Books are sent to the bindery and repair department from the delivery department, as the head of the latter department may direct; and the head of the bindery department, or some one under her direction, is constantly looking over the shelves for books that need attention.

In the repair department, which attends to the repair of books and to the sending of those needing binding to the bindery, these directions are followed:

When a book looks dilapidated, note carefully its condition throughout. Consider these questions in regard to it: Is it worth repairing? Should it be covered? Should it be rebound? Should it be discarded? No general rules can be given by which to answer these queries. Each case must be decided by itself.

General cleaning. Look through book; turn out corners of leaves which have been turned in; mend torn leaves with transparent mending paper, or Japanese mending tissue; erase dirt and pencil marks.

Pencil marks. For removing soil and pencil marks, we have tried the Ruby, Cerise, and Ideal erasers, Art gum, and ivory soap and water. We like the Cerise, manufactured by Eberhard Faber, as having more grit than the Ruby and yet not injurious to the paper.

Torn leaves. Ordinary circulating books are best mended with narrow strips of Japanese tissue and paste. This is cheaper than commercial gummed paper and is preferable to it also, as the mucilage on the latter grows dark and brittle in a short time. Dennison’s adhesive tape costs about three cents for a roll of four yards, while one sheet of Japanese tissue, costing two and a quarter cents, cuts into 46 yards of strips the width of Dennison’s.

Torn leaves in choice books may thus be mended: Match the edges of the tear carefully and apply a narrow line of paste along them. Lay over this a piece of Japanese tissue larger than the tear, and rub it down very lightly. Repeat this on the other side of the leaf and put under moderate pressure. When dry, pull off all the tissue that will come away easily.

Cleaning publishers’ bindings. Often there are a few spots on books which make them unsightly. It is not advisable to wash a cloth cover, unless very dirty, as the finish is thereby removed, thus permitting the book to become soiled again almost with first handling. In case, however, a publisher’s cloth binding has become so soiled as to need washing, it can be very well cleaned and given a new finish by the process described below. If the directions are carefully followed books treated in this way will look almost new and will keep clean almost as well as they did when they came from the publishers’ hands:

Hold the book by the leaves in the left hand, with the covers outside of fingers and thumb; rub the cover gently with a sponge dipped in a mixture of vinegar and water, half of each. Continue to rub it carefully until it is quite clean; but do not press hard enough or rub persistently enough to take off any of the color. Rub gently, slowly and carefully, letting the vinegar and water do most of the work. When thoroughly clean, or as clean as the character of color and cloth will permit the book in hand to be made, stand it on end to dry. The drying will take at least a half hour; a good plan, consequently, is to clean as many books at one time as one can do in about forty-five minutes. The first one cleaned will then be ready for the next step when the whole lot has been finished.

In a common drinking glass, place one teaspoonful of egg albumen, to be had at any book bindery, and two teaspoonfuls of vinegar, add half a glass of water and let this stand over night. The next day, add two teaspoonfuls of binders’ paste, stir thoroughly, and it is ready for use. With a sponge give the cleaned books one coat of this mixture and again stand on end to dry. This mixture will not make the covers as shiny as does shellac or varnish, but will cover the surface well and protect it. It will be sticky when first put on.

Leather decay. Leather bindings which show signs of decay may be treated to an application of vaseline or olive oil, or a solution of paraffin wax in twice its weight of castor oil, slightly warmed. Rub in well with fingers or cloth. The progress of decay can in some cases be stopped by this means.

Labels. Take off and replace with fresh ones all torn and badly soiled back labels. To do this, apply to them a mixture of two parts water and one part ammonia. After they are soaked enough to come off very easily, take them off with a dull knife. In most cases let the water remain on the label for several minutes. To scratch off the label without soaking it first will often injure the book. Labels that have been varnished are sometimes very difficult to remove and great care should be exercised with them.

Replacing labels. Follow method used in putting them on when book is new, except that it is not necessary to moisten with ammonia and water the place on which the label is to go. Use Dennison’s round gummed label, of a size small enough to rest entirely on the back of the book. Never let a label extend over and around the edge of the back. For quite small books trim the label. Moisten the gum slightly and press and work it down carefully until it has set all over. This is very essential. Mark the book with indelible ink. Cover label with quite thin white shellac. The shellac should extend a little onto the book beyond the label all around. Let the first coat dry thoroughly and then apply a second.

Labels on the sides of books. If the cover is durabline or keratol, first put a coat of shellac on the place where the label is to be placed. Allow this to dry. Paste and put on the label, rubbing it down thoroughly. Allow it to dry and give it a coat of shellac. If the cover is cloth, use ammonia and water instead of shellac before putting on the label.

Loose leaves. If the loose leaves are illustrations in an ordinary novel, take them out and send them to the picture department. Replace other pictures with a guard of Japanese mending tissue. This tissue takes up less space than bond paper and must always be cut with the grain of the paper or it cannot well be handled. Rub the tissue down, first laying over it a piece of paper.

Single leaves can be inserted in three different ways:

1. Fold half-inch strips of bond paper in the center lengthwise along the grain. With a small brush apply paste to the outside of this strip. Attach half of it to the edge of the loose leaf and the other half to the adjoining leaf, close in by the fold. Cover the strip with paste evenly, but sparingly and quickly, stretching it as little as possible. If it does stretch, and it tends to do so as soon as moistened, it will when dry wrinkle the page to which it is attached. Loose leaves should be attached in this way only in books which are in good condition.

2. Draw a soft piece of twine over a board which has received a thin coat of paste; then pull this cord through the back of the book where the loose leaf is to be inserted. This leaves in the book just enough paste to hold in the loose leaf. Work the loose leaf carefully back into its place, close the back and let it dry. This method is not advised for general use.

3. On the back edge of the loose leaf put a little paste. Lay the leaf in place and close the book for a second, then open and push leaf in place with folder. This method is used with whipstitched books.

The first two methods are generally used with books sewed in the ordinary way on tapes or cords.

Sewing in loose sections and loose leaves.

1. Loose back books. Thread a darning needle three inches long with Barbour’s linen thread, No. 40, or Hayes’s linen thread, No. 20. Open the book in the middle of the loose section. Near the top and bottom of the fold will be seen holes made by the binder. Pass the needle through a hole near the top, and out between the book and its loose back. Do not pull the thread clear through. Drop the needle and thread between the back of the book and the loose part of the binding to the bottom, then run it from the outside into the middle of the loose section through the hole at the bottom thereof, and tie at the point of beginning. Insert Japanese guard over thread. This holds the section in fairly well. Always guard a section before replacing by pasting a half-inch strip of bond paper, folded in the middle, along the folds.

2. Tight-back books. Cut a guard of jaconet or bond paper three-fourths of an inch wide and as long as the book. Sew the signature to the middle of this guard and then paste the guard in the book, attaching half of it to each of the leaves adjoining the loose section.

Broken bindings. Books in publisher’s cloth, which are breaking out of their bindings, are mended in some libraries with considerable success as follows:

The case is taken off with care. If possible, the lining of the boards is removed in such a way as to permit of its being put on again. The super is removed from the margins of the boards and from the back. Necessary repairs are made to end leaves and stitches are taken in the book when out of the case, if need be. The back of the book and the end leaves are then covered with a thin coat of flexible glue. The book is then again put together. This glues the back of the case directly to the back of the book, making it a tight back. It is reported that books thus repaired wear very well. Newark has not had success with this kind of work.

Fly leaves and end papers. To add a new fly leaf. Cut suitable paper just the length of the leaves of the book but half an inch wider, fold over the half inch and paste it; attach this half inch to the last fly leaf in the book, close to the joint.

If a book has two or more fly leaves, very often you can save much time and still have your work look well by turning the first leaf back and pasting down the page facing.

If leaves stick out of book after they have been tipped, guarded or sewed in, trim them off even with the others.

If the end sheet or lining paper of the cover is soiled or injured, cut a sheet of suitable paper to fit the lining paper exactly and paste the new sheet down all over, fully covering it.

After the new lining paper is put in, keep the book for a time under moderate pressure or the cover will curl.

Loose joints. If books are loose along the joint they can sometimes be repaired by pasting along the joint inside as a guard a strip of thin muslin or bond paper, an inch and a quarter wide. Fold the strip through the center, paste it and apply it to fly leaf and book cover. A better material than muslin for this purpose is jaconet, being light in weight and starched a little. The book should lie open and flat after mending until it is dry.

This, as has already been noted, is a poor method of mending a broken joint. By it the strain is passed from the cover through the new joint to the fly leaf, and the strength of the new joint is only the strength of the fly leaf itself, which is generally a poor piece of paper. A better way, in some cases, is to take the book entirely out of its cover, pull the super from the back, sew on new end sheets and glue a new piece of super or muslin over the back and extending half an inch onto the sides. Let this dry thoroughly. Then cover with paste the back and the end leaves, the latter being the sheets which are now to become lining papers, and put the book again into its case. This is recasing, in effect, in the manner in which the book was first put together.

Loosened back. A book which is in fairly good condition, with sewing protected, but loose in the case, can sometimes be strengthened by applying paste or glue down the inside of the loose back of the cover. This can be done fairly well with a long handled brush. This changes the binding from a loose to a tight back.

To reattach loose covers. The method here described should be applied only to books which are little used. Cut a strip of muslin the length of the book, and about an inch and a half wider than its back. Apply hot binder’s glue to it and put it over the back on the outside. When this is dry, cover the book with brown wrapping paper as described under the heading “Covering books,” as a book thus mended is quite unsightly.

When a book is out of the cover, but has its sewing intact and the super or paper over the sewing firmly in place, it may be wise to give the back a coat of hot glue and put book again into its cover, thus making it a tight back.

Covering books. Cut brown Rugby wrapping paper into sheets of such a size that they will extend from 2 to 2½ inches all around beyond the book when laid open on them. This size will be found to be nearly 13×17 inches for the ordinary 12mo. Lay the closed book on the paper with back in the center and toward you, making sure that the proper margin of paper is left all around. Fold the paper over the front edge of top cover; reverse book, this time with front edge toward you, and fold and stretch paper tight over the front edge of the cover. Take book by the back in the left hand. With scissors cut the paper at top and bottom, with slight inward slant from its outer edges down to the four ends of the joints. Take out the book, and turn in these center flaps with a double fold, putting a little paste on them after first turn. Replace the book in the cover, flush with head and tail. Tuck in folds at the corners of the front and back lap, making not too great an angle; crease well. The top and bottom laps should lie over the front and back laps. Put a touch of paste on laps at corners, but do not put any on the book itself.

Re-siding books. Books in good condition as to their bindings, being still solid, but having badly worn or badly soiled sides, send to bindery to have the covering of the boards, not the leather of the back, taken off and replaced with fresh keratol. This costs about 10 cents per volume. This can also be done in the repair department, and book cloth can be used instead of keratol.

Soiled edges. The edges of soiled books can be somewhat improved by rubbing them with sand paper.

To cut fore edges of bound book. This is never done to a book of value or to one that can be rebound; but cheap, shabby books with sound leather backs which hold together well can be freshened by cutting the fore edges and, if necessary, residing. Sometimes one can cut straight down through the front edges and the two boards, reside and insert new end pages. This seems a barbarous process; still, it freshens the appearance of the book very much and often prolongs its usefulness.

Maps. When small folded maps are badly torn line them throughout with Japanese tissue, jaconet or nainsook.

To freshen black leather. Sponge off with ordinary black ink; dry; rub over with paste; dry; apply a coat of bookbinders’ varnish; dry; rub with vaseline.

Broken boards. Books which have one or both of their sides broken, but are otherwise perfect, can have their boards replaced. Do not do this to books in publisher’s binding, as such books will soon have to be rebound in any case.

On a book which is hand sewn, with leather back, a broken board can be replaced thus: Pull off the cloth side, lift up the leather carefully where it laps over the side, also the muslin on the inside and pull out the broken board. Put hot glue along both edges of new board to be inserted, and put in place. Rub down well, and put under pressure, then reside and insert new end leaf.

Ink stains. These if on the leaves can generally be removed with ink eradicator or javelle water; but if they are on the edges and have soaked down into the book, nothing can be done but to cut the edges and have the book rebound. If the stains on the edges have not soaked in very deep, sandpaper can be used on them with good results.

Ink stains can be removed from Keratol by applying to them household ammonia of full strength with a small bristle brush, working it over a little to loosen the ink. Allow this to stand a minute or two and then rub with soft cloth and wash well with water. This cannot be done with imperial cloth, as ink sinks into its fiber.

General stains. Many brown stains can be removed with a strong solution of washing soda, or better with javelle water. Wash with clear water and dry thoroughly after removing the stain or a dark line will later appear at the edge of the spot which was wet; put in a press with clean papers between the leaves. Alum and water also give fairly good results. Water and a little ivory soap will remove some finger marks. All of these methods have the disadvantage of removing the size or finish in the paper so that it soils quickly again.

Grease marks. For spots made with grease use benzine; while still moist apply a hot iron, with a blotting paper on each side of leaf.

Paste. Paste must not be used if not in a good condition. The thickness at which it should be used varies with different kinds of work. Thin paste is quickly taken up and under its application paper quickly expands. In most cases this stretching or expanding of the paper is a disadvantage. If it is desirable that the paper be so applied as not to draw or curl that to which it is applied, it should be covered quickly with thick paste, then applied at once and not much rubbed after it is in place.

The dishes in which paste is kept should be thoroughly and often cleaned; brushes the same. Bits of cloth used in pasting should either be thrown away or washed after they have been used a short time.