proved moreover to be a moveable type, in the first place by the inequality in the size of the several letters of which they are composed, and in the next, by some of them being reversed; as, for instance, in the word discerni. There are other grounds, too, for supposing that this great and important discovery took place at the time we have already stated; but we must refer such of our readers as desire to be made acquainted with them to Dr. Wetter's volume, while we proceed to detail the further progress of the art; and we find this recorded in a very consistent statement made by Trithemius, who, be it remembered, received his account of the discovery and its progress from the mouth of Peter Schöffer. "These inventions," says Trithemius, "were followed by another still more ingenious; they (Gutenberg and Fust) found out a way and manner of casting the forms of all the letters of the Latin alphabet, which forms they called matrices, and from which they cast letters of tin or brass, sufficient for every printing, which they had formerly engraved by hand." Nothing, we think, can be clearer than this statement; yet some writers, not content that the first idea of casting letters should have been carried into effect in this simple and obvious manner, have sought to prove, that the earliest process was the engraving the letters in steel, which letters then formed stamps from which copper matrices were struck. This opinion is, however, by no means tenable; when a simple process would bring about the desired result-a process, too, with which Gutenberg must have been acquainted, from its resemblance to that employed in casting metal mirrors(the production of such mirrors being one of the principal objects of the speculation in which he had engaged at Strasburg in conjunction with Dritzehn, Heilmann, &c.)-it is not to be supposed that he would reject it at the outset of his invention, for the sake of effecting the same object by a very laborious and expensive mode of proceeding. And nothing can prove more clearly that Gutenberg did discover a method of casting types, certainly imperfect, but still answering the end in view, than the fact that Trithemius, when he reverts to the subject of type-founding, expressly declares that Schöffer discovered a much easier method of casting the letters.

The date of Schöffer's improvement cannot be determined. But that he had not made it known in the year 1452 or 1453, when Gutenberg commenced the printing of the Bible, is rendered certain, not only by the fact of that work being printed from type cast in the manner which Gutenberg had originally practised, but by an inspection of the letters used by Albrecht Pfister at Bamberg. Those employed by him in "Boner's Fabelbuch," printed in 1461, in “Die Vier Historien," printed in 1462, and in the

thirty-six line Bible, which he produced some few years earlier, were evidently cast in the faulty and imperfect leaden matrices, which is proved by the irregularity of their edges and corners. Pfister, who had commenced printing at Bamberg several years before the taking of Mayence, an event which occurred in 1462, and was the means of spreading abroad the newly-discovered art, and had obviously left the latter city, and the workshop of Gutenberg and Fust in consequence of their separation, which took place in 1455,-Pfister, it is very evident, knew nothing of Schöffer's method of casting letters by means of copper matrices, a fact which he could not have been ignorant of, had Schöffer in 1453 already brought his plan into operation.

In the year 1455, a difference between the partners, the possibility of which had been provided against in their deed of agreement, arose out of certain claims advanced by Fust in consideration of two advances, each amounting to eight hundred florins, made by him to Gutenberg; which claims, being resisted by the latter, became the subject of legal proceedings, and eventually led to the separation of the parties. It is not easy to decide what motives induced Fust to institute these proceedings against his associate; proceedings, however, which ended in Fust and Schöffer becoming possessed of all the tools, machinery, and materials, employed by Gutenberg and Fust in their printing establishment,-in Gutenberg's endeavouring to establish himself once more at Strasburg, and upon this failing, in his returning to Mayence, and erecting another printing-office with the funds provided by Dr. Humery.

Though Gutenberg failed in his endeavours to form fresh connexions at Strasburg, which evidently was the case, as we find him, with the assistance of Dr. Humery, recommencing printing at Mayence, where in 1460, he completed the Catholicon of John de Janua, an extensive work, which probably occupied him for three years; the fact of his having made such an attempt may, in some degree, have given rise to the idea of his having invented printing in that city. It is also probable that, after the separation, some of the workmen who had assisted Gutenberg retired to Strasburg; for Trithemius, upon the authority of Schöffer, expressly asserts that the art was first promulgated in Strasburg, and that moreover by some of those who had assisted the inventors. Albert Pfister too, as we have already seen, migrated to Bamberg at this period. Fust and Schöffer, on the other hand, remained at Mayence, where they established a printing-office of their own, from which they shortly afterwards

VOL. XIX. NO XXXVII.

K

produced those works which have been looked upon until the present day as master-pieces of typography.

*

It is not necessary for us to proceed further with this sketch of the origin and early progress of the Art of Printing. Dr. Wetter has, in our opinion, clearly established its origin at Mayence, and annihilated for ever the claims of Strasburg and Haerlem to be considered as the scene of its invention. The assertion that the claims of Haerlem must be silenced for ever, after Dr. Wetter's examination of them, may astonish many of our readers who have seen how strenuously they have been supported in the writings of English bibliographers. Nevertheless, the fact is as we have stated. These claims, indeed, were never put forth until they were advanced by Van Zuyren in his " Latin Dialogue upon the first invention of Printing," written by him between the years 1550 and 1560, and which, with the exception of some few of the introductory leaves, has been lost. Van Zuyren was followed by Theodor Volckhard Coornhert, a printer at Haerlem, who, in 1561, published a Dutch translation of Cicero De Officiis; and, in the dedication of his work to the town council of Haerlem, claimed the honour of the invention for that city, asserting that the art had been communicated to Mayence by the treachery of a servant. Coornhert again was followed by Guicciardini, and he again by the physician Hadrian Junius, who in his " Batavia," written before 1575, and printed at Leyden in 1588, relates the account given by Cornelis, the old bookbinder at Haerlem, of the pretended invention of the art of printing by his master, Lawrens Janssoon. Junius may be styled the Defender of the Faith of the men of Haerlem, and his history would be very satisfactory if it were only true. It wants, however, as our author shows very clearly, this desirable quality, which is the greater pity, seeing, as Lambinet says, how nicely the whole story is arranged: "Junius montre quelques principes dans son On y remarque la règle des trois unités, comme dansles drames; unité d'action, de temps, et de lieu. L'art typographique s'execute à Haerlem dans les 24 heures."

roman.

Dr. Wetter shows, however, that the Lawrens Janssoon who is the individual for whom the advocates of Haerlem claim the honour of the invention, could not have been in existence before 1440, but must indeed have been contemporary with Andries

*One of the most splendid specimens of modern typography which we have ever seen, is an edition of the "New Testament," printed in letters of gold, and enamelled, by De la Rue and Co., which we believe is on the eve of publication by Messrs. Richter and Co.

sohn, who was, in fact, the first Haerlem printer, and who erected his printing establishment in that city, in the year 1482. Then showing that this Lawrens Janssoon, the man who, according to the confused traditions of old people, erected at Haerlem the first printing press ever erected in the world, had for his wife a Catherine, the daughter of Andries, while the man who is proved by historical evidence to have been the first printer in that city was the son of Andries,-he contends that it is only reasonable to suppose that this said Catherine, the daughter of Andries, was a sister of the printer Andries' son, and that the printing establishment, which had heretofore been known as that of Andriessohn, must either have been founded by his brother-in-law, Lawrenz Janssoon Coster, or have been the common property of the two. This existed until 1486; and Meerman has satisfactorily proved that nothing of a later date is known to have proceeded from it. From this period until 1561, there did not exist any other printing establishment in Haerlem, and thus the confusion which existed in the traditionary accounts of the earliest printing establishments in that city may be readily explained.

Another curious fact, and which in some measure demonstrates that Cornelis is referring to the press of Andriessohn, when speaking of that of Lawrens Janssoon, and thereby establishes their identity as one and the same, is that, though he must necessarily have known the existence of Andriessohn's establishment, he never once mentioned it. But he knew their identity, and, knowing too that Andriessohn's press was the oldest in Haerlem, he supposed it to be the oldest and first in the world. That Cornelis, the old bookbinder, must have known of the existence of Andriessohn's establishment is put beyond a doubt, by the existence of a copy of the edition of " Bartholomeus, Van de Proprieteyten der Dingen," printed by Andriessohn at Haerlem, in 1485, and in which a former possessor has recorded that he "bought it at Haerlem, in Cross-street, of Cornelis the bookbinder, in the year 1492, in the month of May," &c. It is unnecessary for us to enter into any further examination of the fable, for such it is, which Junius has put upon record on this subject. The few facts we have already stated sufficiently prove how perfectly untenable are the claims which have been put forth from time to time by those who would award to Holland the honour of being the birth-place of the typographic art, and who would set up the statue of Coster upon the glorious column which Gutenberg has erected to his own memory.

The claims of Gutenberg to the proud title of Inventor of Printing are at length established, as it seems to us, beyond all

question. Germany has recognised them, and is preparing to do due honour to his memory. Gernsheim, the birth-place of Schöffer, saw, on the 9th of June last, a monument from the design of Scholl of Darmstadt, erected in honour of him who brought to such perfection the art which Gutenberg had invented. In March will Mayence have seen similar honours paid to the memory of its illustrious townsman.

In the year 1832, a committee was formed for the purpose of collecting subscriptions, and adopting such measures as might be necessary for the production of a memorial to Gutenberg, worthy alike of his genius and of his grateful country.

The design for this monument, which has been selected, is by the celebrated Thorwaldsen, and the casting of it has been entrusted to Crozatier of Paris. It was to have been erected in the course of the last year (1886), but has been delayed from various causes; among others from some difficulty in procuring the stone necessary for the pedestal, until the month of March, 1837. The committee have not decided upon the inscription to be affixed to it; there being no fewer than seven different ones submitted to them for their decision.

The expenses of this tribute to Gutenberg's memory are estimated at from twenty-five to twenty-six thousand florins, for which the city of Mayence has made itself responsible, in the full confidence of being indemnified by the subscriptions of the learned and the wealthy, not only of Germany but of all Europe.

We know not how far this confidence has been justified by the result, but we have much reason to fear that England, which boasts of being second to no other country in the world, either in civilization, or in love of the press and its liberty, has contributed but a very small quota to the subscription in honour of him, whose discovery is the strongest security which it possesses, that rational liberty shall be maintained for ever in the land. The sum stated to have been contributed to Gutenberg's monument by this country is so small, that we can only suppose the contemplated erection of such a monument has never been known to the intellectual classes of society in England. Where are those ardent patriots who once toasted at every public dinner, "The Liberty of the Press-it is like the air we breathe, if we have it not we die!" Where are they, we say, that their guineas do not flow in, towards erecting a monument to the memory of him who invented that press? Where is the Society of Antiquaries at such a moment? surely they have funds sufficiently ample to allow of their offering a tribute to the memory of the founder of