Luck by M. Twain

Luck by Mark Twain§0 §0 §0 [NOTE - This is not a fancy sketch. I got it from a clergyman who was an instructor at Woolwich forty years ago, and who vouched for its truth.]§0 §0 §0 It was a banquet in London in honour of one of the two or three conspicuously

Illustrious English military names of this generation. For reasons which will presently appear, I will withhold his real name and titles, and call him Lieutenant General Lord Arthur Scoresby, V.C., K.C.B., etc., etc., etc. What a fascination there is in a

renowned name! There sat the man, in actual flesh, whom I had heard of so many thousands of times since that day, thirty years before, when his name shot suddenly to the zenith from a Crimean battlefield, to remain forever celebrated. It was food and

drink for me to look, and look, and look at that demigod; scanning, searching, noting: the quietness, the reserve, the noble gravity of his countenance; the simple honesty that expressed itself all over him; the sweet unconsciousness of his greatness -

unconsciousness of the hundreds of admiring eyes fastened upon him, unconsciousness of the deep, loving, sincere worship welling out of the breats of those people and flowing toward him.§0 §0 The clergyman at my left was an old aquaintance of mine -

clergyman now, but had spent the first half of his life in the camp and field, and as an instructor in the military school at Woolwich. Just at the moment I have been talking about, a vieled and singular light glimmered in his eyes, and he leaned down and

muttered confidentially to me - indicating the hero of the banquet with a gesture:§0 §0 "Privately - He's an absolute fool."§0 §0 This verdict was a great surprise to me. If subject had been Napoleon, or Socrates, or Solomon, my astonishment could not have

been greater. Two things I was well aware of: that the reverand was a man of strict veracity, and that his judgement of men was good. Therefore I knew, beyond doubt or question, that the world was mistaken about this hero: he §0§owas§0 a fool. So I meant to

find out, at a convenient moment, how the Reverend, all solitary and alone, had discovered the secret. §0 §0 Some days later the Opportunity came, and this is what the Reverend told me. §0 §0 About 40 years ago I was an instructor in the military

acadamy at Woolwich. I was present in one of the sections when young Scoresby underwent his preliminary examination. I was touched to the quick with pity; for the rest of the class answered up brightly and handsomely, while he - why, dear me, he didn't

know §0§oanything, §0so to speak. He was evidently good and sweet, and loveable, and guileless; and so it was exceedingly painful to see him stand there, as serene as a graven image, and deliver himself of answers which were veritably miraculous for

stupidity and ignorance. All the compassion in me was aroused in his behalf. I said to myself, when he comes to be examined again he will be flung over, of course; so it will be simply a harmless act of charity to ease his fall as much as I can. I took

him aside, and found that he knew a little of Caesar's history; and as he didn't know anything else, I went to work and drilled him like a gallery slave on a certain line of stock questions concerning Caesar which I knew would be used. If you'll believe

me, he went throught with flying colours on examination day! He went through on that purely superficial "cram," and got compliments too, while others, who knew a thousand times more than he, got plucked. By some strangely lucky accident - an accident not

likely to happen twice in a century - he was asked no question outside of the narrow limits of the drill.§0 §0 §0 §0 It was Stupefying. Well, all through his course I stood by him, with something of the sentiment which a mother feels for

a crippled child; and he always saved himself - just by a miracle apparently.§0 §0 §0 Now of course the thing that would expose him and kill him at last was mathematics. I resolved to make his death as easy as I could; so I drilled him and crammed him,

and crammed him and drilled him, just on the line of questions which the examiners would be most likely to use, and then launching him to his fate. Well, sir, try to conceive of the result: to my consternation, he took the first prize! And with it he got

a perfect ovation in the way of compliments.§0 §0 §0 Sleep? There was no more sleep for me for a week. My conscience tortured me day and night. What I had done I had done purely through charity, and only to ease the poor youth's fall - I had never dreamed of

any such preposterous result as the thing that had happened. I felt as guilty and miserable as the creator of Frankenstein. Here was a woodenhead whom I had put in the way of glittering promotions and prodigious responsibilities, and but one thing could

happen: he and his responsibilities would all go to ruin together at the first opportunity.§0 §0 §0 §0 The Crimean war had just broken out. Of course there had to be war, I said to myself: we couldn't have peace and give this donkey a chance to die before he is

found out. I waited for the earthquake. It came. And it made me reel when it did come. He was actually gazetted to a captaincy in a marching regiment! Better men grow old and grey before they climb to a sublimity like that. And who could ever have forseen

that they would go and put such a load of responsibility on such a green and inadequate shoulders? I could just barely have stood it if they had made him a cornet; but a captain - think of it! I thought my hair would turn white.§0 §0 §0 Consider what I did

- I who so loved repose and inaction. I said to myself, I am responsible to the country for this, and I must go along with him and protect the country against him as far as I can. So I took my poor little capital that I had saved up through years of

work and grinding economy, and went with a sigh and bought a cornetcy in his regiment, and away with me to the field.§0 §0 §0 And there - oh dear, it was awful. Blunders? Why he never did anything §0§obut §0blunder. But, you see, nobody was in the fellow's

secret - everybody had him focused wrong, and necessarily misinterpreted his performance everytime - consequently they took his idiotic blunders for inspirations of genius; they did honestly! His mildest blunders were enough to make a man in his right

mind cry; and they did make me cry - and rage and rave too, privately. And the thing that kept me always in a sweat of apprehension was the fact every fresh blunder he made increased the lustre of his reputation! I kept saying to myself, he'll get so high

, that when the discovery does finally come, it will be like the sun falling out the sky.§0 §0 §0 He went right along up, from grade to grade, over the dead bodies of his superiors, until at last, in the hottest moment of the battle of [█████] down went our

colonel, and my heart jumped into my mouth, for Scoresby was next in rank! Now for it, said I; we'll all land in Sheol in ten minutes, sure.§0 §0 §0 The battle was awfully hot; the allies were steadily giving was all over the field. Our regiment occupied a

position that was vital; a blunder now must be destruction. At this crucial moment, what does this immortal fool do but detach the regiment from its plave and order a charge over a neighbouring hill where there wasn't a suggestion of an enemy! "There you

go!" I said to myself; "this IS the end at last."§0 §0 §0 And away we did go, and were over the shoulder of the hill before the insane movement could be discovered and stopped. And what did we find? An entire and unsuspected Russian army in reserve! and

what happened? We were eaten up? That is necessarily what would have happened in 99 cases out of a hundred. But no, those Russians argued that no single regiment would come browsing around here at such time. It must be the entire English army, and that

the sly Russian game was detected and blocked; so they turned tail, and away they went, pell-mell, over the hill and down into the field, in wild confusion, and we after them; they themselves broke the solid Russian centre in the field, and tore through,

and in no time there was the most tremendous rout you ever saw, and the defeat of the allies was turned into a sweeping and splendid victory! Marshal Canrobert looked on, dizzy with astonishment, admiration, and delight; and sent off for Scorseby, and

hugged him, and decorated him on the field, in the presence of all the armies!§0 §0 §0 And what was Scoresby's blunder that time? Merely the mistaking his right hand for his left - that was all. An order had come to him to fall back and support our right; and

instead, he fell forward and went over the hill to the left. But the name he won that day as a marvellous military genius filled the world with his glory, and that glory will never fade while history books last.§0 §0 §0 He is just as good and sweet and

loveable and unpretending as a man can be, but he doesn't know enough to come in when it rains. Now that is absolutely true. He is the supremest ass in the universe; and until half an hour ago nobody knew it but himself and me. He has been pursued, day by

day and year by year, by a most phenomenal and astonishing luckiness. He has been a shining soldier in all our wars for a generation; he has littered his whole military life with blunders, and yet has never committed one that didn't make him a knight or

a baronet or a lord or something. Look at his breast; why, he is just a clothed in domestic and foreign decorations. Well, sir, every one of them is the record of some shouting stupidity or other; and taken together, they are proof that the very best

thing in all this world that can befall a man is to be born lucky. I say again, as I said at the banquet, Scoresby's an absolute fool.