Sunbury American. [volume] (Sunbury, Pa.) 1848-1879, 1874-10-16


ment when the composing-rooms are full
and every day sees every foreman OF al
office be-seiged with bescechers for job.
He viii! probably, by dint of persever
ance, obtain n job on one Of the daily
papers. Here hc will meet with fresi
troubles, but they will all vanish before 4
determination TO succeed, and, at worst
are made lighter by the increased prosperi
ty and prospects Of brighter destiny
which dawns upon him. Very frequently
it happens that The country printer is over
burdened with
AN EXCESS OF PIETY.
The superior of whom he worked had
been in many cases, man OF devout aspi
rations, and had cultivated similar tendeu
cies in his employe. There is no sort o.
similarity between taking Goals TO New.
castle and introducing piety to i printing
office, and it has not unseldom happened
that the rustic printer, after a night o.
horror at the profanity and otherwise Of
the daily paper news room, has shaken the
! dust of the place from his feet, and rushed
home again by the earliest train. As a
general rule, however, the prospect of in
creased worldly prosperity Oyercomes this
! fastidiousness, and the perverted pietist
/ listens TO strange oaths, and sets type on
the Sabbath with as great ease as though
! the first specimen of lithography had not
. contained the third and fourth command
ments. 1t is not however until he has
been working for some time in the city
newsroom that he discovers the ways that
are dark Of the men who work there. One
thing which he suffers from his era of in
nOcence is known among the fraternity as
FIGURING ON THE HOOK
This is cantphrase meant to describe the
wiles to which old and knowing printers
resort in order to secure the ''fattest," e. g,
the most lucrative takes, " i. G., pieces of
copy, from the file on which the forman
has placed them. The forman of an office
cuts up the copy into slips, numbers them,
and each printer takes one as he finishes
the last on hand. Now some takes are
much ''fatter" than others, notably, for
instance, advertisements, short-verse poe
try, cuts, two or three line paragraphs, in
terviews, all ieaded matter, etc 1t is quite
common thing for an old printer, when
lifting his take from the file, to glance down
one or two undertakes, and find out how
far down the fat takes lies, which informa-
tion he imparts to 4 friend, who decides to
hold off until the solid matter intervening
has been disposed Of 1t is the correct
thing then, in order to hurry up the dis
posing of these, to give hint to the cOun-
try newcomer that if he hu-rys up, some
thing exceedingly greasy in the take line
awaits him. He glad at heart at the kind
ness of his new friend, hurries up accord
ingly, and consequently strikes upon solid
mass of printed matter and promotes the
scheme Of the oldsters in the business.
Gradually, however, his eyes open so the
vain tricks Of city printers, and day by day
he falls into their little villanics, and it
frequently goes hard with him if he does
not better their instructions. Occasionally,
however, the "hook' will contain n piece
Of copy which, from Immature of the writ
ing or its utter novelty to the new conner,
will nearly drive him to Gispair 4 story
is told Of
A YOUNG PRINTER
who for week had struggled manfully and
with success agains: the difficulties of n
city newsroom. On an evil night, how
ever, the tOpmOst take on the hook for him
was manifold market report execrably
written, Abbreviated in a most diabolical
manner, and utterly devoid of punctuation,
marks. The poor fellow looked at the
hieroglylhics Fl, ',pk, ," ''spg whit, D" Wv.
w. whit" bly," which stood respectively
for flour, pork, spring wheat, white winter
wheat, and barley, sank down on the floor,
and burst into tears and execratiOns of the
wretch who conspired against his success
in life in so cruel fashion.
The overwhelming calamity Of q printer
is
BAD NANUSCRIPT.
50 bad that it is necessary to stop and
ponder over it, lest the proof came back to
him black with corrections. This involves
loss of time, and therefore direct loss of
money. To be deprived of 4 dollar day
by reason of bad copy is no just matter.
Hence the Indignation of the printer con-
ccrning those who write bad hands, and
the number thereof is legion.
When confronted with an impracticable
scrawl there lie two paths before the COM
poSitor upon ripper reflection there are
three One is to curse the end of the man
VINO did that writing, the pen he used, the
ink he employed, and the sentiments he
expressed. a quiet genial curse of five
minutes, followed by the return Of that
take, and an immediate departure from
the office, is the easiest thing TO do. 1t is
the depth of malignant cynicism for the
writer of the above mentioned scrawl to be
in and around when this cursing is going
on, and to rejoice in the misery he has
wrought. Satan, gloating over lost soul,
cannot be compared to him.
The next course is to study it ont, to en-
deayor to read it by calling to his assist
ance the proofreaders and everybody near
by who is supposed TO be an expert in
handwritings. This course of study is sea-
soned with evil words, of course. The
last way is to 90 at the job headloug, and
as the lady substituted Jerusalem" for
every word she could not make out in the
letter she was reading, SO he sticks in any
thing which looks something like the words
before him, and then waits for the proof.
This method has its parallel with certain
shorthand reporters, who, unwilling to
omit anything, substitute for signs they
cannot read something resembling them,
needless of sense, such as "hiatus" for
''hidcous,'' ''heathenn for ''well, then,"
etc.