A Japanese Composing Room — Newspapers, Typesetting

1878

A Japanese Composing Room.

A Tokio (Japan) correspondent of the New York Evening Post, has written up the Nichi Nichi Shinbun or Daily News, the leading journal of the empire. The description of the composing room, as given below, will be found interesting reading:

Next to the editorial room is located the space set aside for the composing force. First we come to the proofreaders, two intelligent persons who have a high reputation for scholarship. The necessity for such attainments becomes apparent when we learn that a full font of type comprises fifty thousand characters, while no less than three thousand are in constant use and two thousand more in frequent employment. And not only must the proof-reader be careful to amend all grammatical slips and typographical errors, but he should have a quick eye for inelegances in the manuscript and for imperfections in the characters themselves.

Separated from the proof-readers by a low latticed railing is the office of the foreman, the magistrate of the cases, and beyond him again we reach the printers. The type is disposed about the room on long racks like those in a public reading room, and the aisles furnish a promenade wherein the compositor can labor in his vocation and take exercise simultaneously.

The matter when set is placed on galleys, and a proof taken. Then the foreman manipulates it into the shape in which the public see it. Four forms are used, each eleven by sixteen inches. The first — that is, the last — page is occupied by a display head, the information concerning number of issue, place and date of publication, price and days of appearance, which commonly follow the title, and government notifications. After these come editorial leading articles and paragraphs. The last — that is, the first — page is devoted to market reports, scientific information and advertisements, and with the official editorial matter makes up the outside forms, which are sent down to press at midnight.

On the "inside" we find the day's discoveries of the reporters and such editorial articles, communications, etc., as found no corner in the outside forms. Such is the routine "make up," but it is elastic enough, of course, to suit the journalistic requirements of the day. During the war, when Mr. Fukuchi was for a time at the front as a special correspondent, much space and attention was given to telegraphic news, but the lack of an associated press makes such matter rather costly, and only a limited amount appears. Each correspondent, however, is furnished with a private telegraphic code, and is empowered to send the journal by this means information that seems to justify the outlay.