us type--is supposed to have
been surmounted either by locking up the form with the type-face
downward on the composing stone, or by perforating the type, either at
the time of casting or afterwards, and holding them in their places by
means of a wire or thread through the perforations.

[Illustration]

To this cause has been attributed the numerous misprints in those
early specimens of the printers' art, to correct which would have
involved the unthreading of every line in which a typographical error
occurred.

A striking proof that the lines were put into the form one by one, as
a piece, instead of type by type, is shown in a blunder in the
"Speculum" of Coster where the whole of a last reference line is
"turned." It is as if a modern linotype slug were put in the form
up-side-down.

A third suggestion as to the method by which the type of those early
days of printing may have been produced is described as a system that
the type-founders of about 1800 called Polytypage, which is a cast
facsimile copy of an engraved block of type matter. Lambinet, who is
responsible for this suggestion, explains that this method really
means an early adoption of the stereotyping process.

Lambinet thought that the early printers may have discovered a way of
molding in cooling metal so as to get a matrix-plate impression of an
entire page. Upon this matrix they would pour molten lead or tin and
by the aid of a roller, press the fused metal evenly so as to make it
penetrate into all the hollows and corners of the letters. This tablet
of lead or tin, when cooled, being easily detached from the matrix,
would then reveal the letters of the alphabet reversed and in relief,
similar to a present day stereotype. The individual letters, of
course, could easily be cut apart by a sharp tool, and the molding
operation could be repeated, using the same matrix. The metal type
faces so produced would be fixed on wooden shanks, type high, and the
font would be complete.

It is impossible to suppose, however, that the Mainz psalter of 1457,
which Lambinet points to as a specimen of this mode of execution, is
the impression, not of type at all, but a collection of "casts"
mounted on wood.

Yet another theory has been proposed by Dr. Ch. Enschede, head of the
celebrated type foundry of that name in Haarlem. Enschede concludes
that the Costerian type were produced from leaden matrices and the
latter from brass patrices. Their bad, irregular condi