April 2022

Now to return to Tom and Becky’s share in the picnic. They tripped along the murky aisles with the rest of the company, visiting the familiar wonders of the cave – wonders dubbed with rather overdescriptive names, such as ‘The Drawing Room,’ ‘The Cathedral,’ ‘Aladdin’s Palace,’ and so on. Presently the hide-and-seek frolicking began, and […]

As the earliest suspicion of dawn appeared on Sunday morning, Huck came groping up the hill and rapped gently at the old Welshman’s door. The inmates were asleep, but it was a sleep that was set on a hair-trigger, on account of the exciting episode of the night. A call came from a window:‘Who’s there!’Huck’s

The first thing Tom heard on Friday morning was a glad piece of news – Judge Thatcher’s family had come back to town the night before. Both Injun Joe and the treasure sunk into secondary importance for a moment, and Becky took the chief place in the boy’s interest. He saw her and they had

That night Tom and Huck were ready for their adventure. They hung about the neighbourhood of the tavern until after nine, one watching the alley at a distance and the other the tavern door. Nobody entered the alley or left it; nobody resembling the Spaniard entered or left the tavern door. The night promised to

The adventure of the day mightily tormented Tom’s dreams that night. Four times he had his hands on that rich treasure and four times it wasted to nothingness in his fingers as sleep forsook him and wakefulness brought back the hard reality of his misfortune. As he lay in the early morning recalling the incidents

About noon the next day the boys arrived at the dead tree; they had come for their tools. Tom was impatient to go to the haunted house; Huck was measurably so, also – but suddenly said:‘Looky here, Tom, do you know what day it is?’Tom mentally ran over the days of the week, and then

There comes a time in every rightly constructed boy’s life when he has a raging desire to go somewhere and dig for hidden treasure. This desire suddenly came upon Tom one day. He sallied out to find Joe Harper, but failed of success. Next he sought Ben Rogers; he had gone fishing. Presently he stumbled

Tom was a glittering hero once more – the pet of the old, the envy of the young. His name even went into immortal print, for the village paper magnified him. There were some that believed he would be President, yet, if he escaped hanging.As usual, the fickle, unreasoning world took Muff Potter to its

At last the sleepy atmosphere was stirred, and vigorously. The murder trial came on in the court. It became the absorbing topic of village talk immediately. Tom could not get away from it. Every reference to the murder sent a shudder to his heart, for his troubled conscience and fears almost persuaded him that these

Tom joined the new order of Cadets of Temperance, being attracted by the showy character of their ‘regalia.’ He promised to abstain from smoking, chewing, and profanity as long as he remained a member. Now he found out a new thing – namely, that to promise not to do a thing is the surest way

Vacation was approaching. The schoolmaster, always severe, grew severer and more exacting than ever, for he wanted the school to make a good show on ‘Examination’ day. His rod and his ferule were seldom idle now – at least among the smaller pupils. Only the biggest boys, and young ladies of eighteen and twenty, escaped

There was something about Aunt Polly’s manner, when she kissed Tom, that swept away his low spirits and made him light-hearted and happy again. He started to school, and had the luck of coming upon Becky Thatcher at the head of Meadow Lane. His mood always determined his manner. Without a moment’s hesitation he ran

Tom arrived at home in a dreary mood, and the first thing his aunt said to him showed him that he had brought his sorrows to an unpromising market:‘Tom, I’ve a notion to skin you alive’‘Auntie, what have I done?’‘Well, you’ve done enough. Here I go over to Sereny Harper, like an old softy, expecting

That was Tom’s great secret – the scheme to return home with his brother pirates and attend their own funerals. They had paddled over to the Missouri shore on a log, at dusk on Saturday, landing five or six miles below the village; they had slept in the woods at the edge of the town

But there was no hilarity in the little town that tranquil Saturday afternoon. The Harpers and Aunt Polly’s family, were being put into mourning, with great grief and many tears. An unusual quiet possessed the village, although it was ordinarily quiet enough, in all conscience. The villagers conducted their concerns with an absent air, and