7
Decorative Page. A. J. Gaskin (_Process_) 199
Decorative Page from "_The Six Swans_." W. Crane (_Wood_) 201
Title Page of "_The Hobby Horse_." Selwyn Image " 205
Viking Ship from "_Eric Bright Eyes_." L. Speed (_Process_) 208
"Scarlet Poppies." W. J. Muckley " 209
"Take Care." W. B. Baird " 222
Spanish Woman. Ina Bidder " 225
Children Reading. Estelle d'Avigdor " 227
Sketch from Life. G. C. Marks " 229
Bough of Common Furze. William French " 231

[Illustration]

CHAPTER I.

INTRODUCTORY.

There are, broadly speaking, two kinds of engraving for illustration in
books, which are widely distinct--1. _intaglio_; 2. _relievo_. The first
comprises all engravings, etchings, and photogravures in which the lines
are cut or indented by acid or other means, into a steel or copper
plate--a system employed, with many variations of method, from the time
of Mantegna, Albert Duerer, Holbein and Rembrandt, to the French and
English etchers of the present day. Engravings thus produced are little
used in modern book illustration, as they cannot be printed easily on
the same page as the letterpress; these _planches a part_, as the French
term them, are costly to print and are suitable only for limited
editions.

In the second, or ordinary form of illustration, the lines or pictures
to be printed are left in relief; the design being generally made on
wood with a pencil, and the parts not drawn upon cut away. This was the
rudimentary and almost universal form of book-illustration, as practised
in the fifteenth century, as revived in England by Bewick in the
eighteenth, and continued to the present day. The blocks thus prepared
can be printed rapidly on ordinary printing-presses, and on _the same
page as the text_.

During the past few years so many processes have been put forward for
producing drawings in relief, for printing with the type, that it has
become a business in itself to test and understand them. The best known
process is still wood engraving, at least it is the best for the
fac-simile reproduction of drawings, as at present understood in
England, whether they be drawn direct upon the wood or transmitted by
photography. There is no proc