Matrices are sometimes either through a careless, or sometimes through an unlucky stroak or two of the File made too thin. And sometimes the Foot of the Matrice is too much taken away, and the Letter by that means stands too high in Line: And sometimes the Face of the Matrices is too much taken away; So that the Letter will not stand High enough against Paper.
To remedy all or any part of these inconveniencies, Founders are forced to make Botches on the Matrice: As first, If the Matrice be too thin on the right or left-ide, or both; They prick up that side, by laying the Matrice flat on the Work-Bench, with the thin side upwards, and holding the point of a Punch-Graver aslope upon the thin side, with an Hammer drive the point into the thin side of the Matrice, and so raise a Bur upon that side; which Bur (though it thicken not the Matrice, yet it) makes the side of the Matrice stand off the Register, and consequently is equevalent to thickning it.
The higher this Bur is raised, the better is the Matrice Botcht; because the thin fine points thus raised (if not pretty well flatted into the Substance of the Bur) will quickly either wear off by the pressure of the Register against them, or else flatten into the Body of the Bur, and both ways makes the Matrice again too thin.
Sometimes they do not Botch the Matrice thus for this fault; but only Paste a piece of Paper, or a Card, (according as it may want thickness) against the thin side of the Matrice and so thicken it.
But to mend the sides I use another Expedient, viz. by Soldering a piece of Plate-Brass against its thin side or sides, which is much better than Botching it.
Secondly, If the Matrice be filed away too much at the Foot, they knock it up with the Pen of the Hammer; and stretch it between the Foot and the Orifice of the Matrice, and then Justifie it again in Line. Or a piece may be Soldered under the Foot.
Thirdly, If the Face of the Matrice be too much taken away, and either the Punch spoiled or the Notch in the back of the Matrice made so, as it cannot be Sunken deeper, they raise a Bur on the Face, as they did on the thin sides, to keep the Matrice off the Carriages and Bodies which Lengthens the height of the Letter against Paper so much as is the height of the raised Bur. But of all the Botches this is the worst, because the Beard lies now nearer the Face: And the hollow standing off of the Face of the Matrice from the Carriages and Bodies, subjects the Mettal to run between them, and so pesters the Workman to get the Letter out of the Mold and Matrice.
Sect. XVIII, Of setting up the Furnance.
HAving Justified the Mold and Matrice, we come now to Casting of Letters: But yet we have neither Furnance, Mettal, or Ladle. Wherefore it is the Founders care, first to provide these.
The Furnance I have described in Plate 20. It is built of Brick upright, with four square sides and a Stone on the top, in which Stone is a wide round hole for the Pan to stand in.