“All things come to him who waits,” is a pretty sentiment, but practical application hews the way. No great book was ever written at one sitting. Edward Gibbon was twenty years composing “The Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire,” and Noah Webster was thirty-five years in producing the dictionary that bears his name. No great address was the result of a moment’s inspiration. When Dr. Lyman Beecher was asked how long he was preparing a certain speech which had electrified his audience, he answered, “Forty years.” No great invention sprang from a dream. George Stephenson was fifteen years making improvements on his locomotive before he won the victory of Rainhill, and when asked by a company of young men how they might succeed, answered, “Do as I have done; persevere.”
“Attempt the end, and never stand to doubt;
Nothing’s so hard but search will find it out.”
THE CHIEF FOREMAN.
One of the great manufacturing firms in Glasgow, Scotland, owes its prosperity largely to a boy whom they engaged. The story runs that thirty years ago a barefoot, ragged boy presented himself at the desk of the chief partner and asked for work as an errand boy. “There’s a deal of running to be done, and you will need a pair of shoes first,” said Mr. Blank. The boy, with a grave nod, disappeared. He lived by doing odd jobs in the market and slept under the stalls. Two months passed before he had saved money enough to buy the shoes. He then presented himself to Mr. Blank and held out a package. “I have the shoes, sir,” he quietly said. “Oh!” the proprietor remarked, “you want a place? Not in those rags, my lad. You would disgrace the house.”
The boy hesitated a moment and then went out without a word. Six months passed before he returned, decently clothed in coarse but new garments. Mr. Blank’s interest was aroused. For the first time he looked at the lad attentively. His thin, bloodless face showed that he had stinted himself of food in order to buy those clothes. On questioning him, the manufacturer found to his regret that he could not read or write. “It is necessary that you should do both before we could employ you in carrying home packages,” he said. “We have no place for you.” The lad’s face grew paler, but without a word of complaint he left. He now found employment in a stable and went to night school. At the end of a year he again presented himself before Mr. Blank. “I can read and write,” he joyfully said. “I gave him the place,” the employer remarked, years after, “with the conviction that in process of time he would take mine, if he made up his mind to do it. Men rise slowly in Scotland, but to-day he is our chief foreman.” How true as St. Paul says in Myer’s poem:
“Let no man think that sudden in a minute
All is accomplished and the work is done;
Though with thine earliest dawn thou shouldst begin it
Scarce were it ended in thy setting sun.”