then thoroughly cleansed with
turpentine or benzine, all traces of which must be carefully wiped
from the surface before the ink is applied. The plate is then laid on
the heated iron box or "stove" until it has become thoroughly warmed.
The surface of the plate is covered with ink, put on by means of an
ink-roller, or perhaps the old-fashioned dauber, and the ink is
thoroughly worked into the lines or depressions in the plate. After
this the ink on the flat surface of the plate is entirely removed by
wiping with rags. The printer's hand, which has become more or less
covered with ink from the rags, is then passed over a piece of chalk,
or gilder's white, and lightly rubbed over the surface of the plate,
to remove the last vestige of the ink, leaving a highly polished flat
surface with the incised lines or depressions filled with ink to the
level of the surface.

The plate is then ready for printing and is placed on the bed of the
press, a sheet of dampened paper laid upon it, and both are then run
between the rollers of the press. As the top roller is encased in soft
blankets, the soft, dampened paper is forced into the ink-filled lines
of the plate, and when the paper is removed the ink clings to it and
shows an exact impression of the engraving. This entire process must
be repeated for each print made from an intaglio plate.

While the printing of a steel engraving or photogravure is a more or
less mechanical operation, the printing of an etching--and "dry
points" may be included--is oftentimes as much of an art as the actual
etching of the plate. The two styles of printing may be compared to
two kinds of fishing,--that of fishing for flounders with a drop line,
from a flat-bottomed boat at low tide when one must just sit tight
until one has a bite, and then haul in the fish, bait up, drop the
line and wait again, as against that of angling for trout on an early
spring day, dropping the fly in a likely spot without success at the
first cast, persevering until rewarded by a rise and then by the sport
of playing the fish, giving him line and reeling him in as about he
circles and finally is landed. A good one, perchance, but the sport
was in landing him. So it is with printing an etching. There is the
opportunity to play with, and work hard over, a plate. Perhaps the
etcher has not, for reasons only known to himself, put in the plate
all that can be shown in the print by ordinary printing. The printer
actually has to