strations for
reproduction on lecture-platforms and in drawing-rooms, and in
translating and publishing Nodier's tale, from which the author took his
title! Its presentation has given employment, onerous or enjoyable,
honorary or remunerative, to thousands; hundreds of thousands have read
it, and hundreds of thousands seen it on the stage; and its leading
characters--Trilby, Svengali and "the three musketeers of the
brush"--have become household names and personalities. It has enriched
its author, added to the wealth of its publishers, put money in the
purses of playwright and manager and replenished the treasuries of more
than one excellent charity. Directly or indirectly, no doubt, it has
caused much more than a million dollars to change hands within the past
eighteen months. And last but not least, it is responsible for this
pamphlet, in which is chronicled the story of its rise and progress.

* * * * *

AT THE Mercantile Library, New York, it was found necessary, at the time
when "Trilby" was in greatest demand, to circulate a hundred copies of
the book; at the beginning of June the number in circulation was
seventy. Mr. Wingate wrote to _The Critic_ from Boston, in June, that
there were six copies of the book in the main building of the Public
Library, and one in each of its branches, but that this supply was
inadequate, 72 demands for the book having come from the branch
libraries in a single day. And Mr. Hild writes to us from Chicago that
the Public Library of that city has 26 copies, but that they do not
begin to supply the demand. "I believe we could use 260 and never find a
copy on the shelves. Every one of our 54,000 card-holders seems
determined to read the book."

ON THE POINT of the morality or immorality of the book, _The
Independent_ says:--

"Mr. du Maurier, apparently in deference to the current craze for
heroines that have been seduced, or are just going to be, bedaubs the
first fifty pages of his otherwise clean story with telling how his pure
heroine, Trilby, a _blanchisseuse de fin_, had been led astray, and so
forth. That is to say, he unnecessarily goes behind the true door of his
story to wash some dirty linen, and then he sets forth."

On this point the San Francisco _Argonaut_ does not agree with its New
York contemporary:--

"With those who think these passages immoral, we cannot agree. Mr. du
Maurier has treated with candor some facts belonging to the r