every account necessary for that department; cases may occur where the sheets, from particular circumstances, have to be charged in fractional parts, of which an instance is given in G.

The corrections can be entered against each sheet, as charged. Pages charged at random, or where from circumstances they cannot be placed in the signatures to which they belong, are entered in a spare corner, and scratched off when placed and deducted.

A calculation of the price of any number of pages less than a sheet, entered just under the valuation per sheet, will afford much facility in checking the Compositors' book.

It would be folly to suppose my mode generally applicable to every peculiarity of business: it would be impossible to devise a plan that should be so; but I have seen some tolerably large concerns to which it is applied; and I have seen the books of others, totally inexplicable to any one but those who wrote them (and not very clear even to them), where it would have applied. Others may have superior methods adapted to their individual concerns; but I am venturing on the subject only with a view of information to those who may not have formed their own plans, and may think any information I can give worth attending to. I shall only add that, for Job work I have found the same columns equally applicable: for Parliamentary, or Bill work, a different appropriation of the columns may be necessary; but, in my judgment, I cannot conceive any possible cases in which I could not keep the accounts by the same form of entry.

Other accounts may be kept at the fancy or judgment of each individual. The weekly pay-list, where many are employed, may be formed into a book or sheet, of foolscap, to draw into each other the private accounts, from a pocket-ledger to a regular cash-book, each one must keep according to circumstances; my business here is only with those necessary for the printing-office itself.

WAREHOUSE DEPARTMENT.

CHAPTER XII.

Of the Warehouse-Duties of the Warehouse-man-Giving out Paper, Hanging up, Taking down, Laying down a Gathering, Gathering, Collating, Folding, Pressing, Making up Waste, Booking.

The Business of a Warehouse-man.

THE warehouse department of a printer is a highly important part of his concern; the management of which involves his own credit, and materially affects the interest of his employers it is therefore indispensably necessary to appoint a man for the management of it, who has been regularly brought up to the business; on whom the utmost reliance may be placed for sobriety and honesty, and who can be taught to feel and act upon the principle of making his master's, and his master's employers interest, the object of his constant solicitude. Those who have not such qualifications will be continually liable, through ignorance and carelessness, to fall into many serious mistakes; such as mixing papers belonging to different works, and thereby destroying the uniformity of them; giving or setting out the paper incorrectly, which must afterwards be made good by reprinting those sheets which are found to be deficient, or the sheet wanting is left out of a book here and there, and in this imperfect state the work is delivered to the bookseller, who, perhaps, if a large number has been printed of a slow-selling book, will be several years before he discovers the deficiency, and must make the demand of having his books perfected, after so long a time, under very awkward circumstances. These and many other reasons show the impropriety of employing persons in the warehouse not acquainted with its business. I must, however, observe, that the master or overseer should fre

quently look to the concerns of the warehouse, and see that the people employed there forward the different works with expedition, neatness, and accuracy.

Having made these observations, I shall now proceed to speak of the different stages of this department, and begin by supposing the warehouse to be quite clear, business coming in, and the warehouse-man just entering upon his office. He should first be provided with a book which is termed "The Warehouse-book." When the porter or carman brings paper from the stationer or bookseller, the warehouse-man will demand the bill of delivery, and see if it is right according to the invoice, before he signs the receipt, after which he will enter it immediately into the Warehouse-book.

In some houses it is thought necessary to keep a set of books in a warehouse: First, a Day-book, or Journal: secondly, an Employer's Paper-book, in which a place is allotted for every work, with a general index; and wherein the receipt, use, and balance of all papers are kept: thirdly, the Delivery-book; in this, also, a place is assigned for each work, with the number printed, and every delivery of the same, posted from the Day-book : fourthly, a book for the paper received and used on the master's private account: fifthly, Wetting-book: add to these, two or three others for particular accounts. I am, however, of opinion, that the fewer books left to the care of a warehouse-man the better, and have only one book in this department, as particularly described in the preceding chapter; which, with the assistance of the file, I find amply sufficient for posting every article to my own general book.

Having entered the receipt of the paper, the warehouse-man should then write on each bundle, with red chalk, the title of the book it is intended for, and remove it into a part of the warehouse most out of his way, or into a store-room kept for that purpose; observing to place it so as to take up as little room as possible.

Of giving or setting out Paper for the Press.

A BUNDLE of paper contains two reams- -a ream of paper, perfected, consists of 516 sheets, or twenty-one quires and a half, twenty-four sheets to each quire. If not perfected, twenty quires

to the ream, of which the two outside quires are called corded or cassé, as they are generally rubbed by the cording of the ream. These quires are by the paper-maker made up of torn, wrinkled, stained, and damaged sheets; not that the whole quire always consists of such sheets, some good or passable being generally found in looking them over. But the general custom now is, for booksellers and authors to send in their paper perfect. When, however, it is sent in imperfect, it is the warehouse-man's business to lay by the two outside quires, to cull them when most convenient, and to add the quires to make the bundle perfect. What he afterwards selects as passable of the sheets in the outside quires, he must take care to dispose of so that they may neither be at the beginning nor end, but about the middle of the volume; or to have them used wholly for jobs or proof paper; for they are seldom so perfect as the inside quires.

It is the general custom to print of every work what is termed an even number, either 250, 500, 750, 1000, &c. These quantities are set out for the wetter in tokens: viz. for 250 (sheets) one token, containing 10 quires 18 sheets; for 500, two tokens, one 11 quires, and the other 10 quires and a half; for 750, three tokens, two of them 11 quires each, and the other 10 quires 6 sheets; and for 1000, four tokens, three of them 11 quires each, and the other 10 quires. If a work is printed in half-sheets, it, of course, requires only half the above quantities.

As it will sometimes happen that other numbers different from the above are printed, it may be necessary to give some hints to warehouse-men on this head. In giving out fractions of a ream of paper for short numbers, some loss will necessarily arise in the division of the overplus. The twenty-one quires and a half of twenty-four sheets each, making 516 sheets, is ample allowance, (if the paper has been honestly supplied) for the overplus books expected by the booksellers, and for waste, in numbers amounting to 500. But since the tympan-sheets and register-sheets are equally used for either small or large numbers, an overplus proportionate to the above will seldom be found sufficient for numbers under 500. Hence, when paper is given out for smaller fractional numbers, an additional allowance must be made; or it will be difficult to make up even the proper number; since, according to this rule, the proportion of the sixteen sheets overplus in a ream,