came on the heels of the setting sun. In the
adjoining bin, two women and half a dozen chil
dren had picked nine bushels; so that the five
bushels the measurers found in our bin demon
strated that we had done equally well, for the half-
dozen children had ranged from nine to fourteen
years of age.

Five bushels ! We worked it out to eight pence
ha penny, or seventeen cents, for two men working
three hours and a half. Eight and one-half cents
apiece, a rate of two and three-sevenths cents per
hour ! But we were allowed only to sub five-
pence of the total sum, though the tally-keeper,
short of change, gave us sixpence. Entreaty was
in vain. A hard luck story could not move him.
He proclaimed loudly that we had received a
penny more than our due, and went his way.

Granting, for the sake of the argument, that we
were what we represented ourselves to be, namely,
poor men and broke, then here was our position:
night was coming on; we had had no supper, much
less dinner; and we possessed sixpence between us.
I was hungry enough to eat three sixpenn orths of
food, and so was Bert. One thing was patent. By
doing i6f per cent justice to our stomachs, we
would expend the sixpence, and our stomachs
would still be gnawing under 83 per cent injustice.
Being broke again, we could sleep under a hedge,

[[178]]

p177 _ -chap- _ toc-1 _ p178w _ toc-2 _ +chap+ _ p179

v?