The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1900-03-27
HOW THINGS HAPPEN.
The Secret of "Luck' Disclosed for the Benefit
of Young Men.

MY boy, I thing Iheard you remark
U1 while you WereItelling me what
q hard time you had getting along that
nothing lucky ever happened TO you"
Well, / don't doubt that at all. In
deed, I think you are about fve-ftths
right. I don't believe that lucky things
do happen to very many people. Moth
ing "Iucky" ever happened to me until
I got tired Of waiting for good fortune
to happen, and took things into my
own hands and began to make them
happen the way / wanted them to.
Then it was surprising to find what a
regular systematic thing Chance was
after eli.
Now, that man out in Colorado that
you were telling me all about-you
had forgotten his name, but remem
bered the circumstanees-hoW he chap
hened" one day, after years Of ill luck,
10 stumble upon q lucky lead, and is
one Of the owners Of q gold mine that
pays him either 81. 600 o. 81. OOO. 600 a
month, you havetorgotten which, and,
indeed, it doesn't make any diff 9rence,
one would be just as much as the
other to you OF me. Well, I was going
TO say that I knew the man; know all
about his story, and know how his
good luck happened to happen" TO
him.
He was f'ty-three years old when
IL happened" And he had been work.
ing about $50 days year for "a years
trying to make is happen. That's the
way it happened" Ho had prospected
ell over the Rocky Mountain country;
he had worked harder than any slave
he fought to free during the Civil War
eVer worked; lived on meaner food
than any ante bellum darkey ever ate;
ate it worse cooked; his home, when
he didn't roll up in q rag Of a blaD ket
and sleep in the cleanest dirt he could
dnd, was a howell you Wouldn't stable
q COW in, and that no self-respecting
pig would stay in. His stomach is
gone, and most Of his teeth, by rea.
son Of his miserable food in all those
years. His back has q stoop in it that
you couldn't s~traighten out with a
stump machine. His hands are hard
and rough and gnarled, and his fin.
gers have a crook that just f. a pick
handle.
he is so tired sll the time, that he
just wants to sit around and rest. He
lost all taste for reading fifteen years
ago. Society bores him, because he
doesn't know what to do with himself
outside Of q mine. And his income is
either Ga. 600 Oh 60 600. 900 a month, we
don't know which. Aud which everit
Is, you don't want his job, with all that
goes with it, and his wealth could ut
buy you and your twenty three years,
jus5 as you stand, and you Wouldn't
sell 1t, il it could be sid. But that's
the way he happened" to fall in such
g streak Of good luck, son. You can
make anything happen" if you work
for it q quarter Of a century.
This isn't q world of chance, my
boy. You happened" to sprain your
ankle q month ago, because you didn't
walk fquarelY, and because you set
your feet down on q pebble. And then
you called il an accident" Ard you
gotsmashed up On your wheel last week
because when you were crossing the
intersection OF two busy streets, lou
we're looking at q girl in the hotel win
dow, and went head-on into q man
with q wheelbarroW, who was watch
ing a policeman chasing q boy around
q hay wagon. That's the way acct
dents happen; by rule, and in perfect
order, regular and certain as the mul
DUPLICATION table. I knew a boy when
I went TO school, who used to dream
out Of the window and wait for his
SUM to do themselves. And the sums
never happened" not once in all the
years he went TO school. But one day
he happened to get expelled that was
what was dead certain to happen.