room, although it is a big one. He offers us cigarettes ill mitigation.
The first things tiiat strilce us in tiie studio are tools everywhere, a long bench like a carpenter's work-bench, with a vice and racks of tools arranged over it, and a good part of it covered with all manner of bottles and pots. Then there are shelves ranged nearly all round the room, and standing upon them copper plates of all sizes, with their backs turned towards us, making lovely patches of colour in their various states of brightness. One rack is filled with neatly stacked reams of paper of different kinds, and near to this a great ' machine ' which is the ' press ' ; but our attention is centered on the end of the studio where the light is, and where the master of the place sits at his work on the plate. A great window runs from the level of the table high up into the roof. From this window- sill (which makes a shelf for tools), and across the whole width, there is a wood frame covered with tissue paper, leaning over the etcher's head at an angle of about 45° with the table. In the centre of this is the etcher's table, covered with dilapidated green cloth, on which his plate lies in all its glory of colour ; and on either side of him are ranged a lead sink with a tap for water, an iron table (called a heater) with a ring of gas burners under- neath, a small antl greasy wood table (called the 'jigger ') whereon the plate is manipulated during printing, and a slab and niuller for grinding ink ; and round about are boxes of dry colours and cans of oil. When you look at a polislied metal plate the reflections from it prevent you seeing the wliole of the work on it at once, and the use of the screen is to soften and equalise the light to obviate this difficulty. Whatever notions one may have had as to the connection of etchings with pen and ink drawings, these very soon vanish by the very influence of the place, and you become a«are that etchings are in some manner evolved from a copper plate (or some- times zinc, and even iron or brass). A little piece of copper plate, polished to a perfect surface, is shown us. ' Now,' says the etcher, ' if I covered this plate with copperplate ink (which is a rather thick and greasy substance made of burnt linseed oil and some pigment, black, brown, or indeed anv colour), and wijje it away with a rag, I can remove all traces of it from the plate ; but supposing there be any scratch upon the surface of the plate, be it ever so slight, some ink would remain in that scratch. Now it is these scratches or marks in the plate which form the lines in an etching or engraving. In a line engraving the lines are cut direct into the plate by a sharp steel tool called a "graver" or "burin," but this does not concern us much now. There is another method, and a very beautiful one, called " dry-point etching," really a form of very free line engraving, in which the lines are simply scratched into the plate by a needle' (here he shows his dry- point needle — simply a saddler's needle driven into a wood handle, and sharpened, he says, continually to whatever kind of point he requires at the mo- ment, either round or angular). ' In making a dry- point line, you will readily understand the copper is turned ujd out of the line or furrow, on either side, making a ragged edge. This is called " burr," and can, if you like, be removed with a " scraper," mak- ing the line print clear and sharp like an engra^'ed line ; but if it is left on, the ink in printing clings to it, and a wonderfully soft and rich line is the result. A little burr is raised by a burin line, but not so much as on a dry-point line, because the burin cuts out the copper in little curly shavings as it ploughs its way along.' In Etching j^roper the line is eaten, or ' bitten ' into the plate by acid, or some substance which will decompose the plate. ' Now I am going to etch and print this little plate to show the process,' he says. He takes the copper and polishes it quite clean — that is, quite free from the least trace of greasiness — with a piece of clean rag, and puts it on the heater to get warm, while he gets out of a little box a small ball of black stuff which he says is ' etching ground,' this particular kind being composed of beeswax. Burgundy pitch, and asphaltuni. This he touches on to the plate in several places, and as the plate is now hot, a little of it (very little indeed is required) melts away from the ball. He now spreads it more evenly with a bit of muslin (' stuff ladies call " lino," ' he says, ' the same kind we print with '), and then takes the ' dabber.' This is a sort of bundle made of a pad of horse-hair, covered with cotton wool, tied up in a piece of silk, so as to be rather flat on the bottom, and gathered together, with a little knob on the top for a handle. He now dabs this on to the hot plate with a quick short action, and spreads the ground quite evenly and thinly — much thinner than one would think possible. When done, it looks of a beautiful gold colour. ' Seems a pity to blacken it,' he says, 'but it is not easy to see your work without.' So he fixes a small hand-vice on to the corner of the plate (because it is still kept hot) and lights a bundle of wax tapers, which give off' a cloud of smoke. Over this smoke he holds the plate, grounded side down, and the smoke incor- porates itself with the ground, making it jet black. It is then laid down to get cold, and while this is going on he shows us his etching-needle, a jiiece of
