Until a comparatively recent period, no better method of inking the type had been devised than Gutenberg’s sheep-skin dabbers, or stamping balls. Earl Stanhope, who greatly improved the printing-press, sought by many experiments to supply the ink by means of a revolving cylinder or roller, instead of by the old process. The first impediment was the seam which it was necessary to make down the whole length of the roller; and it could be kept neither soft nor pliable. Providentially these difficulties were overcome by observing a process in the Staffordshire potteries, in which the workmen use what are there called dabbers. These dabbers, composed of glue and treacle, possessed every requisite to hold and distribute the ink, spreading it evenly over the form, besides being easily kept clean and pliable. This method was at once seized upon by ingenious printers, who used it in time in the cylinder form, as is common now in all printing-offices. Formerly, the word _the_ was indicated by the letters _y_ and _e_, thus--_y^e_; _&_ was used for _and_; with other ungainly abbreviations. Connected letters were also employed; _c_ and _t_ were joined by a curve from the top of one to the other; and when two _s’s_ occurred a long _ſ_ was used. [Illustration: COMPOSITION ROOM.] Instead of ponderous folios and quartos, untitled, unpaged, and unparagraphed; without capitals, and with words so huddled together as to put the reader to his wit’s end to make out the meaning, now we have the beautiful pocket and library editions, convenient in size, clear and intelligible within,--“books that you may carry to the fire and hold readily in your hand,” as Dr. Johnson says. We have, in imagination, visited Gutenberg’s Printing Rooms, and can vividly recall his rude beginnings and slow and toilsome methods; his printing-press; the wonder of that age,--only turning off a few hundred impressions per diem. With this in mind, let us step into a representative printing establishment of our times,--the “Riverside,” at Cambridge, Mass.; for we wish to get a just idea of the Art of arts. We will first visit the Composition Room.