scattered over this great land must be placed in the same relative
position as their brethren in the large cities. How they are supplied
with the book, posted as to its merits, and enabled to take care of
whatever demands arise, is the wholesale, or "jobbing," side of book
selling.

This class of booksellers relies mostly upon the wholesaler for
information and supplies. Everyone knows when Winston Churchill and
Mrs. Humphry Ward are writing books, and what they are about; but when
a dealer in a small town gets a call for "The Sands of Time," author
unknown, a book he has never heard of before, he usually transmits the
order just as he has received it to his jobber, who supplies him with
the book if it is on the market, or with the necessary information
regarding it if he is not able to supply it. The jobber's work,
broadly speaking, is twofold: To see that a book for which the demand
is certain to be large and immediate is in the hands of all his
customers promptly after publication, and to take care of all
inquiries that arise throughout the country for lesser-known books.
His establishment must be a very temple of learning, and he has to
know everything in the book world, from the plot of the latest "best
seller" to the relative importance of a work on the differential
calculus.

Let us take his first duty. A book is to be published by a noted
author, and a large sale is confidently expected. It will be widely
advertised, and the press will feature it in the review columns. His
first move usually is to distribute descriptive notices among his
customers, telling them what he knows about it and inviting them to
send in their orders. His travellers are also notified and are advised
as to how the book is likely to be received by the people, and whether
it is accounted better or worse than the author's previous works. The
jobber has therefore to size up a book early in the game, without
perhaps having seen anything relating to it except the publisher's
advance notices. He has to be very careful not to "over-sell" the
book, and yet at the same time he must distribute it in sufficient
quantities, so that no sales may be lost through dealers not having
supplies. Orders generally begin to come in quickly, and sometimes the
advance sales of popular books are enormous. Then comes the question
of buying a first supply. The suave, persuasive agent of the publisher
waits upon the jobber and tells him what a wonderful work it is,