mes and sizes--nonpareil, brevier, agate, pica,
minion and a dozen others which Bobby could not remember but which he
found exotic and attractive. Especially was he interested in the poster
type, made of wood. One letter was bigger than the whole form of his
little press.

When he left, Mr. Daggett gave him a small heavy package.

"Here you are," said he. "Here's an old font of script. It's old and too
worn for my use, but you can fool with it."

Bobby was delighted. He could hardly wait to get home before undoing the
package. The font formed a compact quadrilateral wound around the edges
with string. The letters were all arranged in order--four capital A's--A
A A A--then the Bs, and so on. It differed from his own font. The one
that came with his press had just three of each letter--large or small.
This varied. For instance, there were twenty _s_s, and only two _q_s.
Bobby procured his tweezers and began to set up his own name. He had no
stick so he got out the form with the two narrow wooden groves. To his
dismay the type would not fit. They were at least a quarter inch longer
than his own.

"Why so solemn, Bobby?" enquired his father at lunch a few minutes
later. "What's wrong?"

"My printing press isn't a real one," broke out Bobby. "It's a _toy_
one! I don't _like_ toys!"

"Oh, ho!" cried Mr. Orde. "Don't like toys, eh! How about the engine and
cars, and the tin soldiers?"

"I don't like them any more, either," insisted Bobby stoutly.

"All right," suggested Mr. Orde, winking at his wife. "Of course then
you won't want them any more: I'll just give them away to some other
little boy."

"All right," assented Bobby with genuine and astonishing indifference.

Bobby laid the little press away, but he could not resist the
fascination of Mr. Daggett's printing office. One day he came from it
bearing an inky and much-thumbed catalogue. He fairly learned it by
heart--not only the machines, from the tiny card press to the beautiful
fifty-dollar self-inker beyond which his ambition did not stray, but
also all the little accessories of the trade--the mallet, the patent
quoins, the sticks, the type-cases, the composing stones, the roller
moulds and compositions, the patent gauge-pins, the lead-cutters, the
slugs. And page after page he ran over the type in all its sizes and in
all its modifications of form. These things fascinated him and held him
with a longing for them, like revolvers and razors and carpenter's