In the year 1800, Mr. Figgins was engaged by Messrs. Eyre and Strahan, His Majesty’s Printers, to cut and cast an improved fount of Small Pica Domesday; and, in 1805, a new Pica of the same character, expressly for the purpose of printing the splendid and valuable publications of the Commission of Enquiry into the State of the Records of the Kingdom.[706] In the years 1807 and 1808, he was also employed by His Majesty’s Printers in Scotland on three further {340} founts (Pica, Long Primer, and Brevier) for the purpose of printing the Records of that portion of the Empire.[707] This improved Domesday (a specimen of which may be seen in Johnson’s _Typographia_), differs considerably from that of Jackson, in which the _Domesday Book_ had been printed in 1783,[708] and became, subsequently, the uniform character adopted for extracts from Domesday and other ancient Charters and Records quoted in modern topographical works. Mr. Figgins’ good fortune in the first results of his new business was somewhat tempered by the fact that, within a few years of the establishment of his foundry, the public taste with regard to the ordinary Roman letter experienced a complete revolution, setting aside the elegant models on which the punches of Jackson and his contemporaries had been cut, in favour of the new fashion which came in with the nineteenth century. To accommodate himself to this fashion must have involved Mr. Figgins in a considerable sacrifice of his early labour and industry, and the circumstance may possibly account for the somewhat remarkable absence of any specimen bearing his name for a lengthened period. In the appendix to Stower’s _Printers’ Grammar_, 1808, which exhibits the “modern faces” of Caslon and Fry, the compiler regrets not being able to show specimens of the new cut types from Mr. Figgins’ foundry, “but understands that in a few months Mr. F. will have fully completed his specimens.” These new founts appear in a specimen of 1815, a book which contains 24 pages of large letter from 16-line to 4-line; 35 pages of Roman and Italic from French Canon to Pearl; together with Titlings, Black Letter, and Flowers, and a few Orientals. Two years later, Mr. Figgins put forward a specimen of Newspaper founts, showing a series of eight sizes, on a broadside sheet,—the first specimen of the kind, we believe, specially addressed to the proprietors of the public press. The title of this sheet is printed in the 5-line German Text, which Hansard describes as a typographical curiosity. Speaking of Mr. Figgins about 1812, Mr. Nichols remarks (in the passage which called for the acknowledgment already quoted): “With an ample portion of his kind instructor’s reputation, he inherits a considerable share of his talents and industry, and has distinguished himself by the many beautiful specimens he has produced, and particularly of Oriental Types.”[709] {341}