the printing. This process would seem to have been continued for more
than a year. One day in 1764, when the time of publication was drawing
near, Diderot, having occasion to consult an article under the letter S,
found it badly mutilated. Puzzled at first, he presently recognized the
nature of the trick that had been played him. He turned to various parts
of the book, to his own articles and to those of other writers, and
found in many places the marks of the outrage. Diderot was in despair.
His first thought was to throw up the undertaking and to announce the
fraud to the public. The injury that would have been done to Le Breton's
innocent partners, the danger of publishing the fact that the
"Encyclopaedia" was still in process of printing,--a fact of which the
officers of the government had only personal and not official
knowledge,--determined him to go on with the publication. It may be that
Le Breton's changes had been less extensive than Diderot, in his first
excitement on making the discovery, had been led to believe. In
examining the "Encyclopaedia" no alteration of tone is observable
between the first seven and the subsequent volumes; and Grimm, to whom
we owe the story, acknowledges that none of the authors engaged with
Diderot in the work complained or even noticed that their articles had
been altered.

In 1765 the ten volumes which completed the alphabet (making seventeen
of this part of the work) were delivered to the subscribers. As a
precautionary measure, those for foreign countries were sent out first,
then those for the provinces, and lastly those for Paris. The eleven
volumes of plates were not published until 1772. A supplement of four
volumes of text and one of plates appeared in 1776 and 1777, and three
years later a table of contents in two volumes.[Footnote: Several
volumes of the original edition have the imprint of Neufchatel, and the
supplement has that of Amsterdam, although all were actually printed in