or with old worn types. "Fine work must not be hurried, as some do when they are paid for it as piecework, and spoil it, in order to make a large bill. How a master stares at this, when the same men could not earn nearly so much on scale work. These are the very men who have despised the establishment, because they could earn more money by attending fewer hours, but not on scale work. How miserable and discontented I have seen them when on scale work, although at the same time they had as much work as they could do. This has been the cause of masters reducing the price of works not paid by the scale. A few shillings per week additional ought to satisfy a man for his extra abilities on fine work." MAKING REGISTER. The act of making the pages and lines fall exactly on the back of each other at press, when any work is perfected. See REGISTER. MAKE UP. After a compositor has been setting at random, and commences arranging his matter into pages, it is termed making up. In large pages and letter, in a work where good register is required, I would recommend the compositor to mark on a gauge accurately every line of the page, so that he may regulate his whites in such a manner that line may fall upon line without causing much trouble to the pressman, or to himself; for if it be much out, and the pressmen are on piecework, he will be called on to rectify the errors, and this is better avoided in the making up, as it is attended with but little trouble then, and his work will appear to more advantage in the first instance. To give the making-up. When a compositor in a companionship has composed his copy to within the quantity of a page of the work, he gives the overplus of the copy, after having completed his own last page, to him who is composing the copy that follows his matter; and he ought to mark on it with a pencil where he has himself concluded, as well as the folio that should follow that of his own last page. This is called giving the making-up. MALABARIC. See TAMOULIC. MALAY. The Malay is the principal vernacular tongue used by the people who inhabit that vast region and chain of islands comprehended between ninety-three and one hundred and thirty-five degrees of East longitude, a space of about two thousand two hundred and twenty miles; and extending from fourteen degrees North to eleven degrees of South latitude, comprehending twenty-five degrees, about one thousand seven hundred and forty miles. This vast extent of country over which the language is spoken includes the peninsula of Malacca, the islands of Sumatra, Java, Borneo, Maccasser, Balee, Cumbava, Sallayer, Bootoon, Booro, Ceram, Pulo Pinang, the Moluccas, and innumerable others. The Malays have not any proper national character, except that which has been introduced by the Mohammedan priests, who have from time to time settled in the peninsula of Malacca and the adjacent islands; therefore it resembles the Arabic Nishki alphabet, excepting some slight alteration to express a sound which the Arabians had no character to delineate. In conformity then with the principal of the Eastern nations, Arabians, Turks, Persians, &c. they read from the right hand to the left. The acute accent (') is always used to mark a very long sound of the vowel over which it is placed; but when inserted after a consonant, it shows that the syllable ends with it. In the above alphabetical arrangement, the second and fourth columns from the right hand are used only when they are connected with a preceding letter; as, banyak, many. Every letter should be connected with that which follows it, except these five: aulif, ♪ dal,, ré, j zé, and, vau; neither of which can possibly be joined to the following letter. MALLET. A wooden hammer, with which to drive the quoins in locking up and unlocking forms, to plane down forms, and for other similar purposes. The general size of the head is 5 inches by 44, and 3 inches thick the hole in the head for the reception of the handle should be bevelled each way from the centre on two sides, so that the handle fitting into the lower part, and being tightly wedged at the upper end, the head can neither fly off, nor can the handle be driven up, when a quoin is struck down with it, or when the planer is struck with the end of it, both which ways of using the mallet are frequent. It is commonly made of beech; but mallets are more durable when the head is made of a piece of tough ash. The head was formerly made round. MARGIN. Making margin is the apportioning of the proper distances between the pages of a sheet or form. This is a most material object in book work; for, if it be not properly done, the appearance of the book, when bound, will be injured; as the binder will be obliged either to reduce the size of the book, in order to make the edges smooth, or else he will have to leave many raw edges of paper. The spaces between the pages should be such, that, when the book is bound and cut, the page of printing should be very nearly in the middle of the page of paper. Convenience and custom have familiarised us to the printed page being a little higher than the middle of the leaf, and to its having a little more margin at the fore edge than in the back. The first of these circumstances may be accounted for, by the head, in all sizes except folio, being at the fold of the paper, which admits of the bookbinder cutting it smooth by taking off a very narrow shaving, so as to reduce the size but a mere trifle; while the bottom of the page lying towards the raw edge of the paper, which is irregular, and which often varies considerably from being cater-cornered machine-made paper also varies greatly in the size of the sheets, being cut up irregularly; and paper made at different times, and by different makers, which is often used in the same volume, and which likewise varies in size — all combined, render it necessary to allow a little more margin at the foot of the page and at the fore edge than at the head and in the back; for these variations in the paper equally affect the fore edge and the foot but the head, the back, and the gutter, being folded, remain uniformly the same, however much the paper may vary. It is always presumed that the backing of the book in binding, takes up as much of the margin as is cut off the fore edge, so as to make them both equal. Having premised these explanatory observations, I shall proceed to describe, in as clear and distinct a manner as I am able, the manner of ascertaining the proper spaces between the pages, for the different sizes of books, in the simplest way that is known, and as it is now generally practised; for the division of the margin by compasses is obsolete. |