A Manual of Mending and Repairing; With Diagrams

by Charles Godfrey Leland

Very valuable books should be kept in boxes of thin metal, especially in India. Such cases should not be made to open and shut with a hinged lid, but with a covering, and like a cigar case. Such cases, or at least metallic guards, should also be used when a book is wrapped and tied in the usual manner and sent by mail. I am quite sure that at least every other book which I have received by mail during the past year has shown on its edges melancholy scars from its strings, reminding one of the wounds which the heroic red Indian retained from his bonds. A guard is simply a piece of sheet-metal, bent as follows, once or twice:—

These guards are invaluable for packing books in trunks. Their price is trifling, and in the end there would be great economy in using them. Books should not be packed very tightly together on their shelves. It bursts the binding, especially of modern works in boards and paper. The old parchment flexible bindings were in every respect better, and they could even now be made far more cheaply than is generally supposed to be possible. I have before me a book nearly three hundred years old, bound in skiver parchment (split, or very thin), which has evidently been much used, yet which is still in good condition. But parchment need not be prepared very carefully for ordinary binding, and it could be sold for half the price charged by law stationers for what is used to write on. In the United States one must pay much more for a sheepskin than for a sheep, indeed in some cases three or four times as much—that is to say, the skin as a parchment in New York costs as much as three sheep in the Far West—and yet the expense of bringing the skin to the East and of tanning it are in no proportion whatever to the stationer’s profits.

Any one who will examine an ordinary old parchment-bound book, such as lies before me, will see at a glance why it must be more durable than a modern binding. In the modern book the stiff back rises full to the edge, or generally above the level of the sides, and is made of muslin, paper, or at best of soft leather. Therefore in time it breaks from pressure and friction, or wears away. The parchment or vellum had in most cases this back-edge put back or kept down as much as possible, and the tough covering was all in one piece. It is very true that it is not possible to obtain plain, old-fashioned parchment now, and that those who would have vellum, or even sheep, must pay an enormous price for it. This would not, however, be the case long if there were as great a popular demand for parchment binding as there now is for flimsy muslin. Those who prefer the former will find no difficulty in having it made for them, and in binding their books themselves according to the directions which I have given.

I shall in the chapter on Papier-mâché show how covers for books may be cheaply made at no great expense, which may be beautifully embossed and are extremely durable. This is, briefly, by having a flat mould or die, on which lay alternate coats of paper and firm paste (into which glue and alum enter), then passing over them a bread-roller, continually adding paste and paper till the whole is complete. When finished, rub in black or any other colour, then rub in oil, rub again, apply Soehnée, No. 3, and finally rub by hand. This will make very beautiful binding.

It is much to be regretted that, although there has been of late years, owing to machinery and patent processes, such immense production of cheap and showy binding, as shown in photograph albums, there has been as steady and rapid decrease in quality, strength, and durability. It is becoming unusual, even in very expensive books, to find one which can be honestly and well opened or is well stitched. I have, since writing that last word, tested it with two books recently published, one costing six shillings, the other a guinea. The latter was fairly well put together and “held,” but was warped in the stitching and pasting. It was “bad work.” As for the six shilling book, it cracked clear through to the back at every page which I opened, and yet I did not open it very widely. I should say that any amateur who could not learn to bind books better in a month or six weeks than these were bound must be stupid indeed. The examination of a number of other books shows that what I have said is now generally true, and that even very expensive and pretentiously elegant works are not half so well bound in reality as were common and cheap school-books two hundred years ago. This I have also confirmed by examining a number of the latter bound in parchment, which bid fair to last for centuries to come.

Should this cheap, trashy, and showy style of binding continue, and with it a constant rise in the price of everything made by hand, the result will be that everything durable will be made by “amateurs”—that is, by people who to artistic spirit unite a certain personal independence. Owners of libraries will bind their own books, or else employ people who will work as artists, and not like mere machines. The vulgar and ignorant will continue to buy showy, cheap duplicates—induced by hearing, “’Ere’s an harticle, mum, that we’re sellin’ a great many hof”—while the cultured will prefer the hand-made, which is not necessarily more expensive. In fact, if the unemployed in England—or the victims of the wholesale steam trash-maker—could be taught easy hand-work, as they all can be, it would be possible to not only vastly relieve national poverty, but we could have a variety of articles of better quality. For it appears to be, by some strange law, a fact that, with all the improvements in machinery, men can still make by hand—and well—pictures, clothes, shoes or boots, bookbindings, and works of art generally—that is to say, anything in which skill or character can be shown; while, on the contrary, in all such matters machinery, instead of making any progress, is, owing to competition, actually falling behind! Scientific and other journals are continually boasting of new discoveries and improvements, but despite this the jerry-built houses of three-fourths of London, the sawed and glued cheap and vile furniture (made by scientific steam) with which they are filled, the average quality of everything into which skill and taste are supposed to enter, show that this boasted “end of the century” is also rapidly coming to an end in good taste and the quality of its work.

He who will learn to mend with care, taste, and skill, firstly his books, will find that to progress from this to binding and to making elegant covers is only going from A to B. The binding of the olden time, while it was incredibly strong, vigorous, and quaint, was extremely easy to make, as I have satisfied myself by much examination and personal practice. The stitching was not with the weakest and cheapest cotton-thread; still less was it with wires too thin for the purpose; it was executed with linen pack-thread, from the top to the bottom of the page, in three or four stitches, so that the book could really be opened and bent back till the covers touched without injury to it. All of which could be given to-day with the parchment covers at the same price which the book now costs, and to pay the same profit, were it not that public “taste” prefers showy trash. Beyond good, strong stitching, all the necessary process of binding is very easy. It requires neatness and care, and some practice, but it is decidedly not difficult. He who has mastered it will find that other kinds of mending, and also the practice of allied minor arts, are simply the succeeding letters of the alphabet.

It is a fact, to which I invite attention, that dilettante amateurs of books invariably understand by binding nothing more than its refinements and easily ruined adornment, which books had better be without. Amateurs of this class always attempt at once the most difficult work, and generally fail. As a rule, almost without exception, the prize specimens of modern binding seen at exhibitions are chiefly remarkable for ornament, which will not endure handling or rubbing, such as surface-gilding.

Pamphlets or letters, &c., can be bound with “eyelets,” and the clamp or punch which is sold with them. Or they may be simply gummed together, in which case use the powerful fish-glue, which holds perfectly.