Wynken de Worde continued printing up to 1534, and issued over four hundred works. He used no less than nine different marks, all of them bearing Caxton's initials, evidencing the regard of the pupil for his master; the mark which we reproduce is one of rare occurrence. Richard Pynson began in 1493, and continued well into the sixteenth century, and was one of the first of the "privileged" printers, authorised to issue the legal and parliamentary publications. One of the marks used by him is here reproduced. Julian Notary began in 1498. The only style of illustration used by any of these early printers was the woodcut, and of this there was very little beyond the title-page and printer's mark. The artistic form of the Book originated on the Continent, but England was not slow to adopt it and fashion it to her own ends. [Illustration: Fig. 41.--Mark of Richard Pynson.] Thus was printing spread abroad, carrying with it to the countries where it was established the rules of an unchangeable principle; but, according to its surroundings, it was so transformed in a few years that its origin was no longer recognised. It was light in Italy, heavy in Germany, gay in France. Painting, of which it was accidentally the issue, returned to it under the form of illustration a short time after its first and fruitful essays. The Gothic character, generally used in Germany, continued in France with the Vostres, the Verards, and others up to the middle of the sixteenth century, although the first artisans before this used Roman type; it was also the prevailing type used in English books. In Italy it was Jenson, a Frenchman, who gave to the matrix the alphabet preserved to the present time; and it was the Venetians and Florentines who learned before all others the art of judicious ornamentation of the Book. The French came very near perfection, thanks to their printers and booksellers, at the end of the century; and the Germans found illustrious artists to scatter their compositions in their large, heavy works. [Illustration] CHAPTER III. 1500 TO 1600.