The four corners of the pan are not square; and as the iron cover does not fit into the grooves, there is access to the interior of the pan by this means. Down them, then, the founder pours the lead, dipping it from the boiler, until it fills up completely all the little type openings in the plaster moulds. Then the crane lifts it and swings it over to the trough by which the boy is standing. It is lowered into the water to cool, after which a crane swings it over to the wooden standard, where one is waiting to be opened. The handle is removed, and then the founder, taking a heavy hammer, knocks off the lead at the corners and edges, where it has sealed up the iron lid on the pan. The cover is removed, and the contents of the pan taken out. The plaster is chipped off and thrown away; but now are seen lead plates of the size of the plaster moulds, having their surface raised in letters, just as that of the moulds was sunken in letters. The plates are about double the thickness of the slates used in schools. These plates are cooled, and washed free of plaster in the trough,--the boy in the picture is now doing this,--when they are ready to go into the finishing room, to be trimmed, planed, picked out, corrected, and generally made ready for use in the printing-office. In the first place, the plate is trimmed at the edges, and planed in a planing-machine, which shaves off, from the back, strips of the rough lead. It is beveled also; that is, the edges are shaved down in the left hand of the three smaller machines shown in this picture: the object of the beveling is to secure the plate afterward, when it comes to be put on the press. It is also picked out: a workman goes over the lettered surface with a sharp tool, clearing out letters which have accidentally become filled up with lead, and correcting all inaccuracies of form which he discovers. [Illustration: Planing and Beveling.] The man at work in this picture is planing the back of the plate again, for the purpose of getting the requisite thickness. The knife in this plane makes one shaving of lead, which rolls up as it leaves the plate, like any fine shaving. To take off another shaving, a piece of pasteboard is placed under the plate, by which it is raised a trifle higher, and so again brought under the knife. [Illustration: Correcting Stereotype Plates.] A proof is taken on a common hand-press, and with this proof before him the corrector marks such letters as were overlooked when the plate was picked out. This proof goes into the proof-reader’s room again, who now goes once more over the page, to see if everything is right; and after he has marked it, back it goes to the corrector, who now, with the printed proof-sheet before him, makes the corrections that are required. If, for instance, a letter is set up wrong, as _pan_ for _pen_, and has been overlooked by the proof-reader, and the plate is cast, what is to be done?