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