In John Day's first books there was no sign of the skill he afterwards manifested. These were published in conjunction with William Seres, of whom we know little or nothing, outside his connection with Day. These partners began work in the year 1546 at the sign of the Resurrection on Snow Hill, a little above Holborn Conduit, that is somewhere in the neighbourhood of the present viaduct. They had also another shop in Cheapside. Their first book, so far as we know, was Sir David Lindsay's poem, 'The Tragical death, of David Beaton, Bishop of St. Andrews in Scotland; Wherunto is joyned the martyrdom of maister G. Wyseharte ... for whose sake the aforesayd bishoppe was not long after slayne' (1546, 8vo).
In the following year (1547) Day and Seres printed several other books of a religious character, nearly all of them in octavo, including Cope's Godly Meditacion upon the psalms, and Tyndale's Parable of the Wicked Mammon.
Their work in 1548 included a second edition of the Consultation of Hermann, the bishop of Cologne, Robert Crowley's Confutation of Myles Hoggarde, a sermon of Latimer's, a metrical dialogue aimed at the priesthood and entitled John Bon and Mast Person, and, as a relief to so much theological literature, the Herbal of William Turner.
The types used in printing these books were not a whit better than anybody else's, in fact if anything they were a shade worse. There was the usual fount of large black letter, not by any means new, another much smaller letter of the same character, and a fount of Roman capitals, very bad indeed. Whether these types belonged to Day or to Seres it is impossible to say, but I think the smaller of the two belonged to Day, as it is sometimes found in his later books.
The workmanship was no better than the types. There was no pagination in these books, and no devices, and the setting of the letterpress was very uneven.
In 1548 Seres seems to have joined partnership with another London printer, Anthony Scoloker, and to have moved to a house in St. Paul's Churchyard, called Peter College; but his name still continued to appear with Day's down to the year 1551, when the partnership was dissolved, Day moving to Aldersgate, but retaining his shop in Cheapside.
Fig. 18.—From a Bible printed by John Day. London, 1551. 4to.
The most important undertaking of the partnership was a folio edition of the Bible in 1549. This was printed in the smaller of the two founts of black letter in double columns, with some good initials and a great many woodcuts that had evidently been used before, as they extend beyond the letterpress. Another edition printed by Day alone appeared in 1551, in which a good initial E, showing Edward VI. on his throne, is found.
On the accession of Queen Mary, Day went abroad and his press was silent for several years; meanwhile the ancient brotherhood of Stationers was incorporated by Royal Charter as the 'Worshipful Company of Stationers.' The existence of the brotherhood has been traced to very early times, and it is frequently mentioned in the wills of printers and booksellers in the first half of the sixteenth century. By the Charter of 1556 it now received the Royal authority to make its own laws for the regulation of the trade, although, as Mr. Arber has pointed out, the charter 'rather confirmed existing customs than erected fresh powers.' There is abundant evidence that the Queen's main reason for granting the charter was the wish to keep the printing trade under closer control.