Of Mr. Bulwer’s novels, so universally popular, the first edition never exceeded 2,500; and so it has been, and is, with others.  With all Mr. Thackeray’s popularity, the sale of his books has, I believe, rarely gone beyond 6,000 for the supply of above thirty millions of people.  Occasionally, a single author is enabled to fix the attention of the public, and he is enabled to make a fortune—­not from the sale of large quantities at low prices, but of moderate quantities at high prices.  The chief case of the kind now in England is that of Mr. Dickens, who sells for twenty shillings a book that costs about four shillings and sixpence to make, and charges his fellow-laborers in the field of literature an enormous price for the privilege of attaching to his numbers the advertisements of their works, as is shown in the following paragraph from one of the journals of the day:—­

“Thus far, no writer has succeeded in drawing so large pecuniary profits from the exercise of his talents as Charles Dickens.  His last romance, “Bleak House,” which appeared in monthly numbers, had so wide a circulation in that form that it became a valuable medium for advertising, so that before its close the few pages of the tale were completely lost in sheets of advertisements which were stitched to them.  The lowest price for such an advertisement was L1 sterling, and many were paid for at the rate of L5 and L6.  From this there is nothing improbable in the supposition that, in addition to the large sum received for the tale, its author gained some L15,000 by his advertising sheets.  The “Household Words” produces an income of about L4,000, though Dickens, having put it entirely in the hands of an assistant editor, has nothing to do with it beyond furnishing a weekly article.  Through his talents alone he has raised himself from the position of a newspaper reporter to that of a literary Croesus.”

   [Footnote 1:  The tax on advertisements has just now been repealed, but
   that tax was a small one when compared with that imposed by
   centralization.]

Centralization produces the “cheap and abundant supply of labor” required for the maintenance of the British manufacturing system, and “cheap labor” furnishes Mr. Dickens with his “Oliver Twist,” his “Tom-all-alone’s,” and the various other characters and situation by aid of whose delineation he is enabled, as a German writer informs us, to have dinners

“at which the highest aristocracy is glad to be present, and where he equals them in wealth, and furnishes an intellectual banquet of wit and wisdom which they, the highest and most refined circles, cannot imitate.”

Centralization enables Mr. Dickens to obtain vast sums by advertising the works of the poor authors by whom he is surrounded, most of whom are not only badly paid, but insolently treated, while even of those whose names and whose works are well known abroad many gladly become recipients of the public charity.