Booth and several friends had been invited to dine with an old gentleman in Baltimore, of distinguished kindness, urbanity, and piety. The host, altho disapproving of theaters and theater-going, had heard so much of Booth’s remarkable powers that curiosity to see the man had, in this instance, overcome all scruples and prejudices. After the entertainment was over, lamps lighted, and the company reseated in the drawing-room, some one requested Booth as a particular favor, and one which all present would doubtless appreciate, to read aloud the Lord’s Prayer. Booth exprest his willingness to do this, and all eyes were turned expectantly upon him. Booth rose slowly and reverently from his chair. It was wonderful to watch the play of emotions that convulsed his countenance. He became deathly pale, and his eyes, turned tremblingly upward, were wet with tears. And yet he had not spoken. The silence could be felt. It became absolutely painful, till at last the spell was broken as if by an electric shock, as his rich-toned voice, from white lips syllabled forth, “Our Father who art in heaven,” etc., with a pathos and solemnity that thrilled all hearers. He finished. The silence continued. Not a voice was heard or a muscle moved in his rapt audience, till from a remote corner of the room a subdued sob was heard, and the old gentleman, their host, stept forward, with streaming eyes and tottering frame, and seized Booth by the hand. “Sir,” said he, in broken accents, “you have afforded me a pleasure for which my whole future life will feel grateful. I am an old man, and every day from my boyhood to the present time I thought I had repeated the Lord’s prayer; but I have never heard it—never.” “You are right,” replied Booth; “to read that prayer as it should be read has caused me the severest study and labor for thirty years; and I am far from being satisfied with my rendering of that wonderful production.”—The Millenarian.
(1886)
Losing and Saving—See [Message, A Timely].
Loss and Gain—See [Compensation]; [Deportment]; [Fast Living].
LOSS AND PROFIT
It is said that the bursting of a pin in the driving-wheel of an engine in the Illinois Steel Company will cost the company $369,000, since the accident stopt the operation of the whole plant about six days and a half, and the loss involved by the stop was reckoned at about $40 a minute. This fable teaches that great business operations work both ways: where big profits are made big losses stand ready to overwhelm when something goes wrong.
(1887)
Loss Creating Wealth—See [Discovery, Accidental].
LOSS, GAIN IN
When Mahamoud, the conqueror of India, took the city of Gujarat, he proceeded, as his custom was, to destroy the idols. One of these, standing fifteen feet high, the attendant priests and devotees begged him to spare. But, deaf to their entreaties, he seized a hammer and smote the idol, when to his amazement from the shattered image there rained a shower of gems—pearls and diamonds—treasures of fabulous value hidden within it. (Text.)