A Short History of English Printing, 1476-1898 Part 12

The London Polyglott of 1657, which exceeded all these in the number of texts, was mainly due to the enterprise and industry of Brian Walton, Bishop of Chester. This famous scholar and divine was born at Cleveland, in Yorkshire, in 1600. He was educated at Cambridge, and after serving as curate in All Hallows, in Bread Street, became rector of St. Martin's Orgar and of St. Giles in the Fields. He was sequestered from his living at St. Martin's during the troubles of the Revolution, and fled to Oxford, and it was while there that he is said to have formed the idea of the Polyglott Bible.

The first announcement of the great undertaking was made in 1652, when a type specimen sheet, believed to be still in existence, was printed by James Flesher or Fletcher of Little Britain, and issued with the prospectus, which was printed by Roger Norton of Blackfriars for Timothy Garthwaite. Walton's Polyglott was the second book printed by subscription in England, Minsheu's _Dictionary in Eleven Languages_ having been published in this manner in 1617. The terms were 10 per copy, or 50 for six copies. The estimated cost of the first volume was 1500, and of succeeding volumes 1200, and such was the spirit with which the work was taken up that 9000 was subscribed before the first volume was put to press.

To the texts which had appeared in previous Polyglotts, Persian and Ethiopic were added, so that in all nine languages were included in the work--that is, Hebrew, Latin, Greek, Chaldean, Syriac, Arabic, Samaritan, Persian, and Ethiopic--besides much additional matter in the form of tables, lexicons, and grammars. No single book was printed in all of these, only the Greek, Latin, Syriac, and Arabic running throughout the work, while the Hebrew appears in the Old Testament, the Psalms in Ethiopic, and the New Testament has, in addition to the four princ.i.p.al texts, the Ethiopic and Persian.

The whole work occupied six folio volumes, measuring 16 x 10-3/4, and was printed by Thomas Roycroft from types supplied by the four recognised typefounders. At the commencement of the first volume is a portrait of Walton by Bombert, followed by an elaborately engraved t.i.tle-page, the work of Wenceslaus Hollar, an architectural design adorned with scenes from Scripture history. The second t.i.tle-page was printed in red ink, and the text was so arranged that each double page, when open, showed all the versions of the same pa.s.sage. The types used in this work have been described in detail by Rowe Mores in his _Dissertations upon English Founders_, and by Talbot Baines Reed in his work upon the _Old English Letter Foundries_ (Chap. vii. pp. 164, _et seqq._). Speaking of the English founts, the last-named writer points out that the double pica, Roman and italic, seen in the Dedication, is the same fount that was cut by the sixteenth-century printer, John Day, and used by him to print the _Life of Alfred the Great_. Mr. Reed adds that, in spite of a certain want of uniformity in the bodies, the Ethiopic and Samaritan were especially good, and the Syriac and Arabic boldly cut.

But it was not only for its typographic excellence that the book was remarkable. The rapidity with which this great undertaking pa.s.sed through the press is no less astonishing. All six volumes were printed within four years, the first appearing in September 1654, the second in 1655, the third in 1656, and the last three in 1657. Looking at the labour involved by such an undertaking, it has been rightly described by Mr. T. B. Reed as a lasting glory to the typography of the seventeenth century.

Oliver Cromwell, under whose government this n.o.ble work was accomplished, had a.s.sisted, as far as lay in his power, by permitting the importation of the paper free of duty; and in the first editions this a.s.sistance was gracefully acknowledged by the editor, but on the Restoration those pa.s.sages were altered or omitted to make room for compliments to Charles II.

Amongst those who ably a.s.sisted Walton in his labours was Dr. Edmund Castell, who prepared a _Heptaglott Lexicon_ for the better study of the various languages used in the Polyglott. This work received the support of all the learned men of the time, but the undertaking was the ruin of its author, and a great part of the impression perished in the destruction of Roycroft's premises in the Great Fire of 1666.

The Restoration brought with it little change in the conditions under which printing was carried on in England, or in the lot of the printers themselves. There is still preserved in the Public Record Office a doc.u.ment which throws considerable light on this matter, and is believed to have been drawn up either in 1660 or in 1661. This is a pet.i.tion signed by eleven of the leading London printers, for the incorporation of the printers into a body distinct from the Company of Stationers, and appended to it are the 'reasons' for the proposed change, which occupy four or five closely written folio sheets. The men who put forward this pet.i.tion were:--

RICHARD HODGKINSON, JOHN GRISMOND, ROBERT IBBOTSON, THOMAS MABB, DA[NIEL?] MAXWELL, THOMAS ROYCROFT, WILLIAM G.o.dBID, JO[HN] STREATOR, JAMES COTTREL, JOHN HAYES, and JOHN BRUDENELL;

and it was undoubtedly this band of men, some of them the biggest men in the trade, who formed the 'Companie of Printers,' for whom in 1663 a pamphlet was issued, ent.i.tled _A Brief Discourse concerning Printers and Printing_. For the printed pamphlet embodies the same views put forward in the pet.i.tion, only backed up with fresh evidence and terse arguments.

The claim of the printers amounted to this, that the Company of Stationers had become mainly a Company of Booksellers, that in order to cheapen printing they had admitted a great many more printers than were necessary, and from this cause arose the great quant.i.ty of 'scandalous and seditious' books that were constantly being published. They go on to say that the condition of the great body of printers was deplorable, 'they can hardly subsist in credit to maintain their families ... When an ancient printer died, and his copies were exposed to sale, few or none of the young ones were of ability to deal for them, nor indeed for any other, so that the Booksellers have engross'd almost all.' The pet.i.tioners show also that the Company of Stationers was grown so large that none could be Master or Warden until he was well advanced in life, and therefore unable to keep a vigilant eye on the trade, while a printer did not become Master once in ten or twenty years. They argue that the best expedient for checking these disorders and ensuring lawful printing, would be to incorporate the printers into a distinct body, and they advocate the registration of presses, the right of search, and the enforcement of sureties. Finally, they claim that this plan would also do much to improve printing as an art, as under the existing conditions there was no encouragement to the printers to produce good work.

This pet.i.tion, though it does not seem to have received any official reply, was noticed by Sir Roger L'Estrange in the Proposals which he laid before the House of Parliament, and which undoubtedly formed the basis of the Act of 1662. Sir Roger L'Estrange had been an active adherent of the Royal cause, and soon after the Restoration, on the 22nd February 1661-2, he was granted a warrant to search for and seize unlicensed presses and seditious books (_State Papers_, Charles II. Vol.

li. No. 6). A list is still extant of books which he had seized at the office of John Hayes, one of the signatories of the above pet.i.tion. So that although the office of Surveyor of the Press was not officially created until 1663, it is clear from the issue of the warrant, and also from the fact of L'Estrange having been directed to draw up proposals for the regulation of the Press, that he was acting in that capacity more than a twelvemonth earlier. His proposals were, in 1663, printed in pamphlet form with the t.i.tle, _Considerations and Proposals in order to the Regulation of the Press_, and were dedicated to the King, and also to the House of Lords; and they contain much that is interesting. He states that hundreds of thousands of seditious papers had been allowed to go abroad since the King's return, and that there had been printed ten or twelve impressions of _Farewell Sermons_, to the number of thirty thousand, since the Act of Uniformity, adding that the very persons who had the care of the Press (_i.e._ the Company of Stationers) had connived at its abuse. In support of this statement he pointed out that Presbyterian pamphlets were rarely suppressed, that rich offenders were pa.s.sed over, and scarcely any of those who were caught were ever brought to justice. He gives the number of printers then at work in London as sixty, the number of apprentices about a hundred and sixty, besides a large number of journeymen; and he proposed at once to reduce the number of printers to twenty, with a corresponding reduction of apprentices and journeymen. As this would throw a large number of men out of work, he further proposed a scheme for the relief of necessitous and supernumerary printers. He calculated that the twelve impressions of the _Farewell Sermons_, allowing a thousand copies to each impression, had yielded a profit, 'beside the charge of paper and printing,' of 3300, and he advised that this sum should be levied as a fine upon those booksellers who had sold the book, and be placed to a fund for the benefit of the suppressed printers, the balance of the sum required to be levied on other seditious publications!

[Ill.u.s.tration: SIR ROGER L'ESTRANGE.]

In this pamphlet L'Estrange gave the t.i.tles of most of the pamphlets to which he objected, with brief extracts from them, and the names of the printers and publishers, amongst whom were Thomas Brewster, Giles Calvert, Simon Dover, and one other, whose name is not mentioned, but who is referred to as holding a highly profitable office. The reference may be to Thomas Newcomb.

At pages 26 and 27 L'Estrange notices the pet.i.tion of certain of the printers to be incorporated as a separate body. He says 'that it were a hard matter to pick out twenty master printers, who are both free of the trade, of ability to manage it, and of integrity to be entrusted with it, most of the honester sort being impoverished by the late times, and the great business of the press being engross'd by Oliver's creatures.'

He admits that the Company of Stationers and Booksellers are largely responsible for the great increase of presses, being anxious to have their books printed as cheaply as possible, but thinks that there would be as much abuse of power among incorporated printers as among the Company of Stationers.

The Act of 1662, which was mainly based on L'Estrange's report, was in a large measure a re-enactment of the Star Chamber decree of 1637. The number of printers in London was limited to twenty, the type-founders to four, and the other clauses of the earlier decree were reinforced, but with one notable concession. Hitherto printing outside London had been restricted to the two Universities, but in the new Act the city of York was expressly mentioned as a place where printing might be carried on.

This new Act was enforced for a time with greater severity than the old one, and under it, for the first time in English history, a printer suffered the penalty of death for the liberty of the press.

The story of the trial and condemnation of John Twyn is told in vol. 6 of Cobbett's _State Trials_, and was also published in pamphlet form with the t.i.tle, _An exact narrative of the Tryal and condemnation of John Twyn, for Printing and Dispersing of a Treasonable Book, With the Tryals of Thomas Brewster, bookseller, Simon Dover, printer, Nathan Brooks, bookseller ... in the Old Bayly, London, the 20th and 22nd February 166-3/4_.

John Twyn was a small printer in Cloth Fair, and his crime was that of printing a pamphlet ent.i.tled _A Treatise of the Execution of Justice_, in which, as it was alleged, there were several pa.s.sages aimed at the King's life and the overthrow of the Government. It was further stated by the prosecution that the pamphlet was part of a plot for a general rebellion that was to have taken effect on the 12th October 1662. The chief witnesses against Twyn were Joseph Walker, his apprentice, Sir Roger L'Estrange, and Thomas Mabb, a printer. Their evidence went to show that Twyn had two presses; that he composed part of the book, printed some of the sheets, and corrected the proofs, the work being done secretly at night-time. On entering the premises it was found that the forme of type had been broken up, only one corner of it remaining standing, and that the printed sheets had been hurriedly thrown down some stairs. In defence Twyn declared that he had received the copy from Widow Calvert's maid, and had received 40s. on account, with more to follow on completion, and he stoutly a.s.serted that he did not know the nature of the work. The jury, amongst whom were Richard Royston and Simon Waterson, booksellers, and James Fletcher and Thomas Roycroft, printers, returned a verdict of Guilty, and Twyn was condemned to death and executed at Tyburn.

The charge against Simon Dover was of printing the pamphlet ent.i.tled _The Speeches of some of the late King's Justices_, which we have already seen that Roger L'Estrange had seized in John Hayes' premises, while Thomas Brewster was accused of causing this and another pamphlet, ent.i.tled _The Phnix of the Solemn League and Covenant_, to be printed. In defence, Thomas Brewster declared that booksellers did not read the books they sold; so long as they could earn a penny they were satisfied--an argument that had been used more than a century before by old Robert Copland as an excuse for indifferent printing. Both Dover and Brewster were condemned to pay a fine of 100 marks, to stand in the pillory, and to remain prisoners during the King's pleasure. Sir Roger L'Estrange, as a reward for his services, was appointed Surveyor of the Press, with permission to publish a news-sheet of his own, and liberty to hara.s.s the printers as much as possible.

But far greater calamities than the malice of Sir Roger L'Estrange could devise fell upon the printing trade by the outbreak of the Plague in 1665, and the subsequent Fire of London. In a letter written by L'Estrange to Lord Arlington, and dated 16th October 1665, he stated that eighty of the printers had died of the Plague (_Cal. of S. P._ 1665-6, p. 20), in which total he evidently included workmen as well as masters. The loss occasioned by the stoppage of trade and flight of the citizens must have been enormous, and yet it may have been slight in comparison to that occasioned by the Great Fire. Curiously enough, however, there are very few records showing the effect of this second disaster upon the printing trade. We find a pet.i.tion by Christopher Barker, the King's printer, to be allowed to import paper free of charge in consequence of his loss by the Fire, and the same indulgence is granted to the Stationers' Company as a body and the Universities; but there are no notes of individual losses, and only one or two references to MSS. that were destroyed in it. There is, however, one very eloquent testimony to the ruin it caused in this, as in other trades. The coercive Act of 1662, which had been renewed with unfailing regularity from session to session down to the year 1665, was not renewed during the remainder of the reign of Charles II. On the 24th of July 1668 a return was made of all the printing-houses in London, which shows at a glance who had survived and who had suffered by that terrible calamity (see Appendix II.).

Comparing this list with that of 1649, we find that no inconsiderable number of the printers there mentioned had survived the thinning-out process, as well as imprisonment, death, and fire. In fact, only eight London printers were actually ruined by the Fire, and among them we find both John Hayes and John Brudenell, and also Alice Warren.

But another paper, written in the same year, and preserved in the same volume of State Papers,[13] is even more interesting, for it shows the position of every man in the trade. This is headed--

_A Survey of the Printing Presses with the names and numbers of Apprentices, Officers, and Workemen belonging to every particular press.

Taken 29 July 1668_. (See Appendix III.).

From this we learn that the largest employer in the trade at that time was James Fletcher, who kept five presses, and employed thirteen workmen and two apprentices. Next to him came Thomas Newcomb, with three presses and a proof press, twelve workmen and one apprentice; John Mayc.o.c.ke, with three presses, ten workmen and three apprentices; and then Roycroft, with four presses, ten workmen and two apprentices; while at the other end of the scale was Thomas Leach, with one press, not his own, and one workman.

Whether L'Estrange carried out his threat of prosecuting the three men who had set up since the Act, we do not know, but this is certain, that one of their number, John Darby, continued to work for many years after this, and was the printer of Andrew Marvell's _Rehearsal Transposed_, and a good deal else that galled the Government very much. In fact, the Act of 1662 was openly ignored, and new men set up presses every year.

But of all this work it is almost impossible to trace what was done by individual printers. The bulk of the publications of the time bore the bookseller's name only, and it is very rarely indeed that the printer is revealed. Newcomb had the printing of the _Gazette_, and also printed most of Dryden's works that were published by Herringman; while Roycroft, we know, was employed by all those who wanted the best possible work, such men as John Ogilby, for instance, for whom he printed several works. Milton's _Paradise Lost_ came from the press of Peter Parker; but the printer of Bunyan's _Pilgrim's Progress_ is unknown to us.

As it happens, there is not much lost by remaining in ignorance on this point. For no change whatever took place in the character of printing as a trade during the second half of the seventeenth century. There were only three foundries of note in London during that time, and none of them is considered to have produced anything particularly good. Indeed, one has only to glance at even the best work of that time to see how wretchedly the majority of the type was cast. The first of the three was the celebrated Joseph Moxon, who, in 1659, added type-founding to his other callings of mathematician and hydrographer. Having spent some years in Holland, he was very much enamoured of the Dutch types, and in 1676 he wrote a book ent.i.tled _Regulae Trium Ordinum Literarum Typographicarum_, in which he endeavoured to prove that each letter should be cast in exact mathematical proportion, and ill.u.s.trated his theory by several letters cast in that manner. Similar theories had been propounded in earlier days by Albert Durer and the French printer, Geoffrey Tory, but no improvement in printing ever resulted from them.

Moxon's foundry was fitted with a large a.s.sortment of letter, but his work, judging from the examples left to us, was certainly not up to the theory which he put forward, and he is best remembered for his useful work on printing, which formed the second part of his _Mechanick Exercises_, and was published in 1683. In this he showed an intimate knowledge of every branch of printing and type-founding, and his book is still a standard work on both these subjects. Moxon retired from business some years before his death, and was succeeded in 1683 by Joseph and Robert Andrews, who, in addition to Moxon's founts, had a large a.s.sortment of others. Their foundry was particularly rich in Roman and Italic, and the learned founts, and they also had matrices of Anglo-Saxon and Irish. But their work was not by any means good.

The third of these letter foundries was that of James and Thomas Grover in Angel Alley, Aldersgate Street, who after Moxon's retirement shared with Andrews the whole of the English trade. The most notable founts in their possession were, a pica and longprimer Roman, from the Royal Press at Blackfriars, Day's double pica Roman and Italic, and two good founts of black letter, reputed to have formed part of the stock of Wynkyn de Worde. They also had the English Samaritan matrices from which the type for Walton's Polyglott in 1657 had been cast.

Among the types belonging to this foundry was one which, in the inventory, was returned as New Coptic, but which was in reality a Greek uncial fount, cut for the specimen of the _Codex Alexandrinus_ which Patrick Young proposed to print, but did not live to accomplish. The specimen was printed in 1643 and consisted of the first chapter of Genesis. It is supposed that this fount remained unknown, under the t.i.tle of New Coptic, until 1758, when the Grover foundry pa.s.sed into the hands of John James. On the death of Thomas Grover, the foundry remained in possession of his daughters, who endeavoured to sell it, but without success, and it remained locked up for many years in the premises of Richard Nutt, a printer, until 1758 (Reed, _Old English Letter Foundries_, p. 205).

After a lapse of twenty years, the Act of 1662 was renewed by the first parliament of James II. (1685) for a period of seven years, and at the expiration of that time, _i.e._ in 1692, it was renewed for another twelvemonth, after which we hear no more of it. There is no evidence that it had been very strictly enforced during its short revival; in fact it is clear, from the number of presses found in various parts of the country during the last five and twenty years of the century, that it had remained practically a dead letter from the time of the Great Fire.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 32.--'Fell' Types.]

The troubles of the Civil War had suspended for a time all progress in printing at Oxford. But on the Restoration it made even greater advances than it had done at an earlier period of its history. Archbishop Laud had a worthy successor in Dr. John Fell, who in 1667 enriched the University by a gift of a complete type-foundry, consisting of punches, matrices, and founts of Roman, Italic, Orientals, 'Saxons,' and black letter, besides moulds and other necessary appliances for the production of type. Dr. Fell also introduced a skilled letter-founder from Holland.

For a couple of years the foundry and printing office were carried on in private premises hired by Fell, but upon the completion of the Sheldonian Theatre the printing office was removed to the bas.e.m.e.nt of that building, the first book bearing the Theatre imprint being _An Ode in praise of the Theatre and its Founder_, printed in 1669.

Another scholarly benefactor, Francis Junius, presented the University in 1677 with a splendid collection of type, consisting of Runic, Gothic, 'Saxon,' 'Islandic,' Danish, and 'Swedish,' as well as founts of Roman, Italic, and other sorts. By the kindness of Mr. Horace Hart, the Controller of the Clarendon Press, we are able to give here examples of several of the founts, both of Fell and Junius, in most cases from surviving specimens of the types themselves.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 33.--'Fell' Types.]

Very little use seems to have been made of these gifts before the commencement of the succeeding century. The first Bible printed at Oxford was that of 1674, and no important editions of the cla.s.sics issued from the University press of this period.

It was left to Cambridge to issue the best works of this cla.s.s, for which that University borrowed the Oxford types, having no type-foundry of its own. These editions, chiefly in quarto, came from the press of Thomas Buck, who had succeeded Roger Daniel as printer to the University. Buck was in turn succeeded by John Field, who turned out some very creditable work, notably the folio Bible of 1660. John Hayes, the next of the Cambridge printers, issued some notable books, such as Robertson's _Thesaurus_,1676, 4to, and Barnes's _History of Edward III._, 1688, 4to, but the bulk of the work that came from the Cambridge press at this date was of a theological character, and was none too well printed.

The history of other provincial presses of this period is very meagre.

Mr. Allnutt, to whose valuable papers in the second volume of _Bibliographica_ I am indebted for the following notes, expresses the belief that in several cases local knowledge would show that presses were at work some years earlier than the dates he has given.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 34.--'Junius' Types.]

At the time of the Civil War, Robert Barker, the King's printer, had in 1639 been commanded to attend His Majesty in his march against the Scots, and printed several proclamations, news-sheets, etc., at Newcastle-on-Tyne in that year. He is next found at York, where some thirty-nine different sheets, etc., have been traced from his press, and in 1642 a second press was at work in the same city, that of Stephen Bulkeley. When York fell into the hands of the Parliament, Bulkeley's press was silent for a while, and his place was taken by Thomas Broad, who printed there from 1644 to 1660, and was succeeded by his widow, Alice, who disappears in 1667. After the Restoration, Bulkeley again set up his press at York, where he continued down to 1680. Barker in 1642 had been summoned to attend the King at Nottingham, but no specimen of his work bearing that imprint is known, and the next heard of him is at Bristol, some time in 1643, Mr. Allnutt mentioning ten pieces from his press at this place.

In 1645 Thomas Fuller issued in small duodecimo, a collection of pious thoughts, which he aptly termed _Good Thoughts in Bad Times_, and in the Dedication to it expressly stated that it was 'the first fruits of the Exeter presse.' There was no printer's name in the volume, and no other work printed in Exeter at that time is known. In 1688, however, another press was started there, and printed several political broadsides relative to the Prince of Orange. A new start was made in 1698, when a small pamphlet was printed in this city.

Stephen Bulkeley, the York printer, appears to have gone from that city to Newcastle in 1646, and continued printing there until 1652. He then removed to Gateshead, where he remained until after the Restoration, subsequently returning to Newcastle, and so back to York. No more is heard of printing in Newcastle until the opening of the eighteenth century.

A press was established in Bristol in the year 1695 and in Plymouth and Shrewsbury in the year 1696.

In America the progress of printing was very slow throughout the seventeenth century. Until 1660, Samuel Green, at Cambridge, Ma.s.sachusetts, remained the only printer in the colony. But in that year the Corporation for the propagation of the Gospel in New England among the Indians sent over from London another press, a large supply of good letter, and a printer named Marmaduke Johnson, for the purpose of printing an edition of the Bible in the Indian tongue. This press was set up in the same building as that in which Green was already at work, and the two printers seem to have worked together at the production of the Bible, which appeared in quarto form in 1663, the New Testament having been published two years earlier. Johnson died in the year 1675, but Samuel Green continued to print until 1702. After his death the press at Cambridge was silent for some years.

In 1675 a press was established at Boston by John Foster, a graduate of Harvard College, under a licence from the College. Besides the official work of the colony and theological literature, he printed several pamphlets on the war between the English and the Indians. He died in 1681, when he was succeeded by Samuel Green, junior, who continued printing there until 1690. In the following year three printers' names are found in the imprints of books: R. Pierce, Benjamin Harris, and John Allen. Benjamin Harris is afterwards called 'Printer to his Excellency, the Governor and Council,' but in 1693 Harris removed from 'over against the Old Meeting House,' to 'the Bible over against the Blew Anchor,' and another printer, Bartholomew Green, seems to have shared with him the official work.

Pennsylvania was the next of the colonies to establish a press; its first printer, William Bradford, setting up there in 1685, in which year he printed _Kalendarium Pennsilvaniense, or, America's Messinger, Being an Almanack for the Year of Grace 1686_.

In 1688 Bradford issued proposals for printing a large Bible (Hildeburn, _Issues of the Pennsylvania Press_, vol. i. p. 9), but they came to nothing. In 1692 he printed several pamphlets for George Keith, the leader of the schism among the Quakers, and for this he was imprisoned.

On his release he removed to New York. A press was also set up in Virginia in 1682, but was suppressed, and no printing allowed there until 1729. The name of the printer is not known, but is believed to have been William Nuthead, who set up a press in Maryland in 1689 with a similar result.