The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1898-04-17

-0au,;ct'~ Pcsthumous Bo"i@--
Brake and His Cd to the Amer
{,ar .,InE-'-Anccdutes OF Di>ri'-
ol;--Vs hitcyyashinw Judge LeG-
r.c,s--fnj;ry tnc WAR Prophets
En,e Done thc Book Trade
Capt Ninhan, stevenson, Kiplinis
and ,-ur..s.
Co-re>pc1aence The St Paul Globe.
NEW YORK, April l5.-The pre-
emiu1ic Of New York as the book cen
ter The country is forced upon us with
new emphasis by tha lists of spring
announcements. winch have already
appeared in many literary papers. Bos-
toms supp pmaCy Ions since had passed
away. EV5n the eMine-ce VIII en- Phll2-
delrhja had in The early part OF the
&. injury is BOW thinS of the distant
last New York Surmounts all. Thete
sre probably five times as many books
Issued i'm one year with New YORK
im!uat, Is there are Boston BOOKS
Indeed. 1 am rot sure but there are
n1t seven times Is many. But tn
exact nEures are not needed. The fact
of the oVelwhelminG rank OF New York
is u: jispu,lble. With the decline 81
Boston and Philadelphia, has come the
growth Of hicago. That city already
SURPRISES Philadelphia. and / am not
Ce,aiu that Boston viii Tor many more
years keep her second place. it must
eventually go TO Ch.cigo.
Her the causes Of this change we
should need To reflect On many facts.
But chief among them has been the
supreme place held 10y New York as
a ,.:..r of magazines. AS the New
hA
giautS IF the pI1f1s scientifically, Ray
u..G. Bennett and Bryant-acquired
fist rank among American papers, so
have the magazines published in this
city made their way TO the front IN
advance of all that Boston and Phila-
daiihia could do. First was, Of course,
IaIrer's magazine, and then came the
C,uJny. with ScrihEer's, the Cosmo-
Ia.'ilau NcClure's. Munsey's, the H.
view gr Reviews, and others, following
with thu iapsiug time until now their
names stand for nearly all the great
suge ssss that monthly illustrated
ZINE literature has to its account.
Simultaneously with this growth we
have seen the growth in New York Of
book publishing. Periodicals have
made material fer books. 1t was essen
tiai that they should increase in New
York the output of books. The emil
loUc- Row completely won for New
York. ] cannot doubt viii remain.
The ouiy chance for growth in any
other er--er lies in Chicago. SO many
oth.r lines of business have been firm
Il established in that 81 eat c7nter of the
uiE tl- West that books also must
ey.rJufUy give to Chicago one of her
large industries. 1t is certain that the
country does not have a region in which
l...- GIcNth in the consumption of
books is seen by publishers than in the
middle We>- and the Northwest. Pub
ISl.-s have long Sc II this fact. in
Jau.s pan is of the country lives a popu-
laIi.u. row become prosperous and gen
orally I'm Eocd circumstances. 1t is also
aE int llGent population, and in cul-
tuIe and thirst fer knowledge. 1t is
making marked advance Of which I'M
m.sfakahle evidences is seen in the
growing demand for books.
Paul Leicester Ford, recently made
q curious statement. concerning the
early fate Of his, The Hon. Peter Ster-
Iaa." Row one Of the most widely read
d. Es ot fiction that we have. He
made TIE statement 10 a writer in Tho
Times Saturday Review" and as it
has particular interest for the West. l
give this part of his remarks to the
writer in full:
"Da YOU know where the demand for
that book FIRST came from?" Mr.. Ford
uU-rigd. You could never imagine. 1t
was very curious. Peter Stirling was
published late in the fall of 1894. 1t lay
on tEe shelves practically UnsOlG for
four months and looked like a failure.
Ore day l went into my publishers,
and, much 30 my surprise, he said:
We're Just getting ready to print q
new edition of Peter Stirling" and
shall make q new set Of plates I'm
very glad to hear that [ said. He
~ lat en-: Look over these proofs and
make any changes You want.
Il Vas such a surprise to me that
the next time I saw him I asked him
how it had happened that the book
had jumped so suddenly in sales. And
th.u It all came out. San Francisco
was lie place where Peter Stirling
really started to sell. Without any
Warairg an order came in from that
city enc day for 300 copies. The man
taa. ordered them was A NJ. Robert
sau. a bookseller Of san Francisco, and
they tGcught IN the Office that he must
he crazy. q remarked to the publisher
when lac told me this that that wasn't
81 high compliment for the boOk) How
ever. Robertson not only sold those 800
copies. hut a little later ordered 300
more 1t was afterWard learned that
Ee Rad happened to read the book and
was SD taken with it that he made I'D
his mind to sell those 300 copies be
fore he cid anything else in a business
way.
Then orders commenced to come in
from Michigan and Wisconsin. Why
1ra" those states no one knows to this
day. hut these are the facts Mean
Wh.ir The book was not selling at all
in Chicago or in New York. The de-
mar! IN these and other cities did not
start until *Peter Stirling had pretty
widely spread throughout the towns of
tn ~-tFf1a West"
The success of Mr.. Ford's book il
illustrates once more the fact that sue
cess for work Of real merit will final
j. be Won. whatever its early fate may
he Certain it is that the critics can
not prevent it, although I am not sure
lint they can do COnsidera bic in bring
iTg II forward. But the real test must
always come from the public; they are
the true final judges of books, the
critics Of time and the real fame max
crs. Mr.. FOrd's early readers often
came from the smaller cities and the
large towns of the West. Here we see
clearly how fast there is growing I'D
in our country vast array Of book
readers remote from the great centers
OF life and trade. People in large cities
UnQUesti9nably read pr0pOrtionately
far less than do people in smaller COM
muritiee. Our popular magazines find
their largest support in such small
communities, and so do our purely
literary periodicals. Their subscribers
are scattered through such towns from
Maine to Texas, from Florida to the
state of Washington. These classes in
our country are the mainstay of the
publishers, and on them their hopes for
the future are built.
\ posthumous book by Daudet is Just
in