Single letters of the alphabet, not signatures or catchwords, disfigure
the
foot of certain pages in books London printed by Samuel Aris 1730-32. As
each book contains only a few letters, upper or lower-case, placed one in
each forme or sheet with occasional omissions, their function as
press-figures is readily supposed. In Eustace Budgell, A Letter to
Cleomenes (1731) occur the letters C J R W: in one copy C or
C
in 19 formes, J in 5 formes, R or R in 13 formes, W or w
in 5 formes
— other copies vary slightly.[1]
No fewer
than seven letters, C F I J R T W, are used in Budgell's Memoirs
of the
life and character of the late Earl of Orrery (1732). These letters
plus g
(?), l, p, and T appear in others of the seven books printed by Aris that
bear
press letters; J is found in all seven, C and W in five books. One has
evidently stumbled across another of the 'many idiosyncratic numbers or
marks adopted in some books
. . . [involving] the use of letters perhaps to indicate pressmen's names'.[2]
One notices the considerable number and haphazard selection of
letters,
the disproportionate use of some, and the instability of their grouping.
Besides three regulars, C, J, and W, another six or seven letters more
occasionally appear, whilst some formes or sheets are unlettered. No doubt
a
larger sample would reveal more letters and other patterns. From such
tangible evidence in the finished product one is unable to infer the total
number either of presses or pressmen at work, since work at half-press
cannot be distinguished from work at full-press requiring a second
unmarked
crew-member; nor can the absence of letters on occasions be taken to mean
that no other presses or men are concerned.
However, something may be made of the facts by comparison with
press-figures and related work patterns at the Bowyer Press for the same
years 1730-32. Details of press-work are taken from a recently discovered
Bowyer ledger, which records work done and prices charged by
compositors
and pressmen for the period 1730-39.
[3]
Three to five presses were in constant use at the Bowyer Press from March
1730 to March 1732. Occasionally there were six and rarely seven in use
in
any one pay period of two to four weeks. At these presses wrought from
six
to twelve men, usually but not always working in pairs. At one time or
another altogether eight presses were in operation, corresponding with the
figures 1-8 evidenced in the printed sheets. At the Bowyer Press, then,
generally speaking, figures denote a press, and identify work done at that
press, either by a partnership, or occasionally by one man, who regularly
wrought there for a period of weeks or month. Some anomalies, apparent
or
real, may relate to the frequent changes
in personnel and their movements within the shop.
During these two years no fewer than nineteen press-men were
employed at the Bowyer Press, some for periods of only a few weeks,
others
during the whole time. Similarly at some presses the crew remained
constant
for many months at a time, whilst at others there were changes every few
weeks. These phenomena are a function of many variables, including most
obviously the going and coming of workmen, either permanently or
temporarily, the amount of work offering, and breakdowns of equipment.
At
the Bowyer Press, as no doubt at any other commercial press of this or
other
times, frequent changes from press to press and of partnership produce
complex and shifting work-patterns, not easily described and in fact
impossible to infer from patterns of press-figures found in the finished
product.
It is unlikely that the ten or so 'press'-letters in books printed by Aris
— these having been identified as his productions by imprint, types,
and
ornaments — refer to actual presses. From the little known of his
business
one would expect him to have fewer presses than the elder Bowyer,
recognized at the time as a major London printer, and even the preeminent
William Strahan boasts forty years later of no more than '7, 8, or 9 Presses
. .
. constantly employed' in his commercial printing-house.[4] The seven press-letters in
Budgell's
Memoirs
of the Earl of Orrery mentioned above may be taken to
reflect
changes of press-crews. Such changes are shown by the Bowyer records to
be not uncommon in the life of a press.
It is intrinsically probable then that the haphazard letters refer to men,
perhaps by the initial of their surname. It is not hard to believe that by
comparison with Bowyer's nineteen pressmen Aris employed twelve men
over roughly the same period, as delimited very approximately for Aris by
title-page dates. The numerical comparison however can give little idea of
the relative size and output of Aris's establishment, since one cannot
assume
for this period either regular employment or optimum or even steady output
per man. If only one knew the names of Aris's pressmen 1730-32! The list
of
his apprentices given below is no help. Those apprentices out of their time
before 1730 might well have taken jobs elsewhere, and in any case they are
more likely to have been on the composing side, like Thomas Aris, later
proprietor of the Birmingham Gazette. On the other hand, if
any of
the apprentices did help at press 1730-32, his labours, most likely as
'second',
would not need to
be marked by letter, because he would claim no wages at piece rates from
his
master.
Press-letters as used by Aris have the same value as figures in
alerting
one to possibilities of reissue, reimpression, and divided printing, as
evidenced by items 9, 14 and 15 described below.
Possibly insignificant are typographical variations in press-letters: the
alternation between upper and lower case letters, changes in size of type,
and
the occasional use of italic instead of roman. Sometimes the choice seems
to
have been made from the case nearest to hand, containing the type used in
the text or the notes. Still it seems odd that in Budgell's Memoirs of
the
Earl of Orrery only W, out of the seven press-letters used, alternates
between W and w or w. A similar variation in size of
press-figures
was noticed by J. D. Fleeman in respect of William Somerville's The
Chace (1735), which was printed by Bowyer, but here on closer
examination the variation seems to be without significance.[5]
Unlike figures, letters have one great inconvenience, that they may
easily
be confused with signatures and even catchwords, such as A and I. This is
surely why they are seldom encountered.
But how 'idiosyncratic' was this use of letters? For Aris during
1730-32
it was a standard practice, since out of twelve octavos dated
within these years and identified as coming from Aris's press, seven are
lettered; indeed for 1731-32 only one book is unlettered. Aris seems to have
adopted the practice, or sanctioned it, some time in 1730. Daniel
Waterland's
The nature, obligation, and efficacy, of the Christian Sacraments,
considered, 'Printed by Sam. Aris for John Crownfield' (1730), is
unmarked, but its
Supplement, also dated 1730, is lettered.
However,
Budgell's
Letter to His Excellency Mr. Ulrick D'Ypres
(1731) is also
unmarked. Title-page dates of course are no precise indication of the date
of
printing.
Before 1730 the few books recognized as Aris's, most belonging to
1727-28, have some sheets unmarked and others figured 1 or 3. After 1732
no books have been recognized as coming from Aris's press, on the
evidence
of imprint or printer's devices, of which Aris used at least two; by October
1734 he was dead. The above sample is too small to allow generalizations
about the limits and extent of Aris's use of press-letters.
It is worth noting that other printers in this period use letters, but in
ways that I shall not try to explain. Bentham at Cambridge, as remarked by
Dr. McKenzie, uses b-d, 3-6, and 8 in a book of 1743, and examples of
Parliamentary printing, Acts, Bills, and the King's Speeches, by John
Baskett
1726-51 bear the letters B/b, C/c, e, and figures 1-8. This is a complication
to be added to the 'many mysteries about press-figures yet to be
solved'.[6]
The above examples, trivial in themselves, remind us that we need
continually to 'reconsider our ideas about the permissible variations in the
early printer's routine', and to revise and extend our notions of what is
considered normal, since it is out of such notions that our bibliographical
and
textual hypotheses are made.[7]
