CHAPTER XIV. ANECDOTES OF LAWRENCE COSTER ... ART OF PRINTING HOW DISCOVERED ... ITS ORIGINALITY DISPUTED ... FEMALE FORTITUDE AND PRESENCE OF MIND ... SIEGE OF HAARLEM ... HEROIC CONDUCT OF THE WOMEN ... BRIEF ANECDOTE OF WOUVERMANS ... OF BAMBOCCIO ... FATAL EFFECTS OF SEVERE CRITICISM ... ANECDOTES OF NICHOLAS BERGHEM AND HIS TERMAGANT WIFE ... OF RUYSDAAL ... ENORMOUS SLUICES ... APPROACH AMSTERDAM ... ITS GENERAL APPEARANCE ... A SLEY ... ERASMUS’S WHIMSICAL DESCRIPTION OF THAT CITY ... THE STADT-HOUSE ... SILENCE REPRESENTED AS A FEMALE ... THE TOWER ... CLOCKS, SINGULAR MODE OF STRIKING THE HOUR. Not far from the church, the spot where stood the house of Lawrence Coster, who lived in the middle of the fifteenth century, the celebrated inventor of the art of printing, is shewn; formerly there was a statue over the gate where he lived, within this inscription: MEMORIÆ SACRUM TYPOGRAPHIA, ARS ARTIUM OPTIMA CONSERVATRIX, HIC PRIMUM INVENTA CIRCA ANNUM MCCCCXL. The first book he printed is kept in the town house, in a silver case wrapt up in silk, and is always shewn with great caution, as a most precious relic of antiquity. The glory of this transcendent discovery, which spread light and civilization over the world, and formed a new epoch in its history, was for a long time disputed between Haarlem, Mayence, and Strasburg: the latter, after a laborious investigation, has renounced her pretensions, and the general opinion seems to bestow the palm upon the first city. The manner in which Coster imbibed the first impressions of this divine discovery, is said to have been from his cutting the letters of his name on the bark of a tree, and afterwards pressing a piece of paper upon the characters, until they became legible upon it, which induced him to continue the experiment, by engraving other letters upon wood. Those early principles were soon diffused through France, with considerable improvements, by the enterprising ability of the Etiennes; by the learned Manutius, a celebrated Venetian painter, and the inventor of Italian characters, through Italy; and through the Netherlands by Christopher Plantin, whose printing office at Antwerp was one of the principal ornaments of the town, and who was distinguished for his skill, erudition, and prodigious wealth, created solely by a successful prosecution of his important business. Mayence contests the honour of the invention, but it is generally believed that a servant of Coster, of the name of Faustus, stole the types of his master on a Christmas-eve, whilst he was attending his devotions at church, and fled with his booty to Mayence. The portrait of Coster is to be seen in most of the booksellers’ shops at Haarlem, and in other principal towns.