Page:The practice of typography - a treatise on the processes of type-making, the point system, the names, sizes, styles and prices of plain printing types by De Vinne, Theodore Low, 1828-1914.djvu/15

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PLAIN PRINTING-TYPES
I

The Processes of Type-making

Types must be founded in moulds

PRINTING-TYPES are made from an alloy of melted lead, tin, antimony, and sometimes copper, that fills the mould exactly and shrinks but little in cooling. The utility of typography depends upon the accuracy of each type, and the consequent squareness of a thousand or hundred thousand types any combination. This accuracy is most certainly secured by founding each type singly in a mould. Experiments in cutting or swaging them from cold metal have hitherto been unsuccessful. Nor is there any practical substitute for type-metal: brass and copper melt at a great heat that soon wears out the mould; lead and tin are too soft for the service required; glass is too brittle, and will

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