The typographer should know how to extract the utmost from the use of a type which is narrow in relation to its height—leading and spacing play a decisive part here. A round, open, wide letter may, for certain purposes, be set "loose"; i.e., the space between the letters will be greater (or appear greater by reason of the curves of the c, o, e, g, in the lower case), than in a relatively condensed letter. Consistency will here insert a satisfactory lead between the lines.
The space between words composed in a condensed letter is less than that between words in a round, wide form. A lead should always precede and follow quoted matter. Where there is no lead ing between the lines, and the composition is necessarily tight, it may be an advantage to set leads between the paragraphs.
Indention is a most important detail. The opening sentence of every work should automatically manifest itself as such. This may be contrived by using a large initial letter, by printing the first word in CAPITALS, or SMALL CAPITALS, or CAPITALS and SMALL CAPITALS. The first word may be set into the margin; but it should not be indented. Indention marks paragraphs—the subsequent sections of the text. Where for any reason it may be necessary to avoid indention in paragraphs, a lead is plainly desirable. Absence of indention and of lead means the virtual extinction of the paragraph.
The depth of the page will be related to the length of line. The measure must be symmetrical, displaying a form pleasing to the eye. A rectangle is more pleasing than a square.
A rectangular page composed of lines of 10-11-12 words long will generally be satisfactory. It remains to add the running page heading, and the folio. The page-heading may either range to the left and right in the opening (fixing the two pages as a unity); or range to the right and left ; or it may be centred. The folio may be centred at the foot, or range either way at the top or bot tom; but it cannot be centred at the top without abolishing the running page headline. This may be done, but it is an undesirable practice. The running headlines may be set in capitals of the text, in upper- and lower-case of the text, or in any combination of capitals. The use of full-sized capitals renders over-conspicuous a repetitive feature inserted for extrinsic convenience—that is, the identification of loose leaves. By reason of its position, the
headline looks ragged if set in upper- and lower-case. It seems best, therefore, to employ small capitals ; all capitals are best sep arated by hair spaces as their rectangular structure and pre ponderance of perpendiculars tend to solidify the composition.
Full-sized capitals may well be used for chapter headings, the number of the chapter being kept in small capitals, and both , indications being hair spaced. The practice of dropping the chap ter opening is justified by the fact that the eye, in travelling from the generally occasional blank at the end of a chapter to the beginning of the next, finds a companion blank an agreeable con sistency. It has also the psychological advantage of saving the reader from feeling overpowered by the text. The rectangle of type is so imposed upon the edge as to allow centre, head, fore edge and tail margins of a dimension proportionate, first, to the length of line and, secondly, to the disposition of space at points where the text is cut into chapters, and where the body joins the prefatory and other pages known as "preliminaries." These last, less strictly governed by convention than the text pages, offer the maximum opportunity of design to be found in the volume.
The history of printing is in large measure the history of the title-page. The title when fully developed occupied a recto page, either partially or wholly; and the title-phrase, or a catchword of it, has generally been set in a conspicuous size of type. Six teenth century Italian printers generally used large capitals, cop ied from inscriptions, or more exceptionally, from caroline manu scripts; while English use followed the French in employing a leading line of large upper- and lower-case, followed by a few lines of pica capitals. Next came the printer's device, and at the foot of the page, his name and address. The large sizes of upper- and lower-case, being an inheritance from printers who were accus tomed to black-letter (never set in solid capitals), have gone. The device also has vanished, except from the University Presses.