moment. It is the Act touching the merchants of Italy, which forbids them selling their wares in this realm. Here it is:-"Provided always that this Act, or any part thereof in nowise extend or be prejudicial of any let, hurt, or in pediment to any artificer or merchant stranger, of what nation or country he be or shall be of, for bringing inte this realm, or selling by retail or otherwise, of any manner of books written or imprinted." Can we stand up agains that, if we have more presses than the old press of the Abbey of Westminster?"

Ay, truly, we can, good friend,' briskly answered Wynkyn. 'Have we any books in our stores? Could we ever print books fast enough? Are there not readers

rising up on all sides? Do we depend upon the court The mercers and the drapers, the grocers and the spicers of the city, crowd here for our books. The rude uplandish men even take our books; they that our good master rather vilipended. The tapsters and taverners have our books. The whole country-side cries out for our ballads and our Robin Hood stories; and, to say the truth, the citizen's wife is as much taken with our King Arthurs and King Blanchardines as the most noble knight that Master Caxton ever desired to look upon in his green days of jousts in Burgundy. S fill the case.**

But if foreigners bring books into England,' said cautious William Machlinia, there will be more books than readers.'

'Books make readers,' rejoined Wynkyn. Do you re member how timidly even our bold master went on before he was safe in his sell? Do you forget how he asked this lord to take a copy, and that knight to give him something in fee; and how he bargained for his summer venison and his winter venison, as an encouragement in his ventures? But he found a larger market than he ever counted upon T and so shall we all. Go ye forth, my brave fellows. Stay

* To "fill the case" is to put fresh types in the case, ready to arrange new pages. The bibliographers scarcely understood the technical expression honest Wynkyn.

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thats not to work for me, if you can work better for yourselves. is real I fear no rivals.'

Why, Wynkyn,' interposed Pynson, you talk as if let, hurt printing were as necessary as air; books as food, or clothgering, or fire.'

- bringi And so they will be some day. What is to stop the of any want of books? Will one man have the command of books, and up and another desire them not? The time may come when press every man shall require books."

'Perhaps,' said Lettou, who had an eye to printing the ly as Statutes, the time may come when every man shall want to read an Act of Parliament, instead of the few lawyers who buy our Acts now.'

'Or perchance you think that, when our sovereign liege up meets his Peers and Commons in Parliament, it were well aster to print a book some month or two after, to tell what the books said Parliament said, as well as ordained?'

wik

6

'Nay, nay, you run me hard,' said Wynkyn.

And if within a month, why not within a day? Why cha shouldn't we print the words as fast as they are spoken? erde We only want fairy fingers to pick up our types, and presses that Doctor Faustus and his devils may some day make, to tell all London to-morrow morning what is done d' this morning in the palace at Westminster.'

'Prithee, be serious,' ejaculated Wynkyn. 'Why do you talk such gallymaufry? I was speaking of possible y things; and I really think the day may come when one person in a thousand may read books and buy books, and we shall have a trade almost as good as that of armourers and fletchers.'

The Bible!' exclaimed Pynson;
O that we might
print the Bible! I know of a copy of Wickliffe's Bible.
That were indeed a book to print!'

'I have no doubt, Richard,' replied Wynkyn, that the happy time may come when a Bible shall be chained in every church, for every Christian man to look upon. You remember when our brother Hunte showed us the chained

books in the library at Oxford. So a century or two here a Bible may be found in every parish. Twelve thousa parishes in England! We should want more paper in the good day, Master Richard.'

'You had better fancy at once,' said Lettou, 'that every housekeeper will want a Bible! Heaven save the mark how some men's imaginations run away with them!'

'I cannot see,' interposed Machlinia, how we can ventur upon more presses in London. Here are two. They have been worked well since the day when they were shipped Cologne. Here are five good founts of type, as much a thousand weight-Great Primer, Double Pica, Pica-a larg and a small face, and Long Primer. They have wel worked; they are pretty nigh worn out. What man wo risk such an adventure, after our good old master? H was a favourite at court and in cloister. He was we patronized. Who is to patronize us?"

4

The people, I tell you,' exclaimed Wynkyn. Th babe in the cradle wants an Absey-book; the maid at he distaff wants a ballad; the priest wants his Pie; the you lover wants a romance of chivalry to read to his mistress the lawyer wants his Statutes; the scholar wants his Virg and Cicero. They will all want more the more they ar supplied. How many in England have a book at all think you? Let us make books cheaper by printing mor of them at once. The churchwardens of St. Margarets asked me six-and-eightpence yesterday for the volume th our master left the parish ;* for not a copy can I get, if w! should want to print again. Six-and-eightpence? Tha was exactly what he charged his customers for the volume Print five hundred instead of two hundred, and we could his sell it for three-and fourpence.'

It

'And ruin ourselves,' said Machlinia. Master Wynky the I shall fear to work for you if you go on so madly. What are has turned your head?"

*There is a record in the parish books of St. Margaret's of the churc wardens selling for 68. 8d. one of the books bequeathed to the church b William Caxton.

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'Hearken,' said Wynkyn. The day our good master The was buried I had no stomach for my home. I could not eat. I could scarcely look on the sunshine. There was a chill at my heart. I took the key of our office, for you all were absent, and I came here in the deep twilight. I sat down in Master Caxton's chair. I sat till I fancied I saw him moving about, as he was wont to move, in his furred gown, explaining this copy to one of us, and shaking his head at that proof to the other. I fell asleep. Then I dreamed a dream, a wild dream, but one that seems to have given me hope and courage. There I sat, in the old desk at the head of this room, straining my eyes at the old bar proofs. The room gradually expanded. The four frames went on multiplying, till they became innumerable. saw case piled upon case; and form side by side with form. All was bustle, and yet quiet, in that room. Readers passed to and fro; there was a glare of many lights; all seemed k employed in producing one folio, an enormous folio. In an instant the room had changed. I heard a noise as of the many wheels. I saw sheets of paper covered with ink as quickly as I pick up this type. Sheet upon sheet, hundreds of sheets, thousands of sheets, came from forth the wheels -flowing in unstained, like corn from the hopper, and coming out printed, like flour to the sack. They flew abroad as if carried over the earth by the winds. Again the scene changed. In a cottage, an artificer's cottage, though it had many things in it which belong to princes' palaces, I saw a man lay down his basket of tools and take up one of these sheets. He read it; he laughed, he looked angry; tears rose to his eyes; and then he read aloud to his wife and children. I asked him to show me the sheet. It was wet; it contained as many types as our " Mirror of the World." But it bore the date of 1844. I looked around, and I saw shelves of books against that cottage wall-large volumes and small volumes; and a boy opened one of the large volumes and showed me numberless blockcuts; and the artificer and his wife, and his children gathered round me, all looking with glee towards their

his

ing!

books, and the good man pointed to an inscription on h bookshelves, and I read these words,

MY LIBRARY A DUKEDOM.

I woke in haste; and, whether awake or dreaming I know not, my master stood beside me, and smilingly exclaimed “This is my fruit." I have encouragement in this dream.

6

Friend Wynkyn,' said Pynson, these are distemper visions. The press may go forward; I think it will g forward. But I am of the belief that the press will never work but for the great and the learned, to any purpose profit to the printer. How can we ever hope to send our wares abroad? We may hawk our ballads and our merry jess through London; but the citizens are too busy to heed the and the apprentices and serving men are too poor to buy them To the country we cannot send them. Good lack, imagin the poor pedler tramping with a pack of books to Brist or Winchester! Before he could reach either city through our wild roads, he would have his throat cut or be starved Master Wynkyn, we shall always have a narrow market Ta till the king mends his highways, and that will never be.

I am rather for trying, Master Wynkyn,' said Lettor some good cutting jest against our friends in the Abber such as Dan Chaucer expounded touching the friars. Tha would sell in these precincts.'

Hush!' exclaimed Wynkyn: the good fathers are ou friends; and though some murmur against them, we might

have worse masters.'

'I wish they would let us print the Bible, though,' ejac lated Pynson.

The time will come, and that right soon,' exclaimed the hopeful Wynkyn.

6

'So be it,' said they one and all.

But what fair sheet of paper is that in your hand, good Wynkyn?' said Pynson.

This is

'Master Richard, we are all moving onward. English-made paper. Is it not better than the brown thick paper we have had from over the sea? How he would