—We shall have to go outside of fiction, then, to look for well made books?
—It amounts to that.
—You have said that certain unproductive factors prevent you from spending what you otherwise might on good workmanship. What specific factors would you mention?
—Plates—electros. We plate everything on the chance of its running into several printings. 80 per cent of the books are not reprinted. You can see that the money tied up in plates is a very considerable sum, and, as I say, 80 per cent of it is dead loss. We are obliged to take the chance, however.
—Has any remedy occurred to you?
—If stereotyping could be revived as an accurate process it might help us out. It would cost much less to make and to store paper matrices than to make electrotypes. The difficulty here is that no one knows how to make good stereotypes, and the stereotype plates at their best are more trouble to make ready. Trouble with the press-room, you see.
—Is it possible under good conditions to get satisfactory results from stereotype plates?
—Unquestionably. The books printed from this kind of plates in the first days of the invention are entirely satisfactory.
III. MR. L.
Q. Can a trade-edition book be well made and sell for $1.50?