n i books k The Of erchiN(^. Dj fi\A]^k _5hoRT. TiTV^vSfiS o]^j rUe ]viA.kipje op eTchi]\(^. Lor^bor^. i^Der^ r>ujvnrl-ior^jve. att^G^lgr^ of t|;7eli^rT)braT^thea^ ip Vi g t r e £t !W. 1888. Mi trjirj€.r delvet^ ii7 |^it|der^ t-|;e ore.. He^TT;it|7 ^aryryeret^ n^efal TT)aket|; it iyto pol^|;je^ plat^. •-< He etcher worketj^ cupr^ip^ly witjp polpt apd bitGt|7 tj^e plate wit^^trop^ water. Q fmaf! l_^o pri^ter^ by ai^'b co^yi^eret^ i^k . r» d> "( 1 * Nr ' 1 lun 1 fl jNl^ ^d ^^ire o|^ all tb<^c ^ ii^ tl^e. work o|^ tl;eir crajt. LIST OF PLATES. Plate I. Etching— K Norfolk Mill B y Wilfrid Ball. Plate II. White Hart Tavern, Battersea . . . . Plate III. Examples of Methods Plate IV. Envoy. PAGE 4 12 30 r, ON THE MAKING OF ETCHINGS. LINE drawn with a pen and ink is not an General, etched line, and a drawing done with these lines is not an etching. An etching must be printed from a metal plate. The manner of obtaining a print or an “impression” from a plate is roughly as follows : — The plate is first covered thickly with copperplate ink, which is a rather thick and greasy substance, and may be of any colour. The printer proceeds to wipe this gradually away again with a piece of coarse canvas ; but where there is any roughness on the plate, such as furrows or pits sunk into it, or pieces of the metal standing up in relief above the general level of the surface, the ink will not come away. The paper, or whatever substance is to receive the im- pression, is then laid upon the plate, and by means of heavy pressure forced into such close contact with it, that the printer’s ink which was left there adheres to the paper, thus making the print or impression, and thereby “ proving” the correctness or otherwise of the work that has been put upon the plate. This process of inking and wiping the plate has, of course, to be repeated for every impression. 6 On the Making of Etchings. Every mark on a plate, however slight, yields a very exact likeness of itself in the impression. There are a great many ways of working on the surface of a plate so as to make it hold ink in printing, and some of them are called by distinct names, such as mezzotint engraving, line engraving, and aquatint engraving ; but there are many methods which have no special name. But to be an etching proper the thing must be wrought with lines eateti into a plate by acid, or some substance which zvill decompose it. Lines may be scratched direct into a metal plate without the intervention of acid, and this method is called “ Dry- point,” or Dry-point etching, and though it is really a form of engraving, is generally reckoned as belonging to etching. ReliefEngrav- It is, perhaps, worth while to remark here that woodcut ing and Pimt- (and also metal blocks engraved or etched to print like woodcuts) are printed in exactly the reverse manner to plate engraving or etching. In woodcut, or relief engraving, the original surface of the block or plate is the part that receives the ink to be transferred to the proof. All the parts not intended to print are cut away in the case of a wood block (or corroded away by acid in the case of a metal block), and the ink (a much more sticky kind), is dabbed or rolled on to the surface of the block. It would be possible to print a wood block in the same manner as an etching, or an etching (if the lines were pretty deep) the same way as a woodcut, the result in each case being exactly reverse to their proper method, the lines in the etching shewing as white lines on a black 071 the Making of Etchings. 7 ground, and the black lines of the woodcut telling as white ones. Now, having cleared the ground somewhat, we will follow in detail all the processes an etched plate is subjected to, from the time it leaves the rolling mill to the time it yields up its complete impression. Most metals may be used for etching upon, but copper The Plate, is the one generally chosen. Zinc is also a good deal used, because the lines worked upon this metal print with a peculiar richness of quality. It is, however, softer than copper, and as a rule, wears out sooner in the process of printing. Steel and iron can be used (two etchings by Albert Diirer, probably among the first ever done, were upon iron plates), but the quality of line they give is hard and poor. And there is no reason now for using steel, because copper can be coated with a wonderfully thin electro deposit of steel, renewed as often as it shews signs of wearing away ; thus making the copper more durable than steel itself, and at the same time keeping the quality of the copper line. It is difficult to imagine a better metal than copper for etching upon. It can be polished to a perfect surface, is soft enough to cut as easily as a carpenter cuts hard wood, can be prepared with any degree of hardness from being as soft as lead to as brittle as steel, and lastly, is a continual delight to work with, owing to its beautiful colour. To make the plate the coppersmith gets the sheet metal from the rolling mill, of various thicknesses (that for small plates being about as thick as a penny), and selects the 8 On the Making of Etchmgs. most solid pieces to make his best plates from. The metal is then placed upon an anvil and hammered all over for some time, to ensure its being of an even density. This process is very important, and it is to be feared is often omitted in the manufacture of modern plates, being, of course, laborious work when done by hand. Rolled or machine planished coppers are not so satisfactory as those hammered by hand, and to make sure of its being done thoroughly, there are etchers who for important works hammer their plates themselves. The hammering makes the plate very hard ; and to soften it again, it is made hot and dipped in water (copper behaving curiously the reverse of steel in this respect). The smith then chooses the best side of the plate for the front and goes over it with a kind of broad chisel which acts like a plane, cutting off the surface of the plate, and revealing any small holes or pits there may be. These are scooped out cleanly with a kind of bent gouge called a “ scorper,” and the hole thus made is beaten up level again from the back of the plate. This done, the face of the plate is hammered carefully with a polished hammer, traversing the plate methodically so that every part shall receive the same amount of blows ; and the quantity of hammering "given it being in proportion to the hardness of the copper required, the more it is hammered the harder the copper gets. The plate is now fixed down upon a kind of sink, and water is made to just cover it. A piece of sandstone is then rubbed backwards and forwards over the plate till all marks save those of the stone itself are removed ; then it is gone over in the same manner with pumice stone, which leaves still finer scratches ; then with snake stone (a On the Making of Etchings. 9 kind of slate with a finer grain than pumice stone) ; lastly, with sticks of charcoal made from willow branches. The plate is now taken out of the water and is beautifully smooth and flat, but is not polished. The final polish is got by rubbing it with the end of a roll of cloth or canvass, tightly bound up (called the “ oil rubber ”). It is used first with oil and the finest washed emery powder, and last of all with oil alone. The plate is now ready for the etcher — to spoil or otherwise. Very often this is the first state an etcher knows of his plate, but it is well that he should know practically all the coppersmith’s work, and be able to do it if necessary him- self ; because it often happens that part of an etched plate has to be altered, and although coppersmiths are very care- ful and wonderfully clever in manipulating plates, the etcher can hardly expect them to understand so well as he himself does, exactly what he wants altered. Copper made now-a-days is nothing like so good as that made half a century ago. The coppersmiths say the difference lies with the smelters of the ore, and it seems to be so. The copper of to-day does very well in a general way, but for a bit of very delicate work, or for mezzotinting, where the grain of the metal is severely tested, there is nothing like old plates : and etchers who have got these, work upon them etching after etching, till the plate is ground away so thin as to be next to transparent. The waxy substance which is put upon the plate, and through which the etcher scratches his lines with the needle, is called the “ground.” The qualities a ground should possess are, — perfect resistance to the action of acid, firm oil bbbfr Abnur 2 >ns. Old plates. The Etching Ground. lO On the Making of Etchings. Layinp; the ground. Dabbed ground. adhesion to the plate, and a certainty of its being removed by the needle-point in a perfectly clear line without chipping up at the sides. These are obtained by mixing together in various combinations different waxes, gums, and resins. There are many good mixtures, most of them containing some of the following substances, viz. : — white wax, Burgundy pitch, gum mastic, and asphaltum. The ingredients are melted together and rolled up into balls, or the ground may be dissolved in chloroform or oil of spike lavender. There are several ways of putting the ground on the plate, or “ laying the ground ” as it is technically called, the following three being most used. By the dabber. This is the old way, and very strong grounds can be laid with it. The plate (in laying all grounds) is made perfectly clean and free from grease by rubbing it with clean rag, and perhaps whitening. It is then laid upon a heated iron plate, kept at an even tem- perature by a Bunsen burner underneath, or held with a hand vice over a fire, or spirit lamp, and made just so warm that the ball of etching ground will melt upon being applied to the plate. The ball of ground is touched on to the plate in various places so as to leave sufficient ground to cover the rest of the plate, and it is then spread evenly over it by a bit of canvas which is free from fluff. Then the dabber is taken. This is a tool made of a pad of horsehair and cotton wool tied up in fine silk so as to form a handle on the top and to present a slightly convex surface on the underside to dab the plate with. This is dabbed with a quick short action regularly over the plate, while the On the Making of Etchings. 1 1 ground is still melted, and spreads it in a perfectly even and very thin coat. Then, while the ground is still melted, the plate is held, with a hand-vice, face down over the flame of a bundle of wax tapers (or a gas jet does capitally) and the smoke from the flame incorporates itself with the ground and makes it jet black. The plate is now left to cool, and when cold presents a perfectly black and shining surface like polished ebony. Bits of dust generally settle on the plate while the ground is being laid, but they are of little con- sequence. This method of laying the ground sounds com- plicated in description, but is really very simple in practice. In laying the ground with the roller the etching ground is dissolved into a thin paste with oil of lavender ; a little of this is spread upon a piece of plate glass, or a spare plate, and the roller passed over it till it is charged evenly and thinly with the paste. It is then rolled in many directions over the plate to be grounded, and constantly returned to the glass or spare plate to be recharged, till the plate is evenly covered. It is then gently heated to drive off the oil of lavender, and smoked in the same manner as the dabbed ground. The roller lays a most perfect ground, exceedingly thin and clear, but the oil of lavender does not quite evaporate till it has been laid for a day or two, and until this time has elapsed it is too tender to bear transferring or rough handling. The third way of laying grounds is by a solution of etching ground in chloroform. The solution is poured on to the plate and allowed to run all over quickly, and then the superfluous liquid is run off at one corner of the plate. The solution dries in a few moments, when it is heated and Rolled ground. Liquid Ground. C On the Making of Etchmgs. 1 2 smoked in the same manner as the rolled ground. Many etchers prefer this method of ground laying. To do it well takes a little more practice than the other methods, but if successfully done it certainly makes a splendid ground for working on. It does not answer well, however, for laying grounds over work already bitten, because the solution runs away from the edges of the lines, and does not sufficiently protect the plate at those places. Preparing the The plate having been grounded, its face is covered with plate for the ^ & fc. ^ > acid. a beautiful black surface which perfectly protects the metal from the action of acid, and if the back and edges of the plate be painted over with a varnish which will resist acid, such as common Brunswick Black, Turpentine Varnish, French Polish, or any other resinous solution which will dry pretty quickly, it may be immersed in a bath of acid without the acid attacking the plate anywhere but where the etcher scratches through the ground and lays bare the metal. The old etchers did not immerse their plates in the acid. Instead of painting over the back, they stuck a wall of wax round the border or margin of their plate, so as to make a dish, the bottom of which was formed by the plate itself, and poured the acid into this. Of course this did quite well, but it took a much longer time to do than the modern way. The design may be drawn upon the plate with the needle and then put in the bath and “ bitten,” or it may be drawn in the bath itself and each line will commence to “bite ” as soon as it is drawn. As a rule, both these methods are used on a plate, but we will follow the former one through first, being perhaps the more simple. 13 On the Making of Etchings. It will be understood that the design on the plate is the reverse of that on the proof. That is, that the right side of the plate becomes the left on the proof. The reflection of a proof in a looking-glass is the way it is placed on the plate. In outdoor etching, it does not much matter whether the drawing is reversed on the plate or not, because it should look as well one way as the other ; but if it is desired to make a portrait of any place, or to copy anything, it must be reversed on the plate : and of course all lettering must be reversed. In Plate III. P"ig. 3 the lettering “soft ground etching” is the way lettering has to be put on a plate. The design can be transferred to the plate in several ways. If there is a plate printing press near, the easiest way is to trace the drawing, or to make a drawing with soft lead pencil on a piece of thin paper, damp it slightly, and then turn it pencil side down on to the etching ground of the plate, and pass it through the press in the same manner as in taking a proof. The result is a drawing in beautiful grey lines on the black ground. But for very accurate work (for the damping and rolling through the press stretch the paper somewhat) or where a press is not available it is quite easy to transfer the design by hand. Black lead, or red chalk dry transfer paper is laid on the plate, a tracing of the design pinned down over this, and the lines traced over with a hard lead pencil or style ; of course if the tracing is laid on the plate the face side up, the transfer will be the same way as the drawing, but if the tracing be reversed the drawing will be reversed on the plate. In working out of doors, it is rather nervous work begin- ning on a clear plate w'ithout anything as a guide. But a Reversal of proof. Transferring the design. H On the Making of Etchings. Needling. brush dipped in Chinese white will mark a subject out sufficiently if it is drawn straight on to the plate ; or if it is desired to reverse the subject, then a sketch can be made on tracing paper with soft pencil ; the tracing turned face down on the plate and the lines traced over from the back. This will transfer the sketch on to the plate very well. In working a plate, reversed, out of doors, a looking- Fflass can be used. It is fixed on an easel or anything that will support it, and the etcher, turning his back on the object to be etched, draws from its reflection in the glass. Now comes the scratching through the ground of the lines with the needle. Anything that has a sharp round point will do to scratch with ; generally it is a rather thick piece of steel tapered down to a fine point, but a sewing needle driven into a stick of wood till only one- eighth of an inch or so projects, and the wood pared away towards the needle, does capitally ; or a jewel point may be used, or indeed any point. Different thicknesses of needles may be used to make thick lines and thin ones, but it is not, perhaps, so good as using one needle, and getting the different thicknesses by biting with the acid. In needling the plate the point should only just graze the metal, and it is necessary for the point to be perfectly round to pre- vent it catching and destroying the freedom of the line. All the lines on a plate are laid with a careful reference to their biting in the acid, and with a reference, too, to the particular kind of mordant they are to be bitten with : and a man who draws the lines upon a plate and does not bite them himself is not an etcher— only a draughtsman on copper. There are ’several kinds of mordants used. The one The bath. 15 On the Making of Etchings. most general, perhaps, is that made from nitrous, or nitric Nitric acid, acid, one-half acid, and one-half water, or one-third acid and two-thirds water {mixed some hours before tising, oh ! ye beginners !) In acting on the metal, this acid forms a gas which comes away in bubbles, and has some effect in break- ing away the ground at the edges and widening the lines. The next most popular bath is called the Dutch mor- The Dutch dant, made of two parts Chlorate of Potash, ten of Hydrochloric acid, and eighty-eight of water. It is very slow in action compared with the nitric bath, but the lines are much finer in quality, going deeper into the plate with- out widening so much. There is also no gas generated in the lines. This is the mordant used for working in the bath, because, being slow in action, it allows time to finish the design without the lines first drawn being bitten deeper than they should be : and also the slight chlorine gas given off is not unpleasant or injurious, whilst that from the nitric bath soon gets unbearable, and is very injurious to the chest. These two are practically the only baths, but others are sometimes used ; of course anything which will decompose copper will do, such for instance as perchloride of iron, which is a capital mordant. Now let us follow the biting of a plate through, with. Biting, say, the nitrous bath. A new bath is colourless, and looks innocent as water ; putting your finger in, however, for a moment or two will quickly remove this impression, and be perhaps a good lesson. After biting a plate, however, the colour of the liquid changes to a beautiful blue green, owing to the copper eaten out of the plate being converted into nitrate of copper. After having had your finger turned 1 6 On the Making of Etchings. yellow, it will not perhaps be necessary to remark that it is well to be careful and not spot the acid about on clothes or anything near, else bright-coloured and indelible spots will immediately appear. Now you take your plate in hand and look lovingly at it. It seems such a pity to sacrifice your drawing in beautiful gold lines (for the scratches of the needle through the black ground look like lines of burnished gold) ; but with a sigh, and something of a prayer, and a wary eye to the back and edges of your plate to see all exposed places covered with varnish, in it goes ! and now begins the etching proper. White porcelain dish, green acid, and black plate with the gold lines — gold only for a minute, however, for they soon go grey and then green, and then for a minute or two you have a design which looks as if it were done with bronze green lines. But now they are all lost in a cloud of bubbles of gas, and these must be brushed off with a feather, or they would stay in the lines, and prevent the acid acting equally. Again they are covered with bubbles, and now if there are any very faint lines in your design, such as sky in a landscape, the plate must be Stopping out. taken out and these lines covered over, or as it is technically called “ stopped out ” with some of the varnish which covered the back of the plate, so that the acid shall not get at them any more, because of course the longer the acid acts on a line the deeper and the wider it gets. This being dry, the plate is put in the bath again, and the bubbling goes on, rather more fiercely now. The biting will go on now for several more babblings till the next darkest lines have bitten in sufficiently, and while it is On the Making of Etchings. 1 7 going on you will have time to notice peculiarities in the action of the acid. It would seem reasonable to suppose that all lines under the action of the acid for the same length of time would be bitten in exactly the same depth, and supposing the lines on the plate were quite evenly distributed this would probably be the case : and if this were so the biting of a plate might be divided into intervals of time, and the lines would exactly correspond in degrees of darkness. For instance, if the sky was bitten for one minute and then painted over or “stopped out,” then the distance for two minutes (making three in all), then the middle distance for four minutes (making seven in all) ; then the foreground for eight minutes (making fifteen in all), you would have a gradation of tone ranging in the proportion of i. 3. 7. 15. from the faintest distance to the darkest foreground. But the lines on a plate are never evenly distributed, and you will notice on watching the plate bite, that wherever the lines are closest together there they bite much faster (owing probably to the generation of heat by the action of the acid on the copper). So it is evident a time calcula- tion would be of no use, and even if this were not so, the temperature of the room in which you are working, or the varying strength of the acid as the bath gets older, and also the different densities of the metal, make so much difference in the acid’s action that time is no guide whatever. The quantity of gas given off in the form of bubbles is the best indication whilst the plate is in the bath of the depth the lines have bitten, and if you watch the plate carefully as it bites this is a very sure guide as to the depth the lines have gone. Time in biting. Time no test of biting. On the Makmg of Etchings. Cleaning off the ground. In biting with the Dutch mordant there are no bubbles of gas given off, and it is difficult to tell the depth of the lines whilst in the bath. The only way is to frequently take the plate out and examine the lines closely, removing a bit of the ground if necessary in order to see better. The Dutch bath turns the lines it is biting dark purple, and so the etching ground is not smoked for working in the bath; and for a plate which is to be bitten with Dutch mordant it is better to use a transparent ground always, as the depth of the lines, being dark coloured, can be more easily seen. The darkest lines being now duly bitten into their full depth, the plate is washed in water, the ground and varnish from the back dissolved with turpentine and cleaned off, and there your lines are ! all sunk into the plate of various depths and thicknesses, and the plate is ready for the printer. In Plate III. Fig i, are lines bitten with the nitrous acid bath. This square on the plate was covered with the diagonal lines, all drawn at once with one needle, and a few cross lines added in the lower corner. They were all bitten for two minutes, and then, had the ground been removed, would have printed the same as the light corner bit. This corner was then painted over, with stopping out varnish, which of course prevented the acid from biting its way further, and the remainder bitten again for five minutes. Then the middle band was painted over or “ stopped out,” and the remaining corner bitten again for ten minutes. This was done to show the different qualities biting will give to the same lines ; observe, too, the extra depth of the On the Making of Etchings. 19 lines themselves where the cross lines are, this bit in the corner having been under the action of the acid just the same time as the rest of the dark piece, thereby illustrating the effect mentioned above of lines close together biting much faster. As the acid gets down below the surface of the plate, the sides of the furrows in the plate are of course exposed, and the acid works sideways as well as down, and widens the lines. Another method of etching a plate is as follows. First, only the lines intended to be dark are drawn, and the plate put in the bath and bitten for a certain time. Then it is taken out and the next darkest lines drawn (on the same ground) and the plate bitten again for another period, the first lines being bitten of course much deeper than the second set on account of the start they had. At the end of another period, and if desired, still another, the plate is taken out and fresh work added, and at the end of this time the last work added is quite light and the first lines very dark with a gradation between for the intermediate work. To work a plate well in this manner, however, requires some practice and forethought. Now the plate is “ proved ” by the printing press, and and the proof of your work lies before you. First proofs are sometimes rather startling things — all along through the working of the plate you have been picturing to yourself the look of the proof, and the differences between the image and the one realised by the plate, appearing as they do all in a moment, are startling enough. Of course an experienced etcher generally knows exactly what his plate will look like when printed, but it is most interesting D Etching with- out stopping out. The proof. 20 Rebiting. Reworking or transparent ground. On the Making of Etchings. to watch the face of a beginner in the craft, as the proof is turned up from the plate and laid in front of him on the press. It is almost certain to be the case that the plate is either bitten too little in places or too much in others, or both these, or it may be the lines are too open, and patches of quite bright light appear among the shadows, destroying all depth. Supposing it is too light, or “underbitten,” and the lines are good in themselves (as of course they ought to be), then there is a method by which they can be made deeper, called “ rebiting.” This is done by covering the surface very carefully with etching ground without letting it go into the lines or hollows, and then putting it in the acid again, when of course they go on biting. It can be done by the dabber, but a much surer way is by the roller. The same operation is gone through as that described in laying a ground with the roller. But for rebiting more care is used and as little ground as possible taken up on the roller. This is then rolled lightly over the plate and leaves the thinnest film of ground adhering to it without stopping up the finest lines. The plate is then heated a little to drive off the oil of spike, but is not smoked, for fear of the ground creeping round the edges of the faintest lines and stopping them out. When the ground has dried for a day or so the biting can be proceeded with just as though the first ground had not been removed. Laying a rebiting ground is an operation requiring very delicate manipulation. In the case of the work being too open and requiring more lines, a “reworking” ground is put on. This is put on in On the Makmg of Etchmgs. 2 1 the same manner as the first ground, either with the dabber or roller, only care is taken to rub the ground into the lines already bitten (to prevent them biting again) and the ground is not smoked. If it was, the faint lines would not be seen through : but put on thinly without smoke ail the lines already there can be seen perfectly through the gold-coloured ground. The new work is now put in, and bitten and stopped out in the same manner as that on the first ground, the former work remaining the same. Of course if it be desired that a few of the old lines should be bitten more deeply, the needle may be run into them clear- ing out the ground sufficiently to make them bite again. As many grounds can thus be put on a plate as is desired, and as many stoppings out made. Some etchers take many days to bite a plate, and stop out thirty or forty times. But with all stoppings out it is necessary to make arbi- trary divisions between lighter and darker parts, which of course in nature there are not. This is not of such great consequence really, because there are many ways of correcting it afterwards, but if the plate is etched direct in the bath a more perfect gradation is obtained. You may wonder what happens to the needle, if it be a steel onq, in working in the acid. Well, it gets eaten away gradually, but it lasts out more than one plate, and common sewing needles are cheap enough. An accomplished etcher seldom binds himself down to one method or process. He probably uses combinations of several on a plate, taking up a process and dropping it for another just as the ideas strike him. So it generally Working the bath. 2 2 On the Making of Etchings. Collecting. Burnishing. I Burnisher Aij***A. M A. aC ar^4\i 0ml. . ,1 1 happens that a good deal of a plate is etched in the bath. It is difficult at first to believe that the work on a plate can be readily altered or modified, and yet it is more easy to do this than to alter a drawing on paper. Supposing the work on a plate, or part of it, is too dark, or “over-bitten,” there are several ways of correcting it. First, by the burnisher. This is a highly polished piece of steel, about as large as a lead pencil, of an oval section and tapered towards the end. It is fixed in a wooden handle and is used upon the plate with oil. It is rubbed back- wards and forwards with considerable pressure obliquely over the line it is desired to lighten ; and its action is to close together the sides of the furrow in the plate, and make it hold, and yield, less ink. Used skilfully the burnisher is a splendid tool, and many etchers over-bite their plates purposely in order to avail themselves of the gradations which can be obtained by skilfully using it. In Fig 2, Plate III, the lines in the square were all bitten of the same depth, and would have printed an even tone all over, but the lower parts have been burnished to shew the effect of the tool. Charcoaling. When a considerable portion of a plate is too darkly bitten it can be reduced by rubbing or grinding the surface of the plate away with charcoal — the same kind as that used for surfacing the plate. Of course this acts in a different way to the burnisher, making the lines shallower. Lines which been reduced by charcoal print greyly, a quality which is often valuable. A mass of lines over-bitten can also be made to print On the Making of Etchmgs. 23 much lighter by placing the plate face down on a polished anvil and striking the back of the plate with a full-faced hammer. This drives up the bottoms of the lines and crushes the division between them broader, acting a good deal like a burnisher, only without the danger there would be with the burnisher of destroying the sharpness of the lines. Passages in a plate can be erased quite easily. Faint Erasing, passages can be taken out perfectly by the burnisher, like the corner of the square in Pig 2, Plate III, and of course if the passage is a broad one, snake-stone and charcoal will the copper being crushed down by the burnisher, would leave too abrupt an indentation in the plate to print clearly. In such a case the quickest way is to cut out the part on place on the back of the plate with plate callipers, place it face down on the polished anvil, and knock the engraver’s hammer, or if the place is small, punches of different shapes. surface is altered, and the plate buckles and .springs about in a very unpleasant manner, and to recover or set a plate thus sprung takes a great deal of practice. Dry-point is generally used to complete an etching, but Dry-point, it is dry-point robbed of its own peculiar beauty by the “bur” being removed. A dry-point line is made by scratching it direct into the plate by a sharp point, which may be a steel needle, or diamond point, or a diarnond- the plate with a three-square scraper or scorper, mark the hollow level again. The knocking up is done by an It requires considerable skill to knock up well, because if the plate is hammered much in one place the tension of the 24 On the Makuig of Etchings. Dry-point Line, fr7lAr<|