WHILE it is very natural, in these days of great mechanical progress, that methods and machinery should be preËminent in printers’ literature, it should not be forgotten that the “art preservative” is not entirely mechanical. Our presses are not fed with paper until after the forms are fed from paper.

How much of the brain-work should be done by the printers, and how much by writers? Mr. Theodore L. De Vinne spoke as follows concerning this important question, at the bicentennial celebration of the setting up of the first printing-press in New York by William Bradford:

“I want to ask the question, What is the writer doing for us? Is he making his copy any better? Do you get any clearer manuscript than you used to? So far as handwriting is concerned, I should say no. What we get through the typewriter is better. The copy which the author furnishes has not kept pace with the improvement in machinery. Yet at the same time the printer is asked to do his work better and quicker than before. We are asked to make bricks without the proper straw. Too much is expected of printers in regard to this matter. I have been in the printing-office for nearly fifty years, and during that time I have had occasion to handle the copy from a great many authors, and from all ranks and conditions of men, and I find that the compositor and the proof-reader are expected to do more work.

“There was a time when the printer was merely expected to follow copy. Now, I have no hesitation in saying that if every compositor was to follow his copy strictly, and if every proof-reader was to imitate his example, and neglect to correct errors; if books were printed as they are written, there would go up a howl of indignation on the part of authors as when the first-born of Egypt were slaughtered. I say that too much is expected of the proof-reader. He is expected to take the babe of the author and put it in a suitable dress for the public. The author should do it. Now and then you get an idea of how badly copy is prepared when out of revenge some newspaper editor prints it as the author sends it in. The reader, when he reads that copy, printed as it is written, with a misuse of italics, a violation of the rules of composition, lack of punctuation, etc., is astonished that a man of education can be so careless.”

Among other things following this, Mr. De Vinne said: “I wish to ask, on behalf of the proof-reader, a little more attention to the preparation of manuscript. The people who furnish the manuscript are not doing their share. I think it is an imposition that the proof-reader should do more than correct the errors of the compositor.”

We may well add to this plea on behalf of the proof-reader another on behalf of the compositor. Although so much type-setting is now done on time, many compositors are still at piece-work, and there is not one of them who does not suffer through the gross injustice of losing time in deciphering bad manuscript. It is properly a matter of mere justice to the compositor that every letter in his copy should be unmistakable, and that every point in punctuation, every capital letter, and every peculiarity of any kind should appear on the copy just as the author wishes it to be in the printed work. Copy should be really something that can be copied exactly.

Certainly such copy is seldom produced, and there are excellent reasons for supposing that some authors—and many among the best—will never furnish plain copy in their own handwriting. One of the best reasons is indicated by this passage from a book entitled “Our English,” by Prof. A. S. Hill, of Harvard: “Every year Harvard sends out men—some of them high scholars—whose manuscripts would disgrace a boy of twelve; and yet the college can hardly be blamed, for she can not be expected to conduct an infant school for adults.”

Probably “manuscripts” refers mainly to handwriting, though it may include literary composition. The students have to take notes of lectures, and, in order to secure the largest amount of information, they write so rapidly that their manuscript can hardly be legible. Through this practice, rapid and almost formless writing becomes habitual.

Another justification for much of the bad handwriting of authors may be found in the fact that the matter is more important than the form, at least in the first making, and writers are comparatively few who can do the necessary thinking and at the same time put the thoughts on paper in perfect form. If an author can write plainly and punctuate properly without losing any of his thoughts or sacrificing literary quality in any way, it is far better for his own interest, as well as for that of the printers, that he should do so; but where this is not the case it is necessary for some one to “put the babe of the author in a suitable dress for the public.”

Here is the point of the whole matter: If the work of finishing is to be done by the printers, they should be paid for doing it. There should be an extra charge for composition from poorly prepared copy, according to the extra amount of time required beyond that necessary in working from copy that can be read easily and followed literally. Nearly the full extra charge should be added to the type-setter’s pay, unless the proof-reader prepares the copy before the type is set, in which case, of course, the extra charge should be simply for his time.

Oliver Wendell Holmes, in “The Autocrat of the Breakfast-table,” says: “I am a very particular person about having all I write printed as I write it. I require to see a proof, a revise, a re-revise, and a double re-revise, or fourth-proof rectified impression of all my productions, especially verse.” A laudable desire to make his productions peculiarly his in all details must have been the incentive to all this work on proofs; but probably a close comparison of the finished work and the original manuscript would disclose many differences.

When good printers work from manuscript that can not be misread, with all details of spelling, punctuation, etc., properly attended to, and with explicit understanding that copy is to be followed literally, one proof is sufficient for an author who does not have to make many changes in the wording of what has been written.

It will pay any author to make copy showing exactly what should appear in print, and to make every stroke of the writing unmistakable. If the writer can not himself produce such copy, his manuscript should be carefully revised by some one else. Any person doing such work of revision should be very cautious in order to preserve the writer’s intended expression, for often even an extra comma is disastrous. This applies also to proof-reading. The writer should be consulted, when consultation is possible, about changes from copy.

When authors have cultivated the habit of writing as they should write, or of having their copy made good for them, there will be no reasonable excuse for bad errors in printing. If Mr. De Vinne’s speech from which I have quoted, for instance, had been carefully revised by its author in the manuscript, a nonsensical misreading would probably have been avoided. One of his sentences as printed is, “We always understand how much the world is indebted to printing.” I have no doubt that he said, “We all of us,” etc.

No matter what plan is followed in its preparation, copy should certainly go to the compositor in such shape that he can read it easily and follow it absolutely. This is the only just way; and it is the surest way to secure good work.