Orley Farm is a novel written in the realist mode by Anthony Trollope (1815–82), and illustrated by the Pre-Raphaelite artist John Everett Millais (1829–96). It was first published in monthly shilling parts by the London publisher Chapman and Hall. Although this novel appeared to have undersold (possibly because the shilling part was being overshadowed by magazines, such as The Cornhill, that offered a variety of stories and poems in each issue), Orley Farm became Trollope's personal favourite. George Orwell said the book contained "one of the most brilliant descriptions of a lawsuit in English fiction." The house in the book was based on a farm in Harrow once owned by the Trollope family. The real-life farm became a school, which was originally supposed to be the feeder school to Harrow School. It was renamed Orley Farm School after the novel, with Trollope's permission. Background Orley Farm was written between July 1860 and June 1861. The novel was first published in monthly shilling parts by the London publisher Chapman and Hall from March 1861 to October 1862, with forty wood-engraving illustrations by John Everett Millais. Each part comprised two illustrations that were situated at the front, and two to three chapters that followed. The first volume, also published by Chapman and Hall, appeared in December 1861, before the novel's serialisation was completed. The second volume was published in September 1862, and both volumes included the illustrations. To produce some of these volumes Chapman and Hall used the unsold parts, making the double volume set valuable for present-day collectors. While the cost for the monthly parts had been low, that for the double volume set was set at eleven shillings per volume. The standard price for such books was ten shillings, and in a letter to the publisher, Trollope blamed the increased price for slow sales of the first volume. Trollope's arrangement with Chapman and Hall was that he would receive £125 for each of the monthly parts, a sum of £2,500, with an additional half interest in each copy sold after the first 10,000. He was paid a total of £3,135 under this agreement. Plot summary When Joseph Mason of Groby Park, Yorkshire, died, he left his estate to his family. A codicil to his will, however, left Orley Farm (near London) to his much younger second wife and infant son. The will and the codicil were in her handwriting, and