Qy whether Wilson's declaration of 30,000 profits in 8 years be not a proof want of judgmͭ. Qy whether Wilson be not an adventͬ--without judgment. Hints to new Vice-Cͬ. 1. The system of talking _before_ them viz. Watts and Wilson. The absolute necessity of others being informed in the stereotype art. Watts talks of going to London again by Wilson's directions to see what chases and things he wants--and when I say he should not leave them, he says, Oh, there is no more in leaving them now than when he was ill--they are to be trusted. Qy--Quid cogitant ille and Wilson. Qy _x_ to agree with Oxfͩ? as a Stereotyper? The supposition contained in the last cryptic note was well justified, as Wilson had in March, 1805, proposed to the Clarendon Press "to put the University in possession of the Art of Stereotype Printing"; later in the same year the Delegates, having resolved that "the University of Cambridge being in possession of the Art, it seems not only expedient, but necessary, that Oxford should be possess'd of the same advantages," entered into an agreement by which Wilson was to instruct their representatives in the stereotype processes for the sum of £4000[128]. In 1806 Wilson claimed that, as the introduction of stereotyping had enabled the Syndics to convert a warehouse into a printing-office for the sum of £1500 instead of building a new one at a cost of £4500, he was entitled by the agreement to his share of the saving of £3000 thus effected. On 6 March, 1807, the university agreed to pay Wilson the sum of £865 16_s_ 9_d_ for the composition and two sets of plates of a bourgeois testament, a brevier testament and a nonpareil Welsh testament[129]; it being provided that the university should make for Wilson (from type supplied by himself) so many perfect plates towards octavo editions of Ainsworth's Dictionary and Johnson's Dictionary as should amount in value to the aggregate of Wilson's bill. Later in the same year the university definitely acquired the stereotype secret by a further agreement: £2000 was to be paid immediately, £1000 which had been previously advanced to Wilson was to become his property, and further sums were to be paid in accordance with the amount of the sales of bibles, testaments and prayer-books[130]. The following extracts, describing the outline of the stereotype process, are taken from Milner's notebook: 1. The pages as they come from the composers have been first well cleansed with a solution of American Potash--14 lb in 3 buckets of water. 2. They must then be gently dried by the fire and then _cool_ and a little oil of Turpentine is put on a plate with 2 parts sweet oil.... This mixture gets thick by time: The plate is then well done over with a little of this mixture by one of the small soft brushes like a painter's brush....