Page:Cyclopedia of illustrations for public speakers, containing facts, incidents, stories, experiences, anecdotes, selections, etc., for illustrative purposes, with cross-references; (IA cyclopediaofillu00scotrich).pdf/722



he does, he is lost. The lower coils will expand, bringing the business end, neck and all a few feet nearer; the head points like a leveled rifle, then darts forward with electric swiftness, guided by an unerring instinct for the selection of the least-protected parts of the body. (Text.)

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SUBTLETY AMONG ANIMALS

It is said that when wolves meditate an attack upon the wild horses of the Mexican plains they are very subtle in their maneuvers. First, two wolves come out of the woods and begin to play together like two kittens. They gambol about each other and run backward and forward. Then the herd of horses raise their frightened heads in readiness for a stampede. But the wolves seem to be so playful that the horses, after watching them a while, forget their fears and continue to graze, at perfect ease in their eating. Then the wolves, in their play, come nearer and nearer, while other wolves slowly and stealthily creep after them. Then suddenly the enemies encircle the herd, and with one lunge the doomed horses are in the pitiless grasp of the wily foe. They desperately fight a losing battle as the fierce brutes sink their fangs in the horses' throats.

In a similar way evil companions seek to lay a snare for those whom they would entrap.

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SUCCESS

It often turns out that our apparent successes are really our undoing. Croake James tells this incident:

I was mightily delighted with the whim I was shown on a sign at a village not far from this capital, tho it is too serious a truth to excite one's risibility. On one side is painted a man stark naked, with this motto: "I am the man who went to law and lost my cause." On the reverse is a fellow all in tatters, looking most dismally with this motto: "I am the man who went to law and won my cause." (Text.)—"Curiosities of Law and Lawyers."

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A Nebraska woman won a prize of $250 for this essay on "What Constitutes Success," written in competition with many others:

He has achieved success who has lived well, laughed often and loved much; who has gained the respect of intelligent men and the love of little children; who has filled his niche and accomplished his task; who has left the world better than he found it, whether by an improved poppy, a perfect poem or a rescued soul; who has never lacked appreciation of earth's beauty or failed to express it; who has always looked for the best in others and given them the best he had; whose life was an inspiration; whose memory a benediction.

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SUCCESS AND CIRCUMSTANCES

I remember Thackeray saying to me, concerning a certain chapter in one of his books that the critics agreed in accusing of carelessness: "Careless? If I've written that chapter once, I've written it a dozen times—and each time worse than the last!" a proof that labor did not assist in his case. When an artist fails it is not so much from carelessness—to do his best is not only profitable to him, but a joy. But it is not given to every man—not, indeed, to any—to succeed whenever and however he tries. The best painter that ever lived never entirely succeeded more than four or five times; that is to say, no artist ever painted more than four or five masterpieces, however high his general average may have been, for such success depends on the coincidence, not only of genius and inspiration, but of health and mood and a hundred other mysterious contingencies.—Sir , Magazine of Art.

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SUCCESS BY EXPERIMENTATION

A few years ago the cotton-boll weevil, which had increased steadily from year to year, reached a point at which it destroyed in Texas over $30,000,000 worth of cotton in one season. Many men in southern Texas were bankrupted, cotton-planting was given up in certain places, and it looked as if this great wealth-producing industry were doomed in Texas and probably also in time over the entire South. The practical farmers were completely overwhelmed. Here the Department of Agriculture started three lines of experimentation; first, to find some other harmless insect or parasite that would destroy the boll weevil as the white scale had been destroyed in California; second, to develop a species of cotton that could resist weevil attack; and third, to find a method of cultivation that would lessen the injury of the attack of the weevil when made. The ants, which the department brought from South America to eat up the boll weevil, proved a failure, but the development of a