otten, while my three lines
will live forever," he replied.

Ariosto wrote his "Description of a Tempest" in sixteen different ways.
He spent ten years on his "Orlando Furioso," and only sold one hundred
copies at fifteen pence each. The proof of Burke's "Letters to a Noble
Lord" (one of the sublimest things in all literature) went back to the
publisher so changed and blotted with corrections that the printer
absolutely refused to correct it, and it was entirely reset. Adam
Tucker spent eighteen years on the "Light of Nature." Thoreau's New
England pastoral, "A Week on the Concord and Merrimac Rivers," was an
entire failure. Seven hundred of the one thousand copies printed were
returned from the publishers. Thoreau wrote in his diary: "I have some
nine hundred volumes in my library, seven hundred of which I wrote
myself." Yet he took up his pen with as much determination as ever.

The rolling stone gathers no moss. The persistent tortoise outruns the
swift but fickle hare. An hour a day for twelve years more than equals
the time given to study in a four years' course at a high school. The
reading and re-reading of a single volume has been the making of many a
man. "Patience," says Bulwer "is the courage of the conqueror; it is
the virtue _par excellence_, of Man against Destiny--of the One against
the World, and of the Soul against Matter. Therefore, this is the
courage of the Gospel; and its importance in a social view--its
importance to races and institutions--cannot be too earnestly
inculcated."

Want of constancy is the cause of many a failure, making the
millionaire of to-day a beggar to-morrow. Show me a really great
triumph that is not the reward of persistence. One of the paintings
which made Titian famous was on his easel eight years; another, seven.
How came popular writers famous? By writing for years without any pay
at all; by writing hundreds of pages as mere practise-work; by working
like galley-slaves at literature for half a lifetime with no other
compensation than--fame.

"Never despair," says Burke; "but if you do, work on in despair."

The head of the god Hercules is represented as covered with a lion's
skin with claws joined under the chin, to show that when we have
conquered our misfortunes, they become our helpers. Oh, the glory of
an unconquerable will!

CHAPTER XXIV

NERVE--GRIP, PLUCK

"Never give up; for the wisest is boldest,
Knowing that Providence mingles