Item for Psalmes letters xv^c and di' ... the prise of C. iiij^d vj^s ij^d Item for p'ms letters lxiij^c ... prise of c. j^d v^s iij^d Item for wrytynge of a quare and demi ... prise the quayr xx^d ij^s vj^d Item for wrytenge of a calender xij^d Item for iij quayres of velym, prise the quayr xx^d v^s Item for notynge of v quayres and ij leves, prise of the quayr viij^d iii^s vij^d Item for capital drawynge iij^c and di', the prise iij^d Item for floryshynge of capytallis, v^c v^d Item for byndynge of the boke xij^s ------------ li^s ij^d ------------ It is possible that the work in this case was all done by one man, though it is equally possible that several were engaged on it, under the direction of a master-scrivener, but in either case the fact that vignettes and demi-vignettes, psalter letters (i.e. the small red letters at the beginning of each verse of a psalm, sometimes called versals), the mysterious "p'ms letters" (possibly the dabs of colour bestowed on small initials), the writing of the text, the writing of the calendar, the musical notation, and the drawing and flourishing the capitals, were all charged separately, at so much a piece or so much a hundred, shows how distinct each operation was kept. Partly, no doubt, from policy, so as not to rouse the wrath of more than one industry at a time, partly to save themselves trouble and expense, the earliest printers, with few exceptions, set themselves to supplant only the calligrapher, and sold their books with all the blanks and spaces, which the most modest or perfunctory scribe could have left to be filled by his kindred craftsmen. No better starting-point for a typographical collection could be desired than fine copies of two well-printed books in which the printer has confined himself severely to reproducing the text, leaving all headings, capitals, and ornaments to be supplied by hand. In one (as in the page from a book of Jenson's, which forms the illustration to this chapter, Plate VII) the blanks should remain blanks (as more especially in early books printed in Italy they often did remain), in the other they should have been filled in with red ink or colours by a rubricator. The owner of two such volumes is really as much at the fountain-head as the possessor of the Mainz Indulgences of 1454, or any still earlier document that may yet be found.[27] This is the logical beginning, and the logic of history is quite as interesting as the chronology.