Explore "Struggles and Triumphs" by P.T. Barnum on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
Grand Scheme -- Congress of All Nations -- A Bold and Brilliant Enterprise -- The Jenny Lind Engagement -- My Agent in Europe -- His Instructions -- Correspondence with Miss Lind -- Benedict and Belletti -- Joshua Bates -- Chevalier Wyckoff -- The Contract Signed -- My Reception of the News -- The Entire Sum of Money for the Engagement Sent to London -- My First Lind Letter to the Public -- A Poor Portrait -- Musical Notes in Wall Street -- A Friend in Need.
Many of my most fortunate enterprises have fairly startled me by the magnitude of their success. When my sanguine hopes predicted a steady flow of fortune, I have been inundated; when I calculated upon making a curious public pay me liberally for a meritorious article, I have often found the same public eager to deluge me with compensation. Yet, I never believed in mere luck and I always pitied the simpleton who relies on luck for his success. Luck is in no sense the foundation of my fortune; from the beginning of my career I planned and worked for my success. To be sure, my schemes often amazed me with the affluence of their results, and, arriving at the very best, I sometimes "builded better" than "I knew."