back, so to speak. "Don't be a chump!" it would ex-
claim. "Go and get the Goliath Bunion Cure.""Get
a move on you!" would chime in another. "It's easy, if
you wear the Eureka Two-fifty Shoe."

Among these importunate signs was one that had
caught the attention of the family by its pictures. It
showed two very pretty little birds building themselves
a home; and Marija had asked an acquaintance to read it
to her, and told them that it related to the furnishing of
a house. "Feather your nest," it ran -- and went on to
say that it could furnish all the necessary feathers for a
four-room nest for the ludicrously small sum of seventy-
five dollars. The particularly important thing about this
offer was that only a small part of the money need be had
at once -- the rest one might pay a few dollars every
month. Our friends had to have some furniture, there
was no getting away from that; but their little fund of
money had sunk so low that they could hardly get to
sleep at night, and so they fled to this as their deliver-
ance. There was more agony and another paper for Elz-
bieta to sign, and then one night when Jurgis came home,
he was told the breathless tidings that the furniture had
arrived and was safely stowed in the house: a parlor set
of four pieces, a bedroom set of three pieces, a dining-
room table and four chairs, a toilet-set with beautiful pink
roses painted all over it, an assortment of crockery, also
with pink roses -- and so on. One of the plates in the
set had been found broken when they unpacked it, and
Ona was going to the store the first thing in the morning
to make them change it; also they had promised three
sauce-pans, and there had only two come, and did Jurgis
think that they were trying to cheat them?

The next day they went to the house; and when the
men came from work they ate a few hurried mouthfuls
at Aniele's, and then set to work at the task of carrying
their belongings to their new home. The distance was
in reality over two miles, but Jurgis made two trips that
night, each time with a huge pile of mattresses and bed-
ding on his head, with bundles of clothing and bags and

-64-