er name, either--they had company "spotters" for just that
purpose, and he wouldn't keep a job in Packingtown three days. It was
worth a fortune to the packers to keep their blacklist effective, as
a warning to the men and a means of keeping down union agitation and
political discontent.

Jurgis went home, carrying these new tidings to the family council. It
was a most cruel thing; here in this district was his home, such as it
was, the place he was used to and the friends he knew--and now every
possibility of employment in it was closed to him. There was nothing in
Packingtown but packing houses; and so it was the same thing as evicting
him from his home.

He and the two women spent all day and half the night discussing it. It
would be convenient, downtown, to the children's place of work; but then
Marija was on the road to recovery, and had hopes of getting a job in
the yards; and though she did not see her old-time lover once a month,
because of the misery of their state, yet she could not make up her
mind to go away and give him up forever. Then, too, Elzbieta had heard
something about a chance to scrub floors in Durham's offices and was
waiting every day for word. In the end it was decided that Jurgis should
go downtown to strike out for himself, and they would decide after he
got a job. As there was no one from whom he could borrow there, and he
dared not beg for fear of being arrested, it was arranged that every day
he should meet one of the children and be given fifteen cents of their
earnings, upon which he could keep going. Then all day he was to pace
the streets with hundreds and thousands of other homeless wretches
inquiring at stores, warehouses, and factories for a chance; and at
night he was to crawl into some doorway or underneath a truck, and hide
there until midnight, when he might get into one of the station houses,
and spread a newspaper upon the floor, and lie down in the midst of
a throng of "bums" and beggars, reeking with alcohol and tobacco, and
filthy with vermin and disease.

So for two weeks more Jurgis fought with the demon of despair. Once he
got a chance to load a truck for half a day, and again he carried an old
woman's valise and was given a quarter. This let him into a lodging-house
on several nights when he might otherwise have frozen to death; and it
also gave him a chance now and then to buy a newspaper in the morning
and hunt up jobs while his rivals were watching and waiting fo