The declaration contained in this colophon seems incompatible with the truth, as well as with the admissions of Schœffer himself, on other occasions, unless it be understood as applying to the exquisite initial letters, these being printed wholly in colours, instead of being sketched in by the hand of the rubricator or coloured by illuminators. These very letters however, it is believed by some, including Mr. Humphreys, (see p. 86 of his work,) were the work of Gutenberg; and M. Fischer in his interesting essay[134] has shewn, that in several small works[135] which issued from Gutenberg’s press before the forfeiture of his plant to Faust, the identical letters (the smaller initials) used in the Psalter, as well as some of those printed in two colours, and of which he has given fac-similes, appear. But if, as there is abundant reason to believe was the case, Schœffer was engaged as an assistant at the Zum Jungen at, or soon after the year 1450, when Gutenberg first obtained advances from Faust, these capitals, the beauty of which is undisputed, may have been, and most probably were, designed by him for the projected works for which the money was advanced; and, as his ‘inventions,’ and not the work of Gutenberg, they would be included in the property which was transferred to Faust on the termination of the law-suit. Looked at from this point of view, they may be thought to justify the assertion in the colophon of the Psalter of 1457, although there can be no doubt but that that work was partly completed while the whole property was still in the possession of Gutenberg, and that therefore to him must be attributed the honour of planning, and cutting the fount of types with which it was executed. “The most perfect copy known of this work, (says Mr. Timperley,) is that in the Imperial Library of Vienna. It was discovered in the year 1665, near Innspruck in the castle of Ambras, where the Archduke Francis Sigismund had collected a prodigious quantity of manuscripts and printed books; taken for the most part from the famous library of Matthias Corvinus, King of Hungary, from whence it was transported to Vienna. The book is printed in folio on vellum, and of such extreme variety, that though not more than six or seven copies are known to be in existence, all of them differ from each other in some respect. The Psalter occupies one hundred and thirty-five, and the recto the hundred and thirty-sixth, and the remaining forty-one leaves are appropriated to the litany, prayers, responses, vigils, &c. The Psalms are executed in larger characters than the hymns; the capital letters are cut in wood, with a degree of delicacy and boldness which are truly surprising: the largest of them--the initial letters of the Psalms--which are black, red, and blue, must have passed three times through the press.” From 1457 to 1466 the following works were printed by Faust and Schœffer. (1) The Psalter, 2d edition.--1459.