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THE BOOK BINDINGS OF RALPH RANDOLPH ADAMS.

AMONG bookbinders of the past of the chief beauties of a binding.

four centuries, several classical models have held sway, dominating the designs of the minor binders, who have copied, often with much technical excellence, but without originality, the styles of Maioli, Grolier, Eve, Le Gascon, Derome and Roger Payne. Not until near the end of the nineteenth century was there any breaking away from the geometrical designs of the Grolier style, the dotted ornaments of Le Gascon or the Vandyke borders of Derome. About twenty years ago the elder Lortic turned away from the beaten roads, and went back to Nature for his designs. From this departure has developed the modern French naturalistic style, in which the character of the book serves as the keynote for its binding.

A few years ago, Ralph Randolph Adams entered the field as a binder. Thorough study acquainted him with the work and styles of his predecessors and contemporaries. Probably the mosaic bindings of Trautz-Bauzonnet appealed to him most. The twentytwo masterpieces of mosaic binding which Trautz executed during his life are still looked upon as among the most admirable productions of the binder's art. Design and technique are alike of rare perfection. The process of these bindings is, however, one of onlaying rather than inlaying; and the paring of the onlaid leathers to the necessary degree of thinness destroys the grain which should be one

Then, too, a mosaic composed of bits of thin leather pasted onto an already fully bound book lacks the sincerity of a real mosaic of leathers of the same thickness fitted into each other.

This was the problem Mr. Adams set for himself-to produce a mosaic inlaid clear to the board, in order to preserve the grain of the leather; and to join the leathers so accurately and firmly that there would be no break nor crack between the parts of the mosaic, either when new or when time, heat, and moisture had tried the binding. This had been tried many times, and as often had failed. The joints would part. For several years Mr. Adams carried on his experiments in overcoming this defect. He made a study of the chemistry of leathers and of cements, and after many costly failures has succeeded in joining his leathers so exactly that only the dif ference in grain and color are evidence that the cover is not all in one piece. The binding of Swinburne's A Midsummer Holiday, which we reproduce as a frontispiece, was taken to the inkmaker's for the purpose of getting inks to match. The expert inkmaker explained that it would be impossible to get the same effects in printing on paper that had been obtained in printing on the leather. Only our reputation for veracity convinced him that the binding was made up of pieces of leather of three different colors.

Of course, centuries have not yet

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SOME BINDINGS IN VIENNESE INLAY DONE BY RALPH RANDOLPH ADAMS

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