  We report the results of a sensitive near-infrared JHKL imaging survey of the
Trapezium cluster in Orion. We use the JHKL colors to obtain a census of
infrared excess stars in the cluster. Of (391) stars brighter than 12th
magnitude in the K and L bands, 80 +/- 7% are found to exhibit detectable
infrared excess on the J-H, K-L color-color diagram. Examination of a subsample
of 285 of these stars with published spectral types yields a slightly higher
infrared excess fraction of 85%. We find that 97% of the optical proplyds in
the cluster exhibit excess in the JHKL color-color diagram indicating that the
most likely origin of the observed infrared excesses is from circumstellar
disks. We interpret these results to indicate that the fraction of stars in the
cluster with circumstellar disks is between 80-85%. Moreover, we find that the
probability of finding an infrared excess/protoplanetary disk around a star is
independent of stellar mass over essentially the entire range of the stellar
mass function down to the hydrogen burning limit. We identify 78 stars in our
sample characterized by K-L colors suggestive of deeply embedded protostellar
objects. If even a modest fraction fraction (i.e., ~ 50%) of these objects are
protostars, then star formation could be continuing in the molecular ridge at a
rate comparable to that which produced the foreground Trapezium cluster.
