but they began to run for shorter and shorter hours.
They had always required the men to be on the killing-
beds and ready for work at seven o'clock, although there
was almost never any work to be done till the buyers
out in the yards had gotten to work, and some cattle had
come over the chutes. That would often be ten or eleven
o'clock, which was bad enough, in all conscience; but now,
in the slack season, they would perhaps not have a thing
for their men to do till late in the afternoon. And so
they would have to loaf around, in a place where the
thermometer might be twenty degrees below zero! At
first one would see them running about, or skylarking
with each other, trying to keep warm; but before the day
was over they would become quite chilled through and
exhausted, and, when the cattle finally came, so near frozen
that to move was an agony. And then suddenly the place
would spring into activity, and the merciless "speeding-
up" would begin!

There were weeks at a time when Jurgis went home
after such a day as this with not more than two hours'
work to his credit -- which meant about thirty-five cents.
There were many days when the total was less than half
an hour, and others when there was none at all. The
general average was six hours a day, which meant for
Jurgis about six dollars a week; and this six hours of
work would be done after standing on the killing-bed till
one o'clock, or perhaps even three or four o'clock, in the
afternoon. Like as not there would come a rush of cattle
at the very end of the day, which the men would have to
dispose of before they went home, often working by
electric light till nine or ten, or even twelve or one o'clock,
and without a single instant for a bite of supper. The
men were at the mercy of the cattle. Perhaps the buyers
would be holding off for better prices -- if they could scare
the shippers into thinking that they meant to buy nothing
that day, they could get their own terms. For some
reason the cost of fodder for cattle in the yards was much
above the market price -- and you were not allowed to
bring your own fodder! Then, too, a number of cars were

[[103]]

p102 _ -chap- _ toc-1 _ p103w _ toc-2 _ +chap+ _ p104

v?