And for all I know the pawnbroker still has the suit.

I had never intended to redeem it.
But I couldn't get any work.

Yet I was a bargain in the labour market.
I was twenty-two years old, weighed one hundred and sixty-five pounds stripped, every pound of which was excellent for toil; and the last traces of my scurvy were vanishing before a treatment of potatoes chewed raw.

I tackled every opening for employment.

I tried to become a studio model, but there were too many fine-bodied young fellows out of jobs.