The ink with which the cuts in the “Poor Preachers’ Bible” have been printed, is evidently a kind of distemper of the colour of bistre, lighter than in the History of the Virgin, and darker than in the Apocalypse. In many of the cuts certain portions of the lines appear surcharged with ink,--sometimes giving to the whole page rather a blotched appearance,--while other portions seem scarcely to have received any.[II-66] This appearance is undoubtedly in consequence of the light-bodied ink having, from its want of tenacity, accumulated on the block where the line was thickest, or where two lines met, leaving the thinner portions adjacent with scarce any colouring at all. The block must, in my opinion, have been charged with such ink by means of something like a brush, and not by means of a ball. In some parts of the cuts--more especially where there is the greatest portion of text--small white spaces may be perceived, as if a graver had been run through the lines. On first noticing this appearance, I was inclined to think that it was owing to the spreading of the hairs of the brush in inking, whereby certain parts might have been left untouched. The same kind of break in the lines may be observed, however, in some of the impressions of the old wood-cuts published by Becker and Derschau,[II-67] and which are worked off by means of a press, and with common printer’s ink. In these it is certainly owing to minute furrows in the grain of the wood; and I am now of opinion that the same cause has occasioned a similar appearance in the cuts of the “Biblia Pauperum Predicatorum.” Mr. Ottley, speaking of the impressions in Earl Spencer’s copy, makes the following remarks: “In many instances they have a sort of horizontally striped and confused appearance, which leads me to suppose that they were taken from engravings executed on some kind of wood of a coarse grain.”[II-68] This correspondence between Earl Spencer’s copy and that in the King’s Library at the British Museum tends to confirm my opinion that there are not so many editions of the book as Heineken,--from certain accidental variations,--has been induced to suppose. [Footnote II-66: Schelhorn has noticed a similar appearance in the old block-book entitled “Ars Memorandi:” “Videas hic nonnunquam literas atramento confluenti deformatas, ventremque illarum, alias album et vacuum, atramentaria macula repletum.” Amœnitat. Liter. tom. i. p. 7.]