other babies were slung in cloths on their
mothers' backs.

There was no work for the Beechams, and they climbed into the Reo
once more and stared down on the other side of the road, where
the foreman had told them his packers lived. Even from that
distance it was plain that this was a Chinese village, not
American at all.

"The little babies were so sweet, with their shiny black eyes.
But, my gracious, they don't get any sun or air at all!"
Rose-Ellen squeezed Sally thankfully. Even though the baby was
underweight and had violet shadows under her blue eyes, she
looked healthier than most babies they saw.

The hops were queer and interesting, unlike any other crops
Rose-Ellen had met with. The leaves were deep-lobed, shaped a
little like woodbine, but rough to touch. The fruits resembled
small spruce cones of pale yellow-green tissue paper. The vines
were trained on wires strung along ten-foot poles; they formed
aisles that were heavy with drowsy fragrance.

The picking baskets stood almost as high as Rose-Ellen's
shoulder, and she and Dick were proud of filling one apiece, the
first day they worked. These baskets held sixty pounds
each--more when the weather was not so dry--and sixty pounds
meant ninety cents. School had not started yet, so the children
worked all day. Sometimes Rose-Ellen could not keep from crying,
she was so tired. And when she cried, Grandma's mouth worked
over her store teeth in the way that meant she felt bad.

"But we've got to get in under it, all of us," she scolded, to
keep from crying herself. "We've got to earn what we can. I
never see the beat of it. If we scrabble as hard as we can, we
just only keep from sliding backwards."

Here in the hopyards the Beechams did not get their pay in money.
They were given tickets marked with the amount due them. These
they could use for money at the company store.

"And the prices there are sky-high!" Grandma wrathfully told
Grandpa, waving a pound of coffee before his eyes. "Thirty-five
cents, and not the best grade, mind you! Pink salmon higher than
red ought to be. Bread fifteen cents a loaf! Milk sky-high and
Carrie plumb dry!"

The living quarters were bad, too: shacks, with free straw on the
floor for beds, and mud deep in the dooryards where the campers
emptied water. Over it all hung a sick smell of garbage and a
cloud of flies.

It was no wonder that scores of children and some older people
were sick. The public healt