BEING BORN LUCKY.

Dunstan Times, Issue 2173, 17 March 1903, Page 6

BEING BORN LUCKY.

IU Benefits IllMtntel *»r Good Fortnac of a Man Who Taaaalcd a MU, The men around the table were telling stories about being born lucky or vice versa, says the Detroit Free Press. “And,” concluded a Chicago drummer who had been telling of an unlucky friend of his, “what did he do at last but gather together what little money he bad left/and buy a lot in a western oil district, before prices boomed. He started to sink his well, with just enough money on the mortgage to finish it, if he had luck, and he struck a rock before he had gone 20 feet. He drove away at it and kept driving for a hundred feet, breaking drills and costing money, till he finally threw up his hands, gave the property to his creditors and killed himself. The creditors investigated the boring and found that my friend had struck a petrified tree, upright in the earth and had bored for a hundred feet right into it. They moved the drill only four feet to the right and within two weeks had tapped a well that was good for 300 barrels a day.” There was a chorus of sighs at the sad fate of this unlucky one, and a Philadelphia railroad man began something more cheerful. “I had a friend,” he said, “whose luck was just the reverse of the gentleman's whose history we have listened to with so much pleasure —I mean sorrow” —the Philadelphian was getting mixed. “That’s all right,” laughed the Chicago man, “I know what you mean.” “And he made his ten-strike on a case of boring, just as the other one did not. Which shows that fortune is truly a fickle goddess. My friend Smith, I’ll call him, had luck always as a boy, and as soon as he graduated he got a good job, although he was not a brilliant man at all. Which, however, is no sign, because some of the best jobs—-that pay the best, I mean—are held by men who get them by luck and not by genius. He became a promoter and schemer later, and went in for himself, coming out of every undertaking with more or less success, and never losing money. It made no difference to Smith what kind of a proposition came before'Jiim; if he I thought there was anything in it, he I did not let it get away. The one parj ticular instance I have in mind was j the driving of a tunnel on a southwestern railroad. He didn’t know any more about that sort of business than n pulpit knows about practical politics, but he thought it was . a chance I to make something, and he went in j with a contractor, who had only done small jobs. Their bid was so low that | if Smith hadn’t had rich and influeni tial friends he would hare lost it. He had made considerable money in his ventures and he put that up also as his backing. The tunnel was to cost about half a million dollars and Smith stood to win $50,000 at his own estimation, and to lose SIOO,OOO, according to estimates of the contractors who had put in. higher bids. There was to be SIOO a day bonus for every day ahead of time that the tunnel was completed, and a forfeit of the same amount for delay. “Well, he got everything ready and set his men to work at one end of the tunnel only, for the first month. Then he expected to put on a night and day force at both ends, for Smith was a hustler. However, his luck was with him, as usual, and it wasn’t necessary to hustle. Before his sappers had gone 50 feet into the hill, and they began almost at the face of a cliff, I’ll be jiggered if they didn’t break through into a cave 40 feet high and 20 wide and running that size half way through the hill. It got down small again for a hundred feet and then widened again and ran big to within 50 feet of daylight on the far side of the hill. There was some work to do to put it into shape, but it hardj ly amounted to anything, as tunneling goes, and Smith not only made a big I thing on his contract direct, but the bonus on extra days was nearly enough for a modest man to retire from business on.” “And yet,” said a man of years, “you hear people say that there is no such thing as luck in the making of a man’s success.” Albert Edward TJnohanared. He is one of the heavy swells and struts. Nothing pleases him so much as to hold forth eloquently before new acquaintances. Old ones can’t bear him. He had just returned from Europe, where he won something over 12.000 “puns” “over” the “Darby.” He said to a delighted audience at the club that the impression sent abroad that the king is not the same old prince of Wales is erroneous. “The whole world seems bent on making him a second Prince HalHenry V. It is said that he has gone back on his old Falstaffs. Not a bit of it. He is the same Albert Edward. When I met him the other day he treated me just as he always did.” Some one at the pool table was mean enough to ask: “How was that?” To which the plunger “over” the “Darby” replied: “He didn’t notice me at ail.” —N. Y. Frees. Many Are Unlit That Way, Y “My aim,” said the confidence mat,"’ “i* to give happiness. In one way I may claim to be a philanthropist.” “A philanthropist!” exclaimed the listener. “Certainly,” was the answer. “If you have followed the various fakes and swindles of the present day, you surely must have noticed that some people are happy only when ;iu y are being properly humbugged.”—Chicago