The Monitor., 1884-06-13
THE OLD PRINTER.
A Sketch of Life Behind the Scenes in Newe,.na.
Composing Room F-Pe'

THE OLD PRINTER.
Sketch OF Life Behind the Scenes in a Newsoane,
composing Room.
slug nine learned his letters right from
i the boxes, and grew up and learned to set tvne
IN one OF those mustang offices where thew
Keep the type IN coffee sack and chalk ont
the cases on the floor. He wasn't even a verv
fast printer; he didn't often rush. and he
never 'soldIered for the fat on the hook bnt
TOOK Whatever came along with equal patience
and good nature, whether it was a nick- -nnn
Or great take of blind copy, scribbled In nen-
ell on blue foolscap on both sides of the raner
and marked solid, with never break nor a
paragraph from to 2. But he would stand
at that Old case and pick up type all night
pegging along on straight BREWER as tbonob
ne struck display head on every take. He
always made fair bills, and after while no
the sixties began creeping on him. the bows
had way of g soldering for him. and NAV
De you don't know how hard it is for printer
not to drop good many type, and tumble
for the boxes, and let his thumb get most aw-
/ fully sore, and have to hunt for the bellows
and blow out his case and study the conv
very closely and find it dreadfuliv hard ~
read, and that sort of thing, when bv rnsb;no
little he can get pickup" as long as
your arm and loaded take with parapranb
to every sentence. But they did all that for
the Old man, and he knew it by and by and
loved the boys as if they were his own. every
last slug of them.
And SO, year after year he wrought among
the boys on morning paper. He went to
bed about the time the rest of the world oot
up, and he rose about the time the rest of the
world sat down to dinner. He worked by
every KIND OF light except sunlight There
were candles IN the office when he came in.
had Iar Ill L.
and sputtered and smelled: then he saw two
or three printers blinded by explosions of
camphene and spirit gas then kerosene came
IN and heated up the news room on summer
nights like furnace; then the Office put in
gas; and now the electric light hung from
the ceiling and dazzled his old ewes and olared
into them from his copy. If he sang on his
way home, policeman bade him .scheese
that, and reminded him that he was disturh-
ing the peace, and people wanted to sleep
But when he wanted to sleep, the rest of the
world, for whom he had sat up all night to
make morning paper, roared and crashed by
down the noisy street under his window,
with cart, and truck, and omnibus: blared
with brass bands, howled with hand-orpans.
talked and shouted; and even the shrieking
newsboy, with ghastly sarcasm, murdered
the sleep of the tired old printer by yelling
the name of his own paper. Year after wear
the foreman roared at him to remember that
this wasn't an afternoon paper; editors
shrleked down the tube to have blind man
put on that dead mans case: smart youno
proof-readers scribbled sarcastic comments on
his work, on the margin of his proof-slips:
long -winded correspondents, learning to write.
and Iong-halred poets who could never learn
to spell, wrathfully cast all their imperfections
upon his head But through it all he wrought
not onfl ar,1
shadow IN the world he had more friends
than enemies. Printers and foremen and
pressmen and reporters and editors came and
went, but he stayed, and he saw news room
and sanctum filled and emptied and filled and
emptied again, and filed again with new and
strange faces.
He was working one night, and when the
hours that were SO short in the ballroom and
SO long In the composing drew wearily
on, he was tired. He hadn't thrown in
full case, he said. One of the boys tired as
himself-but printer is never too tired to be
good natured-ofered to change places with
him, but the old man said there was enough
Ill his case to last him through his take, and
he wouldn't work any more tonight. The
type clicked In the silent room, and by and
by the old man said:
Pm out of sorts"
He sat down on the low window-sill by his
case, with his stick in his hand, his hands
folded wearily in his lap. The types clicked
on. galley of telegraph waited
Will any one kindly tell me what gentle
man is lingering with d 1927 called the fore
man, who was always dangerously polished
and polite when he was on the point of ex.
ploding with wrath and impatience
Slug Ten, passing by the alley, stopped to
speak TO the old man sitting there SO quietly.
The telegraph boy came running in with
the last manifold sheet, shouting:
Thirty"
They carried the old man to the foreman's
long table. and laid him down reverently,
and covered his face. They took the stick
out of his nerveless hand and read his last
take
Boston, Nov. 23.-The American baraue, Pill
grim, went to pieces off Marblehead in a light
gale. about midnight She was old and unsea-
worthy, and this was to have been her last trip
1t is thought that the artesian we'll soon to