Chapter XXIII: Finishing (2)

The outside must now be finished. Are the sides to be polished, or left plain? If they are not to be polished, paste-wash the whole of the side up to the edge of the back carefully, then glaire only that portion which is to be gilt. Generally a two-line fillet only is used round the edge, so that the width of the fillet or roll must determine the width to be glaired. When glaired twice and dry, take up the gold on the fillet or roll and work it evenly and straightly round the edge. The corners where the lines meet are next to be stopped by working a small rosette or small star on them. Clean off any gold that may be on the side, and |142| work a small dotted or pin-head roll at the edge of the glaire. This will cover and conceal the edge.

Extra calf books generally have the sides polished. Paste-wash the sides all over, and when dry size them. Hold the book, if small, in the left hand, if large, lay it on the press and work the sponge over the side in a circular direction, so that the size may be laid on as evenly as possible. Be very careful that it does not froth; should it do so, squeeze the sponge out as dry as possible, and fill it anew with fresh size. Some workmen work the sponge up and down the book, but if this be not done very evenly it produces streaks. The finisher will find he can lay a more even coating on by using the sponge in a circular direction. Allow this to dry by leaving the book with boards extended. When perfectly dry glaire once. This will be found sufficient, as the size gives body to the glaire. When sizeing and glairing, be assured that the book be laid down with the boards extended on a level surface; if the book be not level, the size or glaire will run down to the lowest portion of the surface, and become unequally distributed. The gold is now to be laid on the respective places, either broad or narrow, according to the nature of the finishing or width of the rolls. As a general rule, the sides of the better class of calf books have nothing more than a three-line round the edge and mitred in the corners. This is, however, quite a matter of taste. Some have a border of fancy rolls, but never any elaborate pattern as in morocco work. To finish the sides, place the book in the finishing press with the boards extended, so that they may rest on the press. This will afford greater facility for working the fillets, rolls, and tools necessary to complete the design on each side. The finishing press being a small one, can be easily turned round as each edge of the border is finished.

To polish the sides, place the book on its side on some |143| soft surface, such as a board covered with baize, and kept for the purpose. Use the large and heavy polishing iron, hot and clean. Rub or work the iron quickly and firmly over the sides, first from the groove towards the foredge, and then in a contrary direction, from the tail to the head, by turning the volume. The oil or grease applied to the cover previous to laying on the gold will be sufficient to allow the polisher to glide easily over the surface. Polishing has also the effect of smoothing down the burr formed on the leather by the gilding tools, and bringing the impressions slightly to the surface. The iron must be held very evenly, so that the centre of the iron may be the working portion. If held sideways the edge of the iron will indent the leather. The heat must be sufficient to give a polish. It must be remembered that if the iron is too hot it will cause the glaire to turn white. The temperature must be well tested before it be applied to the cover. A practised finisher can generally tell the proper heat on holding the iron at some little distance from his face, by the heat radiated from the iron. Calf books should be pressed, whether polished or not.

_Pressing._—Plates of japanned tin or polished horn are proper for this purpose. Put pressing tins between the book and the mill-boards: the tins must be up to the joint. Now place one of the japanned plates on the side level with the groove; turn book and japanned plate over carefully together, so that neither shifts; place another of the polished plates on the top of the book, thus placing the book between two polished surfaces. Put the book into the standing press, and screw down tightly. Leave in for some hours. When pressed sufficiently, take the book out, and if the sides be polished, varnish them.

Make a little pad of cotton wool, saturate the lower portion with varnish; rub it on a piece of waste paper to equalize the varnish, then work the pad over the side as |144| quickly as possible in a circular direction. Renew the wool with varnish for the other side. Enough must be taken on the pad to varnish the whole side, or the delay caused by renewing the varnish on the cotton will cause a streaked surface. When the varnish is perfectly dry—a few minutes will suffice—the book must be again pressed. To do this, rub the gold-rag, which is greased, over the sides, this will prevent the sides from sticking to the polished plates. Place the book between the plates as before, leaving out the pressing tins, and place in the standing press. Only little pressure must now be given; if the press be screwed down too tightly the plates will stick to the book. The varnish must be of good quality, and perfectly dry, or the result will be the same. Half an hour in the press will be found quite long enough. Should the plates stick, there is no other remedy than washing off the varnish with spirits of wine, and the glaire and size with warm water, and carefully re-preparing the surface as before. This is, however, an accident that cannot happen if due care and judgment be exercised.

_Graining._—Graining is now used very much on calf books. It may be properly considered as a blind ornament. It is done by means of wooden, or, better still, copper plates cut out in various patterns, so as to form small squares, scales of fish, or an imitation of morocco. Place the volume between two of these plates, level to the groove of the back, in the standing press; screw down tightly. The pressure should be equal over the whole surface. Nothing looks worse than a bold impression in one place and a slight one in another, so that it is rather important that it be evenly pressed; a second application of the plates is impracticable. Graining has the advantage of hiding any finger-marks that may accidentally be on the calf, and also partly conceals any imperfections in the leather. |145|

The state of the weather must in a great measure guide the finisher as to the proper number of volumes he ought to prepare at one time. The leather should always be a little moist, or, in other words, rather _fresh_. In winter double the number of books may be prepared, and the gold laid on, than the dryness of a summer’s day will permit. If books are laid on over night the tools must be used very hot in working them the next morning, or the gold will not adhere. During summer, flies will eat the glaire from various places while the book is lying or standing out to dry, so that constant vigilance must be kept to avoid these pests.

Russia is prepared in the same way as calf, but is usually worked with more blind tools than gold, and the sides are not as a rule polished, so that the size and glaire are dispensed with, except on those parts where it is to be finished in gold; those portions need be only paste-washed and glaired once, without any size.

_Finishing with Dry Preparation._—The dry preparation is used for silk, velvet, paper, or any other material that would be stained by the employment of the wet process. There are a number of receipts in the trade and in use.

Take the white of eggs, and dry by spreading it somewhat thickly over glass plates, taking care to preserve it from dust. When dry it will chip off readily, if the glass has been previously _very slightly_ oiled or greased. It must not be exposed to more heat than 40° Reaum., or the quality of the albumen will be destroyed. The dried mass is to be well powdered in a porcelain mortar.

Or, take equal portions of gum mastic, gum sandrac, gum arabic, and powder them well in a mortar. This powder, if good work be desired, must be ground into an impalpable powder. When powdered put it into a box or bottle, and tie three or four thicknesses of fine muslin over the mouth. By tapping the inverted box, or shaking |146| it over the lines or letters, the dust will fall through in a fine shower. The powder should fall only on the part to be gilt. Cut the gold into strips, take it up upon the tool, and work rather hot. The overplus of the powder can be brushed away when the finishing is completed. Finishing powder is now sold commercially.

_Velvet_ is very seldom finished beyond having the title put on, and this should be worked in blind first and with moderately large letters, or the pile will hide them.

_Silk_ is finished more easily, and can, if care be taken, have rather elaborate work put upon it. In such a case, the lines or tools, which must be blinded-in first, may be glaired. For this purpose the glaire must be put in a saucer or plate in the free air for a day or two, so that a certain amount of water or moisture of the glaire may be evaporated; but it must not be too stiff so as to prevent the brush going freely over the stuff. Great care, however, must be taken, or the glaire will spread and cause a stain. A thin coat of paste-water will give silk a body and keep the glaire from spreading to a certain extent, but I think the best medium for silk is the dry one, and it is always ready for instant use. In using glaire the gold is laid on the silk, but on no account must any oil or lard be rubbed on it for the temporary holding of the gold. Rub the parts intended for the gold with the finger (passed through the hair), or with a clean rag lightly oiled, and when the tools are re-impressed a clean piece of flannel should be used to wipe off the superfluous gold.

Blocking has been used lately on silk with some success in Germany. The blocking plate is taken out of the press, and the gold is laid on it, and then replaced in the press. The finishing powder is freely distributed over the silk side, which is laid on the bed of the press. On pulling the lever over, the block descends and imprints the design in gold on the silk. This process may be applied to velvet, |147| but velvet never takes the sharpness of the design on account of the pile, so that as a rule it is left in its natural state.

_Vellum._—The Dutch, as a nation, appear to have been the first to bind books in vellum. It was then a simple kind of casing, with hollow backs. A later improvement of theirs was that of sewing the book on double raised cords, and making the book with a tight back, similar to the way in which our flexible books are now done, showing the raised bands. The ornamentation was entirely in blind, both on the back and sides, and the tools used were of a very solid character.

This art of binding in vellum seems to be entirely lost at the present day; its imperishable nature is indeed its only recommendation. It has little beauty; is exceedingly harsh; and little variety can be produced even in the finishing.

There are two or three kinds of vellum prepared from calf skins at the present day, thanks to the progress of invention. First, we have the prepared or artist’s vellum, with a very white artificial surface; then the Oxford vellum, the surface of which is left in its natural state; the Roman vellum, which has a darker appearance. Parchment is an inferior animal membrane prepared from sheepskins after the manner of vellum, and this is very successfully imitated by vegetable parchment, made by immersing unsized paper for a few seconds in a bath of diluted oil of vitriol. This preparation resembles the animal parchment so closely that it is not easy to distinguish the difference. It is used very extensively in France for wrappering the better class of literature, instead of issuing them in cloth as is the custom here.

The method of finishing vellum is altogether different to leather. On account of its very hard and compact nature, it requires no other ground or preparation than glaire for gold work. |148|

The cover should be very carefully washed with a soft sponge and clean water, to clean off any dirt or finger-marks, and to make the book look as fresh as possible. This washing must be very carefully done by going over the surface as few times as possible. This caution applies particularly to the prepared or artist vellum, as each washing will take off a certain amount of the surface, so that the more it is damped and rubbed the more the surface will be disturbed and the beauty destroyed. It requires some experience to distinguish the flesh and leather surfaces of prepared vellum, but this experience must be acquired, because it is absolutely necessary that the leather side should be outward when the book is covered, for two reasons: the flesh side is more fibrous, and adheres better to the boards than the leather side, and the leather side is less liable to have its surface disturbed in the process of washing.

The parts that are to be gilt must be glaired, but as the glaire will show its presence, or, more strictly speaking, leave rather a dirty mark, the tools should first be worked in blind, and the glaire laid on carefully up to their outer edge. When dry, lay the gold on and work the tool in. Let the tools be only moderately warm; if too hot they will go through to the mill-board, leaving their mark as if they had been cut out with a knife.

As a rule no very heavy tooling is ever put on vellum, the beauty lies in keeping the vellum as clean as possible. The tooling being, comparatively speaking, on the surface, owing to the thinness of the skin, requires a very competent and clean workman to produce anything like good work on vellum.

Vellum is of so greasy a nature that, if a title-piece of leather has to be put on, it will be found that there is a great difficulty in making it adhere properly unless some special precaution be taken. The best plan is to scrape |149| the surface where the leather is intended to be placed with the edge of a knife. This will produce a rough and fibrous ground on which to place the pasted leather. This _leather_, when dry, must be prepared with paste-water and glaire, in the same manner as with other books.

In the foregoing instructions for finishing a book, the most that can be looked for towards teaching either the apprentice or the unskilled workman is to give him an idea how it is accomplished by practised hands. Pure taste, a correct eye, and a steady hand, are not given to all in common. The most minute instructions, detail by detail, cannot make a workman if Nature has denied these gifts. I have known men whose skill in working a design could not be excelled, but who could not be trusted to gild a back without instructions. Others, whose ideas of design were not contemptible, could not tool two panels of a back in perfect uniformity. Some also have so little idea of harmony of colour, that without strict supervision they would give every volume the coat of a harlequin. In a word, a first-rate bookbinder is _nascitur non fit_, and although the hints and instructions I have penned may not be sufficient to _make_ a workman, I trust they will be found of some value to the skilled as well as to the less practised craftsman.

_Blocking._—The growing demand for books that were at once cheap and pretty, became so strong, that mechanical appliances were invented to facilitate their ornamentation; and thus we have the introduction of the present blocking press.

I will not follow too closely the various improvements introduced at different periods, but roughly describe the blocking press, without which cheap bookbinding cannot be done at the present day. There can be no doubt that this press owes its extensive use to the introduction of publishers’ cloth work.

Formerly, when the covers of books were blocked, a |150| small lying or other press was used. The block, previously heated, was placed on the book, and the screw or screws turned to get a sufficient pressure. It often happened that the pressure was either too much or too little: the block either by the one accident sank into the leather too deeply, or by the other the gold failed to adhere, and it required a good workman to work a block properly.

The first press to be noticed is a Balancier, having a moveable bed, a heating box, heated by means of red-hot irons, two side pillars to guide the box in a true line, and attached to it a screw connected at the top with a bar or arm, having at each extremity an iron ball. The block, having been fixed to a plate at the bottom of the heated box, the side of the book was laid down on the bed, and by swinging the arm round the block descended upon the book. The arm was then swung back, and the next book put into place. It will be seen that this incurred a great loss of time.

The next improvement consisted in having a press that only moved a quarter circle, with almost instantaneous action; and another improvement connected with the bed was, that by means of screws and gauges, when the block was once set, a boy or an inexperienced hand might with ease finish off hundreds of copies, all with equal pressure. By referring to the woodcut opposite, the press and its action will be seen and understood. The box may be heated with gas, and kept at a constant and regulated temperature the whole time of working. It can be adjusted to any amount of pressure, as it is regulated by the bed underneath.

The next step in progress was the introduction of printing in different colours upon the cloth, and intermixing them with gold. Messrs. Hopkinson and Cope’s machines may be mentioned. They are made to be driven by steam, and will print and emboss from 500 to 600 covers per |151| hour, and are heated by steam or gas. The inking apparatus is placed at the back of the press, so that while the workman is placing another cover, the ink roller, by automatic action, inks the block ready for the next impression. The inking or printing of the covers is done without heat, so, to avoid loss of time, an arrangement is made that the heating box can be cooled immediately by a stream of water passed through it.

Messrs. Kampe and Co. have just brought out a blocking machine, which they claim to be superior to any in the trade. It will block at the rate of 700 to 800 covers per hour. The pressure is obtained by one of the most powerful of mechanical appliances, and it can be adjusted to block either paper or leather.

The tools required for blocking are called blocks or stamps. These may be composed of very small pieces, or may be of one block cut to the size of the book. In any case, the block has to be fastened to the moveable plate at the bottom of the heating box. To block the sides of a book, take a stout piece of paper and glue it upon a moveable plate.[11] Then take the book, and having set the blocks upon the side in exact position, place the side or board upon which are placed the blocks upon the bed of the blocking press, leaving the volume hanging down in front of the press. The bed is now to be fixed, so that the centre of the board is exactly under and in the centre of the heating box. When quite true, the sides and back gauges are fixed by screws. Pull the lever so that a slight pressure upon the plate be given: release |152| the press, and take out the book and examine if all be correct. Some of the blocks may require a small piece of paper as a pad, so as to increase the pressure, others to be shifted a little. Now glue the back of the stamps and replace them in their respective places. Place the whole under the top plate in the press, heat the box, and pull the lever over; and let the book remain for some little time to set the glue. Take out the book, examine if perfectly square and correct, but replace it with a soft mill-board under the stamps, and pull down the press. The lever must remain over, and the blocks be under pressure until the glue is hardened.

[11] The moveable plate is also called the _platen_.

Another method is to glue upon the plate a piece of thick paper and mark upon it the exact size of the book to be blocked. Strike upon the plate from the size the centre, and from that any other lines that may assist in placing the blocks. Arrange the blocks upon the plate so as to form the design; when correct, paste the blocks on their backs and replace them on the plate. When the paste adheres a little, turn the plate over and put it into the press. Apply heat to the box; pull the lever over, and when the paste is set, regulate the bed and gauges.

When the press is properly heated, throw back the lever; take out the mill-board from under the stamp, and regulate the degree of pressure required by the side-screw under or over the bed. Place upon the bed the side to be stamped, hold it firmly against the guides with the left hand, and with the right draw the lever quickly to the front. This straightens the toggels and forces down the heating box, causing a sharp impression of the stamp upon the leather or other material. Throw or let the lever go back sharply, and take out the book. If the block be of such a design that it must not be inverted, the whole of the covers must be blocked on one side first, and the block turned round for the other side, or the design will be upside down. |153|

Work for blocking in gold does not require so much body or preparation as if it were gilt by hand. Morocco can be worked by merely washing the whole surface with a little urine or weak ammonia, but it is safer to use a coat of glaire and water mixed in proportion of one of the former to three of the latter. The heat should not be great, and slowly worked.

Calf should have a coat of milk and water or thin paste-water as a ground, and when dry another of glaire. Both should be laid on as evenly as possible; but if only portions are to be gilt, such as a centre-piece, and the rest dead, the centre-piece or other design should be pencilled in with great care. The design should be first slightly blocked in blind as a guide for the glairing. The edge of the glaire generally leaves a black or dark stain. The heat required for calf is greater than for morocco, and the working must be done more quickly.

Cloth requires no preparation whatever, the glue beneath and the coloured matter on the cloth gives quite enough adhesiveness when the hot plate comes down for the gold to adhere.

A great deal of taste may be displayed in the formation of patterns in this branch, but as publishers find that books that are tawdrily gilt are better liked by the public, they are, of course, very well satisfied if their books are well covered with gold. It would be well if those who have the principal charge of this work would strive, by the cultivation of elegant design, to correct the vitiated taste of the public, and seek by a study of classic ornamentation to please the eye and satisfy the judgment rather than to attract the vulgar by glitter and gaudy decoration.

However, of late years a great advancement has been made with publishers’ block work; the samples given in the trade paper (“The Bookbinder” now “Bookmaker”) will prove this.

GENERAL INFORMATION.

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