" An
offer was accordingly made to him to undertake the publication of
the 'Saturday Magazine' and the other publications of the
Christian Knowledge Society, which he accepted. It is
unnecessary to follow his fortunes. His progress was steady; he
eventually became the publisher of 'Fraser's Magazine' and of the
works of John Stuart Mill and other well-known writers. Mill
never forgot his appreciation and generosity; for when his
'System of Logic' had been refused by the leading London
publishers, Parker prized the book at its rightful value and
introduced it to the public.
To return to Mr. Clowes. In the course of a few years, the
original humble establishment of the Sussex compositor, beginning
with one press and one assistant, grew up to be one of the
largest printing-offices in the world. It had twenty-five steam
presses, twenty-eight hand-presses, six hydraulic presses, and
gave direct employment to over five hundred persons, and indirect
employment to probably more than ten times that number. Besides
the works connected with his printing-office, Mr. Clowes found it
necessary to cast his own types, to enable him to command on
emergency any quantity; and to this he afterwards added
stereotyping on an immense scale. He possessed the power of
supplying his compositors with a stream of new type at the rate
of about 50,000 pieces a day. In this way, the weight of type in
ordinary use became very great; it amounted to not less than 500
tons, and the stereotyped plates to about 2500 tons the value of
the latter being not less than half a million sterling.
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