Year: 1866

I 4 = y


The following beautiful extract is from the
/ pen Of Benjaman i. Taylor, the printer
! poet. Perhaps there IS no department of
I enterprise whose details are less understood
/ by intelligent people than the art preser-
/ yative the achievement OF types Every
I day their lifelong they are accustomed to


read the newspapers and find fault with i5s
! statements, It's arrangements, Its looks to
/ plume themselves upon the discovery of
j some roruish and acrobatic tyne chat gets
into a froiic and stands upon is head 0r of
! some waste letter or tive III is-but Of the
/ process by which the newspaper Is made,
Of the myraids Of motions and the thousands
! Of pieces necessary to It's composition, they
/ know lttie and think less. They imagine
/ they discourse of n wonder, indeed when
/ they speak Of the fair white carpet, woven
for thought to walk on of the RAGS chat fut-
tered on the back of the heggar yesterday.
But there Is something more wonderful still
Whom we look at the hundred ami fifty two
little boxes, somewhat shaded with the touch


OF inky fingers, that the printers a case,


noiseless, eXcept the clicking OF the types,
/ as one BY one they fake their places IN the
growing line we think we have looud the


marvel of the art We think how many
fancies in fragments there are in boxes, how


many atoms OF poetry and eiOquence the
printer can make here and there, if he had
only little chart to work by, how many
facts in a sUail handful" how much truth
in chaos. Now he picks up the scattered
elements until he holds in his hands n
| stanza Of q" Gray's Elegy," or u moaoday
upon Grimes, All Buttoned up before
Now he sets puppy missing" and now
" Paradise Lost" he arrays bride IN


small caps, and q sonnet in nonpareil; :"
he announces the languishing live in one
sentence-transpOsing the word and de-


plores the days that are few and evil IN


the next A poor Jest ticks its way slowly
into the printers hand, like a clock just run
down, and strain of elOqusnce marches into


the line letter by letter We fancy we


can tell the difference by hearing by the ear
but perhaps not. The types that told


wedding yesterday announce a burial to-
morrow-perhaps the same letters. They
are the elements to mOye a WOrId-thOse
types are world with something 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. 1t tells at what rate the
world Is running we cannot find our


reckoning without it. True the green
grocer may bundle up pound of candles
In our last expressed thoughts, but It Is only


coming to base uses, something that is done





by thinking that one can make Of that news
paper what he can make of living oaks-a
bridge for time, that he can flying over the


chasm Of the dead years and safely back


upon the shadoWy sea into the far past. The
singer shall not end his song, nor the soul
be eloquent no more. The realm Cf the
press is enchanted ground Sometimes the
editor has the happiness of knowing that he


has defended the right, exposed the wrong,
protected the weak; that he has given utter
ance to a sentiment that has cheered some
/ bOdys solitary hour made somebody hap
pier, dndled a smile upon a sad face, or q
heavy heart. He may meet with that senti-


ment many years after; it may have lost al
charms Of Its paternity but he feels affection
fOrit. He welcomes it as a long absent child.


He reads 1t as for the first time, and Won
ders if indeed he wrote it, for he has changed
since then Perhaps he could not give utter
ance to the sentiment nOw-perhaps he would
not if lie could. 1t seems like the voice of
his former self calling to his parents, and
there Is s0methig mOurnful IN his tone He


begins TO think-tO remember why be wrote
it, who were his readers then, and whittier
they have gone-what he was then, and how
much he has changed. So he muses., until
he finds himself wondering if that thought
Of his viii continue to float after he is dead,
and whether he is looking upon something
that will survive him And then comes the
sweet consciousness that there is nothing in
the sentence that he could wish unwritten


that is better part of bim-a shred from
a garment of Immortality he shall leave be-
hind him when be joins the innumerabie
caravan and takes his place In the silent
halls Of death.