The Pulaski citizen. [volume] (Pulaski, Tenn.) 1866-current, 1867-07-12
The Printer and HIS Tvpes.

Perhaps there is no department Of enter
prise whose details are less understood
by intelligent people than the ''art preser-
vative''--the achievement of types.
Every day, their life long, they are ac-
customed to read the newspaper, to find
fault with its statements, its arrangements,
its looks to plum themselves upon some
roguish and acro0atic type that gets into a
frolic and stands u5on its head, OF Of some
waste letter or two In it-but Of the pro-
cess by which the newspaper is made, Of
the myriads Of motions aud thousands of.
pieces necessary to its composition, they
know little and think less.
They imagine they discourse of a won
der, indeed, when they speak of the fair
white carpet woven for thought to walk on,
of the rags that futtered on the back of
the beggar yesterday.
But there Is something more wonderful
still When he looks at the hundred and
ffty-two little boxes. somewhat shaded by
the touch of inky fingers, that compose
the prnter's 'case,'' noisless, except the
clicking of the types as one by one they
take their places in growing line-we think
we have found the marvel of the art.
We think how many faneies in fragments
there are in the boxes, how many atoms of
poetry and eloquence the printer can make
here and there, if he only had a little chart
to work by, how many facts in small
''handful," how much truth in chaos.
New he picks up the scattered elements
until be holds in his hand a stauza, Of
'.Grey's Elegy OF monody upon Grimes,
"All Buttoned up Before" Now he
''5ets" puppy missing" and now Para
disc Lost - he arrays a bride in "smell
caps" and a sonnet in "nonpariel - he
announces the Ianguishing ''liye,' in one
sentence-transposes the words and de-
plores the days that are few and 'eyii, in
the next.
A poor Jest ticks its way slowly into the
printers hand, like clock just running
down, and strain of eloquence marches
into line letter by letter. We fancy we
can tell the difference by hearing of the
ear. but perhaps not. The types that told
wedding yesterday, announces burial
to-morrow-perhaps in the same letters.
They are the elements to make world
of-thoso types are, world with some
thing in it as beautiful as spring, as rich
as summer and as grand as autumn flowers
that frost cannot wilt, fruit that shall ripen
for all time.
The newspaper has become the log-bOok
of the age, it tells at what rate the world is
running we cannot find our reckoning
without it.
True, the green grocer may bundle up
a pound oS candles in our last expressed
thoughts, but it is only coming to base
uses, some thing that is done times innu-
merable.
We console ourselves by thinking that
ode can make that newspaper what he can
not make Of living oaks-a bridge for time,
that he can fling it over the chasm of the
dead years and walk safely back upon the
shadowy sea into the far past. The singer
shall not end his song, nor the true SOU
be eloquent more.
The realm of the press is in enchanted
ground Sometimes the editor has the
happiness of knowing that he has defend
ed the right, exposed the wrong, protected
the weak that he had given utterance to
a sentiment that has cheered somebody &
solitary hour, made somebody happier,
kindled a smile upon a sad face, or hope on
heavy heart.
He 1na7 meet with that sentiment many
years after ii may have lost all charm o
its paternity, but he feels affection for it
He welcomes it as lohg absent child
He reads it as for the first time, and won
ders if, indeed, he wrote it, for he hai
T changed since then. Perhaps he could no
give utterance to the sentiment now-Per
haps he would not if he could.
It seems like the voice Of his forme
self calling to its parents. and there j
something mournful in its tone. He be
gins to think-to remember why be Wrot
it. where his readers then and whithe
t they had gone-what be was then, an'
how much be has changed. So he muses.
until he finds himself wondering if tba
, thought Of his wall continue to foat afte
he is dead, and whether be is really look
lug upon something that will survive him
And then comes the sweet consciousness
. that there is nothing in the sentence tha
be could wish unwritten-that it is bet
ter part Of bim-a shred from a Carmen
of immortality be shall leave behind hin
f when be joins the ''innumerable caravan,
and takes his place in the silent hall o
death.
Shall Weakness Triumphi
Pom an ho1. tnat Hi1nn.