at The Times
office, and is supplied to all comers. Among the other daily papers
printed by its means in this country are the Daily News, the Scotsmam,
and the Birmingham Daily Post. The first Walter Press was sent to
America in 1872, where it was employed to print the Missouri Republican
at St. Louis, the leading newspaper of the Mississippi Valley. An
engineer and a skilled workman from The Times office accompanied the
machinery. On arriving at St. Louis--the materials were unpacked,
lowered into the machine-room, where they were erected and ready for
work in the short space of five days.

The Walter Press was an object of great interest at the Centennial
Exhibition held at Philadelphia in 1876, where it was shown printing
the New Fork Times one of the most influential journals in America.
The press was surrounded with crowds of visitors intently watching its
perfect and regular action, "like a thing of life." The New York Times
said of it: "The Walter Press is the most perfect printing press yet
known to man; invented by the most powerful journal of the Old World,
and adopted as the very best press to be had for its purposes by the
most influential journal of the New World.... It is an honour to Great
Britain to have such an exhibit in her display, and a lasting benefit
to the printing business, especially to newspapers.... The first
printing press run by steam was erected in the year 1814 in the office
of The Times by the father of him who is the present proprietor of that
world-famous journal. The machine of 1814 was described in The Times
of the 29th November in that year, and the account given of it closed
in these words: 'The whole of these complicated acts is performed with
such a velocity and simultaneosness of movement that no less than 1100
sheets are impressed in one hour.' Mirabile dictu! And the Walter
Press of to-day can run off 17,000 copies an hour printed on both
sides. This is not bad work for one man's lifetime."

It is unnecessary to say more about this marvellous machine. Its
completion forms the crown of the industry which it represents, and of
the enterprise of the journal which it prints.

Footnotes for Chapter VII.

[1] Diary, Reminiscences, and Correspondence of Henry Crabb Robinson,
Barrister-at-Law, F.S.A., i. 231.

[2] After the appearance of my article on the Koenig and Walter Presses
in Macmillan's Magazine for December, 1869, I received the following
letter from Sir