The Jungle

Roughly three weeks after his injury, Jurgis tries to return to work. The pain quickly becomes overwhelming, and when he again consults with a doctor, he learns that his bedrest has accomplished nothing; the problem is a misaligned tendon. The doctor resets it but tells Jurgis that he will need to take another two months off.

Soon afterwards, a severe snowstorm forces Ona and Stanislovas to turn back on their way to work. Stanislovas’s fingers are frostbitten, which causes permanent damage to three of them and exacerbates his fear of the cold: “[T]hereafter he always had to be beaten before he set out to work, whenever there was fresh snow on the ground. Jurgis was called upon to do the beating, and as it hurt his foot he did it with a vengeance” (134).

One day, Jonas fails to return from work. His supervisors claim he took his week’s wages and left, and although companies often lie about workplace accidents, the family concludes that in this case they’re likely telling the truth: “He had been discontented for a long time, and not without some cause. He paid good board, and was yet obliged to live in a family where nobody had enough to eat” (135).

Jonas’s departure dramatically reduces the family’s income, forcing them to increasingly rely on Marija and Tamoszius for support. They also decide to put two of Elzbieta’s younger boys—Vilimas and Nikalojus—to work selling papers.

As spring approaches, Ona becomes increasingly ill and anxious, plagued by fears that Jurgis no longer loves her. Meanwhile, when Jurgis is finally able to return to work, he finds that he has been replaced. Since he is no longer as healthy and strong as he once was, he struggles to find a new position. 

While Jurgis is out of work, another tragedy strikes: Elzbieta’s youngest son dies of food poisoning. Kristoforas was his mother’s favorite, and she is devastated both by his death and by Jurgis’s insistence that they can’t afford a proper burial.

Eventually, Jurgis resigns himself to the fact that he will have to seek employment at the fertilizer warehouses. In June, Jurgis is finally hired by Durham’s to shovel fertilizer into carts:

[T]he phosphates soaked in through every pore of Jurgis' skin, and in five minutes he had a headache, and in fifteen was almost dazed. […] half an hour later he began to vomit—he vomited until it seemed as if his inwards must be torn into shreds (145).

It takes Jurgis a week to physically adjust to his new work, although the headaches and the stench never leave him. With Jurgis once again working, the family is able to pay off some of their debts and begin saving money. They also decide to return Vilimas and Nikalojus to school in the fall, fearing that their work downtown is exposing them to bad moral influences. To make up for the lost wages, Elzbieta finds a position twisting sausage into links.

Elzbieta’s job gives the family even more insight into the meatpacking companies’ practices: “[S]ausage that had been rejected, and that was mouldy and white […] would be dosed with borax and glycerine, and dumped into the hoppers, and made over again for home consumption” (151).

Elzbieta is now so constantly tired that she exists in a stupor. By contrast, Ona is plagued more and more by bouts of anxiety and crying that irritate Jurgis: “[S]he learned to weep silently. Their moods so seldom came together now. It was as if their hopes were buried in separate graves” (153).

Meanwhile, Jurgis struggles with alcohol, which provides temporary relief from his misery. Aware of his family’s disappointment whenever he gives in to the temptation, he struggles to suppress the urge, but doing so is a constant battle. As a result, he begins to resent his family; the fact that Ona, who is once again pregnant, is deteriorating both physically and emotionally only solidifies Jurgis’s belief that they should never have married.  

Although Elzbieta insists that Ona’s outbursts are caused by pregnancy, Jurgis worries that his wife is hiding something from him. Meanwhile, winter approaches, and Marija, Elzbieta, and Ona work longer hours than usual as the factories prepare for the holidays.

Shortly before Thanksgiving, Elzbieta wakes Jurgis up and tells him that Ona didn’t come home the night before. Jurgis rushes to the factory where she works, only to learn that Ona left as scheduled. Ona finally shows up as the plant is opening; she tells Jurgis that she spent the night with her friend Jadvyga after heavy snow shut down public transport.

Two weeks later, Ona once again fails to come home. Believing she must have spent the night at Jadvyga’s again, Jurgis stops by the following morning. Ona, however, isn’t there, and Jadvyga tells him that she has never slept over. Next, Jurgis goes to Ona’s factory to wait for her, but she never arrives. As he’s walking home later that afternoon, he sees Ona disembarking from a car coming from downtown Chicago.

Jurgis shadows Ona all the way back to their house. When he goes inside, Elzbieta claims that Ona returned earlier that morning. Jurgis accuses her of lying and violently confronts his wife, who cries and begs him not to question her further. Eventually, however, she admits that she was at Miss Henderson’s brothel, where Connor has been forcing her to sleep with him by threatening her family’s employment.

Without another word, Jurgis returns to the factory where Ona works, finds Connor, and attacks him. A group of men finally subdue Jurgis and carry him to the police station.