e while a little leathern bag, in which are the advertisements or
the articles--the "copy" as the type-setters call it.

In this room are thirty or forty type-setters. Each one of them has his
number. When the copy comes up, a man takes it and cuts it up into little
bits, as much as will make, say, a dozen lines in the paper, and numbers
the bits--"one," "two," etc., to the end of the article. Type-setter
after type-setter comes and takes one of these little bits, and in a few
moments sets the type for it, and lays it down in a long trough, with the
number of the bit of copy laid by the side of it. We will suppose that an
article has been cut up into twenty bits. Twenty men will each in a few
moments be setting one of these bits, and, in a few minutes more they
will come and lay down the type and the number of the bit in the long
trough, in just the right order of the number of the bits--"one," "two,"
etc. Then all the type will be slid together, and a long article will
thus be set in a few minutes, which it would take one or two men several
hours to set. It is by this means that long articles can in so short a
time be put into type. Each man who takes a bit, has to make his last
line fill out to the end of the line; and, because there are sometimes
not words enough, so that he has to fill out with some extra spaces
between the words, you may often see in any large daily paper every two
inches, or so, a widely spaced line or two showing how the type-setter
had to fill out his bit with spaces--only he would call the bit, a
"take."

[Illustration: PRINTING PRESSES OF THE PAST AND PRESENT]

I said that each type-setter has his number. We will suppose that this
man, next to us, is number "twenty-five." Then he is provided with a great
many pieces of metal, just the width of a column, with his number made on
them--thus: "TWENTY-FIVE." Every time he sets a new bit of copy, he puts
one of these "twenty-fives" at the top; and when all the bits of type in
the long trough are slid together the type is broken up every two inches
or so, with "twenty-five," "thirty-seven," "two," "eleven," and so on, at
the top of the bits which the men, whose numbers these are, have set. When
a proof of the article is taken, these several numbers appear; and, if
there are mistakes, it appears from these numbers, what type-setters made
them, and they have to correct them. Also, of each article, a single
"proof" is taken on colored paper. These colo