there was no time to look at him, so really the only chance
the father had was on Sundays. This was more cruel yet
for Ona, who ought to have stayed home and nursed him,
the doctor said, for her own health as well as the baby's;
but Ona had to go to work, and leave him for Teta
Elzbieta to feed upon the pale blue poison that was called
milk at the corner-grocery. Ona's confinement lost her
only a week's wages -- she would go to the factory the
second Monday, and the best that Jurgis could persuade
her was to ride in the car, and let him run along behind
and help her to Brown's when she alighted. After that
it would be all right, said Ona, it was no strain sitting
still sewing hams all day; and if she waited longer she
might find that her dreadful forelady had put someone
else in her place. That would be a greater calamity than
ever now, Ona continued, on account of the baby. They
would all have to work harder now on his account. It
was such a responsibility -- they must not have the baby
grow up to suffer as they had. And this indeed had been
the first thing that Jurgis had thought of himself -- he
had clenched his hands and braced himself anew for the
struggle, for the sake of that tiny mite of human possibility.

And so Ona went back to Brown's and saved her place
and a week's wages; and so she gave herself some one of
the thousand ailments that women group under the title
of "womb-trouble," and was never again a well person as
long as she lived. It is difficult to convey in words all
that this meant to Ona; it seemed such a slight offense,
and the punishment was so out of all proportion, that
neither she nor any one else ever connected the two.
"Womb-trouble" to Ona did not mean a specialist's
diagnosis, and a course of treatment, and perhaps an opera~
tion or two; it meant simply headaches and pains in the
back, and depression and heartsickness, and neuralgia
when she had to go to work in the rain. The great
majority of the women who worked in Packingtown
suffered in the same way, and from the same cause, so it
was not deemed a thing to see the doctor about; instead
Ona would try patent medicines, one after another, as

[[128]]

p127 _ -chap- _ toc-1 _ p128w _ toc-2 _ +chap+ _ p129

v?