When the sewing is done and the cords are pre pared for the covers, what are called the head bands are put in, the only purpose of which is to save the top edge of the binding a little when the hook is tilted by one finger from the shelf where it stands. The ideal way of putting this in is to sew the sheets to them as well as to the other bands, and at the same time; but in modern work they are generally additions intended rather for show than for utility.
The covering of the book is done by simply glueing or pasting the material to be used upon the boards of the sides and upon the back. There is, however, this difference between different kinds of back. Thus, the hollow back, so called, which allows the mass of folded sheets forming the book proper to leave the back and to hinge itself at any point, while the back remains inde pendent and rounded out with an open space between it and the book, is made by a piece of pasteboard put in between so that the leather or silk of the cover is glued to it. The 'fast back' or 'tight back' is made by glueing the covering directly to the back-folded edges of the sheets. As this covering material is added to the com pletely made book, to the stiff covers and the hack after they are put together, it is evident that a great deal of care must be used in stretch ing it to cover the bands, the corners, and the edge where it is turned under and has its edges covered by the lining paper or doublure. This doublure is commonly a piece of marbled or col ored and glazed paper. half of which is pasted to the inside of the cover, while the other half forms an additional end-paper; but sometimes the cover is lined with a piece of leather.
Finally, the book is ornamented by stamping or tooling. These terms are used generally to imply, in the one ease, large plates from which a stamp is taken covering the whole or a large part of the cover at one impression, while tool ing is the putting on of the impressed or gilded lines, dots, leaves, and the like, separately, one by one, with a number of tools, the impressions of which are combined together so as to produce the patterns desired. The French term fel' (iron) is used for one of these tools; hence the phrase ri petits fens, uncoiling that the orna mentation is applied by hand, with little tools, one by one, making separate points, short bars, single leaves or flowers, which are combined in patterns. Rollers are used, by means of which indefinitely long lines, zigzags, or simple scroll patterns are applied.
For a still more elaborate adornment, different colored leathers are combined by 'inlaying.' Very rarely this is done by a mosaic process of the full thickness of the leather; most commonly the background is lowered or cut away very slightly, and the piece to be inlaid is a mere film. The lines of junction are generally concealed by broader lines of gold, impressed by means of a tool.
As to casing, the two stiff sides and the more flexible back are put together exactly as a paper box is made. The sheets of the book having been stitched together. as if to make a pamphlet, are then glued or pasted into the ease by means of a piece of canvas glued fast to the back of the folded book and having loose strips projecting to be pasted to the covers; or in some very simi lar way.
Casing is made decorative chiefly in two ways —first, by the use of a textile material which is in itself decorative, and secondly, by printing upon the surface of the boards, whether covered with silk or cotton cloth or with paper, a pattern which may be 'blind.' that is to say, merely im pressed without color, or iu one or several colors. The first method, that by the use of stuff which of itself is ornamental. may be very rich if a brocade is used: and it is noticeable that the large and carefully made books of the Japanese, made to contain water-colors, pieces of old draw ings. or rare old stuffs and the like. have some times for their sole decoration a beautiful piece of brocade for covering material, and sometimes this with the addition of richly worked metal corners. So, a private person. wishing to bind a lot of novels cheaply, may select printed calico or other inexpensive material and have all the volumes of one author bound uniformly; such work costing in Paris not more than one franc twenty centimes per volume, and in the American cities not over sixty cents a volume, even when the title is in gold letters on an attached leather label. Such work, if properly done, is. in a way, satisfactory. Thirty years of rather constant use, as of a popular book in a reading family, does not seem to injure it except by slightly loosening or 'spreading' the back. This, however, is for small books only; those weighing two pounds. or a kilogramme. can hardly remain firm more than two or three years. The 'decorative bindings' of modern English and especially American popular books are sometimes adorned in a very effective way either by stamped gold patterns rather deeply impressed upon the cloth sides, or by surface printing without deep in cision, which printing may he in one or many colors. It is not hard to combine the two pro cesses. Thus, in one rather pretty book, each cover, y 814 inches, has a convention alized landscape in two dull colors: and above this picture, which occupies two-thirds of the surface, the title, consisting of seven words, is impressed in gold. Some admirable designs are prepared for English pnblishing !mimes in which the almost lost art. of designing patterns of con ventional leafage and the like has been revived. American work runs more often, as in the case mentioned above, toward descriptive and sug gestive art, landseapes, emblematic compositions, even figure subjects of some pretension.
Books that are cased in this way need not necessarily be injured for future permanent bind ing; but it often happens that they are injured, as by the pasting of the edges of inserted plates to the folded sheets of the letterpress, or by sewing the sheets together in such a way that while the same sewing will not be found sufficient for the permanent binding, it has still injured the backs for better work. Of course, where any such device as the 'stabbing* of the sheets with tinned wire is used, the book is ruined as a per manent possession. It is to be regretted that our valuable illustrated magazines are sold in that condition.