and inventor. Birmingham has contributed many distinguished men to the industrial armies of England; but there are few of whom she has more reason to be proud than the skilful genius who was at once the British Aldus Manutius and the finest printer of modern times."*

He was very intimate with Dodsley, the bookseller, a man of great property and of irreproachable character, who stayed with him when in Birmingham, and with whom Baskerville stayed when he was in London.† His correspondence with Shenstone is quite voluminous, and with Benjamin Franklin he had very excellent relations. Franklin visited him in Birmingham, advised him in his printing affairs, and in the proposed sale of his type when he was about to give up business. It is not likely, if he had been profane and ignorant, that he would have remained on such terms with such people. The trouble seems to have been that he refused to put himself on a par with other printers, and insisted that he did much better work than anybody else; this of course brought the whole clamjamfrie down on him.

Baskerville had probably very little taste for letters as such. He printed the books which, in the estimation of the public, were most important. He was a type-founder and printer, not a scholar. He printed Bibles and Prayer Books not because he believed in Christianity, but because they were the books which everybody used and which he thought warranted the most effective treatment. I think he can hardly be said to have printed a book which represented his ideas, unless it be Shaftesbury's "Characteristicks," which was brought out in 1773, and is a beautiful specimen of his printing. He admired the satire of "HudiDictionary of National Biography.

+Straus, Robert Dodsley, pages 219, 273.

bras" and was fond of quoting it, and as Shenstone says, "was seized with a violent inclination to publish 'Hudibras,' his favorite poem, in a pompous quarto in an entire new set of cuts." He liked Voltaire, and is said to have quoted him constantly. He sent copies of the editions of Virgil and Milton to Voltaire at Ferney, and proposed to him to print some work of his. Voltaire replied in English, "I thank you earnestly for the honour you do me. I send you an exemplary by the way of Holland." Baskerville set up some sheets from the copy which was sent him and returned them to Voltaire, who replied, "The old scribbler to whom you have been so kind as to send your magnificent editions of Virgil and Milton thanks you heartily. He will send you as soon as possible his poor sheets duly corrected. They stand in great need of it."* Beyond this fondness for "Hudibras" and admiration for Voltaire, we have nothing to show that Baskerville cared anything for letters. He was artistic, but at the same time mercenary and vain. He meant to print books such as had never been printed, and he expected that people would buy them and pay the expense. When they did not, he became disgusted and gave up the work for two or three years. Then, spurred into action by the attempt of Boden, a rival printer in Birmingham, to print a Bible, he came again into the field and printed some of his finest works. But all the time he was in bad temper because his books cost him so much money and he got so little back. He wrote Walpole that he should be obliged to sell his little patrimony, that he had borrowed £2000 to print the Cambridge Bible. He continually looked out for little expenses. In a letter to Dodsley he says, "As you are in the Land of Franks, half a Doz would do me a peculiar pleasure, as a good many things *Lettres inédites de Voltaire (1857), page 254.

not worth a Groat might be communicated by, &c." He was excessively self-confident. He considered himself different from others. He thought that whatever was brought into being by Baskerville was therefore a fine thing, and truth compels us to say he was probably right. His japan work was better than that of any one else, and his printing was the finest that England had seen or has since seen.

So much for Baskerville the man. We have now to see what he did as a type-founder and printer.

At the beginning of the century there was no real type foundry in England. Nearly all the type used was imported from Holland, but in 1737 Samuel Caslon, who was a gunsmith's apprentice, issued a specimen sheet of his founts of type, and after that England could depend upon her own resources for types. William Caslon, brother to Samuel, afterward lived with a Birmingham type-maker named William Anderton, who printed a little specimen of Great Primer, Roman and Italic. Baskerville probably became acquainted with Anderton. At any rate, there is here an explanation of the way in which the japanner's interest became aroused in the designing and making of founts of type for purposes of printing. Much of the beauty of type depends upon the printer, and therefore Baskerville soon came to see that he must print with the types which he cut. From the very commencement of his experiments in type-founding he was determined to occupy himself both with type-founding and printing. It also occurred to him to introduce a new kind of paper which had been finished in a certain way. In a word, he wished to use processes for books very similar to those which he had used for his japanned goods. His proposals, therefore, took

the following shape. There was to be a new typography, and for its introduction four points were to be considered: First, the character of the types themselves; secondly, the press; thirdly, the paper and ink; and lastly, the actual mode of printing.

It is fortunate that in the preface to the second book which Baskerville printed - Milton's "Paradise Lost"- he took the world into his confidence. It is the only preface written by him. He said: "AMONGST the feveral mechanic Arts that have engaged my attention, there is no one which I have pursued with so much steadiness and pleasure, as that of Letter-Founding. Having been an early admirer of the beauty of Letters, I became infenfibly defirous of contributing to the perfection of them. I formed to my self Ideas of greater accuracy than had yet appeared, and have endeavoured to produce a Sett of Types according to what I conceived to be their true proportion.

"Mr. Caflon is an Artist, to whom the Republic of Learning has great obligations; his ingenuity has left a fairer copy for my emulation, than any other master. In his great variety of Characters I intend not to follow him; the Roman and Italic are all I have hitherto attempted; if in these he has left room for improvement, it is probably more owing to that variety which divided his attention, than to any other cause. I honor his merit, and only wish to derive some small share of Reputation, from an Art which proves accidentally to have been the object of our mutual pursuit.

in

"After having spent many years, and not a little of my fortune my endeavours to advance this art; I muft own it gives me great Satisfaction, to find that my Edition of Virgil has been fo favorably received. The improvement in the Manufacture of the Paper, the Colour, and Firmness of the Ink were not over

looked; nor did the accuracy of the workmanship in general, pafs unregarded. If the judicious found fome imperfections in the first attempt, I hope the present work will shew that a proper ufe has been made of their Criticisms: I am confcious of this at least, that I received them as I ever shall, with that degree of deference which every private man owes to the Opinion of the public.

"It is not my defire to print many books; but such only, as are books of Confequence, of intrinsic merit, or eftablished Reputation, and which the public may be pleased to see in an elegant dress, and to purchase at such a price, as will repay the extraordinary care and expence that must neceffarily be bestowed upon them. Hence I was defirous of making an experiment upon fome one of our best English Authors, among those Milton appeared the most eligible. And I embrace with pleasure the opportunity of acknowledging in this public manner the generofity of Mr. Tonfon; who with fingular politenefs complimented me with the privilege of printing an entire Edition of that Writers Poetical Works.

"In the execution of this defign, if I have followed with exactness the Text of Dr. Newton, it is all the merit of that kind which I pretend to claim. But if this performance fhall appear to persons of judgment and penetration, in the Paper, Letter, Ink and Workmanship to excel; I hope their approbation may contribute to procure for me what would indeed be the extent of my Ambition, a power to print an O&avo Common-Prayer Book, and a FOLIO BIBLE.

"Should it be my good fortune to meet with this indulgence, I wou'd use my utmost efforts to perfect an Edition of them with the greatest Elegance and Correctness; a work which I hope