WILLIAM, an ingenious though unsuccessful artist, who was a goldsmith in Edinburgh, deserves to be recorded for his attempt to introduce an improvement in the art of printing. The invention, first practised by Ged in 1725, was simply this. From any types of Greek or Roman, or any other character, he formed a plate for every page, or sheet, of a book, from which he printed, instead of using a type for every letter, as is done in the common way. This was first practised, but on blocks of wood, by the Chinese and Japanese, and pursued in the first essays of Cotter the European inventor of the present art. "This improvement (says James Ged the inventor's son) is principally considerable in three most important articles, viz. expence, correctness, beauty and uniformity."

In July 1729, William Ged entered into partnership with William Fenner, a London stationer, who was to have half the profits, in consideration of his advancing all the money requisite. To supply this, Mr John James, then an architect at Greenwich (who built Sir Gregory Page's house, Bloomsbury church, &c.) was taken into the scheme, and afterwards his brother Mr Thomas James, a letter founder, and James Ged the inventor's son. In 1730, these partners applied to the university of Cambridge for printing Bibles and common prayer books by blocks instead of single types; and, in consequence, a lease was sealed to them, April 23, 1731. In their attempt they sunk a large sum of money, and finished only two prayer books; so that it was forced to be relinquished, and the lease was afterwards given up. Ged imputed his disappointment to the villany of the preltsmen, and the ill treatment of his partners (which he specifies at large), particularly Fenner, whom John James and he were advised to prosecute, but declined it. He returned to Scotland in 1736, where he gave his friends a specimen of his performance, by an edition of Sallust. But being still unsuccessful, and having failed in obtaining redress from Fenner, who died insolvent, he was preparing again to set out for London, in order to join with his son James as a printer there, when he died October 19, 1749. Ged's son attempted unsuccessfully, in 1751, to revive this invention; Messrs Tilloch and Foulis about the year 1782 practised it on a small scale at Glasgow; and of late years many beautiful editions of the classics have been printed in this way by Didot of Paris, and Wilson and Company of London*.