The time that elapsed from the death of Louis XI. until the accession of Francis I.--that is to say, from 1483 to 1515--was, to employ an old expression, the golden age of French printing and illustration. Under Charles VIII. and Louis XII. the designers on wood were not yet affected by the neighbouring schools; neither the accentuated Italian influence nor the German processes had reached them; they did in their own way that which came to them, and they did it in their own fashion and habit, without foreign influence. Further, the kings did not ignore them, and Louis XII. preserved to the printers of the university all their rights and privileges in a magniloquent ordinance, in which the art of typography was extolled in the highest terms. It restores to them all the advantages that they had lost. It recites, "In consideration of the great benefit that has come to our kingdom by means of the art and science of printing, the invention of which seems more Divine than human, which, thanks to God, has been invented and found in our time by the help and industry of booksellers, by which our holy Catholic faith has been greatly augmented and strengthened, justice better understood and administered, and Divine service more honourably and diligently made, said, and celebrated, ... by means of which our kingdom precedes all others," etc., etc. (Blois, 9th April, 1513). Certainly Louis made the best of himself and his kingdom in this preamble, but it must be recognised that France already held a predominant rank in the new industry, and that beyond the Italians she had no fear of serious rivalry. The school of ornamentists made constant progress. Before the books of hours, the booksellers contented themselves with miserable blocks, placed side by side, forming a framework of good and bad together; but after Simon Vostre, Verard, and the others they were singularly refined. The borders, at least in the books of hours, had become the principal part of the book; they had in them flowers, architectural, complicated, and simple subjects, all of perfect taste and extreme elegance; and, as we have observed in the representation of Anne of Brittany in the _Illustrations de la Gaule_, the figure subjects were no longer mechanical, commonplace, and tiresome blocks, but, on the contrary, more often works specially designed and engraved by artists of merit. [Illustration: Fig. 47.--Title of the _Entree d'Eléonore d'Autriche a Paris_, by Guillaume Bochetel. Printed by Geoffroy Tory in May, 1531, quarto.]