Then, too, his health came back to him, all his lost youthful vigor, his
joy and power that he had mourned and forgotten! It came with a sudden
rush, bewildering him, startling him; it was as if his dead childhood
had come back to him, laughing and calling! What with plenty to eat and
fresh air and exercise that was taken as it pleased him, he would waken
from his sleep and start off not knowing what to do with his energy,
stretching his arms, laughing, singing old songs of home that came back
to him. Now and then, of course, he could not help but think of little
Antanas, whom he should never see again, whose little voice he should
never hear; and then he would have to battle with himself. Sometimes at
night he would waken dreaming of Ona, and stretch out his arms to her,
and wet the ground with his tears. But in the morning he would get up
and shake himself, and stride away again to battle with the world.

He never asked where he was nor where he was going; the country was big
enough, he knew, and there was no danger of his coming to the end of it.
And of course he could always have company for the asking--everywhere he
went there were men living just as he lived, and whom he was welcome to
join. He was a stranger at the business, but they were not clannish, and
they taught him all their tricks--what towns and villages it was best
to keep away from, and how to read the secret signs upon the fences, and
when to beg and when to steal, and just how to do both. They laughed at
his ideas of paying for anything with money or with work--for they got
all they wanted without either. Now and then Jurgis camped out with
a gang of them in some woodland haunt, and foraged with them in the
neighborhood at night. And then among them some one would "take a shine"
to him, and they would go off together and travel for a week, exchanging
reminiscences.

Of these professional tramps a great many had, of course, been shiftless
and vicious all their lives. But the vast majority of them had been
workingmen, had fought the long fight as Jurgis had, and found that it
was a losing fight, and given up. Later on he encountered yet another
sort of men, those from whose ranks the tramps were recruited, men who
were homeless and wandering, but still seeking work--seeking it in the
harvest fields. Of these there was an army, the huge surplus labor army
of society; called into being under the stern system of nature, to
do the casual work of the world, the tasks which were transient and
irregular, and yet which had to be done. They did not know that they
were such, of course; they only knew that they sought the job, and that
the job was fleeting. In the early summer they would be in Texas, and
as the crops were ready they would follow north with the season, ending
with the fall in Manitoba. Then they would seek out the big lumber
camps, where there was winter work; or failing in this, would drift to
the cities, and live upon what they had managed to save, with the
help of such transient work as was there the loading and unloading of
steamships and drays, the digging of ditches and the shoveling of snow.
If there were more of them on hand than chanced to be needed, the weaker
ones died off of cold and hunger, again according to the stern system of
nature.

It was in the latter part of July, when Jurgis was in Missouri, that
he came upon the harvest work. Here were crops that men had worked for
three or four months to prepare, and of which they would lose nearly
all unless they could find others to help them for a week or two. So all
over the land there was a cry for labor--agencies were set up and all
the cities were drained of men, even college boys were brought by the
carload, and hordes of frantic farmers would hold up trains and carry
off wagonloads of men by main force. Not that they did not pay them
well--any man could get two dollars a day and his board, and the best
men could get two dollars and a half or three.

The harvest-fever was in the very air, and no man with any spirit in
him could be in that region and not catch it. Jurgis joined a gang and
worked from dawn till dark, eighteen hours a day, for two weeks without
a break. Then he had a sum of money that would have been a fortune to
him in the old days of misery--but what could he do with it now? To be
sure he might have put it in a bank, and, if he were fortunate, get
it back again when he wanted it. But Jurgis was now a homeless man,
wandering over a continent; and what did he know about banking and
drafts and letters of credit? If he carried the money about with him, he
would surely be robbed in the end; and so what was there for him to do
but enjoy it while he could? On a Saturday night he drifted into a town
with his fellows; and because it was raining, and there was no other
place provided for him, he went to a saloon. And there were some who
treated him and whom he had to treat, and there was laughter and singing
and good cheer; and then out of the rear part of the saloon a girl's
face, red-cheeked and merry, smiled at Jurgis, and his heart thumped
suddenly in his throat. He nodded to her, and she came and sat by him,
and they had more drink, and then he went upstairs into a room with her,
and the wild beast rose up within him and screamed, as it has screamed
in the Jungle from the dawn of time. And then because of his memories
and his shame, he was glad when others joined them, men and women; and
they had more drink and spent the night in wild rioting and debauchery.
In the van of the surplus-labor army, there followed another, an army of
women, they also struggling for life under the stern system of nature.
Because there were rich men who sought pleasure, there had been ease and
plenty for them so long as they were young and beautiful; and later on,
when they were crowded out by others younger and more beautiful, they
went out to follow upon the trail of the workingmen. Sometimes they came
of themselves, and the saloon-keepers shared with them; or sometimes
they were handled by agencies, the same as the labor army. They were in
the towns in harvest time, near the lumber camps in the winter, in
the cities when the men came there; if a regiment were encamped, or a
railroad or canal being made, or a great exposition getting ready, the
crowd of women were on hand, living in shanties or saloons or tenement
rooms, sometimes eight or ten of them together.

In the morning Jurgis had not a cent, and he went out upon the road
again. He was sick and disgusted, but after the new plan of his life, he
crushed his feelings down. He had made a fool of himself, but he could
not help it now--all he could do was to see that it did not happen
again. So he tramped on until exercise and fresh air banished his
headache, and his strength and joy returned. This happened to him every
time, for Jurgis was still a creature of impulse, and his pleasures had
not yet become business. It would be a long time before he could be like
the majority of these men of the road, who roamed until the hunger for
drink and for women mastered them, and then went to work with a purpose
in mind, and stopped when they had the price of a spree.

On the contrary, try as he would, Jurgis could not help being made
miserable by his conscience. It was the ghost that would not down. It
would come upon him in the most unexpected places--sometimes it fairly
drove him to drink.

One night he was caught by a thunderstorm, and he sought shelter in a
little house just outside of a town. It was a working-man's home, and
the owner was a Slav like himself, a new emigrant from White Russia; he
bade Jurgis welcome in his home language, and told him to come to the
kitchen-fire and dry himself. He had no bed for him, but there was straw
in the garret, and he could make out. The man's wife was cooking the
supper, and their children were playing about on the floor. Jurgis sat
and exchanged thoughts with him about the old country, and the places
where they had been and the work they had done. Then they ate, and
afterward sat and smoked and talked more about America, and how they
found it. In the middle of a sentence, however, Jurgis stopped, seeing
that the woman had brought a big basin of water and was proceeding to
undress her youngest baby. The rest had crawled into the closet where
they slept, but the baby was to have a bath, the workingman explained.
The nights had begun to be chilly, and his mother, ignorant as to the
climate in America, had sewed him up for the winter; then it had turned
warm again, and some kind of a rash had broken out on the child. The
doctor had said she must bathe him every night, and she, foolish woman,
believed him.

Jurgis scarcely heard the explanation; he was watching the baby. He was
about a year old, and a sturdy little fellow, with soft fat legs, and a
round ball of a stomach, and eyes as black as coals. His pimples did
not seem to bother him much, and he was wild with glee over the bath,
kicking and squirming and chuckling with delight, pulling at his
mother's face and then at his own little toes. When she put him into the
basin he sat in the midst of it and grinned, splashing the water over
himself and squealing like a little pig. He spoke in Russian, of which
Jurgis knew some; he spoke it with the quaintest of baby accents--and
every word of it brought back to Jurgis some word of his own dead little
one, and stabbed him like a knife. He sat perfectly motionless, silent,
but gripping his hands tightly, while a storm gathered in his bosom and
a flood heaped itself up behind his eyes. And in the end he could bear
it no more, but buried his face in his hands and burst into tears, to
the alarm and amazement of his hosts. Between the shame of this and his
woe Jurgis could not stand it, and got up and rushed out into the rain.

He went on and on down the road, finally coming to a black woods, where
he hid and wept as if his heart would break. Ah, what agony was that,
what despair, when the tomb of memory was rent open and the ghosts of
his old life came forth to scourge him! What terror to see what he had
been and now could never be--to see Ona and his child and his own dead
self stretching out their arms to him, calling to him across a bottomless
abyss--and to know that they were gone from him forever, and he writhing
and suffocating in the mire of his own vileness!


Chapter 23


Early in the fall Jurgis set out for Chicago again. All the joy went out
of tramping as soon as a man could not keep warm in the hay; and, like
many thousands of others, he deluded himself with the hope that by
coming early he could avoid the rush. He brought fifteen dollars with
him, hidden away in one of his shoes, a sum which had been saved from
the saloon-keepers, not so much by his conscience, as by the fear which
filled him at the thought of being out of work in the city in the winter
time.

He traveled upon the railroad with several other men, hiding in freight
cars at night, and liable to be thrown off at any time, regardless of
the speed of the train. When he reached the city he left the rest, for
he had money and they did not, and he meant to save himself in this
fight. He would bring to it all the skill that practice had brought him,
and he would stand, whoever fell. On fair nights he would sleep in the
park or on a truck or an empty barrel or box, and when it was rainy or
cold he would stow himself upon a shelf in a ten-cent lodginghouse,
or pay three cents for the privileges of a "squatter" in a tenement
hallway. He would eat at free lunches, five cents a meal, and never a
cent more--so he might keep alive for two months and more, and in that
time he would surely find a job. He would have to bid farewell to
his summer cleanliness, of course, for he would come out of the first
night's lodging with his clothes alive with vermin. There was no place
in the city where he could wash even his face, unless he went down to
the lake front--and there it would soon be all ice.

First he went to the steel mill and the harvester works, and found that
his places there had been filled long ago. He was careful to keep away
from the stockyards--he was a single man now, he told himself, and he
meant to stay one, to have his wages for his own when he got a job. He
began the long, weary round of factories and warehouses, tramping all
day, from one end of the city to the other, finding everywhere from ten
to a hundred men ahead of him. He watched the newspapers, too--but no
longer was he to be taken in by smooth-spoken agents. He had been told
of all those tricks while "on the road."

In the end it was through a newspaper that he got a job, after nearly
a month of seeking. It was a call for a hundred laborers, and though he
thought it was a "fake," he went because the place was near by. He found
a line of men a block long, but as a wagon chanced to come out of an
alley and break the line, he saw his chance and sprang to seize a place.
Men threatened him and tried to throw him out, but he cursed and made
a disturbance to attract a policeman, upon which they subsided, knowing
that if the latter interfered it would be to "fire" them all.

An hour or two later he entered a room and confronted a big Irishman
behind a desk.

"Ever worked in Chicago before?" the man inquired; and whether it was
a good angel that put it into Jurgis's mind, or an intuition of his
sharpened wits, he was moved to answer, "No, sir."

"Where do you come from?"

"Kansas City, sir."

"Any references?"

"No, sir. I'm just an unskilled man. I've got good arms."

"I want men for hard work--it's all underground, digging tunnels for
telephones. Maybe it won't suit you."

"I'm willing, sir--anything for me. What's the pay?"

"Fifteen cents an hour."

"I'm willing, sir."

"All right; go back there and give your name."

So within half an hour he was at work, far underneath the streets of the
city. The tunnel was a peculiar one for telephone wires; it was
about eight feet high, and with a level floor nearly as wide. It had
innumerable branches--a perfect spider web beneath the city; Jurgis
walked over half a mile with his gang to the place where they were to
work. Stranger yet, the tunnel was lighted by electricity, and upon it
was laid a double-tracked, narrow-gauge railroad!

But Jurgis was not there to ask questions, and he did not give the
matter a thought. It was nearly a year afterward that he finally learned
the meaning of this whole affair. The City Council had passed a quiet
and innocent little bill allowing a company to construct telephone
conduits under the city streets; and upon the strength of this, a great
corporation had proceeded to tunnel all Chicago with a system of railway
freight-subways. In the city there was a combination of employers,
representing hundreds of millions of capital, and formed for the purpose
of crushing the labor unions. The chief union which troubled it was the
teamsters'; and when these freight tunnels were completed, connecting
all the big factories and stores with the railroad depots, they would
have the teamsters' union by the throat. Now and then there were rumors
and murmurs in the Board of Aldermen, and once there was a committee to
investigate--but each time another small fortune was paid over, and the
rumors died away; until at last the city woke up with a start to find
the work completed. There was a tremendous scandal, of course; it
was found that the city records had been falsified and other
crimes committed, and some of Chicago's big capitalists got into
jail--figuratively speaking. The aldermen declared that they had had no
idea of it all, in spite of the fact that the main entrance to the work
had been in the rear of the saloon of one of them.

It was in a newly opened cut that Jurgis worked, and so he knew that he
had an all-winter job. He was so rejoiced that he treated himself to a
spree that night, and with the balance of his money he hired himself
a place in a tenement room, where he slept upon a big homemade straw
mattress along with four other workingmen. This was one dollar a week,
and for four more he got his food in a boardinghouse near his work. This
would leave him four dollars extra each week, an unthinkable sum for
him. At the outset he had to pay for his digging tools, and also to buy
a pair of heavy boots, since his shoes were falling to pieces, and a
flannel shirt, since the one he had worn all summer was in shreds. He
spent a week meditating whether or not he should also buy an overcoat.
There was one belonging to a Hebrew collar button peddler, who had died
in the room next to him, and which the landlady was holding for her
rent; in the end, however, Jurgis decided to do without it, as he was to
be underground by day and in bed at night.

This was an unfortunate decision, however, for it drove him more quickly
than ever into the saloons. From now on Jurgis worked from seven o'clock
until half-past five, with half an hour for dinner; which meant that he
never saw the sunlight on weekdays. In the evenings there was no place
for him to go except a barroom; no place where there was light and
warmth, where he could hear a little music or sit with a companion
and talk. He had now no home to go to; he had no affection left in his
life--only the pitiful mockery of it in the camaraderie of vice. On
Sundays the churches were open--but where was there a church in which an
ill-smelling workingman, with vermin crawling upon his neck, could sit
without seeing people edge away and look annoyed? He had, of course,
his corner in a close though unheated room, with a window opening upon
a blank wall two feet away; and also he had the bare streets, with
the winter gales sweeping through them; besides this he had only the
saloons--and, of course, he had to drink to stay in them. If he drank
now and then he was free to make himself at home, to gamble with dice or
a pack of greasy cards, to play at a dingy pool table for money, or to
look at a beer-stained pink "sporting paper," with pictures of murderers
and half-naked women. It was for such pleasures as these that he spent
his money; and such was his life during the six weeks and a half that he
toiled for the merchants of Chicago, to enable them to break the grip of
their teamsters' union.

In a work thus carried out, not much thought was given to the welfare of
the laborers. On an average, the tunneling cost a life a day and several
manglings; it was seldom, however, that more than a dozen or two men
heard of any one accident. The work was all done by the new boring
machinery, with as little blasting as possible; but there would be
falling rocks and crushed supports, and premature explosions--and in
addition all the dangers of railroading. So it was that one night, as
Jurgis was on his way out with his gang, an engine and a loaded car
dashed round one of the innumerable right-angle branches and struck him
upon the shoulder, hurling him against the concrete wall and knocking
him senseless.

When he opened his eyes again it was to the clanging of the bell of
an ambulance. He was lying in it, covered by a blanket, and it was
threading its way slowly through the holiday-shopping crowds. They took
him to the county hospital, where a young surgeon set his arm; then he
was washed and laid upon a bed in a ward with a score or two more of
maimed and mangled men.

Jurgis spent his Christmas in this hospital, and it was the pleasantest
Christmas he had had in America. Every year there were scandals and
investigations in this institution, the newspapers charging that doctors
were allowed to try fantastic experiments upon the patients; but Jurgis
knew nothing of this--his only complaint was that they used to feed him
upon tinned meat, which no man who had ever worked in Packingtown would
feed to his dog. Jurgis had often wondered just who ate the canned
corned beef and "roast beef" of the stockyards; now he began to
understand--that it was what you might call "graft meat," put up to
be sold to public officials and contractors, and eaten by soldiers and
sailors, prisoners and inmates of institutions, "shantymen" and gangs of
railroad laborers.

Jurgis was ready to leave the hospital at the end of two weeks. This
did not mean that his arm was strong and that he was able to go back to
work, but simply that he could get along without further attention, and
that his place was needed for some one worse off than he. That he was
utterly helpless, and had no means of keeping himself alive in the
meantime, was something which did not concern the hospital authorities,
nor any one else in the city.

As it chanced, he had been hurt on a Monday, and had just paid for his
last week's board and his room rent, and spent nearly all the balance of
his Saturday's pay. He had less than seventy-five cents in his pockets,
and a dollar and a half due him for the day's work he had done before he
was hurt. He might possibly have sued the company, and got some damages
for his injuries, but he did not know this, and it was not the company's
business to tell him. He went and got his pay and his tools, which he
left in a pawnshop for fifty cents. Then he went to his landlady,
who had rented his place and had no other for him; and then to his
boardinghouse keeper, who looked him over and questioned him. As he must
certainly be helpless for a couple of months, and had boarded there only
six weeks, she decided very quickly that it would not be worth the risk
to keep him on trust.

So Jurgis went out into the streets, in a most dreadful plight. It was
bitterly cold, and a heavy snow was falling, beating into his face.
He had no overcoat, and no place to go, and two dollars and sixty-five
cents in his pocket, with the certainty that he could not earn another
cent for months. The snow meant no chance to him now; he must walk along
and see others shoveling, vigorous and active--and he with his left arm
bound to his side! He could not hope to tide himself over by odd jobs
of loading trucks; he could not even sell newspapers or carry satchels,
because he was now at the mercy of any rival. Words could not paint the
terror that came over him as he realized all this. He was like a wounded
animal in the forest; he was forced to compete with his enemies upon
unequal terms. There would be no consideration for him because of his
weakness--it was no one's business to help him in such distress, to make
the fight the least bit easier for him. Even if he took to begging, he
would be at a disadvantage, for reasons which he was to discover in good
time.

In the beginning he could not think of anything except getting out of
the awful cold. He went into one of the saloons he had been wont to
frequent and bought a drink, and then stood by the fire shivering and
waiting to be ordered out. According to an unwritten law, the buying a
drink included the privilege of loafing for just so long; then one
had to buy another drink or move on. That Jurgis was an old customer
entitled him to a somewhat longer stop; but then he had been away two
weeks, and was evidently "on the bum." He might plead and tell his "hard
luck story," but that would not help him much; a saloon-keeper who was
to be moved by such means would soon have his place jammed to the doors
with "hoboes" on a day like this.

So Jurgis went out into another place, and paid another nickel. He
was so hungry this time that he could not resist the hot beef stew, an
indulgence which cut short his stay by a considerable time. When he was
again told to move on, he made his way to a "tough" place in the
"Levee" district, where now and then he had gone with a certain rat-eyed
Bohemian workingman of his acquaintance, seeking a woman. It was
Jurgis's vain hope that here the proprietor would let him remain as a
"sitter." In low-class places, in the dead of winter, saloon-keepers
would often allow one or two forlorn-looking bums who came in covered
with snow or soaked with rain to sit by the fire and look miserable to
attract custom. A workingman would come in, feeling cheerful after his
day's work was over, and it would trouble him to have to take his glass
with such a sight under his nose; and so he would call out: "Hello, Bub,
what's the matter? You look as if you'd been up against it!" And then
the other would begin to pour out some tale of misery, and the man would
say, "Come have a glass, and maybe that'll brace you up." And so
they would drink together, and if the tramp was sufficiently
wretched-looking, or good enough at the "gab," they might have two; and
if they were to discover that they were from the same country, or had
lived in the same city or worked at the same trade, they might sit down
at a table and spend an hour or two in talk--and before they got through
the saloon-keeper would have taken in a dollar. All of this might seem
diabolical, but the saloon-keeper was in no wise to blame for it. He
was in the same plight as the manufacturer who has to adulterate and
misrepresent his product. If he does not, some one else will; and the
saloon-keeper, unless he is also an alderman, is apt to be in debt to
the big brewers, and on the verge of being sold out.

The market for "sitters" was glutted that afternoon, however, and there
was no place for Jurgis. In all he had to spend six nickels in keeping a
shelter over him that frightful day, and then it was just dark, and
the station houses would not open until midnight! At the last place,
however, there was a bartender who knew him and liked him, and let him
doze at one of the tables until the boss came back; and also, as he
was going out, the man gave him a tip--on the next block there was a
religious revival of some sort, with preaching and singing, and hundreds
of hoboes would go there for the shelter and warmth.

Jurgis went straightway, and saw a sign hung out, saying that the door
would open at seven-thirty; then he walked, or half ran, a block, and
hid awhile in a doorway and then ran again, and so on until the hour.
At the end he was all but frozen, and fought his way in with the rest of
the throng (at the risk of having his arm broken again), and got close
to the big stove.

By eight o'clock the place was so crowded that the speakers ought to
have been flattered; the aisles were filled halfway up, and at the door
men were packed tight enough to walk upon. There were three elderly
gentlemen in black upon the platform, and a young lady who played the
piano in front. First they sang a hymn, and then one of the three, a
tall, smooth-shaven man, very thin, and wearing black spectacles, began
an address. Jurgis heard smatterings of it, for the reason that terror
kept him awake--he knew that he snored abominably, and to have been put
out just then would have been like a sentence of death to him.

The evangelist was preaching "sin and redemption," the infinite grace of
God and His pardon for human frailty. He was very much in earnest, and
he meant well, but Jurgis, as he listened, found his soul filled with
hatred. What did he know about sin and suffering--with his smooth, black
coat and his neatly starched collar, his body warm, and his belly full,
and money in his pocket--and lecturing men who were struggling for their
lives, men at the death grapple with the demon powers of hunger and
cold!--This, of course, was unfair; but Jurgis felt that these men were
out of touch with the life they discussed, that they were unfitted to
solve its problems; nay, they themselves were part of the problem--they
were part of the order established that was crushing men down and
beating them! They were of the triumphant and insolent possessors; they
had a hall, and a fire, and food and clothing and money, and so they
might preach to hungry men, and the hungry men must be humble and
listen! They were trying to save their souls--and who but a fool could
fail to see that all that was the matter with their souls was that they
had not been able to get a decent existence for their bodies?

At eleven the meeting closed, and the desolate audience filed out into
the snow, muttering curses upon the few traitors who had got repentance
and gone up on the platform. It was yet an hour before the station
house would open, and Jurgis had no overcoat--and was weak from a long
illness. During that hour he nearly perished. He was obliged to run hard
to keep his blood moving at all--and then he came back to the station
house and found a crowd blocking the street before the door! This was in
the month of January, 1904, when the country was on the verge of "hard
times," and the newspapers were reporting the shutting down of factories
every day--it was estimated that a million and a half men were thrown
out of work before the spring. So all the hiding places of the city were
crowded, and before that station house door men fought and tore each
other like savage beasts. When at last the place was jammed and they
shut the doors, half the crowd was still outside; and Jurgis, with his
helpless arm, was among them. There was no choice then but to go to a
lodginghouse and spend another dime. It really broke his heart to do
this, at half-past twelve o'clock, after he had wasted the night at the
meeting and on the street. He would be turned out of the lodginghouse
promptly at seven they had the shelves which served as bunks so
contrived that they could be dropped, and any man who was slow about
obeying orders could be tumbled to the floor.

This was one day, and the cold spell lasted for fourteen of them. At the
end of six days every cent of Jurgis' money was gone; and then he went
out on the streets to beg for his life.

He would begin as soon as the business of the city was moving. He would
sally forth from a saloon, and, after making sure there was no policeman
in sight, would approach every likely-looking person who passed him,
telling his woeful story and pleading for a nickel or a dime. Then when
he got one, he would dart round the corner and return to his base to get
warm; and his victim, seeing him do this, would go away, vowing that he
would never give a cent to a beggar again. The victim never paused to
ask where else Jurgis could have gone under the circumstances--where
he, the victim, would have gone. At the saloon Jurgis could not only get
more food and better food than he could buy in any restaurant for the
same money, but a drink in the bargain to warm him up. Also he could
find a comfortable seat by a fire, and could chat with a companion until
he was as warm as toast. At the saloon, too, he felt at home. Part of
the saloon-keeper's business was to offer a home and refreshments to
beggars in exchange for the proceeds of their foragings; and was there
any one else in the whole city who would do this--would the victim have
done it himself?

Poor Jurgis might have been expected to make a successful beggar. He
was just out of the hospital, and desperately sick-looking, and with
a helpless arm; also he had no overcoat, and shivered pitifully. But,
alas, it was again the case of the honest merchant, who finds that the
genuine and unadulterated article is driven to the wall by the artistic
counterfeit. Jurgis, as a beggar, was simply a blundering amateur in
competition with organized and scientific professionalism. He was just
out of the hospital--but the story was worn threadbare, and how could
he prove it? He had his arm in a sling--and it was a device a regular
beggar's little boy would have scorned. He was pale and shivering--but
they were made up with cosmetics, and had studied the art of chattering
their teeth. As to his being without an overcoat, among them you would
meet men you could swear had on nothing but a ragged linen duster and
a pair of cotton trousers--so cleverly had they concealed the several
suits of all-wool underwear beneath. Many of these professional
mendicants had comfortable homes, and families, and thousands of dollars
in the bank; some of them had retired upon their earnings, and gone into
the business of fitting out and doctoring others, or working children
at the trade. There were some who had both their arms bound tightly to
their sides, and padded stumps in their sleeves, and a sick child hired
to carry a cup for them. There were some who had no legs, and pushed
themselves upon a wheeled platform--some who had been favored with
blindness, and were led by pretty little dogs. Some less fortunate had
mutilated themselves or burned themselves, or had brought horrible sores
upon themselves with chemicals; you might suddenly encounter upon the
street a man holding out to you a finger rotting and discolored with
gangrene--or one with livid scarlet wounds half escaped from their
filthy bandages. These desperate ones were the dregs of the city's
cesspools, wretches who hid at night in the rain-soaked cellars of
old ramshackle tenements, in "stale-beer dives" and opium joints, with
abandoned women in the last stages of the harlot's progress--women who
had been kept by Chinamen and turned away at last to die. Every day
the police net would drag hundreds of them off the streets, and in the
detention hospital you might see them, herded together in a miniature
inferno, with hideous, beastly faces, bloated and leprous with disease,
laughing, shouting, screaming in all stages of drunkenness, barking like
dogs, gibbering like apes, raving and tearing themselves in delirium.



Chapter 24


In the face of all his handicaps, Jurgis was obliged to make the
price of a lodging, and of a drink every hour or two, under penalty of
freezing to death. Day after day he roamed about in the arctic cold,
his soul filled full of bitterness and despair. He saw the world of
civilization then more plainly than ever he had seen it before; a world
in which nothing counted but brutal might, an order devised by those who
possessed it for the subjugation of those who did not. He was one of
the latter; and all outdoors, all life, was to him one colossal prison,
which he paced like a pent-up tiger, trying one bar after another, and
finding them all beyond his power. He had lost in the fierce battle of
greed, and so was doomed to be exterminated; and all society was busied
to see that he did not escape the sentence. Everywhere that he turned
were prison bars, and hostile eyes following him; the well-fed, sleek
policemen, from whose glances he shrank, and who seemed to grip their
clubs more tightly when they saw him; the saloon-keepers, who never
ceased to watch him while he was in their places, who were jealous
of every moment he lingered after he had paid his money; the hurrying
throngs upon the streets, who were deaf to his entreaties, oblivious of
his very existence--and savage and contemptuous when he forced himself
upon them. They had their own affairs, and there was no place for him
among them. There was no place for him anywhere--every direction he
turned his gaze, this fact was forced upon him: Everything was built
to express it to him: the residences, with their heavy walls and bolted
doors, and basement windows barred with iron; the great warehouses
filled with the products of the whole world, and guarded by iron
shutters and heavy gates; the banks with their unthinkable billions of
wealth, all buried in safes and vaults of steel.


And then one day there befell Jurgis the one adventure of his life. It
was late at night, and he had failed to get the price of a lodging. Snow
was falling, and he had been out so long that he was covered with it,
and was chilled to the bone. He was working among the theater crowds,
flitting here and there, taking large chances with the police, in his
desperation half hoping to be arrested. When he saw a bluecoat start
toward him, however, his heart failed him, and he dashed down a side
street and fled a couple of blocks. When he stopped again he saw a man
coming toward him, and placed himself in his path.

"Please, sir," he began, in the usual formula, "will you give me the
price of a lodging? I've had a broken arm, and I can't work, and I've
not a cent in my pocket. I'm an honest working-man, sir, and I never
begged before! It's not my fault, sir--"

Jurgis usually went on until he was interrupted, but this man did not
interrupt, and so at last he came to a breathless stop. The other had
halted, and Jurgis suddenly noticed that he stood a little unsteadily.
"Whuzzat you say?" he queried suddenly, in a thick voice.

Jurgis began again, speaking more slowly and distinctly; before he was
half through the other put out his hand and rested it upon his shoulder.
"Poor ole chappie!" he said. "Been up--hic--up--against it, hey?"

Then he lurched toward Jurgis, and the hand upon his shoulder became an
arm about his neck. "Up against it myself, ole sport," he said. "She's a
hard ole world."

They were close to a lamppost, and Jurgis got a glimpse of the other. He
was a young fellow--not much over eighteen, with a handsome boyish face.
He wore a silk hat and a rich soft overcoat with a fur collar; and he
smiled at Jurgis with benignant sympathy. "I'm hard up, too, my
goo' fren'," he said. "I've got cruel parents, or I'd set you up.
Whuzzamatter whizyer?"

"I've been in the hospital."

"Hospital!" exclaimed the young fellow, still smiling sweetly, "thass
too bad! Same's my Aunt Polly--hic--my Aunt Polly's in the hospital,
too--ole auntie's been havin' twins! Whuzzamatter whiz you?"

"I've got a broken arm--" Jurgis began.

"So," said the other, sympathetically. "That ain't so bad--you get over
that. I wish somebody'd break my arm, ole chappie--damfidon't! Then
they'd treat me better--hic--hole me up, ole sport! Whuzzit you wammme
do?"

"I'm hungry, sir," said Jurgis.

"Hungry! Why don't you hassome supper?"

"I've got no money, sir."

"No money! Ho, ho--less be chums, ole boy--jess like me! No money,
either--a'most busted! Why don't you go home, then, same's me?"

"I haven't any home," said Jurgis.

"No home! Stranger in the city, hey? Goo' God, thass bad! Better come
home wiz me--yes, by Harry, thass the trick, you'll come home an'
hassome supper--hic--wiz me! Awful lonesome--nobody home! Guv'ner gone
abroad--Bubby on's honeymoon--Polly havin' twins--every damn soul gone
away! Nuff--hic--nuff to drive a feller to drink, I say! Only ole Ham
standin' by, passin' plates--damfican eat like that, no sir! The club
for me every time, my boy, I say. But then they won't lemme sleep
there--guv'ner's orders, by Harry--home every night, sir! Ever hear
anythin' like that? 'Every mornin' do?' I asked him. 'No, sir, every
night, or no allowance at all, sir.' Thass my guv'ner--'nice as nails,
by Harry! Tole ole Ham to watch me, too--servants spyin' on me--whuzyer
think that, my fren'? A nice, quiet--hic--goodhearted young feller like
me, an' his daddy can't go to Europe--hup!--an' leave him in peace!
Ain't that a shame, sir? An' I gotter go home every evenin' an' miss
all the fun, by Harry! Thass whuzzamatter now--thass why I'm here! Hadda
come away an' leave Kitty--hic--left her cryin', too--whujja think of
that, ole sport? 'Lemme go, Kittens,' says I--'come early an'
often--I go where duty--hic--calls me. Farewell, farewell, my own true
love--farewell, farewehell, my--own true--love!'"

This last was a song, and the young gentleman's voice rose mournful
and wailing, while he swung upon Jurgis's neck. The latter was glancing
about nervously, lest some one should approach. They were still alone,
however.

"But I came all right, all right," continued the youngster,
aggressively, "I can--hic--I can have my own way when I want it, by
Harry--Freddie Jones is a hard man to handle when he gets goin'! 'No,
sir,' says I, 'by thunder, and I don't need anybody goin' home with me,
either--whujja take me for, hey? Think I'm drunk, dontcha, hey?--I know
you! But I'm no more drunk than you are, Kittens,' says I to her. And
then says she, 'Thass true, Freddie dear' (she's a smart one, is Kitty),
'but I'm stayin' in the flat, an' you're goin' out into the cold, cold
night!' 'Put it in a pome, lovely Kitty,' says I. 'No jokin', Freddie,
my boy,' says she. 'Lemme call a cab now, like a good dear'--but I can
call my own cabs, dontcha fool yourself--and I know what I'm a-doin',
you bet! Say, my fren', whatcha say--willye come home an' see me, an'
hassome supper? Come 'long like a good feller--don't be haughty! You're
up against it, same as me, an' you can unerstan' a feller; your heart's
in the right place, by Harry--come 'long, ole chappie, an' we'll
light up the house, an' have some fizz, an' we'll raise hell, we
will--whoop-la! S'long's I'm inside the house I can do as I please--the
guv'ner's own very orders, b'God! Hip! hip!"

They had started down the street, arm in arm, the young man pushing
Jurgis along, half dazed. Jurgis was trying to think what to do--he knew
he could not pass any crowded place with his new acquaintance without
attracting attention and being stopped. It was only because of the
falling snow that people who passed here did not notice anything wrong.

Suddenly, therefore, Jurgis stopped. "Is it very far?" he inquired.

"Not very," said the other, "Tired, are you, though? Well, we'll
ride--whatcha say? Good! Call a cab!"

And then, gripping Jurgis tight with one hand, the young fellow began
searching his pockets with the other. "You call, ole sport, an' I'll
pay," he suggested. "How's that, hey?"

And he pulled out from somewhere a big roll of bills. It was more money
than Jurgis had ever seen in his life before, and he stared at it with
startled eyes.

"Looks like a lot, hey?" said Master Freddie, fumbling with it. "Fool
you, though, ole chappie--they're all little ones! I'll be busted in
one week more, sure thing--word of honor. An' not a cent more till the
first--hic--guv'ner's orders--hic--not a cent, by Harry! Nuff to set a
feller crazy, it is. I sent him a cable, this af'noon--thass one
reason more why I'm goin' home. 'Hangin' on the verge of starvation,' I
says--'for the honor of the family--hic--sen' me some bread. Hunger will
compel me to join you--Freddie.' Thass what I wired him, by Harry, an' I
mean it--I'll run away from school, b'God, if he don't sen' me some."

After this fashion the young gentleman continued to prattle on--and
meantime Jurgis was trembling with excitement. He might grab that wad of
bills and be out of sight in the darkness before the other could collect
his wits. Should he do it? What better had he to hope for, if he waited
longer? But Jurgis had never committed a crime in his life, and now he
hesitated half a second too long. "Freddie" got one bill loose, and then
stuffed the rest back into his trousers' pocket.

"Here, ole man," he said, "you take it." He held it out fluttering. They
were in front of a saloon; and by the light of the window Jurgis saw
that it was a hundred-dollar bill! "You take it," the other repeated.
"Pay the cabbie an' keep the change--I've got--hic--no head for
business! Guv'ner says so hisself, an' the guv'ner knows--the guv'ner's
got a head for business, you bet! 'All right, guv'ner,' I told him, 'you
run the show, and I'll take the tickets!' An' so he set Aunt Polly to
watch me--hic--an' now Polly's off in the hospital havin' twins, an' me
out raisin' Cain! Hello, there! Hey! Call him!"

A cab was driving by; and Jurgis sprang and called, and it swung round
to the curb. Master Freddie clambered in with some difficulty, and
Jurgis had started to follow, when the driver shouted: "Hi, there! Get
out--you!"

Jurgis hesitated, and was half obeying; but his companion broke out:
"Whuzzat? Whuzzamatter wiz you, hey?"

And the cabbie subsided, and Jurgis climbed in. Then Freddie gave a
number on the Lake Shore Drive, and the carriage started away. The
youngster leaned back and snuggled up to Jurgis, murmuring contentedly;
in half a minute he was sound asleep, Jurgis sat shivering, speculating
as to whether he might not still be able to get hold of the roll of
bills. He was afraid to try to go through his companion's pockets,
however; and besides the cabbie might be on the watch. He had the
hundred safe, and he would have to be content with that.


At the end of half an hour or so the cab stopped. They were out on
the waterfront, and from the east a freezing gale was blowing off the
ice-bound lake. "Here we are," called the cabbie, and Jurgis awakened
his companion.

Master Freddie sat up with a start.

"Hello!" he said. "Where are we? Whuzzis? Who are you, hey? Oh, yes,
sure nuff! Mos' forgot you--hic--ole chappie! Home, are we?
Lessee! Br-r-r--it's cold! Yes--come 'long--we're home--it ever
so--hic--humble!"

Before them there loomed an enormous granite pile, set far back from the
street, and occupying a whole block. By the light of the driveway lamps
Jurgis could see that it had towers and huge gables, like a medieval
castle. He thought that the young fellow must have made a mistake--it
was inconceivable to him that any person could have a home like a hotel
or the city hall. But he followed in silence, and they went up the long
flight of steps, arm in arm.

"There's a button here, ole sport," said Master Freddie. "Hole my arm
while I find her! Steady, now--oh, yes, here she is! Saved!"

A bell rang, and in a few seconds the door was opened. A man in blue
livery stood holding it, and gazing before him, silent as a statue.

They stood for a moment blinking in the light. Then Jurgis felt his
companion pulling, and he stepped in, and the blue automaton closed the
door. Jurgis's heart was beating wildly; it was a bold thing for him to
do--into what strange unearthly place he was venturing he had no idea.
Aladdin entering his cave could not have been more excited.

The place where he stood was dimly lighted; but he could see a vast
hall, with pillars fading into the darkness above, and a great staircase
opening at the far end of it. The floor was of tesselated marble, smooth
as glass, and from the walls strange shapes loomed out, woven into
huge portieres in rich, harmonious colors, or gleaming from paintings,
wonderful and mysterious-looking in the half-light, purple and red and
golden, like sunset glimmers in a shadowy forest.

The man in livery had moved silently toward them; Master Freddie took
off his hat and handed it to him, and then, letting go of Jurgis'
arm, tried to get out of his overcoat. After two or three attempts he
accomplished this, with the lackey's help, and meantime a second man had
approached, a tall and portly personage, solemn as an executioner. He
bore straight down upon Jurgis, who shrank away nervously; he seized him
by the arm without a word, and started toward the door with him. Then
suddenly came Master Freddie's voice, "Hamilton! My fren' will remain
wiz me."

The man paused and half released Jurgis. "Come 'long ole chappie," said
the other, and Jurgis started toward him.

"Master Frederick!" exclaimed the man.

"See that the cabbie--hic--is paid," was the other's response; and he
linked his arm in Jurgis'. Jurgis was about to say, "I have the money
for him," but he restrained himself. The stout man in uniform signaled
to the other, who went out to the cab, while he followed Jurgis and his
young master.

They went down the great hall, and then turned. Before them were two
huge doors.

"Hamilton," said Master Freddie.

"Well, sir?" said the other.

"Whuzzamatter wizze dinin'-room doors?"

"Nothing is the matter, sir."

"Then why dontcha openum?"

The man rolled them back; another vista lost itself in the darkness.
"Lights," commanded Master Freddie; and the butler pressed a button, and
a flood of brilliant incandescence streamed from above, half-blinding
Jurgis. He stared; and little by little he made out the great apartment,
with a domed ceiling from which the light poured, and walls that were
one enormous painting--nymphs and dryads dancing in a flower-strewn
glade--Diana with her hounds and horses, dashing headlong through a
mountain streamlet--a group of maidens bathing in a forest pool--all
life-size, and so real that Jurgis thought that it was some work of
enchantment, that he was in a dream palace. Then his eye passed to
the long table in the center of the hall, a table black as ebony, and
gleaming with wrought silver and gold. In the center of it was a huge
carven bowl, with the glistening gleam of ferns and the red and purple
of rare orchids, glowing from a light hidden somewhere in their midst.

"This's the dinin' room," observed Master Freddie. "How you like it,
hey, ole sport?"

He always insisted on having an answer to his remarks, leaning over
Jurgis and smiling into his face. Jurgis liked it.

"Rummy ole place to feed in all 'lone, though," was Freddie's
comment--"rummy's hell! Whuzya think, hey?" Then another idea
occurred to him and he went on, without waiting: "Maybe you never saw
anythin--hic--like this 'fore? Hey, ole chappie?"

"No," said Jurgis.

"Come from country, maybe--hey?"

"Yes," said Jurgis.

"Aha! I thosso! Lossa folks from country never saw such a place. Guv'ner
brings 'em--free show--hic--reg'lar circus! Go home tell folks about it.
Ole man lones's place--lones the packer--beef-trust man. Made it all
out of hogs, too, damn ole scoundrel. Now we see where our pennies
go--rebates, an' private car lines--hic--by Harry! Bully place,
though--worth seein'! Ever hear of lones the packer, hey, ole chappie?"

Jurgis had started involuntarily; the other, whose sharp eyes missed
nothing, demanded: "Whuzzamatter, hey? Heard of him?"

And Jurgis managed to stammer out: "I have worked for him in the yards."

"What!" cried Master Freddie, with a yell. "You! In the yards? Ho, ho!
Why, say, thass good! Shake hands on it, ole man--by Harry! Guv'ner
ought to be here--glad to see you. Great fren's with the men,
guv'ner--labor an' capital, commun'ty 'f int'rests, an' all that--hic!
Funny things happen in this world, don't they, ole man? Hamilton, lemme
interduce you--fren' the family--ole fren' the guv'ner's--works in the
yards. Come to spend the night wiz me, Hamilton--have a hot time. Me
fren', Mr.--whuzya name, ole chappie? Tell us your name."