The Company were not slow in making use of their enlarged powers, and the refractory Roger Ward appears to have had considerable experience of the rigours of the new decree. In October 1586 the wardens seized on his premises “3 presses and divers other parcells of pryntinge stuffe,” and ordered them to be defaced and rendered unserviceable, according to the tenor of the decree. In 1590 they made a further visitation, and discovered that “he did kepe and conceale a presse and other pryntinge stuff in a Taylor’s house near adjoyninge to his owne, and did hide his letters in a hen house near St. Sepulchure’s Churche, expressely against the Decrees of the Star Chamber. All the whyche stuff were brought to Stacioners Hall” and duly destroyed. But the dauntless Roger Ward was not thus to be extinguished, and scarcely six months later, at Hammersmith, another press, “with 5 formes of letters of Divers sortes and 3 cases with other printing stuffe,” were impounded and rigorously defaced.
Nor was Ward the only victim. In a Secret Report presented in September 1589 to Lord Burleigh respecting the authors of the famous Marprelate Tracts, it is stated that the printer of the first three of these, “all beinge printed in a Dutch letter,” was Robert Waldegrave; and “towchinge the printinge of the two last Lebells in a litle Romaine and Italian letter,” the report states—once more showing how in those days a printer was known by his types—“the letter that these be printed in is the same that did printe the Demonstration of Discipline aboute Midsommer was twelve moneth (24 June, 1588), which was printed by Waldegrave neere Kingston upon Thames, as is discovered. When his other letters and presse were defaced about Easter was twelve moneth {128} (7th April, 1588) he saved these lettres in a boxe under his Cloke, and brought them to Mistris Cranes howse in London, as is allso confessed; and they are knowen by printers to be Waldegrave’s letters; And it is the same letter that was taken with Hodgkys. These two last Libells came abroade in July (1589) last. Now it is confessed by the Carier that John Hodgkys that is taken, did send from a gentlemans howse in Woltonam in Warwikeshier unto Warrington immediatlye after whitsontyde last (18 May 1589), a printinge presse, two boxes of letter, a barrell of nicke (incke ?), a baskett and a brasse pott, which were delyvered to him at Warrington,” etc.[213]
The Stationers’ Company, on the whole, had a busy time during the few years following the Star Chamber decree, in hunting up and destroying disorderly presses and the “stuffe” appertaining thereto. The numerous monopolies and patents of which they were the appointed guardians provoked a regular secret organisation of unprivileged printers,[214] who pirated right and left, sometimes with impunity, sometimes at the cost of losing their whole plant and stock-in-trade by a raid of the authorities.
These raids must have kept the typecasters of the day well occupied, and it is even possible that the “stuffe” which from time to time fell into the hands of the Company may have included punches, matrices and moulds, which it would be far less easy to replace than presses, ink and balls.
A printer liable to such visitations would prefer, if possible, to procure his type out of doors, rather than maintain the valuable plant requisite to make it himself; and it is probable that the outside demand thus created may have been among the causes which led to the establishment of one or two small foundries, unconnected with any one printing office in particular, whose business it would be to supply any purchaser with type from its matrices.
The Stationers’ Company, who from time to time supplemented the powers conferred upon them by the Star Chamber with regulations of their own on matters such as standing formes, apprentices and prices, would naturally recognise a source of danger in a new foundry starting under the circumstances described, and were prompt to assert their authority.
Accordingly we find the following entry in the Index to the Court Books of the Company under date 1597:—
“BENJAMIN SYMPSON, letter founder, to enter into a £40 bond not to cast any letters or characters, or to deliver them, without advertising the Master and Wardens in writing, with the names of the parties for whom they are intended.—1597.” {129}
Here we have the first historical record of letter-founding as a distinct and recognised trade.[215] Of Benjamin Sympson and his types nothing is known. His name does not occur in any of the lists of printers of the period, nor does it appear that he was even a member of the Stationers’ Company. Whether he was called upon at his own request to qualify as a typefounder, or whether the resolution of the Court was arrived at in consequence of his previous transactions with one or more of the disorderly printers, is equally uncertain.
In 1598 the Stationers’ Company made a regulation respecting the price of work, which is also of interest, as indicating the bodies of type at that time most commonly in use for bookwork. It was as follows:—