Nowadays, paper received in the printery has been so well calendered beforehand—that is to say, polished between rollers—and after printing the sheets are once more so well rolled that the gathered sheets may at once be prepared for sewing. Old paper, however, must be beaten or rolled to make it firm and solid. The former work will be completely forgotten at no very distant date, as the younger generation of masters and men show less and less inclination to learn it. For beating, a stone about the height of a low table, and a surface about the size of a sheet may be used, or a cast-iron plate about 6 cm. in thickness embedded in a block of wood the same height as the stone. Upon this firm base—which, of course, must stand on the ground floor or in the cellar—the book, or section of it if too thick, is beaten with a short-handled iron hammer, the face of which measures about 100 sq. cm. All corners and edges are well rounded off, and the face is slightly convex. The handle must be short, not above 12 cm. long, cut oval, and just thick enough to be well grasped. The hole in the hammer is made so that the handle drops a little at the (outer) end.
In beating, the sections should be held by the left hand after being knocked up. In order to prevent injury to the paper, the sections are placed between pieces of waste paper of same size, also a mill-board or piece of waste paper to size is laid upon the beating stone. The right hand wields the hammer, which must strike the sections (or book) fairly and squarely with the full face. The beating is begun at the edge, and blow after blow is given in gradually lessening circles until the centre is reached, the left hand, of course, keeping up the necessary motion of the sections. It requires considerable practice to do this without shifting the sections, but if this happens they must again be knocked up.
The experienced workman knows by the touch where the book has been beaten much or little and works accordingly. The main thing in this, as in all other work, is that the book should be again pressed for some time—for a night at the least. The beaten volumes are divided into several lots or sections about a finger thick, and pressing-boards placed between them. If any sections show folds or creases even after pressing, they must be once more beaten and pressed.
The work of beating, as already said, has been almost entirely superseded by the rolling machine. In treatises by theorists, one finds over and over again that books are not so well bound nowadays owing to the "practice of hand-beating being discontinued." This opinion is absurd, and arises from a very superficial technical knowledge and wholly imperfect acquaintance with the requirements of our craft. A machine-rolled or unbeaten book is always much better than one imperfectly beaten, for here nothing is demanded but sheer force, and that is always exercised with better results by a machine. As already pointed out, our modern printed books do not require any such work; besides, the so-called surface papers and printed illustrations prohibit both beating and rolling, as such work would destroy the high surface of the paper. Old books, on the contrary, where the paper is unsized, spongy, and swollen, require some such work, as pressing alone, even for days, has not the required effect.
In beating, the work should be divided into sections or lots of 15 to 20 sheets; they need not be counted, they are measured by the eye. For rolling, however, the sheets must be counted off exactly, from 8 to 12; they are knocked up and placed between zinc plates of same size and passed through the rollers obliquely, the upper back corner being first inserted. It is well to introduce the second lot before the first has quite passed through the rollers; this not only saves the rollers but avoids the extra pressure on the lower corner when a section leaves the rollers. For this reason it is advisable to insert the lots right and left alternately. The first lot rolled should be examined to test the amount of pressure, and at first a lighter pressure should be applied to avoid risk of injury.
We have now come to the end of the processes through which a book has to pass before it is actually made up into book form. Before we take up this work there is incidental work to be mentioned which comes before the work of binding proper. This is the stitching and treatment of stitched or bound books for binding and the necessary repairs thereto.
The stitched or brochured book is no true book form; it is nothing more than the gathered sheets of a work in a temporary form, handier and more convenient, and therefore more saleable.
To prevent leaves from falling out in the event of their being cut open, they are lightly stitched together—holländert.
How did the name originate? It is difficult to say. Perhaps books stitched in this manner were first brought out in Holland.