medal from the King of the Netherlands, valued at 250 dollars, besides other flattering testimonials from persons of distinction.

This press is an application of the upright lever principle; but being very complicated, and liable to derangement, a more simple one, made by Mr. Wells, of Hartford, Connecticut, soon contended with it for popularity in the Northern States, and both were followed and finally superseded by the Smith press. And, at about the time this last-mentioned invention came into use, the Washington press was brought into notice, taking its place at once with the Smith press, and the two are now the only large hand-presses in general use in the United States. The Washington press is remarkable for its simplicity of construction, great power, cheapness, and the facility with which it can be worked. Like the Smith press, it is an application of the upright lever principle.

The great demand for daily journals in the United States, together with the large editions required of some, early attracted the attention of the publishers of the more successful of these publications to a means for their production more rapid than the ordinary hand-press; and it is not surprising, therefore, that cylinder steam-presses were made use of there soon after their appearance in Europe. We are unable, however, to learn with any degree of accuracy when, where, or by whom the first steam printing press was set up in America; but it is quite certain the Napier press was in operation in New York before 1824. In 1829, Robert Hoe, of New York, father of the present head of the celebrated firm of Hoe and Co., of that city, made an improvement in the Napier press, by which 1500, instead of 1100, copies were thrown off by it in an hour; and in 1835, Richard M. Hoe constructed a double cylinder press, which printed 3000 sheets in an hour. In 1842 this was further increased to 5000 impressions in an hour; and in 1846 an improvement was made by which 10,000 an hour were thrown off. This number, great as it is, was subsequently surpassed; but before describing this last achievement in mechanics as applied to printing, we shall briefly refer to the Adams press.

We are not aware of the date of this invention. Nevertheless it was in use as early as 1838, and is unquestionably the very best steam printing machine for fine book-work. We believe it to be of Boston origin-at all events that city is the sole place of its manufacture. It ordinarily throws off 2500 sheets in an hour, is fed by females, discharges itself, and moves with the precision and ease of an intelligent being. Its work equals the finest produced on the handpress, although the sheets are of the largest size used in book-printing, and it is in use everywhere from the Atlantic to the Pacific where book-work is done.

The great American improvement, or, more properly speaking, invention, in printing presses, is the result of the talents and industry of R. M. Hoe. and was first put into operation in 1846. It is believed to be the first successful effort to print from types secured around a cylinder, and certainly surpasses all other similar machines designed for that purpose. The first of these presses publicly used was set up in the office of the Public Ledger, in Philadelphia, in February, 1847, since which time they have become popular throughout the United States, and have been introduced successfully into Europe. In fact, Mr. Hoe introduced them into Paris in 1849, at which time he attempted to bring them into use in England, but did not succeed. Mr. Applegath's press

was then in high repute in London, and a transatlantic rival was not likely to attract much patronage. Still merit at last asserted its claims, and in May, 1856, the first of this description of presses used in England was put into operation in the office of Lloyd's Weekly. The simplicity of so vast a machine, the cylinder being horizontal, the ease with which it works, its rapidity, and, more than all, its wonderful capacity for printing large editions, and in some cases throwing off 20,000 copies of a journal like the great London daily in a single hour, claimed for it at once the attention of those most interested in such machines; and in 1856 Mr. Hoe received an order from the proprietors of the London Times for a press which is to print 20,000 copies of that paper in an hour. This machine is to be 37 feet long, 18 feet high, and 64 feet wide. It is to have ten cylinders, and as it will lay off its own sheets, but ten persons will be required to work it, whereas twenty are employed at present on the presses used in striking off a daily edition of the Times. Mr. Hoe has also an order for another from the proprietors of Lloyd's Weekly, and for one cach for the publishers of the London Illustrated News, and the North British Advertiser; but not having the facilities at home for their construction, in addition to those in hand for American use, he has made arrangements, and is now manufacturing these in Manchester.

Did our subject admit, we could extend this list of American printing presses by a description of those intended for job-work; but a simple reference to them here must suffice. Some of this description of presses are as unique in their line as is the "Type Revolving Printing Machine" of Mr. Hoe among newspaper presses.

Time brings about strange revolutions, and but few of his wonders are more remarkable than the facts this brief sketch contains. In 1770 the Colonies were mainly dependent upon England for printing presses; in 1856, the once dependent colonies—now a vigorous young nation-sent to the mother-country the best invention capable of supplying in sufficient quantities that daily pabulum of the mind so widely demanded by the British nation. It is not irreverent here to say, that the inspired prophecy, "Cast your bread upon the waters, and it shall be returned to you in many days," has in this case found a singular and unlooked-for fulfilment.

CHAPTER XIV.

TYPOGRAPHY-TYPE-FOUNDRIES-PAPER-BINDING, ETC.

AMERICAN typography sixty, or even forty years ago, was quite a different thing to what it is now. At the first-named period, the country was almost wholly dependent upon Europe for type, paper, and printing ink, of good quality, and as these were not easily obtainable, and were always expensive, the larger proportion of the printing done in the republic was necessarily of an inferior character, until the native manufactures of type, paper, and printing ink began to manifest improvement. And we must bear in mind that the

absence of a wide demand for good typography also had weight in preventing its general production: for the majority of the works first printed were both cheap and useful, which circumstances prevented, in a new country, any desired display at fine typography an ambitious printer might cherish. Still, much of the work executed at the close of the last, and the beginning of this, century, equals some of the best English printing of the period. Fry and Kamerer, of Philadelphia, executed some very superior work, their 4to edition of Barlow's Columbiad being one of the most creditable specimens of typography of the age; and an edition of the British Poets, in fifty neat duodecimo volumes, printed at Philadelphia about 1820, by Mr. William Brown, would do honour now to many establishments of large pretensions. A very handsomely printed edition of Rees's Cyclopædia, in 47 vols., was sent forth from the Philadelphia press at the beginning of the present century, and not a few admirable specimens of typography were thrown off by the Boston and New York press. Some excellent work was done in smaller towns, and we have in our possession a copy of the Rev. N. S. Wheaton's Journal of a visit to England, Scotland, and France, printed at Hartford, Connecticut, in 1830, before the general introduction of rollers, which, in point of accuracy of composition, and beauty of pressmanship, is a masterpiece of typography. The colour is wonderfully uniform, considering it was put on the type with balls, and yet it does not appear that the book in question was regarded at the time of printing as anything more than an ordinary piece of work.

At the present time book-printing in America has reached a high state of perfection. We have elsewhere referred to the printing-presses of the country, and the work executed on them fulfils the highest expectations. Much of the printing now done for the government at Washington is of the best kind, and Owen's Geological Survey, Perry's Japan Expedition, the Reports of the various surveys of a railroad route to the Pacific, and the different volumes relating to the scientific department of the U. S. Exploring Expedition under Captain Wilkes, are most creditable specimens of American typography. And so are the great majority of the books published by the large publishing houses at New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Cincinnati, Boston, Auburn, and Hartford.

The earliest American printers obtained their types from Europe. Christopher Sower, of Germantown, before mentioned as the publisher of a quarto German Bible at that place, established a type-foundry there for casting German letters as early as 1739- -some say 1735. This was necessarily small, but it was the nucleus of what is now the largest establishment south of New York, if not the largest in the country. Attempts to establish typefoundries were made both in Massachusetts and Connecticut, about 1768, and Franklin tried the experiment in Philadelphia, in 1775, but all were unsuccessful. Soon after the Revolutionary War a more fortunate attempt was made in the same city by John Baine, a Scotchman, and he was the first who regularly carried on the business of type-founding in the United States. The fragments of his establishment, and among them were the old matrices used by Sower, fell into the hands of Binney and Ronaldson, also Scotchmen, early in the present century, and their foundry was for several years the most extensive in the country. In 1828, it was the only foundry

south of New York, and at that time six or seven persons produced all the types cast in it. The business, however, has increased wonderfully, and at this time there are no less than nine type foundries in Philadelphia alone, employing from 600 to 700 hands, and any one of them produces more than did all the foundries in the country in 1828. We are unable to say what is the number of these establishments now in the United States, but they are quite numerous, and abound from the Atlantic to the Pacific coasts. They supply not only the American Republic, but Canada, the West India Islands, South America, and Mexico. In 1851 there were about twenty-five in all, employing 8000 persons, and the aggregate weight of the type produced in them daily was upwards of 4400 pounds.

It has been erroneously stated that stereotyping was first introduced into the United States only about thirty-five years ago. We have the authority of Thomas for the fact that it was practised by Benjamin Mecum, a nephew of Dr. Franklin, in Philadelphia, in 1775. He cast the plates for a number of pages of the New Testament, and although skilful, was not entirely successful. Mr. Jacob Perkins, of Newburyport, Massachusetts, invented a new plan of stereotyping about 1810, and, coming to England, realized a fortune by printing stamps for the government. It is curious that Massachusetts, the first colony to resist the Stamp Act openly, should send a son of hers to England there to manufacture stamps for the use of the British people! The business of stereotyping has much increased of late, as may be supposed, and whereas, but thirtythree years ago, one man was able to do all of it required in Philadelphia, now several hundred persons are employed at the business in that city alone. Paper-making was first practised in the United States by a family of the name of Rittenhouse, at Roxborough, Penna., if not in 1693, certainly in 1697, for we have positive proof of that in Gabriel Thomas's History of the Province of Pennsylvania, written in that year. Since then the business has become extensive, and there are now more than 750 paper-mills in the country, with 2000 engines in constant operation. Much of this paper is excellent; but it cannot be denied that the beauty of American printing is considerably affected detrimentally by the predominance given to cotton rags.

If the consumption of paper be an evidence of the intelligence of a people, those of the United States should be the best informed in the world. In France the yearly production averages about four pounds of paper per head; in England the average is four and three quarter pounds, and in the United States it is quite thirteen and a half pounds per head.

In conclusion, we may say that the Americans have effected much that is creditable to themselves in book-binding. Their books are usually bound in a substantial manner, and, where occasion requires, in a style of elegance and finish not inferior to much of a fine description produced in Europe. Many of their publications are bound in the best style of the art, and the books of the present day, when compared with those of forty years ago, exhibit the whole history of the progress of the arts of printing, paper-making, type founding, and binding, in that period in the United States.

CHAPTER XV.

GENERAL REMARKS.

We have endeavoured in the foregoing pages to supply a few facts respecting American literature, and to place those facts before the reader with as little parade as possible. Where titles are introduced they are intended to represent such works as are the types of their class, books which have received the approval of competent judges, and which are known on both sides of the Atlantic. What has been stated is mainly the result of careful investigation and extensive reading. The object in view, was the arrangement into narrative form, with some regard to chronological order, of such facts as would go towards imparting to the general reader a correct and comprehensive outline of the rise and progress of American literature. How far this object has been accomplished it is for the reader to judge. The whole labour may be a failure: but, if so, we feel confident that the materials we have thrown together are in themselves good, and may yet prove acceptable to readers under the treatment of a writer better qualified than ourselves for the task. We shall be content to know that the facts we have brought to light may tend to remove prejudices now honestly entertained by many Europeans respecting American literature, and that our remarks may incite to further inquiry.

Great authors rise at long intervals. England has but one Shakspeare, and but one Milton. Within the two centuries which have elapsed since the successful settlement of Virginia and Massachusetts, many of her most cherished authors lived. The majority of these, however, are as much American as English. The marked distinction between the two nations did not show itself in their literature before the American Revolution. Then the colonists began to think for themselves, and their writings took the impress of the new state of things. What has been accomplished in the past fifty years should satisfy any American. Another half century of equal progress will leave no doubt as to the fact of an American literature. An English author of distinction, recently returned from the United States, lately stated at a public dinner in London that Great Britain and the United States are now the only depositories of pure literature. An American would hesitate to make such a declaration :—an Englishman could do it with propriety. It is bold. Some may ask, is it correct? Yes. At this time no Continental author can write and publish his independent thoughts without the danger of exile or imprisonment before his eyes. Tyranny must be conciliated at the sacrifice of honest conviction, and purity is thus destroyed. And if Continental countries no longer foster a pure literature, where must we seek it? The answer is to be found in Mr. Mackay's speech. Fifty years ago the most sanguine believer in the eventual success of American literature would hardly have ventured to predict, that at this time the most popular living poet in Great Britain would be an American, and that American books would constitute a large and important part of the popular reading of the British public. Yet such is the fact. The wonder is that a country, then so dependent on foreign ideas, should now influence old communities by her thoughts. It has been justly observed, that we are not so much governed by the opinions