“Look through myeyes if thou hast none of thine own.”

the catalogue, by Melville’s measure

Whales, and books, are reckoned by their heft.

In the chapter on Cetology, Melville sorts the whales as a printer sorts a press — the Folio, the Octavo, the Duodecimo. We keep his shelving.

a folio, opened

anatomy of a book · a standing glossary

The parts have names. We keep them.

A restorer ought to know the body he mends. A short reference, added to as we go — and, we’re told, the part of the house most passers-by come to read.

Colophonˈkɒl.ə.fɒn

The printer’s closing note — the maker’s mark at the end of a book rather than the front. It records who set the type, in what face, and where the work was done. Ours is a signature, not an afterthought.

Foxingˈfɒk.sɪŋ

The rust-brown freckling that age brings to old paper, from iron in the pulp meeting damp air over decades. Not damage so much as a book keeping time — the reason our pages are cream and never white.

Deckle edgeˈdek.əl

The soft, feathered edge left where handmade paper met the frame of the mould. Machines trim it flat; we leave it ragged where we can, because the hand that made the sheet is worth seeing.