In the fourteenth century this multitude of book-readers had not been created. One hundred copies would have been considered a great edition, and the engravers or printers who took such a hazard would have waited many years for purchasers. Their unwillingness to take an unwise risk has been often regarded as an evidence, not of their sagacity, but of their stupidity. There are writers who have taught that the project of a printed book was a grand conception, not to be imagined by any but a great inventor—an idea far above the capacity of any printer of playing cards or images; but the legends in the image prints teach us that the early engravers knew how to engrave the letters, and that they could have engraved entire books of letters if they had thought it expedient. The advantages or disadvantages of engraving books were considered by them as they would be by publishers of our own time, purely as an economical question. The early engravers decided that books of letters could be appreciated, and would be purchased, only by the educated, a class too small to reward the labor of the engraver. For the making of books, printing was not regarded as an economical process, and books were consequently made by the cheaper process of writing. While it was unprofitable to engrave letters for books, it was profitable to engrave designs for printed fabrics, images and playing cards. On work of this character, the relations of cost and sale were completely reversed. The expenses for engraving one design, one image, or one suite of cards, was small; but the sale of the work printed from the blocks was generally very large. Fabrics that could be worn, cards that [p192] could amuse, and images that would serve as decorations or as aids to devotion, had attractions for all people, and especially for the poor and illiterate. Whoever printed merchandise of this nature could rightfully expect that it would be sold in such large quantities that the cost of engraving would be inappreciable. The world was not ready at the beginning of the fifteenth century to apply its knowledge of printing with ink to the making of books. It was regarded as too expensive a process. It bided its time, waiting for more readers and book-buyers, for paper in greater supply and of better quality, for higher skill on the part of the engravers, printers and ink-makers. If there were no other evidences than those afforded by the partly printed and written books, it could be safely assumed that when the early engravers did begin to print books, they would be, not books of letters, but books of pictures. [p193] XI Block-Books of Images without Text.