TYPE-SETTING OR COMPOSING. The setting of printing types in proper order for printing is termed composing, and may be performed either by hand or by machine. (For machine composi tion. see TYPE-SETTING MACHINES.) ln hand com position, the compositor places the copy before him on the upper case, and standing in front holds in his left hand a short tray of iron, known as a composing-stick. The stick has a movable slide, which may be regulated to any width of line. One by one the compositor picks up and puts together the letters of each word and sen tence, and the appropriate points, into his stick, securing each with the thumb of his left hand, and placing them side by side from left to right along the line. When he arrives at the end of his line, the compositor must separate the words, so that they will fill the width of the measure. Spaces of varying thickness are inserted as even ly as possible between the words. When the compositor has set up as many lines as his com posing-stick will hold conveniently, they are lifted by grasping them with the fingers of each hand, as if they were a solid piece of metal. He
then places the mass upon a shallow tray termed a galley, which has a ledge on two or three sides.
The printer's unit of measurement by which the compositor is paid is the cm in America and the en in Great Britain. An em is the square of the body of the type selected; the number of ems that fill a line, multiplied by the number of lines in a page gives the total number of ems of type in the page. The piece compositor is paid an agreed rate per 1000 ems, but the rate varies with different kinds of composition. Tabular matter, mathematical formulas, etc., are usually paid for on a time basis. • Composed type that has served the purpose for which it was set is known as dead matter, and its separate letters have to be distributed into the case for re-use, in new work. The com positor first wets the composition so that the separate types will slightly cling together. He then places a number of lines upon his composing ride, picks up a few types between thumb and forefinger, and drops them one at a time. into their proper compartments in the case.