The Baltimore County union. [volume] (Towsontown, Md.) 1865-1909, 1878-08-24
MISCELLANEOUS.
BUSINESS OPPORTUNITIES. ("


The eagerness with which young men rush into
the many hardships they encounter in consequence
thereof, would make one of the most interesting
stories, if fairly written, that has ever been set
forth. The Mysteries of Paris was story of
crime and its penalties but there no city but has
its mysteries of honest struggles of crushed hopes
and bitter disappontments that, if narrated would
be equally wonderful and exciting. Cities are
built up partially on ruins, on the ruin of wasted
effort, on the ruin of fortunes, on a thousand and
one failures from which success to some one comes
at last. The inventor rarely reaps the reward of
his own invention; manufacturers will often fail
and others will step into their shoes and succeed,
and while multitude of merchants go down and
heard of no more, other and more gigantic
concerns grow and.take their places. "Men die
but nations live" and so with the several parts ;
the great sea that casts many a wreck upon the
rocks and sands, carries thousand vessels sue
cessfully into their several Ravens.
1t is common thing to discourage people from
coming to the cities, but this is an error Its
most vigorous life-blood flows into it from the
country, and without these constant accretiOns of
bone, muscle, and BRAIN city would soon fall in
to the sere and yellow leaf of age and decreptude.
1t is unfortunate that so many come but to perish,
emerged, but that cannot be helped it is the in
evitable rule that will never be broken. The law
of natural selection is here perfectly realized the
city takes and absorbs the best and strongest the
remainder must either flee away hold on to the
edges with most uncertain grasp. The men with
shrewdest wit will make their way sterling hon.
esty united with fair business talents will often be
appreciated excellent mechanics are wanted and
men who have little but strong arms, yet who are
sober, industrious, and persevering, will not go
hungry to bed. With these, however, come a host
of men and not few women, who are simply
waits upon the tide, carried hither and thither
without oar, sail, or compass. They are green
timber, likely to spoil in the seasoning they may
have a little of what is called "smartness, but
they lack mother wit and that strong foundation
of common sense which alone the temple of
fortune can be successfully built. The race is to
the swift in Cities and the battle is to the strong
Others may succeed cunning and trickery are
sometimes so triumphant as to dazzle and con-
found, but take life time a generation as
guide, and we shall find that the contrary holds
good. The pitcher that goes often to the well is
broken at last, and few men ever played the game
of Overreaching others who did not end by over
reaching themselves.
The constant struggle that goes on, however, is
painful to witness. No one is willing to believe
that he is not wanted; that in great city, with
its wealth, its business, its thousand avenues to
fame and fortune there is no room for him. He
fights on hopefully while he has money, he lives
in a garnet and on a crust when he has none. He
thinks of Wilmington and Girard, of Franklin
and Vanderbilt and host of others, who, poor
like himself achieved in cities, and became
the rulers of men and the magnates of trade
WE'LL pluck is a good Anglo-SaxOn word, and
those who have it-and something quite as essen
tial at the back of it-have just as good chance
of success as the men named, but these who are
the most certain of success are those who have
something more than the quality embraced in that
word.
There should be some one defined object of am
bition a strong bias towards pursuit, a love of
work and genius for work. There are business
opportunities for those who have had some prac-
tice in business and feel within themselves a ca
pability which nothing can overwhelm. Those
who can edo everything" can usually do nothing,
and they are the kind who are feeced by sharpers
and find city full of snares.-Netcork Advertiser