the adventures of huckleberry finn: summary & analysis | chapter 29-30 | study guide | cliffsnotes

They was fetching a very nice-looking old gentleman along, and a
nice-looking younger one, with his right arm in a sling. And, my
souls, how the people yelled and laughed, and kept it up. But I didn't
see no joke about it, and I judged it would strain the duke and the
king some to see any. I reckoned they'd turn pale. But no, nary a pale
did _they_ turn. The duke he never let on he suspicioned what was up,
but just went a goo-gooing around, happy and satisfied, like a jug
that's googling out buttermilk; and as for the king, he just gazed and
gazed down sorrowful on them new-comers like it give him the
stomach-ache in his very heart to think there could be such frauds and
rascals in the world. Oh, he done it admirable. Lots of the principal
people gethered around the king, to let him see they was on his side.
That old gentleman that had just come looked all puzzled to death.
Pretty soon he begun to speak, and I see straight off he pronounced
_like_ an Englishman--not the king's way, though the king's _was_
pretty good for an imitation. I can't give the old gent's words, nor I
can't imitate him; but he turned around to the crowd, and says, about
like this:

"This is a surprise to me which I wasn't looking for; and I'll
acknowledge, candid and frank, I ain't very well fixed to meet it and
answer it; for my brother and me has had misfortunes; he's broke his
arm, and our baggage got put off at a town above here last night in
the night by a mistake. I am Peter Wilks's brother Harvey, and this is
his brother William, which can't hear nor speak--and can't even make
signs to amount to much, now't he's only got one hand to work them
with. We are who we say we are; and in a day or two, when I get the
baggage, I can prove it. But up till then I won't say nothing more,
but go to the hotel and wait."

So him and the new dummy started off; and the king he laughs, and
blethers out:

"Broke his arm--_very_ likely, _ain't_ it?--and very convenient, too,
for a fraud that's got to make signs, and ain't learnt how. Lost their
baggage! That's _mighty_ good!--and mighty ingenious--under the
_circumstances!_"

So he laughed again; and so did everybody else, except three or four,
or maybe half a dozen. One of these was that doctor; another one was a
sharp-looking gentleman, with a carpet-bag of the old-fashioned kind
made out of carpet-stuff, that had just come off of the steamboat and
was talking to him in a low voice, and glancing towards the king now
and then and nodding their heads--it was Levi Bell, the lawyer that
was gone up to Louisville; and another one was a big rough husky that
come along and listened to all the old gentlemen said, and was
listening to the king now. And when the king got done this husky up
and says:

"Say, looky here; if you are Harvey Wilks, when'd you come to this
town?"

"The day before the funeral, friend," says the king.

"But what time o' day?"

"In the evenin'--'bout an hour er two before sundown."

"How'd you come?"

"I come down on the _Susan Powell_ from Cincinnati."

"Well, then, how'd you come to be up at the Pint in the _mornin_'--in
a canoe?"

"I warn't up at the Pint in the mornin'."

"It's a lie."

Several of them jumped for him and begged him not to talk that way to
an old man and a preacher.

"Preacher be hanged, he's a fraud and a liar. He was up at the Pint
that mornin'. I live up there, don't I?  Well, I was up there, and he
was up there. I see him there. He come in a canoe, along with Tim
Collins and a boy."

The doctor he up and says:

"Would you know the boy again if you was to see him, Hines?"

"I reckon I would, but I don't know. Why, yonder he is, now. I know
him perfectly easy."

It was me he pointed at. The doctor says:

"Neighbors, I don't know whether the new couple is frauds or not; but
if _these_ two ain't frauds, I am an idiot, that's all. I think it's
our duty to see that they don't get away from here till we've looked
into this thing. Come along, Hines; come along, the rest of you. We'll
take these fellows to the tavern and affront them with t'other couple,
and I reckon we'll find out _something_ before we get through."

It was nuts for the crowd, though maybe not for the king's friends; so
we all started. It was about sundown. The doctor he led me along by
the hand, and was plenty kind enough, but he never let go my hand.

We all got in a big room in the hotel, and lit up some candles, and
fetched in the new couple. First, the doctor says:

"I don't wish to be too hard on these two men, but I think they're
frauds, and they may have complices that we don't know nothing about.
If they have, won't the complices get away with that bag of gold Peter
Wilks left? It ain't unlikely.  If these men ain't frauds, they won't
object to sending for that money and letting us keep it till they
prove they're all right--ain't that so?"

Everybody agreed to that. So I judged they had our gang in a pretty
tight place right at the outstart. But the king he only looked
sorrowful, and says:

"Gentlemen, I wish the money was there, for I ain't got no disposition
to throw anything in the way of a fair, open, out-and-out
investigation o' this misable business; but, alas, the money ain't
there; you k'n send and see, if you want to."

"Where is it, then?"

"Well, when my niece give it to me to keep for her I took and hid it
inside o' the straw tick o' my bed, not wishin' to bank it for the few
days we'd be here, and considerin' the bed a safe place, we not bein'
used to niggers, and suppos'n' 'em honest, like servants in England.
The niggers stole it the very next mornin' after I had went
down-stairs; and when I sold 'em I hadn't missed the money yit, so
they got clean away with it. My servant here k'n tell you 'bout it,
gentlemen."

The doctor and several said "Shucks!" and I see nobody didn't
altogether believe him. One man asked me if I see the niggers steal
it. I said no, but I see them sneaking out of the room and hustling
away, and I never thought nothing, only I reckoned they was afraid
they had waked up my master and was trying to get away before he made
trouble with them. That was all they asked me. Then the doctor whirls
on me and says:

"Are _you_ English, too?"

I says yes; and him and some others laughed, and said, "Stuff!"

Well, then they sailed in on the general investigation, and there we
had it, up and down, hour in, hour out, and nobody never said a word
about supper, nor ever seemed to think about it--and so they kept it
up, and kept it up; and it _was_ the worst mixed-up thing you ever
see. They made the king tell his yarn, and they made the old gentleman
tell his'n; and anybody but a lot of prejudiced chuckleheads would 'a'
_seen_ that the old gentleman was spinning truth and t'other one lies.
And by and by they had me up to tell what I knowed. The king he give
me a left-handed look out of the corner of his eye, and so I knowed
enough to talk on the right side. I begun to tell about Sheffield, and
how we lived there, and all about the English Wilkses, and so on; but
I didn't get pretty fur till the doctor begun to laugh; and Levi Bell,
the lawyer, says:

"Set down, my boy; I wouldn't strain myself if I was you. I reckon you
ain't used to lying, it don't seem to come handy; what you want is
practice. You do it pretty awkward."

I didn't care nothing for the compliment, but I was glad to be let
off, anyway.

The doctor he started to say something, and turns and says:

"If you'd been in town at first, Levi Bell--"

The king broke in and reached out his hand, and says:

"Why, is this my poor dead brother's old friend that he's wrote so
often about?"

The lawyer and him shook hands, and the lawyer smiled and looked
pleased, and they talked right along awhile, and then got to one side
and talked low; and at last the lawyer speaks up and says:

"That 'll fix it. I'll take the order and send it, along with your
brother's, and then they'll know it's all right."

So they got some paper and a pen, and the king he set down and twisted
his head to one side, and chawed his tongue, and scrawled off
something; and then they give the pen to the duke--and then for the
first time the duke looked sick. But he took the pen and wrote. So
then the lawyer turns to the new old gentleman and says:

"You and your brother please write a line or two and sign your names."

The old gentleman wrote, but nobody couldn't read it. The lawyer
looked powerful astonished, and says:

"Well, it beats _me_--and snaked a lot of old letters out of his
pocket, and examined them, and then examined the old man's writing,
and then _them_ again; and then says: "These old letters is from
Harvey Wilks; and here's _these_ two handwritings, and anybody can see
_they_ didn't write them" (the king and the duke looked sold and
foolish, I tell you, to see how the lawyer had took them in), "and
here's _this_ old gentleman's handwriting, and anybody can tell, easy
enough, _he_ didn't write them--fact is, the scratches he makes ain't
properly _writing_ at all. Now, here's some letters from--"

The new old gentleman says:

"If you please, let me explain. Nobody can read my hand but my brother
there--so he copies for me. It's _his_ hand you've got there, not
mine."

"_Well!_" says the lawyer, "this _is_ a state of things. I've got some
of William's letters, too; so if you'll get him to write a line or so
we can com--"

"He _can't_ write with his left hand," says the old gentleman. "If he
could use his right hand, you would see that he wrote his own letters
and mine too. Look at both, please--they're by the same hand."

The lawyer done it, and says:

"I believe it's so--and if it ain't so, there's a heap stronger
resemblance than I'd noticed before, anyway. Well, well, well! I
thought we was right on the track of a slution, but it's gone to
grass, partly. But anyway, _one_ thing is proved--_these_ two ain't
either of 'em Wilkses"--and he wagged his head towards the king and
the duke.

Well, what do you think? That mule-headed old fool wouldn't give in
_then!_ Indeed he wouldn't. Said it warn't no fair test. Said his
brother William was the cussedest joker in the world, and hadn't
_tried_ to write--_he_ see William was going to play one of his jokes
the minute he put the pen to paper. And so he warmed up and went
warbling right along till he was actuly beginning to believe what he
was saying _himself_; but pretty soon the new gentleman broke in, and
says:

"I've thought of something. Is there anybody here that helped to lay
out my br--helped to lay out the late Peter Wilks for burying?"

"Yes," says somebody, "me and Ab Turner done it. We're both here."

Then the old man turns toward the king, and says:

"Peraps this gentleman can tell me what was tattooed on his breast?"

Blamed if the king didn't have to brace up mighty quick, or he'd 'a'
squshed down like a bluff bank that the river has cut under, it took
him so sudden; and, mind you, it was a thing that was calculated to
make most _anybody_ sqush to get fetched such a solid one as that
without any notice, because how was _he_ going to know what was
tattooed on the man?  He whitened a little; he couldn't help it; and
it was mighty still in there, and everybody bending a little forwards
and gazing at him. Says I to myself, _Now_ he'll throw up the
sponge--there ain't no more use. Well, did he? A body can't hardly
believe it, but he didn't. I reckon he thought he'd keep the thing up
till he tired them people out, so they'd thin out, and him and the
duke could break loose and get away. Anyway, he set there, and pretty
soon he begun to smile, and says:

"Mf! It's a _very_ tough question, _ain't_ it! _Yes_, sir, I k'n tell
you what's tattooed on his breast. It's jest a small, thin, blue
arrow--that's what it is; and if you don't look clost, you can't see
it. _Now_ what do you say--hey?"

Well, _I_ never see anything like that old blister for clean
out-and-out cheek.

The new old gentleman turns brisk towards Ab Turner and his pard, and
his eye lights up like he judged he'd got the king _this_ time, and
says:

"There--you've heard what he said! Was there any such mark on Peter
Wilks's breast?"

Both of them spoke up and says:

"We didn't see no such mark."

"Good!" says the old gentleman. "Now, what you _did_ see on his breast
was a small dim P, and a B (which is an initial he dropped when he was
young), and a W, and dashes between them, so: P--B--W"--and he marked
them that way on a piece of paper. "Come, ain't that what you saw?"

Both of them spoke up again, and says:

"No, we _didn't_. We never seen any marks at all."

Well, everybody _was_ in a state of mind now, and they sings out:

"The whole _bilin'_ of 'm 's frauds! Le's duck 'em! le's drown 'em!
le's ride 'em on a rail!" and everybody was whooping at once, and
there was a rattling powwow. But the lawyer he jumps on the table and
yells, and says:

"Gentlemen--gentle_men!_ Hear me just a word--just a _single_ word--if
you PLEASE! There's one way yet--let's go and dig up the corpse and
look."

That took them.

"Hooray!" they all shouted, and was starting right off; but the lawyer
and the doctor sung out:

"Hold on, hold on! Collar all these four men and the boy, and fetch
_them_ along, too!"

"We'll do it!" they all shouted; "and if we don't find them marks
we'll lynch the whole gang!"

I _was_ scared, now, I tell you. But there warn't no getting away, you
know. They gripped us all, and marched us right along, straight for
the graveyard, which was a mile and a half down the river, and the
whole town at our heels, for we made noise enough, and it was only
nine in the evening.

As we went by our house I wished I hadn't sent Mary Jane out of town;
because now if I could tip her the wink she'd light out and save me,
and blow on our dead-beats.

Well, we swarmed along down the river road, just carrying on like
wildcats; and to make it more scary the sky was darking up, and the
lightning beginning to wink and flitter, and the wind to shiver
amongst the leaves. This was the most awful trouble and most
dangersome I ever was in; and I was kinder stunned; everything was
going so different from what I had allowed for; stead of being fixed
so I could take my own time if I wanted to, and see all the fun, and
have Mary Jane at my back to save me and set me free when the
close-fit come, here was nothing in the world betwixt me and sudden
death but just them tattoo-marks. If they didn't find them--

I couldn't bear to think about it; and yet, somehow, I couldn't think
about nothing else. It got darker and darker, and it was a beautiful
time to give the crowd the slip; but that big husky had me by the
wrist--Hines--and a body might as well try to give Goliar the slip. He
dragged me right along, he was so excited, and I had to run to keep
up.

When they got there they swarmed into the graveyard and washed over it
like an overflow. And when they got to the grave they found they had
about a hundred times as many shovels as they wanted, but nobody
hadn't thought to fetch a lantern. But they sailed into digging anyway
by the flicker of the lightning, and sent a man to the nearest house,
a half a mile off, to borrow one.

So they dug and dug like everything; and it got awful dark, and the
rain started, and the wind swished and swushed along, and the
lightning come brisker and brisker, and the thunder boomed; but them
people never took no notice of it, they was so full of this business;
and one minute you could see everything and every face in that big
crowd, and the shovelfuls of dirt sailing up out of the grave, and the
next second the dark wiped it all out, and you couldn't see nothing at
all.

At last they got out the coffin and begun to unscrew the lid, and then
such another crowding and shouldering and shoving as there was, to
scrouge in and get a sight, you never see; and in the dark, that way,
it was awful. Hines he hurt my wrist dreadful pulling and tugging so,
and I reckon he clean forgot I was in the world, he was so excited and
panting.

All of a sudden the lightning let go a perfect sluice of white glare,
and somebody sings out:

"By the living jingo, here's the bag of gold on his breast!"

Hines let out a whoop, like everybody else, and dropped my wrist and
give a big surge to bust his way in and get a look, and the way I lit
out and shinned for the road in the dark there ain't nobody can tell.

I had the road all to myself, and I fairly flew--leastways, I had it
all to myself except the solid dark, and the now-and-then glares, and
the buzzing of the rain, and the thrashing of the wind, and the
splitting of the thunder; and sure as you are born I did clip it
along!

When I struck the town I see there warn't nobody out in the storm, so
I never hunted for no back streets, but humped it straight through the
main one; and when I begun to get towards our house I aimed my eye and
set it. No light there; the house all dark--which made me feel sorry
and disappointed, I didn't know why. But at last, just as I was
sailing by, _flash_ comes the light in Mary Jane's window! and my
heart swelled up sudden, like to bust; and the same second the house
and all was behind me in the dark, and wasn't ever going to be before
me no more in this world. She _was_ the best girl I ever see, and had
the most sand.

The minute I was far enough above the town to see I could make the
towhead, I begun to look sharp for a boat to borrow, and the first
time the lightning showed me one that wasn't chained I snatched it and
shoved. It was a canoe, and warn't fastened with nothing but a rope.
The towhead was a rattling big distance off, away out there in the
middle of the river, but I didn't lose no time; and when I struck the
raft at last I was so fagged I would 'a' just laid down to blow and
gasp if I could afforded it. But I didn't. As I sprung aboard I sung
out:

"Out with you, Jim, and set her loose! Glory be to goodness, we're
shut of them!"

Jim lit out, and was a-coming for me with both arms spread, he was so
full of joy; but when I glimpsed him in the lightning my heart shot up
in my mouth and I went overboard backwards; for I forgot he was old
King Lear and a drownded A-rab all in one, and it most scared the
livers and lights out of me. But Jim fished me out, and was going to
hug me and bless me, and so on, he was so glad I was back and we was
shut of the king and the duke, but I says:

"Not now; have it for breakfast, have it for breakfast! Cut loose and
let her slide!"

So in two seconds away we went a-sliding down the river, and it _did_
seem so good to be free again and all by ourselves on the big river,
and nobody to bother us. I had to skip around a bit, and jump up and
crack my heels a few times--I couldn't help it; but about the third
crack I noticed a sound that I knowed mighty well, and held my breath
and listened and waited; and sure enough, when the next flash busted
out over the water, here they come!--and just a-laying to their oars
and making their skiff hum! It was the king and the duke.

So I wilted right down onto the planks then, and give up; and it was
all I could do to keep from crying.

When they got aboard the king went for me, and shook me by the collar,
and says:

"Tryin' to give us the slip, was ye, you pup! Tired of our company,
hey?"

I says:

"No, your majesty, we warn't--_please_ don't, your majesty!"

"Quick, then, and tell us what _was_ your idea, or I'll shake the
insides out o' you!"

"Honest, I'll tell you everything just as it happened, your majesty.
The man that had a-holt of me was very good to me, and kept saying he
had a boy about as big as me that died last year, and he was sorry to
see a boy in such a dangerous fix; and when they was all took by
surprise by finding the gold, and made a rush for the coffin, he lets
go of me and whispers, 'Heel it now, or they'll hang ye, sure!' and I
lit out. It didn't seem no good for _me_ to stay--I couldn't do
nothing, and I didn't want to be _hung_ if I could get away. So I
never stopped running till I found the canoe; and when I got here I
told Jim to hurry, or they'd catch me and hang me yet, and said I was
afeard you and the duke wasn't alive now, and I was awful sorry, and
so was Jim, and was awful glad when we see you coming; you may ask Jim
if I didn't." Jim said it was so; and the king told him to shut up,
and said, "Oh, yes, it's _mighty_ likely!" and shook me up again, and
said he reckoned he'd drownd me. But the duke says:

"Leggo the boy, you old idiot! Would _you_ 'a' done any different?
Did you inquire around for _him_ when you got loose? I don't remember
it."

So the king let go of me, and begun to cuss that town and everybody in
it. But the duke says:

"You better a blame' sight give _yourself_ a good cussing, for you're
the one that's entitled to it most. You hain't done a thing from the
start that had any sense in it, except coming out so cool and cheeky
with that imaginary blue-arrow mark. That _was_ bright--it was right
down bully; and it was the thing that saved us. For if it hadn't been
for that they'd 'a' jailed us till them Englishmen's baggage come--and
then--the penitentiary, you bet! But that trick took 'em to the
graveyard, and the gold done us a still bigger kindness; for if the
excited fools hadn't let go all holts and made that rush to get a look
we'd 'a' slept in our cravats to-night--cravats warranted to _wear_,
too--longer than _we'd_ need 'em."

They was still a minute--thinking; then the king says, kind of
absent-minded like:

"Mf! And we reckoned the _niggers_ stole it!"

That made me squirm!

"Yes," says the duke, kinder slow and deliberate and sarcastic, "_we_
did."

After about a half a minute the king drawls out:

"Leastways, I did."

The duke says, the same way:

"On the contrary, _I_ did."

The king kind of ruffles up, and says:

"Looky here, Bilgewater, what'r you referrin' to?" The duke says,
pretty brisk:

"When it comes to that, maybe you'll let me ask what was _you_
referring to?"

"Shucks!" says the king, very sarcastic; "but _I_ don't know--maybe
you was asleep, and didn't know what you was about."

The duke bristles up now, and says:

"Oh, let _up_ on this cussed nonsense; do you take me for a blame'
fool? Don't you reckon I know who hid that money in that coffin?"

"_Yes_, sir! I know you _do_ know, because you done it yourself!"

"It's a lie!"--and the duke went for him. The king sings out:

"Take y'r hands off!--leggo my throat!--I take it all back!"

The duke says:

"Well, you just own up, first, that you _did_ hide that money there,
intending to give me the slip one of these days, and come back and dig
it up, and have it all to yourself."

"Wait jest a minute, duke--answer me this one question, honest and
fair; if you didn't put the money there, say it, and I'll b'lieve you,
and take back everything I said."

"You old scoundrel, I didn't, and you know I didn't. There, now!"

"Well, then, I b'lieve you. But answer me only jest this one more--now
_don't_ git mad; didn't you have it in your mind to hook the money and
hide it?"

The duke never said nothing for a little bit; then he says:

"Well, I don't care if I _did_, I didn't _do_ it, anyway. But you not
only had it in mind to do it, but you _done_ it."

"I wisht I never die if I done it, duke, and that's honest. I won't
say I warn't goin' to do it, because I _was_; but you--I mean
somebody--got in ahead o' me."

"It's a lie! You done it, and you got to _say_ you done it, or--"

The king began to gurgle, and then he gasps out:

"'Nough!--I _own up!_"

I was very glad to hear him say that; it made me feel much more easier
than what I was feeling before. So the duke took his hands off and
says:

"If you ever deny it again I'll drown you. It's _well_ for you to set
there and blubber like a baby--it's fitten for you, after the way
you've acted. I never see such an old ostrich for wanting to gobble
everything--and I a-trusting you all the time, like you was my own
father. You ought to been ashamed of yourself to stand by and hear it
saddled on to a lot of poor niggers, and you never say a word for 'em.
It makes me feel ridiculous to think I was soft enough to _believe_
that rubbage. Cuss you, I can see now why you was so anxious to make
up the deffisit--you wanted to get what money I'd got out of the
'None-such' and one thing or another, and scoop it _all!_"

The king says, timid, and still a-snuffling:

"Why, duke, it was you that said make up the deffersit; it warn't me."

"Dry up! I don't want to hear no more out of you!" says the duke. "And
_now_ you see what you _got_ by it. They've got all their own money
back, and all of _ourn_ but a shekel or two _besides_. G'long to bed,
and don't you deffersit _me_ no more deffersits, long 's _you_ live!"

So the king sneaked into the wigwam and took to his bottle for
comfort, and before long the duke tackled _his_ bottle; and so in
about a half an hour they was as thick as thieves again, and the
tighter they got the lovinger they got, and went off a-snoring in each
other's arms. They both got powerful mellow, but I noticed the king
didn't get mellow enough to forget to remember to not deny about
hiding the money-bag again. That made me feel easy and satisfied. Of
course when they got to snoring we had a long gabble, and I told Jim
everything.

Even Huck recognizes that the new claimants to Peter Wilks' fortune appear to be English compared to the duke and the king. The older gentleman introduces himself as Harvey and says they can prove their identity when they retrieve their baggage. In response, the king laughs and tells the crowd it is not surprising that the new "brothers" cannot immediately prove their claim. At this point, the crowd still believes the duke and the king are the true brothers, but the doctor convinces everyone that they must investigate further. After questioning Huck about his English heritage, the town lawyer, Levi Bell, tells Huck that he obviously is not used to lying. The older gentleman says he can prove who he is because he knows what is tattooed on Peter Wilks' chest. The king says it is a small blue arrow, and the older gentleman says it is a dim "P" and "B." The lawyer decides the only one way to be positive is to exhume Peter Wilks and have a look at his chest. When they open the coffin, they discover the bag of gold on the body's chest. The crowd becomes so excited that Huck is able to slip away, and he and Jim escape on the raft. Before they can get very far, however, they see the king and duke have also escaped. Jim and Huck realize they are not free from the con men. The duke and the king blame one another for stealing the bag of gold, but after getting drunk, they again become comrades and start working their schemes on new villages.

The introduction of the new Harvey and William adds another element of hilarity to the con men's inheritance scam. The contrast between the two sets of "brothers" is obvious, and the ensuing investigation underscores both the ignorance of the town and the eagerness of the townspeople to witness a dispute. Instead of reacting with anger, the town enjoys the added confusion and as the questions continue, the humor and suspense build. Huck's role as a servant is called into question, and unlike previous escapades, Huck is unable to convince the doctor and lawyer of his English ancestry. Instead of accepting Huck's story, the lawyer tells Huck, "I wouldn't strain myself if I was you. I reckon you ain't used to lying . . . You do it pretty awkward." Although Huck's entire journey has been based on lies and deception, he is unable to fool intelligent men for even a moment. The irony is apparent, as is Huck's reluctance to try and adapt his story. Instead of attempting to lie his way out of another predicament, Huck chooses to remain quiet and observe the comical investigation. The con men's unwillingness to leave without selling all of the family's possessions represents the greed of the two men. Ironically, it is this same type of greed that allows Huck and the duke and the king to escape. When the townsmen see the gold in Peter Wilks' coffin, they are unable to resist and the ensuing melee is reminiscent of Bricksville. Twain's commentary on the greed and ignorance of the mob mentality is solidified with the duke and the king's escape. Glossary cravats neckerchiefs or scarves. shekel a half-ounce gold or silver coin of the ancient Hebrews. gabble to talk rapidly and incoherently; jabber; chatter.


the adventures of huckleberry finn: summary & analysis | chapter 31 | study guide | cliffsnotes

We dasn't stop again at any town for days and days; kept right along
down the river. We was down south in the warm weather now, and a
mighty long ways from home. We begun to come to trees with Spanish
moss on them, hanging down from the limbs like long, gray beards. It
was the first I ever see it growing, and it made the woods look solemn
and dismal. So now the frauds reckoned they was out of danger, and
they begun to work the villages again.

First they done a lecture on temperance; but they didn't make enough
for them both to get drunk on. Then in another village they started a
dancing-school; but they didn't know no more how to dance than a
kangaroo does; so the first prance they made the general public jumped
in and pranced them out of town. Another time they tried to go at
yellocution; but they didn't yellocute long till the audience got up
and give them a solid good cussing, and made them skip out. They
tackled missionarying, and mesmerizing, and doctoring, and telling
fortunes, and a little of everything; but they couldn't seem to have
no luck. So at last they got just about dead broke, and laid around
the raft as she floated along, thinking and thinking, and never saying
nothing, by the half a day at a time, and dreadful blue and desperate.

And at last they took a change and begun to lay their heads together
in the wigwam and talk low and confidential two or three hours at a
time. Jim and me got uneasy. We didn't like the look of it. We judged
they was studying up some kind of worse deviltry than ever. We turned
it over and over, and at last we made up our minds they was going to
break into somebody's house or store, or was going into the
counterfeit-money business, or something. So then we was pretty
scared, and made up an agreement that we wouldn't have nothing in the
world to do with such actions, and if we ever got the least show we
would give them the cold shake and clear out and leave them behind.
Well, early one morning we hid the raft in a good, safe place about
two mile below a little bit of a shabby village named Pikesville, and
the king he went ashore and told us all to stay hid whilst he went up
to town and smelt around to see if anybody had got any wind of the
"Royal Nonesuch" there yet. ("House to rob, you _mean_," says I to
myself; "and when you get through robbing it you'll come back here and
wonder what has become of me and Jim and the raft--and you'll have to
take it out in wondering.") And he said if he warn't back by midday
the duke and me would know it was all right, and we was to come along.

So we stayed where we was. The duke he fretted and sweated around, and
was in a mighty sour way. He scolded us for everything, and we
couldn't seem to do nothing right; he found fault with every little
thing. Something was a-brewing, sure. I was good and glad when midday
come and no king; we could have a change, anyway--and maybe a chance
for _the_ chance on top of it. So me and the duke went up to the
village, and hunted around there for the king, and by and by we found
him in the back room of a little low doggery, very tight, and a lot of
loafers bullyragging him for sport, and he a-cussing and a-threatening
with all his might, and so tight he couldn't walk, and couldn't do
nothing to them. The duke he begun to abuse him for an old fool, and
the king begun to sass back, and the minute they was fairly at it I
lit out and shook the reefs out of my hind legs, and spun down the
river road like a deer, for I see our chance; and I made up my mind
that it would be a long day before they ever see me and Jim again. I
got down there all out of breath but loaded up with joy, and sung out:

"Set her loose, Jim; we're all right now!"

But there warn't no answer, and nobody come out of the wigwam. Jim was
gone! I set up a shout--and then another--and then another one; and
run this way and that in the woods, whooping and screeching; but it
warn't no use--old Jim was gone. Then I set down and cried; I couldn't
help it. But I couldn't set still long. Pretty soon I went out on the
road, trying to think what I better do, and I run across a boy
walking, and asked him if he'd seen a strange nigger dressed so and
so, and he says:

"Yes."

"Whereabouts?" says I.

"Down to Silas Phelps's place, two mile below here. He's a runaway
nigger, and they've got him. Was you looking for him?"

"You bet I ain't! I run across him in the woods about an hour or two
ago, and he said if I hollered he'd cut my livers out--and told me to
lay down and stay where I was; and I done it. Been there ever since;
afeard to come out."

"Well," he says, "you needn't be afeard no more, becuz they've got
him. He run off f'm down South som'ers."

"It's a good job they got him."

"Well, I _reckon!_ There's two hundred dollars dollars' reward on him.
It's like picking up money out'n the road."

"Yes, it is--and I could 'a' had it if I'd been big enough; I see him
_first_. Who nailed him?"

"It was an old fellow--a stranger--and he sold out his chance in him
for forty dollars, becuz he's got to go up the river and can't wait.
Think o' that, now! You bet _I'd_ wait, if it was seven year."

"That's me, every time," says I. "But maybe his chance ain't worth no
more than that, if he'll sell it so cheap. Maybe there's something
ain't straight about it."

"But it _is_, though--straight as a string. I see the handbill myself.
It tells all about him, to a dot--paints him like a picture, and tells
the plantation he's frum, below Newr_leans_. No-sirree-_bob_, they
ain't no trouble 'bout _that_ speculation, you bet you. Say, gimme a
chaw tobacker, won't ye?"

I didn't have none, so he left. I went to the raft, and set down in
the wigwam to think. But I couldn't come to nothing. I thought till I
wore my head sore, but I couldn't see no way out of the trouble. After
all this long journey, and after all we'd done for them scoundrels,
here it was all come to nothing, everything all busted up and ruined,
because they could have the heart to serve Jim such a trick as that,
and make him a slave again all his life, and amongst strangers, too,
for forty dirty dollars.

Once I said to myself it would be a thousand times better for Jim to
be a slave at home where his family was, as long as he'd _got_ to be a
slave, and so I'd better write a letter to Tom Sawyer and tell him to
tell Miss Watson where he was. But I soon give up that notion for two
things: she'd be mad and disgusted at his rascality and ungratefulness
for leaving her, and so she'd sell him straight down the river again;
and if she didn't, everybody naturally despises an ungrateful nigger,
and they'd make Jim feel it all the time, and so he'd feel ornery and
disgraced. And then think of _me!_ It would get all around that Huck
Finn helped a nigger to get his freedom; and if I was ever to see
anybody from that town again I'd be ready to get down and lick his
boots for shame. That's just the way: a person does a low-down thing,
and then he don't want to take no consequences of it. Thinks as long
as he can hide, it ain't no disgrace. That was my fix exactly. The
more I studied about this the more my conscience went to grinding me,
and the more wicked and low-down and ornery I got to feeling. And at
last, when it hit me all of a sudden that here was the plain hand of
Providence slapping me in the face and letting me know my wickedness
was being watched all the time from up there in heaven, whilst I was
stealing a poor old woman's nigger that hadn't ever done me no harm,
and now was showing me there's One that's always on the lookout, and
ain't a-going to allow no such miserable doings to go only just so fur
and no further, I most dropped in my tracks I was so scared.  Well, I
tried the best I could to kinder soften it up somehow for myself by
saying I was brung up wicked, and so I warn't so much to blame; but
something inside of me kept saying, "There was the Sunday-school, you
could 'a' gone to it; and if you'd 'a' done it they'd 'a' learnt you
there that people that acts as I'd been acting about that nigger goes
to everlasting fire."

It made me shiver. And I about made up my mind to pray, and see if I
couldn't try to quit being the kind of a boy I was and be better. So I
kneeled down. But the words wouldn't come. Why wouldn't they? It
warn't no use to try and hide it from Him. Nor from _me_, neither. I
knowed very well why they wouldn't come. It was because my heart
warn't right; it was because I warn't square; it was because I was
playing double. I was letting _on_ to give up sin, but away inside of
me I was holding on to the biggest one of all. I was trying to make my
mouth _say_ I would do the right thing and the clean thing, and go and
write to that nigger's owner and tell where he was; but deep down in
me I knowed it was a lie, and He knowed it. You can't pray a lie--I
found that out.

So I was full of trouble, full as I could be; and didn't know what to
do. At last I had an idea; and I says, I'll go and write the
letter--and then see if I can pray. Why, it was astonishing, the way I
felt as light as a feather right straight off, and my troubles all
gone. So I got a piece of paper and a pencil, all glad and excited,
and set down and wrote:

Miss Watson, your runaway nigger Jim is down here two mile below
Pikesville, and Mr. Phelps has got him and he will give him up for the
reward if you send. HUCK FINN.

I felt good and all washed clean of sin for the first time I had ever
felt so in my life, and I knowed I could pray now. But I didn't do it
straight off, but laid the paper down and set there thinking--thinking
how good it was all this happened so, and how near I come to being
lost and going to hell. And went on thinking. And got to thinking over
our trip down the river; and I see Jim before me all the time: in the
day and in the night-time, sometimes moonlight, sometimes storms, and
we a-floating along, talking and singing and laughing. But somehow I
couldn't seem to strike no places to harden me against him, but only
the other kind. I'd see him standing my watch on top of his'n, 'stead
of calling me, so I could go on sleeping; and see him how glad he was
when I come back out of the fog; and when I come to him again in the
swamp, up there where the feud was; and such-like times; and would
always call me honey, and pet me, and do everything he could think of
for me, and how good he always was; and at last I struck the time I
saved him by telling the men we had smallpox aboard, and he was so
grateful, and said I was the best friend old Jim ever had in the
world, and the _only_ one he's got now; and then I happened to look
around and see that paper.

It was a close place. I took it up, and held it in my hand. I was
a-trembling, because I'd got to decide, forever, betwixt two things,
and I knowed it. I studied a minute, sort of holding my breath, and
then says to myself:

"All right, then, I'll _go_ to hell"--and tore it up. It was awful
thoughts and awful words, but they was said. And I let them stay said;
and never thought no more about reforming. I shoved the whole thing
out of my head, and said I would take up wickedness again, which was
in my line, being brung up to it, and the other warn't. And for a
starter I would go to work and steal Jim out of slavery again; and if
I could think up anything worse, I would do that, too; because as long
as I was in, and in for good, I might as well go the whole hog.

Then I set to thinking over how to get at it, and turned over some
considerable many ways in my mind; and at last fixed up a plan that
suited me. So then I took the bearings of a woody island that was down
the river a piece, and as soon as it was fairly dark I crept out with
my raft and went for it, and hid it there, and then turned in. I slept
the night through, and got up before it was light, and had my
breakfast, and put on my store clothes, and tied up some others and
one thing or another in a bundle, and took the canoe and cleared for
shore. I landed below where I judged was Phelps's place, and hid my
bundle in the woods, and then filled up the canoe with water, and
loaded rocks into her and sunk her where I could find her again when I
wanted her, about a quarter of a mile below a little steam-sawmill
that was on the bank.

Then I struck up the road, and when I passed the mill I see a sign on
it, "Phelps's Sawmill," and when I come to the farm-houses, two or
three hundred yards further along, I kept my eyes peeled, but didn't
see nobody around, though it was good daylight now. But I didn't mind,
because I didn't want to see nobody just yet--I only wanted to get the
lay of the land. According to my plan, I was going to turn up there
from the village, not from below. So I just took a look, and shoved
along, straight for town. Well, the very first man I see when I got
there was the duke. He was sticking up a bill for the "Royal
Nonesuch--three-night performance--like that other time. They had the
cheek, them frauds! I was right on him before I could shirk. He looked
astonished, and says:

"Hel-_lo!_ Where'd _you_ come from?" Then he says, kind of glad and
eager, "Where's the raft?--got her in a good place?"

I says:

"Why, that's just what I was going to ask your grace."

Then he didn't look so joyful, and says:

"What was your idea for asking _me?_" he says.

"Well," I says, "when I see the king in that doggery yesterday I says
to myself, we can't get him home for hours, till he's soberer; so I
went a-loafing around town to put in the time and wait. A man up and
offered me ten cents to help him pull a skiff over the river and back
to fetch a sheep, and so I went along; but when we was dragging him to
the boat, and the man left me a-holt of the rope and went behind him
to shove him along, he was too strong for me and jerked loose and run,
and we after him. We didn't have no dog, and so we had to chase him
all over the country till we tired him out. We never got him till
dark; then we fetched him over, and I started down for the raft. When
I got there and see it was gone, I says to myself, 'They've got into
trouble and had to leave; and they've took my nigger, which is the
only nigger I've got in the world, and now I'm in a strange country,
and ain't got no property no more, nor nothing, and no way to make my
living'; so I set down and cried. I slept in the woods all night. But
what _did_ become of the raft, then?--and Jim--poor Jim!"

"Blamed if I know--that is, what's become of the raft. That old fool
had made a trade and got forty dollars, and when we found him in the
doggery the loafers had matched half-dollars with him and got every
cent but what he'd spent for whisky; and when I got him home late last
night and found the raft gone, we said, 'That little rascal has stole
our raft and shook us, and run off down the river.'"

"I wouldn't shake my _nigger_, would I?--the only nigger I had in the
world, and the only property."

"We never thought of that. Fact is, I reckon we'd come to consider him
_our_ nigger; yes, we did consider him so--goodness knows we had
trouble enough for him. So when we see the raft was gone and we flat
broke, there warn't anything for it but to try the 'Royal Nonesuch'
another shake. And I've pegged along ever since, dry as a powder-horn.
Where's that ten cents? Give it here."

I had considerable money, so I give him ten cents, but begged him to
spend it for something to eat, and give me some, because it was all
the money I had, and I hadn't had nothing to eat since yesterday. He
never said nothing. The next minute he whirls on me and says:

"Do you reckon that nigger would blow on us? We'd skin him if he done
that!"

"How can he blow? Hain't he run off?"

"No! That old fool sold him, and never divided with me, and the
money's gone."

"_Sold_ him?" I says, and begun to cry; "why, he was _my_ nigger, and
that was my money. Where is he?--I want my nigger."

"Well, you can't _get_ your nigger, that's all--so dry up your
blubbering. Looky here--do you think _you'd_ venture to blow on us?
Blamed if I think I'd trust you. Why, if you _was_ to blow on us--"

He stopped, but I never see the duke look so ugly out of his eyes
before. I went on a-whimpering, and says:

"I don't want to blow on nobody; and I ain't got no time to blow,
nohow; I got to turn out and find my nigger."

He looked kinder bothered, and stood there with his bills fluttering
on his arm, thinking, and wrinkling up his forehead. At last he says:

"I'll tell you something. We got to be here three days. If you'll
promise you won't blow, and won't let the nigger blow, I'll tell you
where to find him."

So I promised, and he says:

"A farmer by the name of Silas Ph--" and then he stopped. You see, he
started to tell me the truth; but when he stopped that way, and begun
to study and think again, I reckoned he was changing his mind. And so
he was. He wouldn't trust me; he wanted to make sure of having me out
of the way the whole three days. So pretty soon he says:

"The man that bought him is named Abram Foster--Abram G. Foster--and
he lives forty mile back here in the country, on the road to
Lafayette."

"All right," I says, "I can walk it in three days. And I'll start this
very afternoon."

"No you won't, you'll start _now_; and don't you lose any time about
it, neither, nor do any gabbling by the way. Just keep a tight tongue
in your head and move right along, and then you won't get into trouble
with _us_, d'ye hear?"

That was the order I wanted, and that was the one I played for. I
wanted to be left free to work my plans.

"So clear out," he says; "and you can tell Mr. Foster whatever you
want to. Maybe you can get him to believe that Jim _is_ your
nigger--some idiots don't require documents--leastways I've heard
there's such down South here. And when you tell him the handbill and
the reward's bogus, maybe he'll believe you when you explain to him
what the idea was for getting 'em out. Go 'long now, and tell him
anything you want to; but mind you don't work your jaw any _between_
here and there."

So I left, and struck for the back country. I didn't look around, but
I kinder felt like he was watching me. But I knowed I could tire him
out at that. I went straight out in the country as much as a mile
before I stopped; then I doubled back through the woods towards
Phelps's. I reckoned I better start in on my plan straight off without
fooling around, because I wanted to stop Jim's mouth till these
fellows could get away. I didn't want no trouble with their kind. I'd
seen all I wanted to of them, and wanted to get entirely shut of them.

With the temperature rising and the landscape scattered with Spanish moss, Huck realizes that they are a long way from home. The new schemes of the duke and the king barely bring in enough money for liquor, so the two men begin to plot and whisper about their next scam. Huck and Jim are concerned about the clandestine behavior of the con men, and when Huck finally sees a chance to escape, he discovers that the duke and the king have made a fake handbill and turned in Jim for a $40 reward. Huck is furious with the con men because "after all we'd done for them scoundrels . . . they could have the heart to serve Jim and make him a slave again all his life." As Huck ponders his choices, his conscience begins to trouble him again. He cannot help but feel guilty for assisting Jim, despite the fact that his instincts constantly force him into that role. After trying to pray for resolution, Huck writes a letter to Miss Watson detailing where Jim is and signs it "Huck Finn." After he finishes the letter, he feels momentary relief and is confident that he has saved himself from going to hell for helping a slave. Instead of being satisfied with his decision, however, Huck begins to replay their trip down the river. He reminisces about the two of them "a-floating along, talking and singing and laughing" and cannot force himself to see Jim as someone disgraceful. Huck trembles as he again picks up Miss Watson's letter and realizes that the struggle must stop: He must decide forever between two things: heaven and hell. He pauses for a minute, then declares "All right, then, I'll go to hell" and tears the letter to pieces. Once Huck makes his decision to betray society for Jim, he immediately plots to steal Jim back out of slavery.

If Chapter 18 is the end of the first segment of the novel, Chapter 31 is the end of the second segment and one of the most important chapters in Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Up until this point, the novel has wavered back and forth between the river and the shore, with humorous and cruel events constantly bombarding the reader. The conflicts of individual versus society, freedom versus civilization, and sentimentalism versus realism, as well as Huck's struggle between right and wrong, are all revealed in Huck and Jim's journey. And all come to a head in Huck's eventual decision. In the midst of these events rests Huck's inner struggle to ignore his conscience and transcend his environment. The catalyst for Huck's action is the sale of Jim back into slavery. Ironically, Huck believes he will be shunned by his community and doom himself to literal hell if he aids Jim. Despite this realization, Huck's proclamation "All right, then, I'll go to hell," ends his struggle in a concise and powerful moment, which is the climax of the novel. In light of his climatic decision, Huck's entire narrative symbolizes a search for his own conscience and identity, and this identity is shaped by his attempt to make moral evaluations despite the pressures of surrounding theological and societal codes. That Huck has not been able to reconcile his struggle should not come as a surprise to readers, for Huck's sacrifice is lost on the racist society that pervaded nineteenth-century America. The statement becomes even more powerful when readers realize that Huck's decision to recognize Jim's humanity is not shared by the rest of society. Above all, it is important to note that Huck's declaration, despite the surrounding satire and bitter irony, elevates him to a heroic character. Twain, however, cannot help but infuse more subtle irony even after Huck's decision, and Huck's reasoning that "as long as I was in , and in for good, I might as well go the whole hog" notifies readers that the novel will take yet another turn in its last segment. Glossary Spanish Moss a plant often found growing in long, graceful strands from the branches of trees in the south eastern U.S. doggery a saloon.

It was awful thoughts and awful words, but they was said. And I let them stay said; and never thought no more about reforming. The foursome travels downstream on the raft for several days without stopping, trying to outdistance any rumors of the scams of the duke and the dauphin. The con men try several schemes on various towns, without success. Then, the two start to have secret discussions, worrying Jim and Huck, who resolve to ditch them at the first opportunity. Finally, the duke, the dauphin, and Huck go ashore in one town to feel out the situation. The con men get into a fight at a tavern, and Huck takes the chance to escape. Back at the raft, however, there is no sign of Jim. A boy explains that a man recognized Jim as a runaway from a handbill that offered $200 for Jim's capture in New Orleans--the same fraudulent handbill that the duke had printed earlier. The boy says that the man who captured Jim had to leave suddenly and sold his interest in the captured runaway for forty dollars to a farmer named Silas Phelps. Based on the boy's description, Huck realizes that it was the dauphin himself who captured and quickly sold Jim. Huck decides to write to Tom Sawyer to tell Miss Watson where Jim is. But Huck soon realizes that Miss Watson would sell Jim anyway. Furthermore, as soon as Huck's part in the story got out, he would be ashamed of having helped a slave, a black man, escape. Overwhelmed by his predicament, Huck suddenly realizes that this quandary must be God's punishment for the sin of helping Jim. Huck tries to pray for forgiveness but finds he cannot because his heart is not in it. Huck writes the letter to Miss Watson. Before he starts to pray, though, he thinks of the time he spent with Jim on the river, of Jim's kind heart, and of their friendship. Huck trembles. After a minute, he decides, "All right then, I'll go to hell. and resolves to "steal Jim out of slavery. Huck puts on his store-bought clothes and goes to see Silas Phelps, the man who is holding Jim. While on his search, Huck encounters the duke putting up posters for The Royal Nonesuch. When the duke questions him, Huck concocts a story about how he wandered the town but found neither Jim nor the raft. The duke initially slips and reveals where Jim really is but then changes his story and says he sold Jim to a man forty miles away. The duke encourages Huck to head out on the three-day, forty-mile trip

In the aftermath of the Wilks episode, the duke and the dauphin lose the last vestiges of their inept, bumbling charm and become purely menacing and dangerous figures. Although the standoff over the Wilks estate ultimately is resolved without any physical or financial harm to anyone, the depth of greed and sliminess the con men display is astonishing. Then, just when it appears the duke and the dauphin can sink no lower, the catastrophe that Twain has foreshadowed for the last few chapters materializes when Huck discovers that Jim is missing. Just as it has throughout The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, evil follows Huck and Jim onto the raft and thwarts their best attempts to escape it. Jim's capture significantly matures Huck, for it convinces him to break with the con men for good and leads him to a second moment of moral reckoning. Huck searches the social and religious belief systems that white society has taught him for a way out of his predicament about turning Jim in. In the end, Huck is unable to pray because he cannot truly believe in these systems, for he cares too much about Jim to deny Jim's existence and humanity. Huck's thoughts of his friendship with Jim lead him to listen to his own conscience, and, echoing his sentiments from Chapter 1, Huck resolves to act justly by helping Jim and "go to hell" if necessary. Once again, Huck turns received notions upside down, as he figures that even hell would be better than the society in which he lives. Huck then sets out on his first truly adult endeavor--setting off to free Jim at whatever moral or physical cost to himself. It is vital to note that Huck undertakes this action with the belief that it might send him to hell. Though he does not articulate this truth to himself, he trades his fate for Jim's and thereby accepts the life of a black man as equal to his own.


the adventures of huckleberry finn: summary & analysis | chapter 32-33 | study guide | cliffsnotes

When I got there it was all still and Sunday-like, and hot and
sunshiny; the hands was gone to the fields; and there was them kind of
faint dronings of bugs and flies in the air that makes it seem so
lonesome and like everybody's dead and gone; and if a breeze fans
along and quivers the leaves it makes you feel mournful, because you
feel like it's spirits whispering--spirits that's been dead ever so
many years--and you always think they're talking about _you._ As a
general thing it makes a body wish _he_ was dead, too, and done with
it all.

Phelps's was one of these little one-horse cotton plantations, and
they all look alike. A rail fence round a two-acre yard; a stile made
out of logs sawed off and up-ended in steps, like barrels of a
different length, to climb over the fence with, and for the women to
stand on when they are going to jump onto a horse; some sickly
grass-patches in the big yard, but mostly it was bare and smooth, like
an old hat with the nap rubbed off; big double log house for the white
folks--hewed logs, with the chinks stopped up with mud or mortar, and
these mud-stripes been whitewashed some time or another; round-log
kitchen, with a big broad, open but roofed passage joining it to the
house; log smokehouse back of the kitchen; three little  nigger cabins
in a row t'other side the smokehouse; one little hut all by itself
away down against the back fence, and some outbuildings down a piece
the other side; ash-hopper and big kettle to bile soap in by the
little hut; bench by the kitchen door, with bucket of water and a
gourd; hound asleep there in the sun; more hounds asleep round about;
about three shade trees away off in a corner; some currant bushes and
gooseberry bushes in one place by the fence; outside of the fence a
garden and a watermelon patch; then the cotton-fields begins, and
after the fields the woods.

I went around and clumb over the back stile by the ash-hopper, and
started for the kitchen. When I got a little ways I heard the dim hum
of a spinning-wheel wailing along up and sinking along down again; and
then I knowed for certain I wished I was dead--for that _is_ the
lonesomest sound in the whole world.

I went right along, not fixing up any particular plan, but just
trusting to Providence to put the right words in my mouth when the
time come; for I'd noticed that Providence always did put the right
words in my mouth if I left it alone.

When I got half-way, first one hound and then another got up and went
for me, and of course I stopped and faced them, and kept still. And
such another powwow as they made! In a quarter of a minute I was a
kind of a hub of a wheel, as you may say--spokes made out of
dogs--circle of fifteen of them packed together around me, with their
necks and noses stretched up towards me, a-barking and howling; and
more a-coming; you could see them sailing over fences and around
corners from every-wheres.

A nigger woman come tearing out of the kitchen with a rolling-pin in
her hand, singing out, "Begone! _you_ Tige! you Spot! begone sah!" and
she fetched first one and then another of them a clip and sent them
howling, and then the rest followed; and the next second half of them
come back, wagging their tails around me, and making friends with me.
There ain't no harm in a hound, nohow.

And behind the woman comes a little nigger girl and two little nigger
boys without anything on but tow-linen shirts, and they hung on to
their mother's gown, and peeped out from behind her at me, bashful,
the way they always do. And here comes the white woman running from
the house, about forty-five or fifty year old, bareheaded, and her
spinning-stick in her hand; and behind her comes her little white
children, acting the same way the little niggers was going. She was
smiling all over so she could hardly stand--and says:

"It's _you_, at last!--_ain't_ it?"

I out with a "Yes'm" before I thought.

She grabbed me and hugged me tight; and then gripped me by both hands
and shook and shook; and the tears come in her eyes, and run down
over; and she couldn't seem to hug and shake enough, and kept saying,
"You don't look as much like your mother as I reckoned you would; but
law sakes, I don't care for that, I'm so glad to see you! Dear, dear,
it does seem like I could eat you up! Children, it's your cousin
Tom!--tell him howdy."

But they ducked their heads, and put their fingers in their mouths,
and hid behind her. So she run on:

"Lize, hurry up and get him a hot breakfast right away--or did you get
your breakfast on the boat?"

I said I had got it on the boat. So then she started for the house,
leading me by the hand, and the children tagging after. When we got
there she set me down in a split-bottomed chair, and set herself down
on a little low stool in front of me, holding both of my hands, and
says:

"Now I can have a _good_ look at you; and, laws-a-me, I've been hungry
for it a many and a many a time, all these long years, and it's come
at last! We been expecting you a couple of days and more. What kep'
you?--boat get aground?"

"Yes'm--she--"

"Don't say yes'm--say Aunt Sally. Where'd she get aground?"

I didn't rightly know what to say, because I didn't know whether the
boat would be coming up the river or down. But I go a good deal on
instinct; and my instinct said she would be coming up--from down
towards Orleans. That didn't help me much, though; for I didn't know
the names of bars down that way. I see I'd got to invent a bar, or
forget the name of the one we got aground on--or--Now I struck an
idea, and fetched it out:

"It warn't the grounding--that didn't keep us back but a little. We
blowed out a cylinder-head."

"Good gracious! anybody hurt?"

"No'm. Killed a nigger."

"Well, it's lucky; because sometimes people do get hurt. Two years ago
last Christmas your uncle Silas was coming up from Newrleans on the
old Lally Rook, and she blowed out a cylinder-head and crippled a man.
And I think he died afterwards. He was a Baptist. Your uncle Silas
knowed a family in Baton Rouge that knowed his people very well. Yes,
I remember now, he _did_ die. Mortification set in, and they had to
amputate him. But it didn't save him. Yes, it was mortification--that
was it. He turned blue all over, and died in the hope of a glorious
resurrection. They say he was a sight to look at. Your uncle's been up
to the town every day to fetch you. And he's gone again, not more'n an
hour ago; he'll be back any minute now. You must 'a' met him on the
road, didn't you?--oldish man, with a--"

"No, I didn't see nobody, Aunt Sally. The boat landed just at
daylight, and I left my baggage on the wharf-boat and went looking
around the town and out a piece in the country, to put in the time and
not get here too soon; and so I come down the back way."

"Who'd you give the baggage to?"

"Nobody."

"Why, child, it 'll be stole!"

"Not where I hid it I reckon it won't," I says.

"How'd you get your breakfast so early on the boat?"

It was kinder thin ice, but I says:

"The captain see me standing around, and told me I better have
something to eat before I went ashore; so he took me in the texas to
the officers' lunch, and give me all I wanted."

I was getting so uneasy I couldn't listen good. I had my mind on the
children all the time; I wanted to get them out to one side and pump
them a little, and find out who I was. But I couldn't get no show,
Mrs. Phelps kept it up and run on so. Pretty soon she made the cold
chills streak all down my back, because she says:

"But here we're a-running on this way, and you hain't told me a word
about Sis, nor any of them. Now I'll rest my works a little, and you
start up yourn; just tell me _everything_--tell me all about 'm
all--every one of 'm; and how they are, and what they're doing, and
what they told you to tell me; and every last thing you can think of."

Well, I see I was up a stump--and up it good. Providence had stood by
me this fur all right, but I was hard and tight aground now. I see it
warn't a bit of use to try to go ahead--I'd got to throw up my hand.
So I says to myself, here's another place where I got to resk the
truth. I opened my mouth to begin; but she grabbed me and hustled me
in behind the bed, and says:

"Here he comes! Stick your head down lower--there, that'll do; you
can't be seen now. Don't you let on you're here. I'll play a joke on
him. Children, don't you say a word."

I see I was in a _fix_ now. But it warn't no use to worry; there
warn't nothing to do but just hold still, and try and be ready to
stand from under when the lightning struck.

I had just one little glimpse of the old gentleman when he come in;
then the bed hid him. Mrs. Phelps she jumps for him, and says: "Has he
come?"

"No," says her husband.

"Good-_ness_ gracious!" she says, "what in the world _can_ have become
of him?"

"I can't imagine," says the old gentleman; "and I must say it makes me
dreadful uneasy."

"Uneasy!" she says; "I'm ready to go distracted! He _must_ 'a' come;
and you've missed him along the road. I _know_ it's so--something
tells me so."

"Why, Sally, I _couldn't_ miss him along the road--_you_ know that."

"But oh, dear, dear, what _will_ Sis say! He must 'a' come! You must
'a' missed him. He--"

"Oh, don't distress me any more'n I'm already distressed. I don't know
what in the world to make of it. I'm at my wit's end, and I don't mind
acknowledging 't I'm right down scared. But there's no hope that he's
come; for he _couldn't_ come and me miss him. Sally, it's
terrible--just terrible--something's happened to the boat, sure!"

"Why, Silas! Look yonder!--up the road!--ain't that somebody coming?"

He sprung to the window at the head of the bed, and that give
Mrs. Phelps the chance she wanted. She stooped down quick at the foot
of the bed and give me a pull, and out I come; and when he turned back
from the window there she stood, a-beaming and a-smiling like a house
afire, and I standing pretty meek and sweaty alongside. The old
gentleman stared, and says:

"Why, who's that?"

"Who do you reckon 'tis?"

"I hain't no idea. Who _is_ it?"

"It's _Tom Sawyer!_"

By jings, I most slumped through the floor! But there warn't no time
to swap knives; the old man grabbed me by the hand and shook, and kept
on shaking; and all the time how the woman did dance around and laugh
and cry; and then how they both did fire off questions about Sid, and
Mary, and the rest of the tribe.

But if they was joyful, it warn't nothing to what I was; for it was
like being born again, I was so glad to find out who I was. Well, they
froze to me for two hours; and at last, when my chin was so tired it
couldn't hardly go any more, I had told them more about my family--I
mean the Sawyer family--than ever happened to any six Sawyer families.
And I explained all about how we blowed out a cylinder-head at the
mouth of White River, and it took us three days to fix it. Which was
all right, and worked first-rate; because _they_ didn't know but what
it would take three days to fix it. If I'd 'a' called it a bolthead it
would 'a' done just as well.

Now I was feeling pretty comfortable all down one side, and pretty
uncomfortable all up the other. Being Tom Sawyer was easy and
comfortable, and it stayed easy and comfortable till by and by I hear
a steamboat coughing along down the river. Then I says to myself,
s'pose Tom Sawyer comes down on that boat?  And s'pose he steps in
here any minute, and sings out my name before I can throw him a wink
to keep quiet?

Well, I couldn't _have_ it that way; it wouldn't do at all. I must go
up the road and waylay him. So I told the folks I reckoned I would go
up to the town and fetch down my baggage. The old gentleman was for
going along with me, but I said no, I could drive the horse myself,
and I druther he wouldn't take no trouble about me.

So I started for town in the wagon, and when I was half-way I see a
wagon coming, and sure enough it was Tom Sawyer, and I stopped and
waited till he come along. I says "Hold on!" and it stopped alongside,
and his mouth opened up like a trunk, and stayed so; and he swallowed
two or three times like a person that's got a dry throat, and then
says:

"I hain't ever done you no harm. You know that. So, then, what you
want to come back and ha'nt _me_ for?"

I says:

"I hain't come back--I hain't been _gone_."

When he heard my voice it righted him up some, but he warn't quite
satisfied yet. He says:

"Don't you play nothing on me, because I wouldn't on you. Honest
injun, you ain't a ghost?"

"Honest injun, I ain't," I says.

"Well--I--I--well, that ought to settle it, of course; but I can't
somehow seem to understand it no way. Looky here, warn't you ever
murdered _at all?_"

"No. I warn't ever murdered at all--I played it on them. You come in
here and feel of me if you don't believe me."

So he done it; and it satisfied him; and he was that glad to see me
again he didn't know what to do. And he wanted to know all about it
right off, because it was a grand adventure, and mysterious, and so it
hit him where he lived. But I said, leave it alone till by and by; and
told his driver to wait, and we drove off a little piece, and I told
him the kind of a fix I was in, and what did he reckon we better do?
He said, let him alone a minute, and don't disturb him. So he thought
and thought, and pretty soon he says:

"It's all right; I've got it. Take my trunk in your wagon, and let on
it's your'n; and you turn back and fool along slow, so as to get to
the house about the time you ought to; and I'll go towards town a
piece, and take a fresh start, and get there a quarter or a half an
hour after you; and you needn't let on to know me at first."

I says:

"All right; but wait a minute. There's one more thing--a thing that
_nobody_ don't know but me. And that is, there's a nigger here that
I'm a-trying to steal out of slavery, and his name is _Jim_--old Miss
Watson's Jim."

He says:

"What! Why, Jim is--"

He stopped and went to studying. I says:

"_I_ know what you'll say. You'll say it's dirty, low-down business;
but what if it is? _I_'m low down; and I'm a-going to steal him, and I
want you keep mum and not let on. Will you?"

His eye lit up, and he says:

"I'll _help_ you steal him!"

Well, I let go all holts then, like I was shot. It was the most
astonishing speech I ever heard--and I'm bound to say Tom Sawyer fell
considerable in my estimation. Only I couldn't believe it. Tom Sawyer
a _nigger-stealer!_

"Oh, shucks!" I says; "you're joking."

"I ain't joking, either."

"Well, then," I says, "joking or no joking, if you hear anything said
about a runaway nigger, don't forget to remember that _you_ don't know
nothing about him, and I don't know nothing about him."

Then he took the trunk and put it in my wagon, and he drove off his
way and I drove mine. But of course I forgot all about driving slow on
accounts of being glad and full of thinking; so I got home a heap too
quick for that length of a trip. The old gentleman was at the door,
and he says:

"Why, this is wonderful! Whoever would 'a' thought it was in that mare
to do it? I wish we'd 'a' timed her. And she hain't sweated a
hair--not a hair. It's wonderful. Why, I wouldn't take a hundred
dollars for that horse now--I wouldn't, honest; and yet I'd 'a' sold
her for fifteen before, and thought 'twas all she was worth."

That's all he said. He was the innocentest, best old soul I ever see.
But it warn't surprising; because he warn't only just a farmer, he was
a preacher, too, and had a little one-horse log church down back of
the plantation, which he built it himself at his own expense, for a
church and schoolhouse, and never charged nothing for his preaching,
and it was worth it, too. There was plenty other farmer-preachers like
that, and done the same way, down South.

In about half an hour Tom's wagon drove up to the front stile, and
Aunt Sally she see it through the window, because it was only about
fifty yards, and says:

"Why, there's somebody come! I wonder who 'tis? Why, I do believe it's
a stranger. Jimmy" (that's one of the children), "run and tell Lize to
put on another plate for dinner."

Everybody made a rush for the front door, because, of course, a
stranger don't come _every_ year, and so he lays over the
yaller-fever, for interest, when he does come. Tom was over the stile
and starting for the house; the wagon was spinning up the road for the
village, and we was all bunched in the front door. Tom had his store
clothes on, and an audience--and that was always nuts for Tom Sawyer.
In them circumstances it warn't no trouble to him to throw in an
amount of style that was suitable. He warn't a boy to meeky along up
that yard like a sheep; no, he come ca'm and important, like the ram.
When he got a-front of us he lifts his hat ever so gracious and
dainty, like it was the lid of a box that had butterflies asleep in it
and he didn't want to disturb them, and says:

"Mr. Archibald Nichols, I presume?"

"No, my boy," says the old gentleman, "I'm sorry to say 't your driver
has deceived you; Nichols's place is down a matter of three mile more.
Come in, come in."

Tom he took a look back over his shoulder, and says, "Too late--he's
out of sight."

"Yes, he's gone, my son, and you must come in and eat your dinner with
us; and then we'll hitch up and take you down to Nichols's."

"Oh, I _can't_ make you so much trouble; I couldn't think of it. I'll
walk--I don't mind the distance."

"But we won't _let_ you walk--it wouldn't be Southern hospitality to
do it. Come right in."

"Oh, _do_,"' says Aunt Sally; "it ain't a bit of trouble to us, not a
bit in the world. You must stay. It's a long, dusty three mile, and we
can't let you walk. And, besides, I've already told 'em to put on
another plate when I see you coming; so you mustn't disappoint us.
Come right in and make yourself at home."

So Tom he thanked them very hearty and handsome, and let himself be
persuaded, and come in; and when he was in he said he was a stranger
from Hicksville, Ohio, and his name was William Thompson--and he made
another bow.

Well, he run on, and on, and on, making up stuff about Hicksville and
everybody in it he could invent, and I getting a little nervious, and
wondering how this was going to help me out of my scrape; and at last,
still talking along, he reached over and kissed Aunt Sally right on
the mouth, and then settled back again in his chair comfortable, and
was going on talking; but she jumped up and wiped it off with the back
of her hand, and says:

"You owdacious puppy!"

He looked kind of hurt, and says:

"I'm surprised at you, m'am."

"You're s'rp--Why, what do you reckon _I_ am? I've a good notion to
take and--Say, what do you mean by kissing me?"

He looked kind of humble, and says:

"I didn't mean nothing, m'am. I didn't mean no harm. I--I--thought
you'd like it."

"Why, you born fool!" She took up the spinning-stick, and it looked
like it was all she could do to keep from giving him a crack with it.
"What made you think I'd like it?"

"Well, I don't know. Only, they--they--told me you would."

"_They_ told you I would. Whoever told you's _another_ lunatic. I
never heard the beat of it. Who's _they?_"

"Why, everybody. They all said so, m'am."

It was all she could do to hold in; and her eyes snapped, and her
fingers worked like she wanted to scratch him; and she says:

"Who's 'everybody'? Out with their names, or ther'll be an idiot
short."

He got up and looked distressed, and fumbled his hat, and says:

"I'm sorry, and I warn't expecting it. They told me to. They all told
me to. They all said, kiss her; and said she'd like it. They all said
it--every one of them. But I'm sorry, m'am, and I won't do it no
more--I won't, honest."

"You won't, won't you? Well, I sh'd _reckon_ you won't!"

"No'm, I'm honest about it; I won't ever do it again--till you ask
me."

"Till I _ask_ you! Well, I never see the beat of it in my born days! I
lay you'll be the Methusalem-numskull of creation before ever _I_ ask
you--or the likes of you."

"Well," he says, "it does surprise me so. I can't make it out,
somehow. They said you would, and I thought you would. But--" He
stopped and looked around slow, like he wished he could run across a
friendly eye somewheres, and fetched up on the old gentleman's, and
says, "Didn't _you_ think she'd like me to kiss her, sir?"

"Why, no; I--I--well, no, I b'lieve I didn't."

Then he looks on around the same way to me, and says:

"Tom, didn't _you_ think Aunt Sally 'd open out her arms and say, 'Sid
Sawyer--'"

"My land!" she says, breaking in and jumping for him, "you impudent
young rascal, to fool a body so--" and was going to hug him, but he
fended her off, and says:

"No, not till you've asked me first."

So she didn't lose no time, but asked him; and hugged him and kissed
him over and over again, and then turned him over to the old man, and
he took what was left. And after they got a little quiet again she
says:

"Why, dear me, I never see such a surprise. We warn't looking for
_you_ at all, but only Tom. Sis never wrote to me about anybody coming
but him."

"It's because it warn't _intended_ for any of us to come but Tom," he
says; "but I begged and begged, and at the last minute she let me
come, too; so, coming down the river, me and Tom thought it would be a
first-rate surprise for him to come here to the house first, and for
me to by and by tag along and drop in, and let on to be a stranger.
But it was a mistake, Aunt Sally. This ain't no healthy place for a
stranger to come."

"No--not impudent whelps, Sid. You ought to had your jaws boxed; I
hain't been so put out since I don't know when. But I don't care, I
don't mind the terms--I'd be willing to stand a thousand such jokes to
have you here. Well, to think of that performance! I don't deny it, I
was most putrified with astonishment when you give me that smack."

We had dinner out in that broad open passage betwixt the house and the
kitchen; and there was things enough on that table for seven
families--and all hot, too; none of your flabby, tough meat that's
laid in a cupboard in a damp cellar all night and tastes like a hunk
of old cold cannibal in the morning. Uncle Silas he asked a pretty
long blessing over it, but it was worth it; and it didn't cool it a
bit, neither, the way I've seen them kind of interruptions do lots of
times.

There was a considerable good deal of talk all the afternoon, and me
and Tom was on the lookout all the time; but it warn't no use, they
didn't happen to say nothing about any runaway nigger, and we was
afraid to try to work up to it. But at supper, at night, one of the
little boys says:

"Pa, mayn't Tom and Sid and me go to the show?"

"No," says the old man, "I reckon there ain't going to be any; and you
couldn't go if there was; because the runaway nigger told Burton and
me all about that scandalous show, and Burton said he would tell the
people; so I reckon they've drove the owdacious loafers out of town
before this time."

So there it was!--but _I_ couldn't help it. Tom and me was to sleep in
the same room and bed; so, being tired, we bid good night and went up
to bed right after supper, and clumb out of the window and down the
lightning-rod, and shoved for the town; for I didn't believe anybody
was going to give the king and the duke a hint, and so if I didn't
hurry up and give them one they'd get into trouble sure.

On the road Tom he told me all about how it was reckoned I was
murdered, and how pap disappeared pretty soon, and didn't come back no
more, and what a stir there was when Jim run away; and I told Tom all
about our "Royal Nonesuch" rapscallions, and as much of the raft
voyage as I had time to; and as we struck into the town and up through
the middle of it--it was as much as half after eight then--here comes
a raging rush of people with torches, and an awful whooping and
yelling, and banging tin pans and blowing horns; and we jumped to one
side to let them go by; and as they went by I see they had the king
and the duke astraddle of a rail--that is, I knowed it _was_ the king
and the duke, though they was all over tar and feathers, and didn't
look like nothing in the world that was human--just looked like a
couple of monstrous big soldier-plumes. Well, it made me sick to see
it; and I was sorry for them poor pitiful rascals, it seemed like I
couldn't ever feel any hardness against them any more in the world. It
was a dreadful thing to see. Human beings _can_ be awful cruel to one
another.

We see we was too late--couldn't do no good. We asked some stragglers
about it, and they said everybody went to the show looking very
innocent; and laid low and kept dark till the poor old king was in the
middle of his cavortings on the stage; then somebody give a signal,
and the house rose up and went for them.

So we poked along back home, and I warn't feeling so brash as I was
before, but kind of ornery, and humble, and to blame, somehow--though
I hadn't done nothing. But that's always the way; it don't make no
difference whether you do right or wrong, a person's conscience ain't
got no sense, and just goes for him _anyway._  If I had a yaller dog
that didn't know no more than a person's conscience does I would pison
him. It takes up more room than all the rest of a person's insides,
and yet ain't no good, nohow. Tom Sawyer he says the same.

After learning of Jim's location, Huck arrives at the Phelps farm. He surmises the Phelps' "little one-horse cotton plantation," but before he can reach the door, he is surrounded by all sorts of barking dogs. After a slave woman runs them off, another woman comes out of the house and says, "It's you, at last! -- ain't it?" as if she is expecting Huck. Before Huck realizes what he is doing, he answers yes and the woman grabs him and hugs him like she has known him all of her life. The woman, who Huck learns is named "Aunt Sally," asks him about his trip and then asks him about the family. Huck realizes he is in a bind, but just before Huck confesses, the husband arrives and Aunt Sally introduces Huck as none other than Tom Sawyer. Huck is stunned momentarily and then realizes that he has somehow managed to stumble upon Tom's relatives. After answering several questions about the Sawyer family, Huck heads back to the river in hopes of finding the real Tom who must be on his way. When Huck gets halfway to town, he finds Tom Sawyer. At first, Tom thinks Huck is a ghost. After Huck explains the situation with Jim, Tom declares that he will "help you steal him" out of slavery. When they arrive at the Phelps farm, Tom makes up an elaborate story and introduces himself as Tom's brother, Sid Sawyer. Huck and Tom learn that the king and the duke are in town to perform and that Jim has warned the townspeople that the upcoming show is a fraud. Huck and Tom sneak out to try and tell the duke and the king, but they soon come upon the chaotic mob who has already tarred and feathered the con men.

Chapter 32 begins what could be called the last segment of the novel. Huck's solemn narration is evident at the beginning of the chapter, when he describes the breeze that occasionally washes over the farm. For Huck, the breeze comes across as a whisper of spirits long dead, and readers are reminded of those that have already died earlier in the novel. The entire journey appears to weigh heavily on Huck, and at one point he "wished I was dead" after hearing the lonesome hum of a spinning wheel. In a sense, the Phelps farm is symbolic of Huck's return back to civilization. Although he and Jim have traveled hundreds of miles down the Mississippi River, they find themselves in a situation very similar to the life they left with Miss Watson and the Widow Douglas. Huck's climatic decision to free Jim has brought about an unconscious epiphany or revelation in Huck's character, and when he nears the farmhouse, he does not pause, but looks to "Providence to put the right words in my mouth." Although Huck has always been prone to improvisation, he now credits his ability to Providence. The statement reveals that Huck, despite his own belief that he is now damned, places his fate  in the hands of another. Ironically, the person who arrives is the real Tom Sawyer, the nephew of Silas and Sally Phelps. Literary critics have argued that the coincidence of Huck arriving at the Phelps farm is implausible in a "realistic" novel. It is important to remember, however, that Twain's original intentions for the novel included Tom as a main character. The first edition was entitled Adventures of Huckleberry Finn , and therefore it is not surprising that Tom reenters the novel before its conclusion. Tom's arrival on the Phelps farm signals that a new leader will control the future of Huck and Jim. Whereas Huck and Jim shared responsibility for their fate, Tom now dictates their plans of "adventure" and escape. By allowing Tom to control the conclusion of the novel, Huckleberry Finn turns away from Huck's constant struggle with his conscience and reverts back to a story intended for boys and girls. The dramatic tonal shift can be attributed to several factors, including the fact that Huckleberry Finn was written in three stages. But it also reflects Twain's indecision over the conclusion of the novel and how to reconcile his scathing social commentary on American, and especially Southern, society. Tom's reintroduction signals that playful and harmless pranks are soon to follow. The reunion of the two boys, however, does not completely overshadow the violent setting that Twain has carefully constructed. Huck still observes the squalid nature of "civilization" and tries to compensate through kindness, a trait reminiscent of the Widow Douglas. The tarring and feathering of the duke and the king reveals Huck's sympathetic view toward everyone, even those who have been cruel to him. Instead of standing by and watching the two con men receive their punishment, Huck tries to save the duke and the king from the town and a fate that could include death. When he fails to save the duke and the king, he comments that "Human beings can be awful cruel to one another." The statement could be applied to the entire novel, as Huck has witnessed countless incidents that were void of humanity. Glossary smokehouse a building, especially an outbuilding on a farm, where meats, fish, etc. are smoked in order to cure and flavor them. bars a thing that blocks the way or prevents entrance or further movement, as in a sandbar. Methusalem Methuselah, one of the biblical patriarchs who was said to live 969 years.