TKAM ch 1

As he told us the old tale his blue eyes would lighten and
darken; his laugh was sudden and happy; he habitually pulled at a cowlick in the
center of his forehead.

The Maycomb school
grounds adjoined the back of the Radley lot; from the Radley chickenyard tall
pecan trees shook their fruit into the schoolyard, but the nuts lay untouched by the
children: Radley pecans would kill you.

Mindful of John Wesley’s strictures on the use of many words
in buying and selling, Simon made a pile practicing medicine, but in this pursuit
he was unhappy lest he be tempted into doing what he knew was not for the glory
of God, as the putting on of gold and costly apparel.

Once the town was terrorized by a series of morbid
nocturnal events: people’s chickens and household pets were found mutilated;
although the culprit was Crazy Addie, who eventually drowned himself in
Barker’s Eddy, people still looked at the Radley Place, unwilling to discard their
initial suspicions.

One night, in an excessive spurt of high spirits, the boys backed around the square
in a borrowed flivver, resisted arrest by Maycomb’s ancient beadle, Mr. Conner,
and locked him in the courthouse outhouse.

They ambled across the square, shuffled in and out of
the stores around it, took their time about everything.

The town decided something had to
be done; Mr. Conner said he knew who each and every one of them was, and he
was bound and determined they wouldn’t get away with it, so the boys came
before the probate judge on charges of disorderly conduct, disturbing the peace,
assault and battery, and using abusive and profane language in the presence and
hearing of a female.

So Simon, having forgotten
his teacher’s dictum on the possession of human chattels, bought three slaves and
with their aid established a homestead on the banks of the Alabama River some
forty miles above Saint Stephens.

But by the end of August our repertoire was vapid from countless reproductions,
and it was then that Dill gave us the idea of making Boo Radley come out.

But by the end of August our repertoire was vapid from countless reproductions,
and it was then that Dill gave us the idea of making Boo Radley come out.

According to neighborhood legend, when the younger Radley boy was in his
teens he became acquainted with some of the Cunninghams from Old Sarum, an
enormous and confusing tribe domiciled in the northern part of the county, and
they formed the nearest thing to a gang ever seen in Maycomb.

Atticus’s office in the courthouse contained little more
than a hat rack, a spittoon, a checkerboard and an unsullied Code of Alabama.

When it healed, and Jem’s fears of never being able to play football were
assuaged, he was seldom self-conscious about his injury.

Boo’s transition from the basement to back home was nebulous in Jem’s memory.

Jem threw open the gate and sped to the side of the house, slapped it with his
palm and ran back past us, not waiting to see if his foray was successful.

The
Radleys, welcome anywhere in town, kept to themselves, a predilection
unforgivable in Maycomb.

Inside the house lived a malevolent phantom.

The
Haverfords had dispatched Maycomb’s leading blacksmith in a misunderstanding
arising from the alleged wrongful detention of a mare, were imprudent enough to
do it in the presence of three witnesses, and insisted that the-son-of-a-bitch-had-itcoming-
to-him was a good enough defense for anybody.

This was enough to make Jem march to the corner, where he stopped and leaned
against the light-pole, watching the gate hanging crazily on its homemade hinge.

So Simon, having forgotten
his teacher’s dictum on the possession of human chattels, bought three slaves and
with their aid established a homestead on the banks of the Alabama River some
forty miles above Saint Stephens.

In England, Simon was irritated by the
persecution of those who called themselves Methodists at the hands of their more
liberal brethren, and as Simon called himself a Methodist, he worked his way
across the Atlantic to Philadelphia, thence to Jamaica, thence to Mobile, and up
the Saint Stephens.

One night, in an excessive spurt of high spirits, the boys backed around the square
in a borrowed flivver, resisted arrest by Maycomb’s ancient beadle, Mr. Conner,
and locked him in the courthouse outhouse.

Their sister Alexandra was the
Finch who remained at the Landing: she married a taciturn man who spent most
of his time lying in a hammock by the river wondering if his trot-lines were full.

All we had
was Simon Finch, a fur-trapping apothecary from Cornwall whose piety was
exceeded only by his stinginess.

You
look right puny for goin’ on seven.”

Atticus had urged them to accept the state’s generosity in allowing them to plead
Guilty to second-degree murder and escape with their lives, but they were
Haverfords, in Maycomb County a name synonymous with jackass.

The Radley Place was inhabited by an
unknown entity the mere description of whom was enough to make us behave for
days on end; Mrs. Dubose was plain hell.

Any stealthy small crimes committed in
Maycomb were his work.

She had been with us ever since Jem
was born, and I had felt her tyrannical presence as long as I could remember.

The
Haverfords had dispatched Maycomb’s leading blacksmith in a misunderstanding
arising from the alleged wrongful detention of a mare, were imprudent enough to
do it in the presence of three witnesses, and insisted that the-son-of-a-bitch-had-itcoming-
to-him was a good enough defense for anybody.

Once the town was terrorized by a series of morbid
nocturnal events: people’s chickens and household pets were found mutilated;
although the culprit was Crazy Addie, who eventually drowned himself in
Barker’s Eddy, people still looked at the Radley Place, unwilling to discard their
initial suspicions.

Somehow, it was hotter then: a black dog
suffered on a summer’s day; bony mules hitched to Hoover carts flicked flies in
the sweltering shade of the live oaks on the square.

The town decided something had to
be done; Mr. Conner said he knew who each and every one of them was, and he
was bound and determined they wouldn’t get away with it, so the boys came
before the probate judge on charges of disorderly conduct, disturbing the peace,
assault and battery, and using abusive and profane language in the presence and
hearing of a female.

According to Miss
Stephanie, Boo was sitting in the livingroom cutting some items from The
Maycomb Tribune to paste in his scrapbook.

“There goes the meanest man ever God blew breath into,” murmured Calpurnia,
and she spat meditatively into the yard.

It was all right to shut him up, Mr.
Radley conceded, but insisted that Boo not be charged with anything: he was not
a criminal.

According to neighborhood legend, when the younger Radley boy was in his
teens he became acquainted with some of the Cunninghams from Old Sarum, an
enormous and confusing tribe domiciled in the northern part of the county, and
they formed the nearest thing to a gang ever seen in Maycomb.

The other boys attended the industrial school and received the best secondary
education to be had in the state; one of them eventually worked his way through
engineering school at Auburn.

The Radley Place was inhabited by an
unknown entity the mere description of whom was enough to make us behave for
days on end; Mrs. Dubose was plain hell.

Once the town was terrorized by a series of morbid
nocturnal events: people’s chickens and household pets were found mutilated;
although the culprit was Crazy Addie, who eventually drowned himself in
Barker’s Eddy, people still looked at the Radley Place, unwilling to discard their
initial suspicions.

According to neighborhood legend, when the younger Radley boy was in his
teens he became acquainted with some of the Cunninghams from Old Sarum, an
enormous and confusing tribe domiciled in the northern part of the county, and
they formed the nearest thing to a gang ever seen in Maycomb.

As he told us the old tale his blue eyes would lighten and
darken; his laugh was sudden and happy; he habitually pulled at a cowlick in the
center of his forehead.

He played the character parts formerly
thrust upon me— the ape in Tarzan, Mr. Crabtree in The Rover Boys, Mr. Damon
in Tom Swift.

Wooden sawhorses blocked the road at each end of the
Radley lot, straw was put down on the sidewalk, traffic was diverted to the back
street.

The town decided something had to
be done; Mr. Conner said he knew who each and every one of them was, and he
was bound and determined they wouldn’t get away with it, so the boys came
before the probate judge on charges of disorderly conduct, disturbing the peace,
assault and battery, and using abusive and profane language in the presence and
hearing of a female.

Rain-rotted shingles
drooped over the eaves of the veranda; oak trees kept the sun away.

Once the town was terrorized by a series of morbid
nocturnal events: people’s chickens and household pets were found mutilated;
although the culprit was Crazy Addie, who eventually drowned himself in
Barker’s Eddy, people still looked at the Radley Place, unwilling to discard their
initial suspicions.

Inside the house lived a malevolent phantom.

The
Haverfords had dispatched Maycomb’s leading blacksmith in a misunderstanding
arising from the alleged wrongful detention of a mare, were imprudent enough to
do it in the presence of three witnesses, and insisted that the-son-of-a-bitch-had-itcoming-
to-him was a good enough defense for anybody.

Now lemme think… reckon we can rock him…”
Jem stood in thought so long that Dill made a mild concession: “I won’t say you
ran out on a dare an‘ I’ll swap you The Gray Ghost if you just go up and touch the
house.”

Thus we came to know Dill as a pocket Merlin, whose head teemed
with eccentric plans, strange longings, and quaint fancies.

John Hale Finch was ten years younger than my father, and chose to
study medicine at a time when cotton was not worth growing; but after getting
Uncle Jack started, Atticus derived a reasonable income from the law.

Miss Stephanie said old Mr. Radley said no Radley was going to any asylum,
when it was suggested that a season in Tuscaloosa might be helpful to Boo.

They did little, but
enough to be discussed by the town and publicly warned from three pulpits: they
hung around the barbershop; they rode the bus to Abbottsville on Sundays and
went to the picture show; they attended dances at the county’s riverside gambling
hell, the Dew-Drop Inn & Fishing Camp; they experimented with stumphole
whiskey.

Dill had seen Dracula, a revelation that moved Jem to eye him with the beginning
of respect.

The place was self-sufficient:
modest in comparison with the empires around it, the Landing nevertheless
produced everything required to sustain life except ice, wheat flour, and articles
of clothing, supplied by river-boats from Mobile.

The judge decided to send the boys to the state industrial school, where
boys were sometimes sent for no other reason than to provide them with food and
decent shelter: it was no prison and it was no disgrace.

Thus we came to know Dill as a pocket Merlin, whose head teemed
with eccentric plans, strange longings, and quaint fancies.

Atticus had urged them to accept the state’s generosity in allowing them to plead
Guilty to second-degree murder and escape with their lives, but they were
Haverfords, in Maycomb County a name synonymous with jackass.

The
Haverfords had dispatched Maycomb’s leading blacksmith in a misunderstanding
arising from the alleged wrongful detention of a mare, were imprudent enough to
do it in the presence of three witnesses, and insisted that the-son-of-a-bitch-had-itcoming-
to-him was a good enough defense for anybody.

The remains
of a picket drunkenly guarded the front yard— a “swept” yard that was never
swept— where johnson grass and rabbit-tobacco grew in abundance.

The judge decided to send the boys to the state industrial school, where
boys were sometimes sent for no other reason than to provide them with food and
decent shelter: it was no prison and it was no disgrace.

The judge decided to send the boys to the state industrial school, where
boys were sometimes sent for no other reason than to provide them with food and
decent shelter: it was no prison and it was no disgrace.

The place was self-sufficient:
modest in comparison with the empires around it, the Landing nevertheless
produced everything required to sustain life except ice, wheat flour, and articles
of clothing, supplied by river-boats from Mobile.

In England, Simon was irritated by the
persecution of those who called themselves Methodists at the hands of their more
liberal brethren, and as Simon called himself a Methodist, he worked his way
across the Atlantic to Philadelphia, thence to Jamaica, thence to Mobile, and up
the Saint Stephens.

They persisted in
pleading Not Guilty to first-degree murder, so there was nothing much Atticus
could do for his clients except be present at their departure, an occasion that was
probably the beginning of my father’s profound distaste for the practice of
criminal law.

Once the town was terrorized by a series of morbid
nocturnal events: people’s chickens and household pets were found mutilated;
although the culprit was Crazy Addie, who eventually drowned himself in
Barker’s Eddy, people still looked at the Radley Place, unwilling to discard their
initial suspicions.

But there came a day when Atticus told us he’d wear us out if we made any noise
in the yard and commissioned Calpurnia to serve in his absence if she heard a
sound out of us.