No book, in recent years at any rate, has had so instantaneous and prodigious a popular success as 'Trilby.' Popularity is always hard to explain with any certainty. It seems to be a quality in the warp and woof of the mind of the man that has it. One condition appears to be that he shall be in sympathy with the minds of the mass of his fellow-beings. There was such a sympathy in Du Maurier's case; and to be more particular, his kindly and friendly enthusiasm was a quality to commend him to men. He had a power of enjoying beauty in his fellow-beings. Then he had had a long education in the qualities that make popularity. He had long studied the art of pleasing. It is not improbable that in these novels, which were intended for the American public, he may have played upon certain of our national susceptibilities. We in this country like to have our literature taken seriously by the European. It may be that Du Maurier may have had an inkling of this, for it is curious to note how much of our poetry appears in these novels. Du Maurier had a very nice taste in poetry, a genuine enthusiasm for it which it is heartily to be wished were shared by all college professors of English literature. Thus, he could not have chosen better lines than those which Peter Ibbetson was in the habit of reciting to Mimsey, 'The Water-fowl' of Bryant,—perhaps the most perfect poem ever produced in this country,—a poem so "beautifully carried," as Matthew Arnold once described it to the present writer. Poe's beautiful and musical lines, written by him at fourteen,—'Helen, thy beauty is to me,'—are also made use of. We have a good deal of Longfellow and other American writers. 'Ben Bolt' is of course an American song. These appeals to our national predilections may have influenced us. But the interest and curiosity of our practical and hard-working American public in the Bohemian art life of the Latin Quarter was also, no doubt, a chief cause of the popularity of 'Trilby.'
Du Maurier did not live long to enjoy his success. He had always been known to his friends as a sensitive man, this quality being ascribed to ill health. Ill health was no doubt a chief cause of the vexation with which he received certain comments upon his books, in some cases inspired by envy of his success. Many of his recent contributions to Punch have been at the expense of the unsuccessful author, and have supported the thesis that ill success was not an indubitable proof of genius. When Lord Wolseley asked him what would be the title of his next novel, he said 'Soured by Success.' He died in London on October 8th, 1896.
AT THE HEART OF BOHEMIA
From 'Trilby' Copyright 1894, by Harper & Brothers
And then—well, I happen to forget what sort of a day this particular day turned into, about six of the clock.
If it was decently fine, the most of them went off to dine at the Restaurant de la Couronne, kept by the Père Trin, in the Rue de Monsieur, who gave you of his best to eat and drink for twenty sols Parisis, or one franc in the coin of the empire. Good distending soups, omelets that were only too savory, lentils, red and white beans, meat so dressed and sauced and seasoned that you didn't know whether it was beef or mutton, flesh, fowl, or good red herring,—or even bad, for that matter,—nor very greatly care.
And just the same lettuce, radishes, and cheese of Gruyère or Brie as you got at the Trois Frères Provençaux (but not the same butter!). And to wash it all down, generous wine in wooden "brocs," that stained a lovely aesthetic blue everything it was spilled over.
And you hobnobbed with models, male and female, students of law and medicine, painters and sculptors, workmen and blanchisseuses and grisettes, and found them very good company, and most improving to your French, if your French was of the usual British kind, and even to some of your manners, if these were very British indeed. And the evening was innocently wound up with billiards, cards, or dominoes at the Café du Luxembourg opposite; or at the Théâtre du Luxembourg, in the Rue de Madame, to see funny farces with screamingly droll Englishmen in them; or still better, at the Jardin Bullier (la Closerie des Lilas), to see the students dance the cancan, or try and dance it yourself, which is not so easy as it seems; or best of all, at the Théâtre de l'Odéon, to see Fechter and Madame Doche in the 'Dame aux Camélias.'
Or if it were not only fine, but a Saturday afternoon into the bargain, the Laird would put on a necktie and a few other necessary things, and the three friends would walk arm-in-arm to Taffy's hotel in the Rue de Seine, and wait outside till he had made himself as presentable as the Laird, which did not take very long. And then (Little Billee was always presentable) they would, arm-in-arm, the huge Taffy in the middle, descend the Rue de Seine and cross a bridge to the Cité, and have a look in at the Morgue. Then back again to the quays on the Rive Gauche by the Pont Neuf, to wend their way westward; now on one side to look at the print and picture shops and the magasins of bric-à-brac, and haply sometimes buy thereof, now on the other to finger and cheapen the second-hand books for sale on the parapet, and even pick one or two utterly unwanted bargains, never to be read or opened again.