William Caxton. B BY ARTHUR N. BUTT. PART II.-AUTHOR AND PRINTER. EFORE passing on to consider the works of the Great Printer, it will be interesting to pause here for a moment, to glance at the political and social aspect of the times, wherein arose such a demand for a book as led him to call in the aid of the new typographic art. It was one of those periods of welcome peace in which the social changes initiated by the result of recent wars begin to make themselves felt-one of those great turning points of history when the whole face of civilization is altered, when men, worn out with fratricidal feuds, and weary of the carnage, begin to realize again that there are things wiser, nobler-aye, more courageous-than slaughtering one's fellows. They were but groping in the dark, yet struggling towards the light of fuller knowledge which an Erasmus, a Luther, and a Columbus were destined soon to bring. The last stronghold of the ancient classic empires-Byzantiumhad been evacuated before the advancing hordes of Islam, and Christian Europe reaped the benefit by affording asylums to the learned fugitives. From the middle of the previous century the Sovereigns of France and the Low Countries had been encouraging literature and accumulating valuable libraries, and the Duke of Bedford, when Regent of France, by way of compensation for any temporary lack of native talent, had, it is believed, been far-sighted enough to steal-we beg pardon, "requisition" - the finest collection, that of the Louvre, for the benefit of his countrymen. Precminent in the love of all that was refined and intel Probably at no so many learned A contemporary, speaks of him as lectual had stood Philip the Good. Court in Europe were there collected men, authors, scribes, and the like. writing some twenty years before, having "in his service numerous translators, scholars, historians, and scribes in various countries, all diligently working" in the production of manuscripts, many of which, fortunately, are still preserved. That the more intellectual of the nobility, no longer harassed by wars and rumours of wars, should follow in the wake of such illustrious pioneers was what we should expect. They in their turn influenced those who are ever ready to follow the fashion, and commissions for and presents of costly manuscripts became frequent-with some for pure love of literature, with others simply because they were "the correct thing." In England the old state of things, under which a man was valuable simply in proportion to his fighting capabilities, and the population of villeins was collected within and around the baronial castles for mutual offence and defence, was drifting away into history; a merchant and professional middle-class, to prove all powerful in future centuries, was making its influence more and more felt. As Dean Stanley has well said :- "The sun that came out of the mists on the morning of the Battle of Barnet was but the type of the new dawn that burst upon England when the feudal system passed away." Such was the time at which Caxton returned to the scenes of his youth and set up a printing press in the Almonry at Westminster. Again, we naturally seek a motive for so singular a step on his part. That very Court, to be more at which he had resigned the office of Governor, he has now left in order to settle down in comparative obscurity in his native land. There is only one reason that occurs to us, and, as we are not aware that it has been suggested before, it may be worth a passing mention. If the William Caxton, mentioned in our previous paper, were the father of the Printer, is it not likely that, hearing of his growing infirmity, he may have been anxious to be with him in his declining days? This might also account for his settling in Westminster, instead of the City, as we should have expected. Other reasons that may have had something to do with his choice were that the Mercers' Company had property there, and it was the seat of an important Wool Staple. The exact spot where he set up his press has been much disputed. It would be impossible to give the evidence here, and we must, therefore, be content with saying that, although in several instances he makes use of such expressions as emprinted by me William Caxton Jn thabbey of westmynstre,” and “ emprynted and fynysshed in thabbey westmestre," he more frequently puts "at westmestre " simply, and the word abbey not being then used in such a restricted sense as now, we have no reason to suppose that anything more than the Abbey precincts was intended in any case. The actual house is, however, indicated in an advertisement issued probably within a year or two of his arrival in England— 66 "If it plese ony man spirituel or temporel to bye ony Supplico stet cedula " We gather from Stow that this "Elemosinary or Almory" was situated in the direction of the celebrated "Totehill streete," swept away by recent improvements, and that it was so-called on account of the erection of an Almshouse there by the mother of Henry VII. The pale is a term in heraldry, meaning the middle third of the field (of a shield) when divided perpendicularly. Without doubt, then, the sign Caxton hung out to indicate his place of business was a shield with that portion painted red. Let us now see what materials he probably possessed wherewith to commence his new business. There is just a doubt whether presses had been used for block printing before the invention of moveable types, but printing from the latter had been practised on the Continent for a long time past, and he would have had no difficulty in either obtaining a press, to bring over with him, or learning how to make one for himself. No representation is preserved of any press earlier than 1507, but, if Caxton's resembled those in use in the early part of the next century, it did not very materially differ from such as served the purpose up to the introduction of the invention of William Jansen Blaew, of Amsterdam, towards the end of the seventeenth century. It was probably a common wooden screw press with a small platen worked by a lever arm, possessing perhaps both tympan and frisket, with possibly a rounce to move the table in and out. It was long thought that the earliest types were cut out of wood. We know of no sufficient ground for this opinion. Printing from wood blocks certainly preceded the use of types, and it may be that the notion of types had its origin when words were added to pictures, in the obvious convenience that would result from cutting them apart, and using them independently in any combinations; but the great labor entailed in cutting out each letter separately, and the difficulty of making them to accurately correspond, would at once suggest the idea of casting them in metal. The identity in form of the same letter in different places is sufficient in itself to prove that Caxton used types of cast metal. They were probably mainly or entirely composed of lead. No one printing for the first time would think of using a mere rectangular frame, like the modern chase, in which to set up his types, nor would it have answered the purpose. Some of the types would have been almost certain to have fallen through when the chase was moved, owing to slight differences in the size of the body. The use of the composing stick, the setting-rule, and reglets being unknown to Caxton, he most likely took the types from the case and placed them, one by one, in a shallow tray, or box, one line upon another, without anything to separate them. If any spaces had to be left, quadrats or letters cut down, which show up occasionally, were used. When the page was completed it was blocked up with slips of wood, and fixed by screws at the bottom. That he printed only one page at a time, perhaps owing to the small size of his platen, we know, because the pages on one side of a sheet do not always correspond in position. In one instance, a single page is blank, and in a copy of the Speculum vita Christi two pages belonging to different sheets have been transposed. The forme was inked by means of hollow hemispheres of wood, stuffed with wool and covered with sheep-skin. They were provided with wooden handles, and used in pairs to spread the ink on one another. These inking-balls continued in use up to the invention of the modern roller composition. The ink must have been nearer the consistence of thick writing ink, than of the modern printer's ink. The paper of Caxton's books is rough, hairy, and fibrous. The differences of quality, and the very numerous watermarks, seem to indicate that it was the product of many different mills. He would be likely to obtain it through Bruges, and this supposition is borne out by most of the marks. Whatever the size of the book, the paper was cut down so as to be used as folio. The system he adopted was the same as that used for manuscripts at that time. The sheets were signed on the first recto, at first by hand, near the margin, so as to be cut off in binding; later on printed under the page. His sections were always "quaternions," i.e., each con |