With a gauge and scale as above suggested, it is extremely easy to quickly mark out a page with pencilled dots, so soon as it is decided how many stamps are to go in each row--_experto crede_.
Of course, allowance must be made if the stamps of a set are of uneven size, but there is no difficulty if a little patience be exercised.
I have arranged many pages of stamps by the aid of a home-made scale on this and similar plans, and have experienced no trouble in allowing for the occasional inclusion of pairs and short strips--a little mental calculation, and a side movement of the gauge to the extent of the width of one stamp will compensate for, say, a pair instead of a single; and so on.
The specialist can rarely have the advantage of a prepared printed album, as his possessions include pairs, blocks, marginal pieces, original covers, and evidential items of a variety of shapes. He works therefore on albums that have blank pages, generally enclosed within a form of semi-binding which allows the interchanging of the leaves. Spring-back covers are now much used, though there are excellent peg and clutch attachments in the British-made albums of the specialist class. The leaves are either quite plain or with a faint _quadrillé_ ground which is an aid to symmetrical arrangement.
The early stamp collectors used to elaborate their albums with gay colourings; some, following the early artistry of Mr. Booty in the preface to his "Aids to Stamp Collectors" (1862), mounted their stamps on squares of coloured paper, and emblazoned the country's arms and painted its flags upon the pages of their albums. The stamps, being of small size, suffered in the contrast with these gaudy trappings, and in the latter-day philately such contrivances are left to the _nouveau riche_, who will embellish each of his pages with his name, titles, address, coat of arms, and would add his portrait were album-pages not made so ridiculously small for such big men. To-day all extravagant flourishes and gay trimmings are a vulgarity; simple elegance and nice judgment in the arrangement make for beauty in our albums.
At the same time we must recognise for the specialist two schools of collecting; one is concerned with the collecting of purely philatelic items, the other devotes itself to the formation of an historical as well as philatelic collection. The former does not require much writing-up on the pages. The latter advocates a good deal of it, and it is this form of collecting--the highest exponent of which is the Earl of Crawford--that allows of the most free scope for the individuality of the collector. It is in the collection which aims at a complete history of the stamps of a country, with all the associated circumstances leading up to their issuance and connected with their use, that the highest summit of philatelic pleasure and culture is attained.