Position of Page Numbers in Books

Abstract

How many months, weeks, or at the very least, days, are wasted in each year by the habit of publishers and printers of omitting the page number at the beginning of a new chapter or article? When one is making a reference to a paper it is excessively annoying to have almost invariably to turn over the leaf in order to find the number of the page on which the chapter or article begins. Certainly it must occupy several minutes of my time each year, and the total time wasted by scientific writers and others who are careful in giving their references must certainly be considerable. If the printer or publisher objects to putting the page number in its usual place at the top outer corner of the page, he could quite easily centre it or place it at the bottom of the page. This, in fact, is a procedure occasionally adopted, especially of late years, but one would like to see it universal.