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^Etna Insurance Company, HARTFORD, CONN. ON JUNE 19th HAD ADJUSTED 789 CLAIMS AND PAID $1,126,506.00 OF ITS SAN FRAN- When You Have a Loss The Best Is None Too Good. Why Not Buy The Best? CISCO LOSSES. ASSETS, ....... $16,815,296.87 SURPLUS, $11,036,010.33 LIPSCOMB & CO., Sole Agents, 619-20-21 Century Building. ’Phone, Bell 172. (Copyright 190.;, by Upton Sinclair. All rights reserved.) CHAPTER V (CONTINUED) S», after all, there was a crack In the fine structure of Jurgls' faith In things as they are. The crack was wide, while Dede Antanas was hunting a ).>b—and It was yet wider when he finally got It. For one evening the old man came horns In a great atate of ex citement, with the tale that he had been approached by a man in one of the corridors of the pickle rooms of Dur ham's. and asked what he would pay to get a job. He had not known what to make of this at first; but the man hail gone on with matter-of-fact frank ness to say that he could get him a job. provided that he were willing to pay nne-thlrd of his wages for It. Wap he a boss? Antanas had asked; to which the man had replied that that was nobody’s business, but that he could do what he sold. Jurgls had made-some friends by this time, and he sought one of them and asked what this meant. The friend, v.ho was named Tamosslus Kusxlelka, was n sharp little man who folded hides on the killing beds, and he listened to What Jurgls had to say without seem ing at all surprised. They were com mon enough, he said, such cases of petty graft.. He .was slmnly some hose who proposed to' come. After Jurgls had been there a while he would know thawthe plants were simply honey-combed~wlth rot tenness of that sort—the bosses graft- . ed off the men, and -they grafted off ’ each other; and some day the superin tendent would find out about the boes, and then he would graft off the boes. Warming to the subject, Tamosslus went on to explain the situation. Here was Durham's, for Instance, owned by a man who was trying to make as much money out of It as he could, and did not care In the least how he did It; and underneath him, ranged ranks nnd grades like an army, were managers and superintendents and foremen, each one driving the man be. low him and trying to squeesa out of him ns mnch work as possible. And all the men of the same rank were pitted against each other; the ac counts of each kept separately, and every man lived In mortal terror of los ing his Job, If another made a better record than he. So from top to bot tom the place was simply a seething cauldron of jealousies and hatreds: there was no loyalty or decency any where about It: there was no place In It where a man counted for anything against a dollar. And worse thaiv there being no decency, there warn not even nny honesty. The reason for that? Who could say? It must have been old Durham In the beginning; It was a heritage which the self-made merchant hud left to his son along with his mll- Ito SYNOPSIS OF PREVIOUS CHAPTERS *rnnitut liivVptlRntlou Into tlie method* employed l»jr the lieef truat, has Ita orl In nn actual l’rickliitftown romance. The first chapter show* a broad-shouldered butcher being wedded to a young girl who aeca In him a hero. The wedding. In all Ita ftrotes4|U«H!rss, la described. Practically penniless. Jurgls tells his bride she shall not return to work In the packing house—he will work early and late, ffe could hot work harder, bat the thought of eeelng her contribute toward their aup|»ort was abhorrent to him. On arriving In Chicago. J. Ssedvllaa, a Lithuanian, who rsu n delicatessen store In rneklngtowu. guided Jurgls, Oust, Mnrljn and the remainder of the (tarty through the stock yards, after he bad given them lodging. In this section of the “—the gnthor reveals aome of the If ‘ * *“ * * 1 given them lodging. In this section of the „jnr the author reveals some of the things that have startled the roantry. Finding the cost of living high, the little coterie decided to purchase a small house, dlvhllug the cost l»etwecn them, against the advice of Hsedvllss, who said they would In* swindled. Ssedvllns went with Tetn Klxbletn nnd Ona to sign the papers. He discovered the word “rental In the Instalment contract. The women. I»ellerlng they had been trapped, were terrified. A lawyer pronounced the paper regular. Their.fright was shared by Jurgls. Another lawyer mollified his wild fancies. Needed furnishings were, purchased on the same 'feagy payujeut” ’lrgla. In bla enormous strength, gloried In being hbU* to ktep up with picked trhn an* »tin fulwu 111 th« ilurflll llhtpil klUllril III “amMtflltlg the gnilg" at trying to correct of the story condod#*. _ * to i ... little tblnjt to do, and everywhere they had or- t even once stopping to ask him a Jurgls would find out these things for himself, If he rUyed there Ion* mouth; It wa» the men who had to do ill tho dirty Jobe, and »o there waa no deceiving them; "and they caught the ■Pint of the place, and did like all the ifit. Jur*le had come there, and ttiou*ht he wee *oln* to make hlnuwlf useful, and rtie and become a skilled man; but he would soon find out hie i ron-—for nobody roee In Packlngtown by doln* food work. You could lay that down for a rule—If you met man who nee rlfln* In Packlngtown. you met a knave. That man who had been sent to Jurgls' father by the boss, be would rl«e; the man who told the 'ale and epted upon hie fellow* would rt«o; but the man who minded hie own bu-lness and did bit work—why, they would "spaed him up” till they had S" , rn him out, and then they would ’ throw- him Into the *utter. Jurgls went home with hla head bui- ring. Yet he could not brln* himself to believe such thln*e—no. It could not be •o. Tamoaxtua waa simply another of the grumbler*. He wae a man who •pent all hla time Addling; and. he would *o to parties at night and not get home till aunriee, and eo of course he dill not feel like work. Then, too, he . *aa a puny little chap; and so he had I been left behind In the race, and that *n» why he wae tore. And yet so many STATUARY. Are you interested in works of art? If so, you will appreciate very much the choice gathering of studies in our Art Rooms. The purest Carara and aCs- tilian marble wrought into forms of compelling beauty and appealing grace. These studies are charm ing for gifts as well as for individual possession. MAIER Si BERKELE. strange things kept coming to Jurgls' notice evry day! . He tried to persuade hie father to Jiave-nothing to do with the offer. But bid Antanas had begged antll he was| worn out, and all his courage was gone; he wanted a Job, any sort of a J |U|IP, lie n niucu a jup, -w.» — - ob. So the next day he went and found the man who had spoken to him, and promised to. bring him a third of all he earned; and that same day he wae put to work In Durham's cellars. It was a ‘‘pickle room," where there was never a dry spot to stand upon, and so he had to take nearly a whole of his Ilrst week's earnings to buy him a pair of heavy-soled boots. He wae a "squeedgle" • man; hla Job was to go about ell day with a long-handled mop, swabbing up the floor. Except that It was damp and dark. It was not an un pleasant Job. In summer. Now Antanas Rudkua wae the meek cat man that God ever put on earth; and so Jurgls found It a striking con firmation of what the men all aaltL that his father had been at work onlr two days before he came home aa bitter as any of them, and curelng Durham s with all the power of hla soul. For they had set him to cleaning out the traps; and the family sat round and listened In wonder while he told them whet that meant. It seemed that he waa working In the room where the men prepared the beef for canning, and the beef hid lain In vata full of chemicals, and men with greet forks speared It out and flumped It Into trucks, to be taken to the cooking rodm. When they had (peered out alt they could reach, they emptied the ret on the floor, and then with shovels scraped up the bal ance end dumped It Into the truck. Thle floor wee fllthy, yet they set An- tanae with hi* mop slopping the "pickle" Into a hole that connected with a sink, where It wee caught and used over again forever; and If that were not enough, there wae a trap In the pe, where all. the ecrape of meat and „Jda and ends of refuse were caught, and every few days It was the old man’s task to dean these out, and shovel their content* Into on* of the trucks with th# rest of the meat! This was the experience of Anltnee; and then there came also Jonas and Marlja with tale* to tell. Marlja was working for one of the Independent packers, and was quits besld* hersslf and outrageous with triumph over th* sums of money ehe was making a* a painter of cane. But one day ehe walked home with a pale-faced little woman who worked opposite her, Jad- vyga Marrlnkus by name, and Jadvyga told her how she, Marlja, had chanced to get her Job. Bhe had taken th* place of an Irish women who had been working In that factory for over fifteen years, so she declared. Mery Dennis was her name, and a long time ago sh* had been betrayed, end had a Uttl* boy: he was a cripple, and ait epilep tic, but 'ktlll he was all that she had In the world to love, and they had lived In a little room alone somewhere back of Haleted etreet. where th* Irish were. Mary had had consumption, end all day long you might hear her cough ing aa she worked: of late eh* bad been going all to plsces. and when Ms- rija came, the "for*lady" had suddenly decided to turn her off.. The forelady bad to com# up to a certain standard herself, end could not stop for sick people, Jadvyga explained. The fact that Mary had been there eo long had not mad* any difference to her—It waa doubtful If eh* even knew that, for both the forelady and the superintendent were new people, having only been there two or three years themselves. Jadvyga did not know what bad be- com* of th* poor creature: eh# would have gone to see her, but had been sick herself. She had pains In her back all th* time. Jadvvgm explained. It was not IU work for a woman, handling fourteen-pound ran* all day. It was a striking circumstance that nnd thence to the packing rooms. The truck* were all of Iron and. heavy, and they put about thre#?aoor« hams on each of them, a load-of more than a quarter of a ton. On the uneven, floor It was a task for a man to start on* of these trucks, unless he was a giant; and when It was once started he natur ally tried hla best to. .keep It golfig. There waa always th* boss prowling about, and If tber* waa a second's de lay he would foil to cursing; Lithuan ians and Slovaks and such, who could not understand what was said to them, the bosses were wont to kick about the place Ilk* so many- dogs. There fore these trucks went for the most part on th* run: and the predecessor of Jonas had been Jammed against the wall by one and crushed In a horrible manner. All of these were sinister Incidents, but they were trifles compared to what Jurgls saw with his own eyes bsfore long. One day s man' slipped and hurt his leg, and that afternoon. When the last of the cattle had'been disposed of and the men were leaving, Jurgls was or- dsred to remain and do some specie! work which this Injured men had usually done. It was late, almost dark, and th* government Inspectors had sll gone, and there were only a dosen or two of men on the floor. That day they had killed about* four thousand cattle, and thee* had com* In freight train* from far states, and some of them had got hurt. There were aome with broken lege and some with gored sides; there were some that had died from what cause nq one could say, and they were all to be dlepoeed of here In darkness and silence. "Downers,” th* men called them, and th* packing house had a special elevator upon which they were raised to th* killing beds, where the gang proceeded to handle them. With an air of business-like non chalance which said plainer then any words that It waa a matter of every day routine. It took a couple of hours to get them out of th* fray, and In the end Jurgls saw them go Into th* chil ling rooms with the rest of the meat, being carefully scattered here and thtre so that they could not be Identi fied. When he cam* home that night he was In a very sombre mood, having begun to see at last bow those might be right who had laughtd at him far his faith In America. Jurgls and Ona were very much In love: they had waited a long time—It was now welt Into th* second year, and Jurgls Judged everything by Ihe criterion of lt> helping or hindering their union. All hhe thoughts were there; he accepted the family because It was part of One. end he was In terested In the house because It was to be One's home. Even the tricks and cruelties he saw at Durham’s had llttl* meaning for him Just then, save as they might happen to affect his future with On*. • . _ Th# marriage woulif have been at once. If they had had their way; but this would mean that they would bars to do without afly wedding feast, end when they suggested this they cam# Into conflict with th# old people. To i very sug gestion was an affliction. Whet! she would cry. To be married on th* road side like a parcel of beggars! No! No! —Elibleta had some traditions behind her; sh* had been a person of Impor tance In her girlhood—had Hved on a big estate aqd bad servants, and might have married well and been a lady but for the fact that there bad been nine daughters and no sons In the family. Even so, however, she knew whet waa decent and clung to her traditions with desperation. They were net going to os* sll caste, even If they had come .o be unskilled laborers In Packing- town; and that Ona had, even talked omitting a vessel I J» waa enough keep her stepmother lying awake all night. It was In vain for them to Jonas, too, had gotten hi* Job by the nushed'a'truck^loaded wiriThams from say that they bed so few friends; they built." and she could toll them all about tbe Jm£k££m on fa an elevator, were bound,to hate friends In Urn*. It. And had It ever been sold before? and then the friends would talk about It They must not give up -what was right for a little money—If they did, the money would never do them any good, they could depend upun that. And Elsbleta would call upon Dede An tanas to support her; there was a fear In the souls of these two, lest this Journey, to a new country might somehow undermine the old home vir tues of their children. The very first Sunday they had all btsn taken to mass: and poor as they were, Elsbleta had felt It advisable to Invest a little of her resources In a representation of the babe of Bethlehem, made In plaster and painted In brilliant colors. Though It was .only a foot high, there was a shrine with four snow-white steeples, and the Virgin standing with her child In her arms, and the king* and ahep- herds and wise men bowing down be fore him. It had coat fifty cents; but Elsbleta had a feeling that money spent for such things was not to be counted too closely. It would come back In hidden ways. The piece waa beauti ful on th* parlor mantel, and one could not have a home without some sort of ornament. • The cost of the.weddlng feast would, of course, be returned to them; but the problem was to raise It even tempora rily. They had. been- In the neighbor hood so short a time that they could not get much "cWllt, and there wee no > one except' Seed Vila* from whom they rould. borrow even a little. Evening after evening. Ju/gls and Ona would nit nnd figure the expenses, calrulatlng tho term of their separation. They could not possibly manage It decently fur less than |f«0, and even though they were welcome to count In the whole of the earnings bt Marlja and Jonna aa a loan, they could not hope to raUo this sum In less tjinii four or five months. Ho Omt begun thinking of seeking employment herself, eaylng that If she had even onllnnrlly good luck, eh* might be able to take two months off the time. They were Just beginning to adjust themselves to this necessity, when out of the clear sky there fell a thunderbolt upon them— calamity that scattered all tlMtr hopes to the four winds! About a block uway from them thtre lived another Lithuanian family, con sisting of an elderly widow ami one grown son; their name was Majausx- kla, and our friends struck up an ac quaintance with them before long. One evening they came over for u visit, and naturally the Aral subject upon which th* conversation turned was the neighborhood end It* history; and then Grandmother Majatssxkiene, aa th* old lady was called, proceeded to recite to them a string of horrors that fairly froxe their blood. She was a wrlnkl*d-up and wlxened personage— she must have been eighty—and as she mumbled th* grim story through her toothless gums, sht seemed a very old witch to them. Grandmother Majausx- klene had lived In th* midst of mis fortune so long that It had come to be her element, and sht talked about starvation, sickness and death ae other people might about weddings and holt< days. The thing cam* gradually. In th* first place aa to the house they hod bought. It waa not new at all, as they had supposed; It was about flftten years old, and there was nothing new upon It but tbs paint, which woe so bad that It needed to be put on new evdry year or two. Th* house was one of a whole row that waa built by a company which existed to make money by swindling poor people. The family had paid Il.fOO far It, and it bad not cost th* builders tUO when It wae flew. Grandmother Majaussklen* knew that, because her eon belonged to a political organxgtlon with a con tractor who put up exactly each houses. They used the very flimsiest and cheapest material; they built th* houses a dosen at a time, and they cared about nothing at all except th* outside shine. The family could take her word as to the trouble they would have, for she bad been through It all —ah* and her son had bought their house In exactly the same way. They had fooled the company, however, for her son was a skilled man, who mad* as high ae $104 a month, and aa he had had sens* enough not fa marry they had been able t» pay far th* house. O rend mother Msjsussklene saw that her friends were puxxled at this re mark; they did not quite ■*• how pay ing for the house waa "fooling the company." Evidently they were very Inexperienced. Cheap os th* house* were, they ware sold with th* Idea that th* people who bought them would not be able to pay far them. When they failed—If It were only by a single month—they would lose th* house and all that they had paid on It, and then the company would sell It over again. And did they often get a chance to do that? Dtevel (Grandmother MaJaoasklaBa raised her bands.) They did it—how often no ona could say, but rertalnly more than half of tha time. They might ask any on* who knew anything at all about Pack- tngtown as to that; she had been tir ing bare ever since this house wee UPTON SINCLAIR. Author of "The Jungle.” Hunlmtlkle! Why, since It had been ; but they had worked hard, and th* built no less than four families that their Informant could name had tried to buy It end failed. She would tell them a little about IL Th* first family had been Germans. Th* families had sll been of different nationalities—there had been a repie- ssntutlv* of several races that had displaced each other In the stock yards. Grandmother Majaussklene had com; to America with her eon at a time when so far aa she knew there was only one other Lithuanian family In the district; the workers had all been Germans then—skilled callle butcher* that th* packer* had brought from abroad to start the business. After wards, as cheaper labor had come, these German* had moved away. The next ware the Irish—there had been six or sight years when Packlngtown had been a regular Irish city. There were a few colonies of them still here, enough to run all th* unions and the police force and get all’the graft; but the most of those who were working In the packing houses had gone away at th* nest drop In wage*—after the big strike. Th* Bohemians had corns ■hen, and after them the Poles. Peo ple said that old man Durham him self was responsible far these Immigra tions; he had sworn that he would fix the people of Parklngtown so that they would never again call a strike on him. and so he had sent hie agents Into every city and village In Europe to spread Ihe tale of the rhanres of work end high wages at th* stock yards Tha people had come In hordes, and old Durham had aqueesed them tight er and tighter, speeding them up and grinding them to piece* and sending, for new ones. The Poles, who had come by tens of thousands had been driven to th* wall by the Lithuanian*, and now the Lithuanians were giving way to the Slovaks. Who there was poorer and more miserable than the Slovaks, Grandmother Majaussklene had no Idea, but the packers would And them, never fear. It was easy to bring them, far wages- were really much higher and It was only when It was too late that the poor people found out that everything else was higher too. TMry were Ilka rets la a trap, that was th* truth; and more of them were piling In every day. By and by they th* thing waa getting beyond human endurance, and th* people would rise and murder the packers. Orandmoth- *r Majaussklene was a socialist, or some such strange thing; another son of here waa working In th* mines of Siberia, and the old lady hersalf had made speeches In her t|me—Which made her seem all the more terrible to her present auditors. They railed her back to tbe story of th* house. The German family bad been a good sort. To be sure, there father had been u steady "man, and they bed a good ileal more then half isild for hla house. ' But he had been killed In an elevator accident In Dur ham's. Then there had come Ihe Irish, and there had been lot* of them, too. The husband drank end beet the children— the neighbors could hear them shriek ing any night. They were behind with their rent all the time. But the com pany waa good to them. There wae some politics bark of that. Grand mother Majaussklene could not aay Just what, but the Laffertya had be longed fa the "War Whoop I.eague," which was a sort of political club of all the thug* and rowdies In (he dis trict, and If you belonged to that you could neeer be arrested for anything. Once.upon a time old Lafferty had been raught with a gang that had stolen cows from several of the poor people of Ihe neighborhood and butch ered them In an old shsnty of the yards and sold them; II* had been In Jail only three days for It, aud had com* out laughing and had not even lost his place In the packing house. He had gone all to ruin with th* drink, however, and lost his power; on* of his sons, who was a good man, had kept him and the family up for'a year or tfro, but then he bad got alck with consumption. There was another thing, Grand mother Majaussklene Interrupted her self—this house was unlucky. Every family that lived In IL some one wee sure to get consumption. Nobody could tell why that was; there must be something about a house or the way It waa built—some folks said It was because the building bed been be gun In tbe dark of the moon. There wren dosena of houses that way In Pocklngtown. Sometimes there would be a particular room that you could point out—If anybody slept in that room he was lust as good as dead. With this house It had been th* Irish Ilrst; and then a Bohemian family had lost a child of It—though, to be sure, that we* uncertain, since It was hard to tall what was tbs matter with chil dren who worked In. the yard*. In those days there had been no law about th* age of children—th* pack ers had worked all but the babies. At this remark the family looked pusaled, and Grandmother Majusx- kfene again had to make an explana tion—that It was (gainst the law far children to work before they were six teen. What was the sense of that? they asked. They hail been thinking of letting Htanleiovas go to work. Well, there was nn noil to worry. Grand mother Majauaxklena said—the law .made no difference except that It forc ed people to II* about the ages of their children. Ona would Ilk* toknow what the lawmakers' expected them to do; there were families that had no pnssl- of getting a living. Very often a man could get no work In Farklnglown for months, while a child could go and art a piece easily; there was always some new machine, by which the packet - could get as much work out of a child as they had been able to get out uf a man, and for a third of the pay. To come back to the house ntrnln, it was the women of the next family ili.it hnd died. That was after they had been there nearly four years, nnd thin woman had had twins regulnrly every year—and there bad been more than you could count When they moved In. After she died the man would go to work all day and leave them to -hift for themselves—the neighbors would help them now and then, for they would almost freSxe to death. At the end there were three days that they were alone before It waa found out that the father was dead. He wen a "floorstnan" nt Jones', nnd n wounded steer had broken loose and mashed him against a pillar. Then the chil dren bail been taken away, nnd tho company had sold the house that lory same week to n peri] emigrants Ho this grim old woman went < o with her lets of horrors, 'How much of It waa saaggerattoo—trbo mom tag It waa only loo pi.up nThere was that about consumption, for Instance. They knew nothing about consumption whatever except that It made pin cough; and lor two weeko they had been worrying nbout a coughing -pell of Antanas. It seemed to shake Mm all over, and It never stopped. You could see n red stnln wherever he had spit upon the floor. And yet all these things were as nothing (o what ram* it little In tar. They hod begun to question the old Indy aa to why one family had haen unnble to pay, trying to show' her by figures that It ought to have been i*»- atble; nnd Grandmother Majnnazklene lirnl disputed their flguren—-"You say Sll a month; but that docs not Includo th* Interest.” Then they starfd at her. "Interest!” they cried. "Interest on tha money you stilt owe." she answered. "Ilut w# don’t have to pay nn' In- tarastl" they exclaimed, o four nt once. "We only hate to pny 111 each month." And fnr this she laughed nt tham. "You arc Ilka all the rest." ehe -old "they trick you un I eat you alive. They never sell the house* without Interest. Oat your deed nnd see.” Then, with a horrible sinking of ihe heart. Trta Etxldetn unlrw krd her bu reau and brought out the paper that hnd nlreadv caused them so pinny agonies. Now they sat round, aenres- ly breathing, while the old holy, wlm could read English, ran over It. "Ye-." ah* said, Anally, "here It I*, of com-.-: With Interest thereon monthly at th* rule of 7 par cent per annum. - ." And there followed a dend alien. e. 'What does thnt mean?" asked Jurgis Anally, almost In n w hisper. "That means," replied the other, “that you have to pay them 17 next month, Its well as the 111." Then again there was not a sound. It waa sickening,. Ilka a nightmare. In which suddenly something gives uuy beneath you, and you fcol feel your- sslf sulking, sinking, down Into bot tomless. nbyssos. As If In n flash of lightning they saw themselves -victim had bran a great many of them, which We means of support except tha children was a common falling In Packlngtown; and the law provided them no other way iiaCmuiUK win of a relentless fate, In the grip of destruction. All tha fair structure of thalr hopes enma crashing about their ear- And nil the time the old woman was going on UlklDf. They wlohsd that she would be still: her voice sounded Just llkn the croak ing of some dismal reran. Jurgls sot with his hands daarhed and brads of perspiration on his forehead, and there was a great lump In Onn’s throat, choking her. Then suddenly Tela Klls- bleta broke Ihe silence with a wall, and Marlja begun to wring her hands and sob, 'Al! Al! Urdu man!” All their outcry did them no good, course. There sat Orendmothar Majaussklene. unrelenting, typifying fata So, of coil--.- II 0.1- not fair, but then fnlrneea had nothing to do with It. And of course they had not known It. They hod not been Intended fa know IL But It "ii- In the deed, and that waa all that was nei essury, as they would flnd when the time iroa. Somehow or other they got rid of their guest, ami then they pn-srd a night of lamentation. The children woke up and found out thnt something was wrong, and thay walled and would no* be comforted; In the morning, of course, most of them hnd to go to work; th* packinghouse would not stop thalr sorrows; but by 1 o'clock tins and her stepmother were -landing at tha door uf th* office of the ugent. Yes, he told them, when he came, it was quite true that they would have to pay Interest And then Tent Elsbleta broke forth Into protestations and re proaches. so th.it the people outside Stopped and peered In at the window. The agent wae n> bland n» ever. H* was deeply pnlned lie said He had not told them simply lie, nuse he hod sum *ed they would understand that they had to pny Interest upon their debt n« a matter of course. (Continued In