I am astonished that so many people should care to hear this story
over again. Indeed, this lecture has become a study in psychology; it often
breaks all rules of oratory, departs from the precepts of rhetoric, and yet
remains the most popular of any lecture I have delivered in the fifty-seven
years of my public life.
I have sometimes studied for a year upon a lecture and made careful
research, and then presented the lecture just once -- never delivered it again.
I put too much work on it. But this had no work on it - thrown together
perfectly at random, spoken offhand without any special preparation, and it
succeeds when the thing we study, work over, adjust to a plan, is an entire
failure.
The "Acres of Diamonds" which I have mentioned through so many years are
to be found in this city, and you are to find them. Many have found
them. And what man has done, man can do. I could not find anything
better to illustrate my thought than a story I have told over and over
again, and which is now found in books in nearly every library.
In 1870 we went down the Tigris River. We hired a guide at Bagdad to
show us Persepolis, Nineveh and Babylon, and the ancient countries of
Assyria as far as the Arabian Gulf. He was well acquainted with the
land, but he was one of those guides who love to entertain their
patrons; he was like a barber that tells you many stories in order to
keep your mind off the scratching and the scraping. He told me so many
stories that I grew tired of his telling them and I refused to listen --
looked away whenever he commenced; that made the guide quite angry.
I remember that toward evening he took his Turkish cap off his head and
swung it around in the air. The gesture I did not understand and I did
not dare look at him for fear I should become the victim of another
story. But, although I am not a woman, I did look, and the instant I
turned my eyes upon that worthy guide he was off again. Said he, "I will
tell you a story now which I reserve for my particular friends!" So
then, counting myself a particular friend, I listened, and I have always
been glad I did.
Acres of Diamonds
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