The Jungle

by Upton Sinclair

  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 up on the few traitors who had got repentance and gone upon 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 of 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 lodging-house 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 lodging-house 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’s 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 woful story and pleading for a nickel or a dime. Then when he got one, he would dart round the comer 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.21 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.

  TWENTY-FOUR

  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 t
heir 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 theatre crowds, flitting here and there, taking large chances with the police, in his desperation half hoping to be arrested. When he saw a blue-coat 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—hie—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 lamp post, 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’s break my arm, ole chappie—damfi- don’t ! Then they’s treat me better—hic—hole me up, ole sport! Whuzzit you wamme 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—hic—hard as nails, by Harry! Tole ole Ham to watch me, too—servants spyin’ on me—whuzyer think that, my fren’? A nice, quiet—hic—good-hearted 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, fare-we-hell, 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—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 unnerstan’ 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 his-self, 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 water-front, 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—be 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 mediaeval 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.