The powers conferred on the Company by its charter related exclusively to the publication of printed matter; and the rights of search granted in the subsequent Acts confirming the charter appear to have been directed rather against the possession of smuggled or illegally printed books than against the possession of the materials necessary to produce them. In 1582 was tried a celebrated lawsuit known as the Star Chamber case of John Day _versus_ Roger Ward and William Holmes, for illegal printing of an {125} _A B C_ and _Catechism_.[206] In the course of the inquiry occurs an interesting reference to the practice of printers as their own letter-founders, which we reproduce as being one of the earliest direct notices of letter-founding in the Public Records. Amongst the questions put to the recalcitrant Roger Ward[207] the following three were intended to discover whether the illicit _A B C_ was printed by him in his own type, or whether (with a view to remove suspicion from himself) he had printed it in the type of another printer:― “QUESTION XIII. Did any person or personns Ayde help or assist you with paper letters (_type_) or other necessaries in this work? “ANSWER. He was not with paper letters (_type_) or other necessaryes in the said worke aidyd holpen or assistyd by any manner of personne or persons but that one Adam a Servant of Master Purfo(o)ttes dyd lend him some letters wherewith he imprinted the said boke. “QUESTION XVIII. Whether were the Letters wherewith you imprinted the sayd _A B C_ your owne yea or no? If not whose were they and by what meanse came you by them, And whether with the Consent of the owner or not? And whether have you redelivered them back againe and how long since, And what nomber of Reames did you imprint with the said letter? “ANSWER. That all the letters wherewith he impryntyd the said _A B C_ were not his owne for he dyd borrowe of one Adame, a man of one master Purfott all the Inglisshe (_i.e._, _Black_) Letters to the said worke and he borrowyd these letters without the consent of the said master Purfytt and hath the same as yet in this defendants custodye and have not Redelyvered of the same sithes he borrowyd the same as aforesaid and to his Remembrance he Did imprynt with the sayd letter the nomber of Twentie Reames of paper. “QUESTION XIX. Whether have you cast any new Letter of your owne since the first printinge of the said _A B C_, and what nomber of the same have you printed of that letter (_in that type_)? “ANSWER. He confessyth that he hath sythes the first imprintyng of the said _A B C_, cast a newe letter of his owne and yet he hath not pryntyd any of that letter (_in that type_).”