number of words, but a complete collection has never been attempted beyond the Chinese Empire.

The type-foundry attached to the National Printing Office at Paris, which founded types for 43,000 distinct characters, has, probably, reached the highest practicable number; but
Chinese Types Made in London.
[Furnished by Mr. John F. Marthens of Pittsburgh.]this performance was accomplished only by repeated alterations of punches and matrices. The punches were cut on wood, and pressed in prepared plaster. The matrices so made were broken when a sufficient quantity of types had been cast from them. By shortening or cutting off a line or lines, the old punches were altered to form new characters. The matrices, also, after they had received the prints of these punches, were sometimes altered by the