The Prince George's enquirer and southern Maryland advertiser. (Upper Marlborough, Md.) 1882-1925, 1897-10-01
MISTAKES OF PRINTERS.
IMPERFECTLY WRITTEN COPY USUALLY
THE CAUSE.
From the Episcopal Recorder.

OF the making of books there is nc
end; of some there should have been
no beginning. But aside from that
class, many 4 book that was intended
to be faultless by its author has issued
from the press with glaring blemishes
lie reads with amazement in the print.
ed copy statements which he had new.
| er formed and ideas which he had new
er conceived. Since the days of Adam
man has laid faults at some other per.
sons door. The bookmakcr recalls in
his mind the various persons through
whose hands his manuscript has pass
ed, and as they stand before the bar of
judgment-his Judgment, of course
he reads them severe lecture. Who
is to blame? Was it the typesetter OF
the proofreader, Or that deniz,c Of the
inky office-the printers devil? Look
ing upon the thwarted attempts at
perfection. he believes it to be decided
ly impish.
Preserves often spoil. Every house
wife knows it. Economizing spoon
ful of sugar results in the loss of jar
of fruit. So ''thc art prcservativc
sometimes fails to preserve the writer
thought, whether through false econo-
my or negligence, | say not. Some
times it is amateur meNpcrienee. BY
request | once sent an anniversary SER
mon to local weekly for insertion.
Such 4 rendition of my fair written
manuscripts. | could weep as | saw
the distorted, disjointed sentences and
paragraphs. All the 'ographies' and
"ologies" seemed to have passed
through collision or experienced an
earthquake. The title was "Memorial
Stones" when l sent it away, but, 10!
the truly original rendition given Iy
the progressive printer was this:
'Memorial Stares." | no longer trust
amateur printers: | must first see the
proof sheet. Happily the sheet had
the small circulation it deserved. The
older residents regarded each issue as
4 joke perpetrated.
THE AUTHOR OFTEN TO BLAME.
Sometimes, perhaps, the author
might blame himself instead of the
printer. Great thinkers are not al
ways good writer's. Indeed, the re-
verse seems to be true generally.
Thought can form faster than ink can
flow from the fountain pen. This often
causes curtailment, the syncopation of
words, or even the telescoping of sew
eral at once; dropping finals, bi-secting
middles, or showing only the initial
letters of one word and the final letters
of others, leaving the poor typesetter
to reproduce the thought from the
scanty remains; just as our scientific
authorities reproduce the original skel-
eton of an aged dead mammal on the
sight of single bone Or tooth. Per-
ha.>s tho printer is equally faithful in
the attempt, and, perhaps, he succeeds
just as perfectly as the aforesaid au-
thorities. They have one advantage
over the printer at least must face
the original creator of the sentence,
who, if he has not forgotten it, can tell
what he meant to say. But who is
competent to judge their work! Who
knows any more about it than they do?
And how little they know! Is it
wonder if the printer fails to reproduce
thought and instead devise anew! All
printers are not Yankees ut guessing.
Sometimes the mistakes are simple
Letters that would never be confounded
in print, through imperfect construct
ion, are often confounded in writing,
e. g., ga and SUI bear no resemblance
in print, but an unclosed written "a"
looks very much like the "u''; or ''a'
and ''o'' may be changed. Whether it
is capitol or capital the printer must
decide from the context and the die
tiOnary. Sometimes they don't Oh
serve either! But typewritcrs will OBJ
viate some of these difficulties. As
the Irishman could "ridc afoot" on the
bicycle, SO the amanuensis hereafter
can write print with the machine"
Impcrfectly written copy lies at the
base of many mistakes The author,
not the printer, is to blame. DR.. Far
rar writes of Dean Stanley and his
poor penmanship; "Words that were
not absolutely essential to the mean
ing were often 4 mere flourish, which
might stand for fifty different combina
tions of letters. Where there was no
clue to the sens,, the unhappy reader
might 90 very widely astray. On one
occasion he directed letter to me to
Marlborough College, Wits. The let
ter never reached me. 1t had gone to
some gentleman of Il totally different
name at Mcrthyr TydviI, Wales.
This gentleman, seeing by the printed
that the letter came from the
Deanery of Westminster, but unable
to make out the name or place for
which the letter had been intended,
sent it back to the dean. who enclosed
the old envelope to me in 4 new one,
with several notes of ah- !