[Class NYU.
zontal. This system, judging of it by the printed pagedisplayed at the Exhibition, appears to be successful.In point of execution, it leaves nothing to he desired;and Mr. "William Wells, an accomplished Chinese scholar,residing in that country, lias bestowed great praise uponit.* M. Beyerhatis has also engraved an Egyptian type,at the suggestion of M. Bunsen. The characters of itare open, whilst the two founts which the National Print-ing-office of France has had engraved are black (en sil-houette).
The Imperial Printing-office of Austria , decomposingeach part of a Chinese word into as many pieces as itcontains strokes of the pen, reconstructs the words bymeans of these little pieces, which the compositor groupstogether so as to construct any Chinese word. The num-ber of points and strokes is about 400, and they appear tobe a most complete system of Chinese typography.
Nearly all the languages of the world were typographi-cally represented either in the specimens of the NationalPrinting-office of Paris , in the numerous tables of theImperial Press of Austria , in the Bibles printed in almostall languages by the Bible Society , in the specimens ofgeneral type-founding at Paris , in those of M. Decker ofBerlin, or in those of the English foufldors, and especiallyin those of the late Mr. Watts of London , who has him-self engraved an extensive series of Oriental types, whicharc an honour to his type-founding, and form the richestseries of this kind existing in any private establishment.
Amongst all the types which express the gift of speech,the most numerous and complicated are those of theChinese language, in which every idea and each word isrepresented by a different character. Owing to typo-graphy, there will soon be no single idiom which maynot be saved from oblivion; for typography contributesto the preservation of languages as essentially as did thepress of Guttemberg to the preservation of books at thetime of its discovery.
The Jury have, in this important branch of art, re-marked the productions of the following contributors:—
England. —Messrs. Caslon* and Co. (78, p. 543), ex-hibited a great variety of beautiful types; Messrs.Duncan Sinclair and Sox '92, p. 543), specimens ofgeneral excellence; Messrs. Figgins (124, p. 545), typesof great excellence and beauty: a super-royal form con-taining 220,000 pieces of pearl type, locked up andshowing the care bestowed in finishing, in order to insurecorrect justification; and a specimen of curious and newly-cut Tudor type, imitating the inscriptions from monu-ments and tombs; Messrs. Miller and Richard (150,p. 546\ a specimen of ruby type, in which “ Gray’sElegy ” is printed, thirty-two verses in two columns,oceup 3 'ing 3j inches in length; Messrs. Besley and Co.(195, p. 550), a great variety of beautiful and originaltypes, among which a complete series of Elizabethan,or church text, as well as the typographical ornamentstaken from the remains of Nineveh and Etruria . TheJury also mention the specimens of Messrs. FergusonBrothers (90, p. 543); of Messrs. Stephenson, Blakeand Co. (182, p. 549); and a curious fount of compli-cated type of the cuneiform character, used in the Baby-lonian inscriptions, exhibited by Messrs. Harrison andSon (21 2 , p. 552). Messrs. King’s new music (22, p. 537)presents an improvement, the result of having very fewkerned types. Mr. Armstrong’s illustrated music offersno peculiar character.
France .—M. Dkrriey (p. 1183), the eminent punch-cutter and type-founder, exhibited types and flourishesof first-rate merit, and music types with separate ledger-lines running the whole length of the line, in brass orother metal, a great improvement on the ordinary musictypes—M. Gauthier's neatly-cut and cast letters (234,p. 1187) deserve mention—MM. Laboclaye and Co.(895, p. 1223), successors to Didot, have shown greatskill in their printing types. M. Roussel (361, p. 1194)exhibits music composed with moveable types and ma-trices, in which there appears to he no marked novelty.
* M. Beyerhaus has made a smaller type, which is alsovery well executed.
Russia . —M. Reyillion (361, p. 1383) has shown goodspecimens of Greek, Oriental, and other types.
Sardinia . The Jury have remarked MM. Farina’s(47, p. 1304, small punches and types.
Holland. —MM. Enschede and Sons (79, p. 1146)maintain the reputation of their old establishment forgood printing types and stereotype plates.
Germany. — Besides the Exhibitors whose merits havealready been noticed, M. Dressler, of Frankfort; 5 Zollv.,(24, p. 1122), exhibited types said to he of new metalliccomposition; M. Schelter, of Dresden (3 Zollv., 182,p. 1113), a variety of printing types; and M. IIaknklspecimens of types, brass types for bookbinders, electro-type matrices for easting large types, and electrotypesfrom woodcuts, all possessing merit.
Type-founding in the United States .
Before the separation of the American colonies fromthe mother-country, paper, printing-presses, and typeswere almost all imported from England. ChristopherSower, who established a printing-office at Germantown,near Philadelphia , in 1735, was the first who cast hisown types. In 17G8, Mr. Mitchelson attempted to set upa foundry in Boston , and the same year Mr. Buel anotherin Connecticut , hut neither of them were successful.Soon after the close of the American "War, however, Mr.John Baine, of Edinburgh , established a type-foundry atPhiladelphia , and he was, it is believed, the first whoregularly carried on the business of type-founding in theUnited States. But the importation of British type, andthe small number of newspapers, still constituted diffi-culties in the way of success. Baine died in 1790, andhis partner returned to Scotland . About this time Mr.Archibald Binny and Mr. James Ronaldson establishedanother foundry at Philadelphia , unconnected with anyother business, and were eminently successful. InEngland, at this time, the assortments of type in thefoundries were about twenty in number, of which thelargest was the twelve-line pica, and the smallest thediamond, of 202 lines to a foot. The assortments ofMessrs. Binny and Ronaldson at first embraced onlv themore essential founts, such as brevier, bourgeois, longprimer, small pica, pica, and two-line letters. At thisperiod the increase of printing in the United States wasmost extraordinary. The number of newspapers* in tenyears from 1790 increased from 70 to 200, and the numberof offices for miscellaneous printing exceeded 50. Theprinting business in these ten years increased probablythreefold. There was, of course, a corresponding increasein the business of type-founding; and before long Messrs.Binny and Ronaldson’s assortment became as extensive asin the chief foundries of England. It is to them theworld is indebted for the first real improvement in type-founding since the days of Peter Schoefter. This im-portant improvement was in the type-mould, by means ofwhich a caster could cast 6,000 types in a day as easily ashe could have accomplished 4,000 by the old process.
About the beginning of the present century the in-vention was introduced into Europe , and is now generallyknown as the American Mould. Messrs. Binny andRonaldson’s type was considered good at that time; withit Dobson printed the first American edition of the Ency-clopaedia , in 21 large 4to. volumes, 1798-1803. Aboutthe year 1805, another type foundry was set up in Balti-more , by Samuel Sower and Co., which contained someof the moulds and matrices used by Christopher Sowermentioned above, who east his own type in German-town in 1740. They were chiefly for German letters.To these were now added a variety of excellent Romanand Italic types, and among others the diamond with asmaller face than had ever before been cast either inEurope or America . Nearly about the year 1805, Messrs.White and Wing established a foundry at Hartford , inConnecticut , where they devised and used a plan of theirown for easting twenty or thirty letters at a time, andare said to have brought their invention to a usefuldegree of perfection. On Mr. White’s removal to NewYork , in 1811, when he established the first regular andextensive foundry in that city, this invention seems tohave been abandoned, and the old plan of casting by