Chapter XXIV

In the face of all his handicaps, Jurgis was obliged to
make the price of a lodging, and of a drink every hour or
two, under penalty of freezing to death. Day after day
he roamed about in the arctic cold, his soul filled full of
bitterness and despair. He saw the world of civilization
then more plainly than ever he had seen it before; a world
in which nothing counted but brutal might, an order de~
vised by those who possessed it for the subjugation of
those who did not. He was one of the latter; and all
outdoors, all life, was to him one colossal prison, which
he paced like a pent-up tiger, trying one bar after another,
and finding them all beyond his power. He had lost in
the fierce battle of greed, and so was doomed to be exter~
minated; and all society was busied to see that he did not
escape the sentence. Everywhere that he turned were
prison-bars, and hostile eyes following him; the well-fed,
sleek policemen, from whose glances he shrank, and who
seemed to grip their clubs more tightly when they saw
him; the saloon-keepers, who never ceased to watch him
while he was in their places, who were jealous of every
moment he lingered after he had paid his money; the
hurrying throngs upon the streets, who were deaf to his
entreaties, oblivious of his very existence -- and savage
and contemptuous when he forced himself upon them.
They had their own affairs, and there was no place for him
among them. There was no place for him anywhere --
every direction he turned his gaze, this fact was forced
upon him. Everything was built to express it to him:
the residences, with their heavy walls and bolted doors,
and basement-windows barred with iron; the great ware~

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v?