The Invention of Lithography. Alois Senefelder
had a clear profit of seventy gulden, earned in fourteen days, and I gained so much happy hope that I thought myself richer than Crœsus.
We were gay and merry. Through his patron, Count von Törring, then President of the Royal Chamber, Herr Gleissner had presented an impression of our first work to the Kurfürst Karl Theodor, and had received one hundred gulden out of the Cabinet Treasury, with the promise of a franchise.
A succeeding little piece of work, "Duets for Two Flutes, by Gleissner," brought forty gulden more into our chest, and finally our finances, as well as a bright success for our institution, seemed assured by a contract closed with the Countess von Herting to print a cantata on the death of Mozart by Cannabich, the musical director, which promised us a profit of one hundred and fifty gulden for two or three weeks' work.
During this time I had presented specimens of work to the Royal Academy of Sciences, with a description of the advantages of the art, in which I named particularly the cheapness, and said that the impression had been made on a press costing not more than six gulden. To my amazement, instead of the expected honorable mention, I received a sum of twelve gulden from the vice-president of the Academy, Herr von Vachiery, with the information that the members had voted favorably for my invention, and that, as my expenses amounted to only six gulden, according to my own statement, I would, no doubt, be satisfied with a sum double this. I had expected an entirely different appreciation from the sentinels of the arts and sciences, whose office was to test the value of this new discovery and call the Government's attention to it if favorable. A mere monetary reward, therefore, especially so small a one, could not possibly give me much pleasure.
Promising as our beginning was (1793), there came a sad period soon enough for the art, for me, and also for Herr Gleissner. We had ordered a new press as soon as our income permitted. I expected to produce a masterpiece with the first impression. Instead of that, there appeared the very opposite, a dirty and smeared imprint. We suspected that we had made some mistake in method. The second attempt, however, was worse than the first, if possible. To be brief, of twenty trials, made with the greatest industry and toil, we obtained only two or three that were even average.
As long as I live I shall be unable to understand how we could have been so blind at that time. We sought the cause of failure in everything except the true thing—an alteration that made the new press different from the old one, which unfortunately had been already destroyed. Later, after I had invented the so-called lever or gallows press, the thing was clear to me at once. But by that time it had cost me and Herr Gleissner two years full of toil, worry, and sorrow. In the contract with the Countess von Herting the date of completion of the work had been stipulated, because she wished to surprise Herr Cannabich with it on his birthday. We had barely four weeks left and not a single sheet had been finished. With press alterations, trial impressions, and so forth, we had wasted money and time, and paper by the ream. Our loss amounted to more than one hundred and fifty gulden, and still there was no prospect of final success. Pressed for results by the Countess, our entire reputation and the honor of my invention were at stake. Added to this came many other annoyances, especially the complaints of Frau Gleissner, who charged that I had destroyed the original, perfectly satisfactory press against her will. These tested my courage sadly.
The cause of all this trouble was so petty that I really must have been half-stupefied by the fear of not keeping our pledges, otherwise I must have perceived it at once.
To make my first imperfect press I had bought a piece of wood from a wheelwright in order to have it turned into two cylinders. Hardly had the two been in the house a day before each one split so that a longitudinal crack of two inches width appeared. As the upper cylinder was thick enough to make an impression of a whole folio of sheet music without revolving so far as to let the crack reach the stone, I contented myself with it temporarily. Now, in order not to spoil the impressions, I had to begin each revolution of the cylinder at the crack, for otherwise the crack might have come at the middle or end of the impression and given no imprint of that part. Therefore, as the stone was pushed under the cylinder at the crack, it was already gripped before the impression began, and was drawn through at once. With the new press, however, the upper cylinder had to draw the stone between both cylinders in order to bring it under its pressure. But in doing this, the new press first pulled the linen stretched over the printing-frame till it would yield no more and forced the stone powerfully under the cylinder, during which of course the paper under the linen was pulled over the inked stone and smeared.
Several attempts to rectify this trouble were unsuccessful. Probably I would have discovered the remedy finally—either that the upper cylinder must not first be pressed on the stone, which must be under it before each impression began, or that I need only use tightly stretched leather instead of linen. But I decided, instead, in order to complete our work if possible, to have a press made in all haste by a carpenter, of a style like the book-printers' press, wherein the force is applied instantly from above.
As everything was very rough, the new press was ready in eight days. The first experiment, with a small stone, seemed to succeed. But the larger stones would not give thorough impressions, probably because of the uneven surface of the press, which was merely of wood. I increased the power enormously. A stone of three hundredweight was elevated with pulleys and released suddenly to fall ten feet. It forced a lever down on the press with a pressure of more than ten thousand pounds. The plates gave fair impressions by this means, but generally they were cracked after the first, second, or third impression.
To determine how much downward force was needed to print a sheet of music, I took a well-ground stone a square inch in area, laid moistened paper on an inked printing-stone, over this a sixfold layer of paper, then a double layer of fine cloth, finally the square inch of stone, and then weights ranging from one to three hundredweight.
This experience taught me that the square inch of surface demanded three hundredweights of force to make a good impression in a few seconds, and almost less than half that weight when I allowed it to act for a whole minute. According to this calculation the entire sheet, which contained about one hundred square inches, would have demanded thirty thousand pounds; and the stone could have withstood this without cracking, had I been able to apply the pressure evenly. But the imperfections of the press made it necessary to apply a pressure three times as great, and this the stones could not bear.
To correct the defects of this press was more than I cared about, after I was nearly killed by the three hundredweights, which fell accidentally, and, as I stood immediately under it, would have beaten out my brains had not a miracle caused the load to catch and hold. The thought that a similar accident might cause the death of one of my men made me hate the whole press, all the more so as I had conceived what seemed to me at the time an exceedingly happy idea for a very simple and not costly printing-machine.
Before I possessed a press of my own, I used to pull proofs of my work in the following manner, in order to avoid the constant trips to a printer. I laid the dampened paper on the inked stone. Over it I laid some heavy paper, and then a sheet of stiff, carefully smoothed dry paper. Then I took a piece of polished wood and rubbed this over the upper sheet of paper, holding the latter firmly to prevent slipping. I continued the rubbing, using more or less power according to whether I wanted the impressions deep or pale. Thus I obtained impressions very often that could not have been better.
I wondered why this could not be done on a large scale, and proceeded to try at once. I stretched a piece of linen firmly over a wooden frame two feet long and wide. On this linen I pasted a sheet of strong paper, polished on the upper side with wax. Then with two bands the frame was fastened to an ordinary wooden table. Then the stone was fastened on the table under the frame. Inside of the printing-frame was a smaller frame with cords, to hold the paper, which had a layer of gray blotting-paper under it. With a piece of polished wood, or a piece of glass such as is used by polishers, I rubbed the upper waxed paper thoroughly, making sure that every spot was touched.
The first proof, and several succeeding ones, which I made myself, turned out so excellent that probably few better impressions ever have been made since. Two more presses were made at once, and six printers hired. The work might still be finished in the stipulated time. New hopes thrilled us. Hastily I inscribed the stones and the printing began. But—oh, human weakness! Does