Fig. 5.
Fig. 5.
Plates or maps that are not paged can only be checked from the printed list. When checked it will save time if thenumber of the page which each faces is marked on the back in small pencil figures.
In the case of early printed books or manuscripts, which are often not paged, special knowledge is needed for their collation. It may roughly be said, that if the sections are all complete, that is, if there are the same number of leaves at each side of the sewing in all the sections, the book may be taken to be perfect, unless of course whole sections are missing. All unpaged books should be paged through in pencil before they are taken apart; this is best done with a very fine pencil, at the bottom left-hand corner; it will only be necessary to number the front of each leaf.
After the volume has been collated it must be “pulled,” that is to say, the sections must be separated, and all plates or maps detached.
If in a bound book there are slips laced in the front cover, they must be cut and the back torn off. It will sometimes happen that in tearing off the leather nearly all the glue will come too, leavingthe backs of the pages detached except for the sewing. More usually the back will be left covered with a mass of glue and linen, or paper, which it is very difficult to remove without injury to the backs of the sections. By drawing a sharp knife along the bands, the sewing may be cut and the bands removed, leaving the sections only connected by the glue. Then the sections of the book can usually be separated with a fine folder, after the thread from the centre of each has been removed; the point of division being ascertained by finding the first signature of each section. In cases where the glue and leather form too hard a back to yield to this method, it is advisable to soak the glue with paste, and when soft to scrape it off with a folder. As this method is apt to injure the backs of the sections, it should not be resorted to unless necessary; and when it is, care must be taken not to let the damp penetrate into the book, or it will cause very ugly stains. The book must be pulled while damp, or else the glue will dry up harder than before. The separated sections must be piled up carefully to prevent pages being soiled by the damp glue.
All plates or single leaves “pasted on” must be removed. These can usually be detached by carefully tearing apart, but if too securely pasted they must be soaked off in water, unless of course the plates have been painted with water-colour. If the plates must be soaked off, the leaf and attached plate should be put into a pan of slightly warm water and left to soak until they float apart, then with a soft brush any remaining glue or paste can be easily removed while in the water. Care must be taken not to soak modern books printed on what is called “Art Paper,” as this paper will hardly stand ordinary handling, and is absolutely ruined if wetted. The growing use of this paper in important books is one of the greatest troubles the bookbinder has to face. The highly loaded and glazed surface of some of the heavy plate papers easily flakes off, so that any guard pasted on these plates is apt to come away, taking with it the surface of the paper. Moreover, should the plates chance to be fingered or in any way soiled, nothing can remove the marks; and should a corner get turned down, the paper breaks and the corner will fall off. It is the opinion of experts that thisheavily loaded Art Paper will not last a reasonable time, and, apart from other considerations, this should be ample reason for not using it in books that are expected to have a permanent value. Printers like this paper, because it enables them to obtain brilliant impressions from blocks produced by cheap processes.
In “cased” books, sewn by machinery, the head and tail of the sheets will often be found to be split up as far as the “kettle” stitches. If such a book is to be expensively bound, it will require mending throughout in these places, or the glue may soak into the torn ends, and make the book open stiffly.
Some books are put together with staples of tinned iron wire, which rapidly rust and disfigure the book by circular brown marks. Such marks will usually have to be cut out and the places carefully mended. This process is lengthy, and consequently so costly, that it is generally cheaper, when possible, to obtain an unbound copy of the book from the publishers, than to waste time repairing the damage done by the cloth binder.
Generally speaking, the sections of a book cased in cloth by modern methods are so injured as to make it unfit for morepermanent binding unless an unreasonable amount of time is spent on it. It is a great pity that publishers do not, in the case of books expected to have a permanent literary value, issue a certain number of copies printed on good paper, and unbound, for the use of those who require permanent bindings; and in such copies it would be a great help if sufficient margin were left at the back of the plates for the binder to turn it up to form a guard. If the plates were very numerous, guards made of the substance of the plates themselves would make the book too thick; but in the case of books with not more than a dozen plates, printed on comparatively thin paper, it would be a great advantage.
Some books in which there are a large number of plates are cut into single leaves, which are held together at the back by a coating of an indiarubber solution. For a short time such a volume is pleasant enough to handle, and opens freely, but before long the indiarubber perishes, and the leaves and plates fall apart. When a book of this kind comes to have a permanent binding, all the leaves and plates have to be pared at the back and made up into sections with guards—a troublesome and expensivebusiness. The custom with binders is to overcast the backs of the leaves in sections, and to sew through the overcasting thread, but this, though an easy and quick process, makes a hopelessly stiff back, and no book so treated can open freely.
Fig. 6.—DividersFig. 6.—Dividers
Fig. 6.—Dividers
When the sheets of books that have to be rebound have been carelessly folded, a certain amount of readjustment is often advisable, especially in cases where the book has not been previously cut. The title-page and the half-title, when found to be out of square, should nearly always be put straight. The folding of the whole book may be corrected by taking each pair of leaves and holding them up to the light and adjusting the fold so that the print on one leaf comes exactly over the print on theother, and creasing the fold to make them stay in that position. With a pair of dividers (fig. 6) set to the height of the shortest top margin, points the same distance above the headline of the other leaves can be made. Then against a carpenter’s square, adjusted to the back of the fold, the head of one pair of leaves at a time can be cut square (seefig. 7). If the book has been previously cut this process is apt to throw the leaves so far out of their original position as to make them unduly uneven.
Accurate folding is impossible if the “register” of the printing is bad, that is to say, if the print on the back of a leaf does not lie exactly over that on the front.
Crooked plates should usually be made straight by judicious trimming of the margins. It is better to leave a plate short attail or fore-edge than to leave it out of square.
Fig. 7.Fig. 7.
Fig. 7.
The old “joints” must be knocked out of the sections of books that have been previously backed. To do this, one or two sections at a time are held firmly in the left hand, and well hammered on the knocking-down iron fixed into the lying press. It is important that the hammer face should fall exactly squarely upon the paper, or it may cut pieces out. The knocking-down iron should be covered with a piece of paper, and the hammer face must be perfectly clean, or the sheets may be soiled.
Guarding—Throwing Out—Paring Paper—Soaking off India Proofs—Mounting very Thin Paper—Splitting Paper—Inlaying—Flattening Vellum
Guardsare slips of thin paper or linen used for strengthening the fold of leaves that are damaged, or for attaching plates or single leaves.
Fig. 8.Fig. 8.
Fig. 8.
Guards should be of good thin paper. That known as Whatman’s Banknote paperanswers very well. An easy way to cut guards is shown infig. 8. Two or three pieces of paper of the height of the required guards are folded and pinned to the board by the right-hand corners. A series of points are marked at the head and tail with dividers set to the width desired for the guards, and with a knife guided by a straight-edge, cuts joining the points are made right through the paper, but not extending quite to either end. On a transverse cut being made near the bottom, the guards are left attached by one end only (seefig. 9), and can be torn off as wanted. This method prevents the paper from slipping while it is being cut.
Fig. 9.Fig. 9.
Fig. 9.
A mount cutter’s knife (fig. 10) will be found to be a convenient form of knife to use for cutting guards.
In using the knife and straight-edge a good deal of pressure should be put on the straight-edge, and comparatively little on the knife.
Fig. 10.—Mount Cutter’s KnifeFig. 10.—Mount Cutter’s Knife
Fig. 10.—Mount Cutter’s Knife
To mend the torn back of a pair of leaves, a guard should be selected a little longer than the height of the pages and well pasted with white paste (see page288). If the pair of leaves are not quite separated, the pasted guard held by its extremities may be simply laid along the weak place and rubbed down through blotting-paper. If the leaves are quite apart, it is better to lay the pasted guard on a piece of glass and put the edges of first one and then the other leaf on to it and rub down.
On an outside pair of leaves the guard should be inside, so that the glue may catch any ragged edges; while on the inside pair the guard should be outside, or it will be found to be troublesome in sewing. In handling the pasted guards care is needed not to stretch them, or they may cause the sheet to crinkle as they dry.
Fig. 11.Fig. 11.
Fig. 11.
Plates must be guarded round the sections next them. When there are a great many plates the back margin of each, to which a guard will be attached, must be pared (seefig. 11, A), or the additional thickness caused by the guards will make the back swell unduly. In guarding plates a number can be pasted at once if they are laid one on another, with about an eighth of an inch of the back of each exposed, the top of the pile being protected by a folded piece of waste paper (seefig. 12). To paste, the brush is brought from the top to the bottom of the pile only, and not the other way, or paste will get between the plates and soil them. Guards should usually be attached to the backs of plates, and should be wide enough to turn up round the adjoining section, so that theymay be sewn through. Should a plate come in the middle of a section, the guard is best turned back and slightly pasted to the inside of the sheet and then sewn through in the ordinary way.
Fig. 12.Fig. 12.
Fig. 12.
If plates are very thick, they must be hinged, as shown atfig. 11, B. This is done by cutting a strip of about a quarter of an inch off the back of the plate, and guarding with a wide guard of linen, leaving a small space between the plate and the piece cut off to form a hinge. It will save some swelling if the plate is pared and a piece of thinner paper substituted for the piece cut off (seefig. 11, C). If the plates are of cardboard, they should be guarded on both sides with linen, and may even need a second joint.
A book that consists entirely of platesor single leaves must be made up into sections with guards, and sewn as usual. In books in which there are a great many plates, it is often found that two plates either come together in the centre of a section, or come at opposite sides of the same pair of leaves. Such plates should be guarded together and treated as folded sheets (seefig. 13).
Fig. 13.Fig. 13.
Fig. 13.
In order to be sure that the pages of a book to be guarded throughout will come in their proper order, it is well to make a plan of the sections as follows, and to check each pair of leaves by it, as they are guarded:—
Thus, if the book is to be made up into sections of eight leaves, the pairs of leaves to be guarded together can be seen at once if the number of the pages are written out—
First the inside pair, 7 and 9, are guarded together with the guard outside, then the next pair, 5 and 11, then 3 and 13, andthen the outside pair, 1 and 15, which should have the guard outside. A plan for the whole book would be more conveniently written thus—
To arrange a book of single leaves for guarding, it is convenient to take as many leaves as you intend to go to a section, and opening them in the centre, take a pair at a time as they come.
The number of leaves it is advisable to put into a section will depend on the thickness of the paper and the size and thickness of the book. If the paper is thick, and the backs of the leaves have been pared, four leaves to a section will be found to answer. But if the paper is thin, and does not allow of much paring, it is better to have a larger section, in order to have as little thread in the back as possible.
The sheets of any guarded book should be pressed before sewing, in order to reduce the swelling of the back caused by the guards.
Fig. 14.Fig. 14.
Fig. 14.
Maps or diagrams that are frequently referred to in the text of a book, should be “thrown out” on a guard as wide as the sheet of the book. Such maps, &c., should be placed at the end, so that they may lie open for reference while the book is being read (seefig. 14). Large folded maps or diagrams should be mounted on linen. To do this take a piece of jaconet and pin it out flat on the board,then evenly paste the back of the map with thin paste in which there are no lumps, and lay it on the linen, rub down through blotting-paper, and leave to dry. Unless the pasting is done evenly the marks of the paste-brush will show through the linen. If a folded map is printed on very thick paper each fold must be cut up, and the separate pieces mounted on the linen, with a slight space between them to form a flexible joint.
Fig. 15.Fig. 15.
Fig. 15.
A folded map must have in the back of the book sufficient guards to equal it in thickness at its thickest part when folded, or the book will not shut properly (seefig. 15).
For paring the edge of paper for mending or guarding, take a very sharp knife,and holding the blade at right angles to the covering-board, draw the edge once or twice along it from left to right. This should turn up enough of the edge to form a “burr,” which causes the knife to cut while being held almost flat on the paper. The plate or paper should be laid face downwards on the glass with the edge to be pared away from the workman, the knife held in the right hand, with the burr downwards. The angle at which to hold the knife will depend on its shape and on the thickness and character of the paper to be pared, and can only be learned by practice. If the knife is in order, and is held at the proper angle, the shaving removed from a straight edge of paper should come off in a long spiral. If the knife is not in proper order, the paper may be badly jagged or creased.
Place a piece of well-sized paper in a pan of warm water, then lay the mounted India proof, face downwards, upon it and leave it to soak until the proof floats off. Then carefully take out the old mount, and the India proof can be readily removedfrom the water on the under paper, and dried between sheets of blotting-paper.
Very thin paper, such as that of some “India” proofs, may be safely mounted as follows:—The mount, ready for use, is laid on a pad of blotting-paper. The thin paper to be mounted is laid face downwards on a piece of glass and very carefully pasted with thin, white paste. Any paste on the glass beyond the edges of the paper is carefully wiped off with a clean cloth. The glass may then be turned over, and the pasted plate laid on the mount, its exact position being seen through the glass.
It is sometimes desirable to split pieces of paper when the matter on one side only is needed, or when the matter printed on each side is to be used in different places. The paper to be split should be well pasted on both sides with a thickish paste, and fine linen or jaconet placed on each side. It is then nipped in the press tomake the linen stick all over, and left to dry.
If the two pieces of jaconet are carefully pulled apart when dry, half the paper should be attached to each, unless at any point the paste has failed to stick, when the paper will tear. The jaconet and paper attached must be put into warm water until the split paper floats off.
Fig. 16.Fig. 16.
Fig. 16.
When a small plate or leaf has to be inserted into a larger book, it is best to “inlay it”; that is to say, the plate or leaf is let into a sheet of paper the size of the page of the book. To do this, a piece of paper as thick as the plate to be inlaid, or a little thicker, is selected, and on this is laid the plate, which should have been previously squared, and the positions of the corners marked with a folder. A point is made about an eighth of an inch inside each corner mark, and the paper within these points is cut out (seefig. 16). This leaves a frame of paper, theinner edges of which will slightly overlap the edges of the plate. The under edge of the plate, and the upper edge of the mount, should then be pared and pasted, and the plate laid in its place (with the corners corresponding to the folder marks). If the edges have been properly pared, the thickness where they overlap should not exceed the thickness of the frame paper. If an irregular fragment is to be inlaid, it is done in the same way, except that the entire outline is traced on the new paper with a folder, and the paper cut away, allowing one eighth of an inch inside the indented line.
The leaves of a vellum book that have become cockled from damp or other causes may be flattened by damping them, pulling them out straight, and allowing them to dry under pressure. To do this take the book to pieces, clean out any dirt there may be in the folds of the leaves, and spread out each pair of leaves as flatly as possible.
Damp some white blotting-paper by interleaving it with common white paperthat has been wetted with a sponge. One sheet of wet paper to two of blotting-paper will be enough. The pile of blotting-paper and wet paper is put in the press and left for an hour or two under pressure, then taken out and the common paper removed.
The blotting-paper should now be slightly and evenly damp. To flatten the vellum the open pairs of leaves are interleaved with the slightly damp blotting-paper, and are left for an hour under the weight of a pressing-board. After this time the vellum will have become quite soft, and can with care be flattened out and lightly pressed between the blotting-paper, and left for a night. The next day the vellum leaves should be looked at to see that they lie quite flat, and the blotting-paper changed for some that is dry. The vellum must remain under pressure until it is quite dry, or it will cockle up worse than ever when exposed to the air. The blotting-paper should be changed every day or two. The length of time that vellum leaves take to dry will vary with the state of the atmosphere, and the thickness of the vellum, from one to six weeks.
Almost any manuscript or printed book on vellum can be successfully flattened in this way; miniatures should have pieces of waxed paper laid over them to prevent the chance of any of the fibres of the blotting-paper sticking. The pressure must not be great; only enough is needed to keep the vellum flat as it dries.
This process of flattening, although so simple, requires the utmost care. If the blotting-paper is used too damp, a manuscript may be ruined; and if not damp enough, the pressing will have no effect.
Sizing—Washing—Mending
Thepaper in old books is sometimes soft and woolly. This is generally because the size has perished, and such paper can often be made perfectly sound by resizing.
Fig. 17.Fig. 17.
Fig. 17.
For size, an ounce of isinglass or good gelatine is dissolved in a quart of water. This should make a clear solution whengently warmed, and should be used at about a temperature of 120° F. Care must be taken not to heat too quickly, or the solution may burn and turn brown. If the size is not quite clear, it should be strained through fine muslin or linen before being used. When it is ready it should be poured into an open pan (fig. 17), so arranged that it can be kept warm by a gas flame or spirit lamp underneath. When this is ready the sheets to be sized can be put in one after another and taken out at once. The hot size will be found to take out a great many stains, and especially those deep brown stains that come from water. If there are only a few sheets, they can be placed between blotting-paper as they are removed from the size; but if there is a whole book, it is best to lay them in a pile one on the other, andwhen all have been sized to squeeze them in the “lying press” between pressing-boards, a pan being put underneath to catch the liquid squeezed out. When the sheets have been squeezed they can be readily handled, and should be spread out to dry on a table upon clean paper. When they are getting dry and firm they can be hung on strings stretched across the room, slightly overlapping one another. The strings must first be covered with slips of clean paper, and the sized sheets should have more paper over them to keep them clean.
Before sizing it will be necessary to go through a book and take out any pencil or dust marks that can be removed with indiarubber or bread crumbs, or the size will fix them, and it will be found exceedingly difficult to remove them afterwards.
When the sheets are dry they should be carefully mended in any places that may be torn, and folded up into sections and pressed. A long, comparatively light pressure will be found to flatten them better and with less injury to the surface of the paper than a short, very heavy pressure, such as that of the rolling-machine.
In some cases it will be found thatsheets of old books are so far damaged as to be hardly strong enough to handle. Such sheets must be sized in rather a stronger size in the following way:—Take a sheet of heavily-sized paper, such as notepaper, and carefully lay your damaged sheet on that. Then put another sheet of strong paper on the top, and put all three sheets into the size. It will be found that the top sheet can then be easily lifted off, and the size be made to flow over the face of the damaged sheet. Then, if the top sheet be put on again, the three sheets, if handled as one, can be turned over and the operation repeated, and size induced to cover the back of the damaged leaf. The three sheets must then be taken out and laid between blotting-paper to take up the surplus moisture. The top sheet must then be carefully peeled off, and the damaged page laid face downwards on clean blotting-paper. Then the back sheet can be peeled off as well, leaving the damaged sheet to dry.
The following is quoted from “Chambers’ Encyclopædia” on Gelatine:—
“Gelatine should never be judged by the eye alone.
“Its purity may be very easily tested thus: Soak it in cold water, then pour upon it a small quantity of boiling water. If pure, it will form a thickish, clear straw-coloured solution, free from smell; but if made of impure materials, it will give off a very offensive odour, and have a yellow, gluey consistency.”
When there are stains or ink marks on books that cannot be removed by the use of hot size or hot water, stronger measures may sometimes have to be taken. Many stains will be found to yield readily to hot water with a little alum in it, and others can be got out by a judicious application of curd soap with a very soft brush and plenty of warm water. But some, and especially ink stains, require further treatment. There are many ways of washing paper, and most of those in common use are extremely dangerous, and have in many cases resulted in the absolute destruction of fine books. If it is thought to be absolutely necessary that the sheets of a book should be washed, the safest method is as follows:—Take an ounce of permanganate of potash dissolvedin a quart of water, and warmed slightly. In this put the sheets to be washed, and leave them until they turn a dark brown. This will usually take about an hour, but may take longer for some papers. Then turn the sheets out and wash them in running water until all trace of purple stain disappears from the water as it comes away. Then transfer them to a bath of sulphurous (not sulphuric) acid and water in the proportion of one ounce of acid to one pint of water. The sheets in this solution will rapidly turn white, and if left for some time nearly all stains will be removed. In case any stains refuse to come out, the sheets should be put in clear water for a short time, and then placed in the permanganate of potash solution again, and left there for a longer time than before; then after washing in clear water, again transferred to the sulphurous acid. When sheets are removed from the sulphurous acid they should be well washed for an hour or two in running water, and then may be blotted or squeezed off and hung up on lines to dry. Any sheets treated in this way will require sizing afterwards. And if, as is often the case, only a few sheets at the beginning or endof the book have to be washed, it will be necessary to tone down the washed sheets to match the rest of the book by putting some stain in the size. For staining there are many things used. A weak solution of permanganate of potash gives a yellowish stain that will be found to match many papers. Other stains are used, such as coffee, chicory, tea, liquorice, &c. Whatever is used should be put in the size. To ascertain that the right depth of colour has been obtained, a piece of unsized paper, such as white blotting-paper, is dipped in the stained size and blotted off and dried before the fire. It is impossible to judge of the depth of colour in a stain unless the test piece is thoroughly dried. If the stain is not right, add more water or more stain as is needed. Experience will tell what stain to use to match the paper of any given book.
To remove grease or oil stains, ether may be used. Pour it freely in a circle round the spot, narrowing the circle gradually until the stain is covered. Then apply a warm iron through a piece of blotting-paper.
Ether should only be used in a draught in a well-ventilated room on account ofits well-known inflammable and anæsthetical properties.
A very dilute (about one per cent.) solution of pure hydrochloric acid in cold water will be found to take out some stains if the paper is left in it for some hours. When the paper is removed from the solution, it must be thoroughly washed in running water. It is important that the hydrochloric acid used should be pure, as the commercial quality (spirits of salts) often contains sulphuric acid.
The following recipes are quoted fromDe l’organisation et de l’administration des Bibliothèques, par Jules Cusin:—
To remove stains from paper:—“Mud Stains.—To take away these kinds of stains, spread some soap jelly very evenly over the stained places, and leave it there for thirty or forty minutes, according to the depth of the stain. Then dip the sheet in clean water, and then having spread it on a perfectly clean table, remove the soap lightly with a hog’s hair brush or a fine sponge; all the mud will disappear at the same time. Put the sheet into the clear water again, to get rid of the last trace of soap. Let it drain a little, press it lightly between two sheets of blotting-paper,and finish by letting it dry slowly in a dry place in the shade.
“Stains of Tallow, Stearine, or Fat.—To take away these stains cover them with blotting-paper and pass over them a warm flat-iron. When the paper has soaked up the grease, change it and repeat the operation until the stains have been sufficiently removed. After that, touch both sides of the sheets where they have been stained with a brush dipped in essence of turpentine heated to boiling-point. Then to restore the whiteness of the paper, touch the places which were stained with a piece of fine linen soaked in purified spirits of wine warmed in the water-bath. This method may also be employed to get rid of sealing-wax stains.
“Oil Stains.—Make a mixture of 500 gr. of soap, 300 gr. of clay, 60 gr. of quicklime, and sufficient water to make it of the right consistency, spread a thin layer of this on the stain, and leave it there about a quarter of an hour. Then dip the sheet in a bath of hot water; take it out, and let it dry slowly.
“You can also use the following method, generally employed for finger-marks:—
“Finger-marks.—These stains are sometimesvery obstinate. Still they can generally be mastered by the following method:—Spread over them a layer of white soap jelly (savon blanc en gelée), and leave it there for some hours. Then remove this with a fine sponge dipped in hot water, and more often than not all the dirt disappears at the same time. If this treatment is not sufficient, you might replace the soap jelly by soft soap (savon noir), but you must be careful not to leave it long on the printing, which might decompose and run, and that would do more harm than good.”
Sheets of very old books are best left with the stains of age upon them, excepting, perhaps, such as can be removed with hot water or size. Nearly all stainscanbe removed, but in the process old paper is apt to lose more in character than it gains in appearance.
For mending torn sheets of an old book, some paper that matches as nearly as possible must be found. For this purpose it is the custom for bookbinders to collect quantities of old paper. If a pieceof the same tone cannot be found, paper of similar texture and substance may be stained to match.
Supposing a corner to be missing, and a piece of paper to have been found that matches it, the torn page is laid over the new paper in such a way that the wire marks on both papers correspond. Then the point of a folder should be drawn along the edge of the torn sheet, leaving an indented line on the new paper. The new paper should then be cut off about an eighth of an inch beyond the indented line, and the edge carefully pared up to the line. The edge of the old paper must be similarly pared, so that the two edges when laid together will not exceed the thickness of the rest of the page. It is well to leave a little greater overlap at the edges of the page. Both cut edges must then be well pasted with white paste and rubbed down between blotting-paper. To ensure a perfectly clean joint the pasted edge should not be touched with the hand, and pasting-paper, brushes, and paste must be perfectly clean.
In the case of a tear across the page, if there are any overlapping edges, they may merely be pasted together and theend of the tear at the edge of the paper strengthened by a small piece of pared paper. If the tear crosses print, and there are no overlapping edges, either tiny pieces of pared paper may be cut and laid across the tear between the lines of print, or else a piece of the thinnest Japanese paper, which is nearly transparent, may be pasted right along the tear over the print; in either case the mend should be strengthened at the edge of the page by an additional thickness of paper. In cases where the backs of the sections have been much damaged, it will be necessary to put a guard the entire length, or in the case of small holes, to fill them in with pieces of torn paper. The edges of any mend may, with great care, be scraped with a sharp knife having a slight burr on the under side, and then rubbed lightly with a piece of worn fine sand-paper, or a fragment of cuttle-fish bone. Care must be taken not to pare away too much, and especially not to weaken the mend at the edges of the sheet. As a general rule, the new mending paper should go on the back of a sheet.
Sometimes it is thought necessary to fill up worm-holes in the paper. Thismay be done by boiling down some paper in size until it is of a pulpy consistency, and a little of this filled into the worm-holes will re-make the paper in those places. It is a very tedious operation, and seldom worth doing.
Fig. 18.Fig. 18.
Fig. 18.
Mending vellum is done in much the same way as mending paper, excepting that a little greater overlap must be left. It is well to put a stitch of silk at each end of a vellum patch, as you cannot depend on paste alone holding vellum securely. The overlapping edges must be well roughed up with a knife to make sure that the paste will stick. A cut in a vellum page is best mended with fine silk with a lacing stitch (seefig. 18).
Mending is most easily done on a sheet of plate-glass, of which the edges and corners have been rubbed down.
End Papers—Leather Joints—Pressing
Ifan old book that has had much wear is examined, it will generally be found that the leaves at the beginning and the end have suffered more than the rest of the book. On this ground, and also to enable people who must write notes in books to do so with the least injury to the book, it is advisable to put a good number of blank papers at each end. As these papers are part of the binding, and have an important protective function to perform, they should be of good quality. At all times difficulty has been found in preventing the first and last section of the book, whether end papers or not, from dragging away when the cover is opened, and various devices have been tried to overcome this defect. In the fifteenth century strips of vellum (usually cut from manuscripts) were pasted on to the back of the book and on the insideof the boards, or in some cases were merely folded round the first and last section and pasted on to the covers. The modern, and far less efficient, practice is to “overcast” the first and last sections. This is objectionable, because it prevents the leaves from opening right to the back, and it fails in the object aimed at, by merely transferring the strain to the back of the overcast section.
In order to make provision for any strain there may be in opening the cover, it is better to adopt some such arrangement as shown infig. 19. In this end paper the zigzag opens slightly in response to any strain.
The way to make this end paper is to take a folded sheet of paper a little larger than the book. Then with dividers mark two points an eighth of an inch from the back for the fold, and paste your paste-down paper, B B, up to these points (seefig. 19, II). When the paste is dry, fold back the sheet (A1) over the paste-down paper, and A2 the reverse way, leaving the form seen infig. 19, III. A folded sheet of paper similar to A is inserted at C (fig. 19, V, H), and the sewing passes through this. When thebook is pasted down the leaf A1 is torn off, and B1 pasted down on the board.If marbled paper is desired, the marble should be “made,” that is, pasted on to B1.
Fig.19.
There are considerable disadvantages in using marbled papers, as if they are of thick enough paper to help the strength of the binding, the “made” sheet is very stiff, and in a small book is troublesome. On no account should any marble paper be used, unless it is tough and durable. The quality of the paper of which most marbled papers are made is so poor, that it is unsuitable for use as end papers. For most books a self-coloured paper of good quality answers well for the paste-down sheets.
It is a mistake to leave end papers to be pasted on after the book has been forwarded, as in that case they have little constructive value. Every leaf of such an end paper as is described above will open right to the back, and the zigzag allows play for the drag of the board.
Paper with a conventional pattern painted or printed on it may be used for end papers. If such a design is simple, such as a sprig repeated all over, or an arrangement of stars or dots, it may look very well; but over elaborate end papers,and especially those that aim at pictorial effect, are seldom successful.
Ends may be made of thin vellum. If so, unless the board is very heavy, it is best to have leather joints.
A single leaf of vellum (in the place of B1 and 2, II,fig. 19) should have an edge turned up into the zigzag with the leather joint, and sewn through. Vellum ends must always be sewn, as it is not safe to rely upon paste to hold them. They look well, and may be enriched by tooling. The disadvantage of vellum is, that it has a tendency to curl up if subjected to heat, and when it contracts it unduly draws the boards of the book. For large manuscripts, or printed books on vellum, which are bound in wooden or other thick boards and are clasped, thicker vellum may be used for the ends; that with a slightly brown surface looks best. The part that will come into the joint should be scraped thin with a knife, and a zigzag made of Japanese paper.
Silk or other fine woven material may be used for ends. It is best used with a leather joint, and may be stuck on to the first paper of the end papers (B1, No. 2,fig. 19), and cut with the book. Theglaire of the edge gilding will help to stop the edges fraying out. In attaching silk to paper, thin glue is the best thing to use; the paper, not the silk, being glued. Some little practice is needed to get sufficient glue on the paper to make the silk stick all over, and yet not to soil it. When the silk has been glued to the paper, it should be left under a light weight to dry. If put in the press, the glue may be squeezed through and the silk soiled.
If the silk is very thin, or delicate in colour, or if it seems likely that it will fray out at the edges, it is better to turn the edges in over a piece of paper cut a little smaller than the page of the book and stick them down. This forms a pad, which may be attached to the first leaf of the end papers; a similar pad may be made for filling in the board.
Before using, the silk should be damped and ironed flat on the wrong side.
Silk ends give a book a rich finish, but seldom look altogether satisfactory. If the silk is merely stuck on to the first end paper, the edges will generally fray out if the book is much used. If the edges are turned in, an unpleasantly thick end is made.
Leather joints are pieces of thin leather that are used to cover the joints on the inside (for paring, see page154). They add very little strength to the book, but give a pleasant finish to the inside of the board.
If there are to be leather joints, the end papers are made up without A 1, and the edge of the leather pasted and inserted at D, with a piece of common paper as a protection (seefig. 19, IV). When the paste is dry, the leather is folded over at E.
A piece of blotting-paper may be pasted on to the inside of the waste leaf, leaving enough of it loose to go between the leather joint and the first sheet of the end paper. This will avoid any chance of the leather joint staining or marking the ends while the book is being bound. The blotting-paper, of course, is taken out with the waste sheet before the joint is pasted down.
Joints may also be made of linen or cloth inserted in the same way. A cloth joint has greater strength than a leather one, as the latter has to be very thinin order that the board may shut properly.
With leather or cloth joints, the sewing should go through both E and F.