“If his friends had not yet the pleasure of occasionally receiving his lively salutations—of enjoying the gay and gentlemanlike converse, the whim, the anecdote, and the agreeable bagatelle of William Caslon aforesaid, I might be induced to amplify on these points . . . The mention, however, of one thing must not be omitted. Some years ago he was deprived of sight by the {327} formation of a cataract in each eye; still his musical ear furnished the faculty of distinguishing persons whom he knew by their voices; and his cheerful spirits enabled him to sustain the calamity with a becoming temper of mind. At length, his courage, in undergoing the operation of couching three several times, was rewarded with the perfect restoration of his sight; and his friends again experience the delight of hearing him truly say, ‘Ah! I’m happy to see you, by ——.’ But although ever ready with anecdote and whim to enliven, still more to his honour as a man, may it be added, that he can at once turn the cheerful smile into serious solicitations, for the assistance of a decayed old friend, his orphan, or his widow.” Mr. Caslon died in 1833. The portrait here given is taken from that in Hansard’s _Typographia_. William Caslon IV, being left in sole possession of the foundry, made considerable progress in extending the business, especially by the addition of the new fashioned fat-faced types, at that period so largely affected. His chief improvement, however, was the introduction in 1810 of the Sanspareil matrices for large letters.[676] This invention, which Hansard somewhat extravagantly describes as the greatest improvement in the art of letter-founding that has taken place in modern times, consisted in the substitution of pierced, or rather built-up matrices, in place of the old sand moulds hitherto in use, and it rapidly secured favour in the trade, and was as early as possible adopted by the other founders. In 1812, Mr. Caslon also took out a patent for a new form of type for imposing on a cylinder, of a size from 1/3 to 1/7th that of ordinary type, and cast wedge-shaped, or larger at the end containing the face than at the foot; an attempt which reflected more credit on the ingenuity of its author than upon his practical judgment, and which was not proceeded with.[677] Although no complete specimen book of Caslon IV has occurred to our notice of a later date than that of 1807 (which is itself the 1803 book altered by pen and ink), the numerous sheets appearing from time to time, and collected in the first specimen of his successors, prove that one or more specimens of the foundry must have appeared during the interval. In 1819, Mr. Caslon, Junr. disposed of his foundry to Messrs. Blake, Garnett & Co., of Sheffield, to which town the entire stock was removed.