Bookbinding and The Care of Books
Librarians by Douglas Cockerell with Drawings
by Noel Rooke and other Illustrations
New York
1902
Book binding Chapter XX
Part 2
by hand is quoted from "Evelyn's Diary,
1641-1706." " I went to see my Lord of St. Alban's
house at Byflete, an old large building. Thence to
the paper mills, where I found them making a
coarse white paper. They cull the rags, which are
linen, for white paper, woolen for brown, then
they stamp them in troughs to a papp with pestles
or hammers like the powder-mills, then put it into
a vessel of water, in which they dip a frame closely
wyred with a wyre as small as a hair, and as close
as a weaver's reed; on this they take up the papp,
pancake on a smooth board between two pieces of flannell, then press it between a great press,
the flannel sucking out the moisture; then taking it out they ply and dry it on strings, as they dry
linen in the laundry; then dip it in alum-water, lastly polish and make it up in quires. They put
some gum in the water in which they macerate the rags. The mark we find on the sheets is
formed in the wyre."
The following are the more usual sizes of printing papers
Inches
Foolscap Crown Post
Foolscap ………… 17 x 13 ½
Crown …………… 20 x 15
Post ……………… 19 ¼ x 15 ½
Demy ……………… 22 ½ x 17 ½
Medium …………… 24 x 19
Royal ……………… 25 x 20
Double Pott ……….. 25 x 15
Foolscap …………... 27 x 17
Super Royal ……….. 27 x 21
Double Crown …….. 30 x 20
Imperial …………… 30 x 22
Double Post ……….. 31 ½ x 19 ½
The corresponding sizes of hand-made papers may differ slightly from the above. Although the
above are the principal sizes named, almost any size can be made to order.
The following is an extract from the report of the Committee of the Society of Arts on the
deterioration of paper, published in 1898: cc The committee find that the paper-making fibers
may be ranged into four classes:
A. Cotton, flax, and hemp.
B. Wood, celluloses (a) sulphite process, and (b) soda and sulphate process.
C. Esparto and straw celluloses.
D. Mechanical wood pulp.
In regard, therefore) to papers for books and documents of permanent value, the selection must
be taken in this order, and always with due regard to the fulfillment of the conditions of normal
treatment above dealt with as common to all papers."
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