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No quality of printing is of more general importance than tone. It has great weight as a purely artistic attribute, and it has a great physiological value. If the tone of a page of print is not right—if it does not conform very closely to the standard set up by the rules of art—it will not be "easy" reading, and will severely try eyes that are not absolutely normal and perfectly strong. Here as elsewhere, and as is the unvarying rule, the art standard is the standard required by hygiene and common sense.

It is of the greatest importance that a printed page shall be toned, with respect to the proportion of visible white paper and black type, in strict accord with the requirements of art, which are identical with the rules that guard healthy eyesight.

Tone in painting has a radically different meaning in America from the meaning attached to the term in England and in France, and it appears to be less important. The American meaning of the word tone as an element in painting is that it refers to the dominant color of a picture; that is, as one would note that the prevailing color of a certain picture is red, of another yellow, of another blue. This makes of tone a mere descriptive adjective of small value as an aid to a critical estimate or as a guide in creation. To the printer, this meaning of the term would bar it out of his curriculum. The English understanding of tone is quite different, and it appears more worthy of acceptance. It is, at all events, the meaning that must be accepted by printers if they are to derive any benefit from a study of tone as a possible aid in their craft. The English consider tone to be "the proper diffusion of light as it affects the intensities of the different objects in the picture; and the right relation of objects or colors in shadow to the parts of them not in shadow and to the principal light."

It is easier, and may be clearer, to think of tone in a piece of type composition, or in a black-and-white engraving prepared for printing, somewhat as we think of tone in music. And we find upon getting further into the subject that it is expedient to take advantage of the extreme comity at present existing between England and America and let the two meanings of tone merge into a more general one for the benefit and use of the printer in practice. The painter's estimate of the tone of a painting may be understood by applying a test cited by a writer upon art: "If the canvas were placed upon a revolving pin and whirled rapidly around, the coloring would blend into a uniform tint." The color tone of a painting must then be the dominant color, modified by the subordinate colors. If the color tone be yellow for example, as it is in some of the good work of Dutch artists, there must be enough yellow so that it will be a yellow blur if the piece is spun rapidly around.

In black-and-white printing tone must mean depth of color, and diffusion of color, and the tone can scarcely be otherwise than some shade of gray. If it is advantageous to strive for a certain harmony between literary motive and type motive an appreciation of the technical meaning of tone and the utilization of the unique test suggested may be of great assistance to the printer of black-and-white work.

The printer has to consider the tone of his piece in a different light than the painter. The latter has only his canvas to take account of, and he works his canvas to its edge. The printer has his page of type and his margins. This blends the question of tone in a very practical way with questions bearing upon the format—with the question of proportion for example, and with the important question of the balance of the margins; and while the determination of the tone of the type page itself, irrespective of the margins, involves one weighty question in optics, the placing of the type page upon the leaf involves another, quite different in nature but none the less important from an artistic point of view.

It is easily perceived that the element of tone is of considerable importance in what is erroneously called "plain" composition, the black-and-white book page. In color printing it is apparent that the knowledge of tone is of more practical importance, as colored printed pieces should show a decided preponderance of that tone which best illustrates or translates the idea that the piece is conceived for the purpose of expressing. It may be important that a certain piece emphatically presents to the eye a certain shade of red. It must be just enough given over to the red to produce the effect required—no more, no less. There must be red everywhere, but not too much. The simple test will show the printer whether he is overloading his piece with the dominant color or whether he has not yet used enough. The color scheme must be keyed to the required pitch of color, as a piece of music written in a certain key must be kept free from notes belonging to another key. But not absolutely free, of necessity; short notes of another key, and very few of them, may be introduced. So a touch of a radically different color may be thrust into a composition without ruining it, as a bit of brick red or small patch of blue in a monotone, or a little green or yellow in a red composition, but not enough to show plainly when we apply the whirling test.

This more obvious meaning of the term tone seems to be applicable to printing, at least to the extent of informing and modifying the mind of the printer. The more important significance of the term in painting means but little to the printer, as it deals in modifications and gradations in color not practicable in typography, and applying, so far as printing in general is concerned, to engravings.

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