True American. [volume] (Steubenville [Ohio]) 1855-1861, 1858-11-10
The Printer and his TYpes.

The Printer and his Types.
The following beautiful extract. from
the Pen of the gifted Buyard Taylor, trav-
cling printer of the New York Tribune,
we commend to the craft everywhere, as
something worthy of their attention.
Perhaps there is no department of en-
terprise whose details are less understood
by intelligent people than the "art pre-
servative the achievement of types,
Every day of their long life, they are
accustomed to read the newspaper, to find
fault with its statements, its arrange
ments, its looks; to plume themselves
upon the discovery of some rougish and
acrobatic type, that gets into frolic and
stands upon it's head: or some with a
waste letter or two in it-but of the pro-
cess by which the newspaper is made, of
the myriads of motions and thousands OF
pieces necessary to its composition they
know little and think less,
They imagine they discourse of Won
der, indeed, when they speak of the fair
white carpet woven for thought to walk
on, of the rags that futtered on theback
of the beggar yesterday.
But there is something more wonderful
still. When we look at the hundred and
ffty-two little boxes, somewhat shaded
with the touch of inky fingers, that COM
pose the printers cease" ,"-noisless ex-
cept the clinking of the types, as one by
one they take their place in the growing
line-we think we have found the marvel
of the art.
We think how many fancies in frag
ments there are in the boxes, how muny
atoms of poetry and eloquence the printer
can make here and there, if he only has
a little chart to work by, how many
ia cts in small handfulls, how much truth
and chaos.
Now he picks up the scattered elements
until he holds in his hand stanza O.
Gray's Elegy or monody upon Grimes
call buttoned down BEFORE" Now he
sets" "puppy missing," and now
Paradise Lost he arrays bride ir
" SMALL CAPS" and sonnet in nonpareil
he. announces that the languishing olive
in one entence--transposes the word ant
deplores the days that are few and =" evil,
in the next.
A poor jest ticks its way slowly int
the printers hand like clock Just running
down, and strain of eloquence marches
into line letter by letter. We fancy W.
can tell the difference by hearing of thu
ear but perhaps not.
Types that told Of wedding yesterday
announce burial o-morrow-perhaps il
the self-same letters. They are element
to make a word of-those types are
word with something in it as beautiful a
spring, as rich as summer, and Us grand a
autumn flowers that frost cannot wilt, frui
that shall ripen for all time.
The newspaper has become the logbool
, of the age; it tells us what rate the worl
is running we cannot find our " reckon
: ing" without it.
True, the green grocer may build up
pound of candles In our last expresse
thoughts, but it is only coming to bad usei
as its letters have done times innumerable
. We console ourselves by thinking thO
one can make of that newspaper what W
D cannot make of living oaks--a bridge ft
time-that he can fling it over the chasl
r Of the dead years and walk safely back o
the shadowy sea into the far Past. tn
singer shall not end his song, nor the tru
soul be eloquent any more.
The realm of the Press is enchante
4 ground. Sometimes the editor has tn
/. happiness of knowing that he has defende
the right, exposed the wrong, protected tf
!. weak that he has given utterance to
u sentiment that is not lost--a sentimei
: that has cheerod somebody's solitary hol
!. made some one happier. kindled smi
: upon sad face, or hope in heart.
b We may meet with the sentiment mar
a year after, it may have lost all traces
: its paternity, but he feels an affection Fl
}, it. He welcomes it as long absent chill
s' He reads it as for the first time, and wo
. ders if, indeed, he wrote it, for he HI
! changed since then. Perhaps he could n
\ give utterance to the sentiment now-pr
d hapa he would not if he could.
n 1t seems like the voice of his form
u self calling to his parent, and there
y something mournful in its tone. He b
:" " gins to think, to remember why he wrote
:, where his readers then, and where tn
had gone--what was he then and how h
% he changed. So he muses. until he fin
b himself wondering If that thought Of