Read an excerpt of Upton Sinclair's The Jungle:
"[Mikolas] is a beef-boner, and that is a dangerous trade[....] Your hands are slippery, and your knife is slippery, and you are toiling like mad, when somebody happens to speak to you, or you strike a bone. Then your hand slips up on the blade and there is a fearful gash. And that would not be so bad, only for the deadly contagion. [Mikolas] is a beef-boner, and that is a dangerous trade[....] Your hands are slippery, and your knife is slippery, and you are toiling like mad, when somebody happens to speak to you, or you strike a bone. Then your hand slips up on the blade and there is a fearful gash. And that would not be so bad, only for the deadly contagion. The cut may heal, but you can never tell. Twice now, within the last three years, Mikolas has been lying at home with blood-poisoning–once for three months and once for nearly seven. Twice now, within the last three years, Mikolas has been lying at home with blood-poisoning–once for three months and once for nearly seven. The last time, too, he lost his job, which means six weeks more of standing at the doors of the packing-houses, at six o'clock on bitter winter mornings, with a foot of snow on the ground and more in the air. There are learned people who can tell you out of the statistics that beef-boners make forty cents an hour, but, perhaps, these people have never looked into a beef-boner's hands."
Upton Sinclair's The Jungle which tells the story of an extended Lithuanian family trying to succeed in Chicago.
Activity: After reading the excerpt, respond to the following question: