HOW FORTUNES ARE MADE.

Mataura Ensign, Volume 7, Issue 369, 27 June 1884, Page 2

HOW FORTUNES ARE MADE.

It; is the strong man, not the acut£ imut — still ' less the $ri£ina& .Ifcnfieft^n^ ma keß money! in large -l.umpsif^iftfe (lfiJßaon 'Spectator ') have . be^n , recently raging, or, to. speak truth, 'trying 'to^ l'ff^/ iTTuige book, published -'by Messrs^Sa#j^iFSfia'Low uporu fortunea,..ma4e,.,in { ,, I feu4q^ )Sfe jih e book is lively,, but so unequal, and 'in chapters so vulgar, as to; feer eo'mpWaiife^^orthless— and we .-have been 1 , struck: jvilirf a certain sameness of qualities .in the sucqesafu 1 industrials r ' whose aehli'etfements? "are therein so absurdly glorified.-!* None oft* them, that we perceive, have beep, intellectual men, though, one, Mr Holden, invented me lucifer match to the permanent relief of mankind j a. /Second, Jsv Perkig, Tyas~aa acute experimental chemist • and a third, Sir H. Bessemer, worked oaTfHe greatest improvement of our tim.e.in the preparatioifcrol iron. But thej all had busrinees courage. Not one hesitated to risk a fortune on a new process, or to adopt' new- machinery at huge cost; or to enlarge works or mines pr mills to any required, or not required, extent. The kind of « timidity I which spmags.tep 0^(916^ thoughtful meu.i^, £afejpoitions seems not to h;iv<t been m these great manufacturers, ir<infoundqrs, ana chemists, and to have ip«en» .rgpiawd b^^so^t^£jcettain.tyi«jMn to the: certainty of . an;aritffinetiSan.""T? nouse talking about expense to Mr jJSolden or Mr Lister.- Tha perfec't t .woolit^toibing machine could b,e fi ma/]e fP and §l^^bemade r and would pay, and c ' whether ten thousand, pounds were spent *-in ; -exp'erinffents or twomillions — there is.vpujfejji jwjpgeserror in the= last figures— made no manner of difference.. .P£ I spegial^ knowledge . helped the courage, but witHbift 1 the* cdurkgtfthe knowledge would not have made fortune ; and courage of that kind and to that extent is not .common..; MiQstifmen who succeed alittle in business become conservative to a. high degreeyand nine men in ten who have niadQ money.- are very, cowards about losing it in anything but 'thl Irdinasy jog-trot of the trade. The f^w exceptions are those who become . ,Theyare all, too, persevering men,' working' a-sO^for years without hope,, with . a determiriltß>n which iS we did not know that kind of persistence iobe of the very grain of |;he character, ar\ti ag. > Uttle a matter of effort as the color of a.saan'& ■ hair, we should also pronounce very sdmira- ; ble. It is, however, rather a useinii quality i.J^aa :a great one, ',13. nearly to the moafc brutal obstinacy; and is consiliitly found mv , great criminais, whose will snaps, as it wero r i -upon, qnj object »f . . de^^andLcannot be uncJosed. They all qan select affd drive multitudes of men) /afc'dTthey all possess a special. kind of sagacity, rising in some, of them to» geuius. They can see, by a. sort of intuition! [ a L uitp,iadqpßndent,. r of . experience^ what will produce money and wharSviii'nOT— see ifc so clearly, ttratr-their J[iii,th, becomes a concrete itfstb£r? th.aa, [a '^pjy^i^lf Mr S. C. Lister, for instance, wool comber — "Going one day iuto-a London warehouse, come upon a. pile of, rubbish f w,hich, strongly attracted his attention. He had nevei" seen auvthins:.

~"~ like it before. —He-inquired what it was, and was told it was silk waste. ' Whq^-do you ,do ; with it?' he asked. 'Sell if for rubbish, that is all,' was the answer ; ' it is impossible to do anything else with it.' Mr, Lister .felt it, poked his nose into it, and pulled it about in a manner that astonished the London t i .warehousemen. , It was neither agreeable to * * %Ws feelf thes smell? nor the touch ; but simply a mass of knotty, dirty, impure stuff, full -, of bits of stick and dead mulberry leaves. In J3 l^ejßndrMxXiptei;. madejthe offer, of a halfr. penny a pound for the "rubbish," and the Bale was there and then concluded, the yenA l!d^>r being' yp-eGialiypleasea to get rid of it on such advantageous terms." Mr Lister •ascertained 'that 'all the silk waste of the „, .world was, sold at.,tJhe. same low rate, and 1 ' '■ Vame to' the conclusidu ttiat if lie could make a machire which would tear that strong, cheap rubbish effectually, there n-as endless •,*«» wealth, to too- obtained. :He sold his patents,' gave up other pnsines.s, and devoted • himself " : " for TEN year's' to 'experiments in tearing silk waste r and ended by turning the despised staff into beautiful and costly .velvet. That, ''was 1 7 true ■'business ' sagacity, and that was possessed >by all the true fortune makers described in this book, including Sir Titus Bait, who in nearly the same way de/ected in / - garde' l niu'gty 'balds' of- "h-ury wo. 1 a fibre which could be-made to look well, and so founded Saltaire and the alpaca trade.; • and Mr Henry" Bessemer, who displayed the same ...quality when he- devoted years to his process t ; , 7 fur changing. iron into steel. He saw the' '"' money in if, plodded' on "determinedly, and * ;! f wa^Sble' at last : tb 'announce,' which he did *jn..pnbUcly,<i : that>;,lie. l ihad , ,jnade ; a million. Sagacity, of that kind is a fine, quality- to '•" T pbsses ! s, a gift' like the"' power ' to ! sing ; and though, like singing, it has .-.little; relation to the intellect, its possessor is never a f 001... The fortune makers do./ipt, however, strike '^-vs 1 as -specially' "admirable' people ; we suppose beHausai. there" is so little self-sacrifice about' them _ Their work, as a rule,.is in a way beneficial to humanity, for they give us i.T'%omethfu|f wnich ttfe' ! world warrt£ or if would not buy it ; ,and if material civilisation is good. that< mu'st bd -g<M&' too. We say "as a r^iejn.j.for.- .wq jUiake anj exception. . against M^Perklris/wtto! , with his abominable r . dyes from coaWar; has : tAl Sdd6d perceptibly J to the misery of living.; •>j -s^^-helgfd/as mjiohia&aiiyjdecenti man could to'degrade trie taste in color thrpugh thVee • eontinents-pbut most of them have ( bencfited >no-J#¥?i B^o -MjW BOP* thing, even if its principal use is rails ; and as wool must befscutched to be worn, there rhay as r/i!'foill iben an :idealf wool-scutcher, with more rr /power,- than any otber,coml>iration' of iron teeth. Most of 'the men 'described.' tob, Beem tofiaVe been fairly honest, though they : »Tn4s bux p^nts,Ghean^and,aie r onjly instance oTsliafplfractice We l&ve 3eefT may look' so owing#o;clgrn£iness in the narrator/ Ay we 1 j»ad his story, the great fortunes of the Daweons, Hirds, and Hardys, the three' families whom the Low Moor works have made so rich, were founded on a— well, a .very keensighted transaction. Mr Dawson was ; a Unitarian Minister, with a knowledge of nietallurgyvMr Hird was a country gentle* man, and Mr Hardy was a country, solicitor,-wfaenviabout-mO/they bought; from the asfflgiw-ttf^-rainM o ld squire, named Leeds, ■\ ?whe»Uad committed; ,suicide Jto get rid .of his, ) ftfeirfs, wJ\\>Mck&L \mHovk chiefly moor, *f0rXi34,0607 TheybOugrrt from ijutermedia-. ries, but the-wrifcer leaves tb,e impression. that , ,Mr Daweon s fxom .the fir^ knew ( wb,at was 1 Aimder!theesfefeJfßd held, M^tqngne until ' the property— r/hic'h is Low^Kro^r, arid has yieldM'rniliibns^wks in his ownjhands. It is good to work at one's trade without sucrrcess anaesp&timtozMW J e f*>\ v *» after all, a million sterling at the end xa pay,; and we dq not .sea why. Queen and nation if* BXxM(& &£ bto|rap^er. . W SiiM Bessemer wishes,- pour, out honor from a^flagor, upon men like him.' .He benefited 'tW jwition, no ■■ =a&abtr r Dut' i he ? did it fdi<oash, and got the ..»» and,did hot: : do half as mnbh for the trorid AS Samuel Clarkson, who got nothing. '•'tiwßdii&r'to deny certain gifts; to the great industrials, but they are gifts^ which bringthei*'- appropriate reward in full meaiv"re and Tunning . over. ; / and it is equally foolish to describe, them as benefactors of mankind. 1 Soiis a ploughman i a benefactor, , : but; he is content with his wage. ■