Grease marks. For spots made with grease use benzine; while still moist apply a hot iron, with a blotting paper on each side of leaf.
Paste. Paste must not be used if not in a good condition. The thickness at which it should be used varies with different kinds of work. Thin paste is quickly taken up and under its application paper quickly expands. In most cases this stretching or expanding of the paper is a disadvantage. If it is desirable that the paper be so applied as not to draw or curl that to which it is applied, it should be covered quickly with thick paste, then applied at once and not much rubbed after it is in place.
The dishes in which paste is kept should be thoroughly and often cleaned; brushes the same. Bits of cloth used in pasting should either be thrown away or washed after they have been used a short time.
[CHAPTER XI]
Repairing Books: Materials and Tools
In spite of the remarks heretofore made about the injury often done to books by repairing them, even when the repairs are cleverly made, it is well for any library, however small, to have a mending table at which such work on books as seems necessary can be done. The materials for this work can in part be obtained from a bindery. There one can get super, pieces of book cloth of several colors, and some of other things mentioned below and in the list of technical terms. One needs for book repairs some or all of the following things, according to the amount of work to be done.
Brushes. Buy a small brush, about as large as a lead pencil, and another half an inch in diameter. Their prices vary with their quality, from 6 cents up. These will be sufficient for most purposes. Get good ones; and for paste and glue the kind set in cement, not in glue. Artists’ bristle brushes are good.
Cloth. A yard or two of super. This is stiffened a little and pastes and handles more easily than ordinary muslin. If you are going to put backs on books you will need also pieces of bookbinder’s cloth. These can be bought at almost any bindery in yard lengths. Get also pieces of cambric and fine muslin called nainsook, or jaconet, for guarding signatures and similar work. It costs 15 cents a yard.
Copying press. For pressing books. One 10×12 inches will cost about $3.75.