To Kill A Mockingbird (Chapters 6-31)

For reasons unfathomable to the most experienced prophets in Maycomb County, autumn turned to winter that year.

Then she launched forth into her usual invectives against Sacchi's troupe, and vowed she would not serve for such pitiful appointments any longer. —Gozzi, Count Carlo TKAM: "But he didn't. He simply murmured, "Her use of bathroom invective leaves nothing to the imagination." In this sentence she's basically saying "potty mouth"

Uncle Jack instructed us in the rudiments thereof; he said Atticus wasn't interested in guns.

Aunt Alexandra's vision of my deportment involved playing with small stoves, tea sets, and wearing the Add-A-Pearl necklace she gave me when I was born; furthermore, I should be a ray of sunshine in my father's lonely life.

Mr. Avery said it was written on the Rosetta Stone that when children disobeyed their parents, smoked cigarettes and made war on each other, the seasons would change: Jem and I were burdened with the guilt of contributing to the aberrations of nature, thereby causing unhappiness to our neighbors and discomfort to ourselves.

It was obstreperous, disorderly and abusive-

If I said as sunnily as I could, "Hey, Mrs. Dubose," I would receive for an answer, "Don't you say hey to me, you ugly girl! You say good afternoon, Mrs. Dubose!" She was vicious. Once she heard Jem refer to our father as "Atticus" and her reaction was apoplectic.

I pulled at his sleeve, and we were followed up the sidewalk by a philippic on our family's moral degeneration, the major premise of which was that half the Finches were in the asylum anyway, but if our mother were living we would not have come to such a state.

I wasn't sure what Jem resented most, but I took umbrage at Mrs. Dubose's assessment of the family's mental hygiene.

In later years, I sometimes wondered exactly what made Jem do it, what made him break the bonds of "You just be a gentleman, son," and the phase of self-conscious rectitude he had recently entered.

She was a less than satisfactory source of palliation, but she did give Jem a hot biscuit-and-butter which he tore in half and shared with me. It tasted like cotton.

From time to time she would open her mouth wide, and I could see her tongue undulate faintly.

His sermon was a forthright denunciation of sin, an austere declaration of the motto on the wall behind him: he warned his flock against the evils of heady brews, gambling, and strange women.

His sermon was a forthright denunciation of sin, an austere declaration of the motto on the wall behind him: he warned his flock against the evils of heady brews, gambling, and strange women.

Somewhere, I had received the impression that Fine Folks were people who did the best they could with the sense they had, but Aunt Alexandra was of the opinion, obliquely expressed, that the longer a family had been squatting on one patch of land the finer it was.

She was not fat, but solid, and she chose protective garments that drew up her bosom to giddy heights, pinched in her waist, flared out her rear, and managed to suggest that Aunt Alexandra's was once an hour-glass figure. From any angle, it was formidable.

We were accustomed to prompt, if not always cheerful acquiescence to Atticus's instructions, but from the way he stood Jem was not thinking of budging.

We asked Miss Maudie to elucidate: she said Miss Stephanie seemed to know so much about the case she might as well be called on to testify.

"And so a quiet, respectable, humble Negro who had the unmitigated temerity to 'feel sorry' for a white woman has had to put his word against two white people's.

"I wouldn't be so sure of that, Atticus," she said. "His kind'd do anything to pay off a grudge. You know how those people are." "What on earth could Ewell do to me, sister?" "Something furtive," Aunt Alexandra said. "You may count on that." "Nobody has much chance to be furtive in Maycomb," Atticus answered.

"You wanta take it off, Scout?" he asked. "Naw, I'll just keep it on," I said. I could hide my mortification under it. "You all want a ride home?" someone asked.

At first we saw nothing but a kudzu-covered front porch, but a closer inspection revealed an arc of water descending from the leaves and splashing in the yellow circle of the street light, some ten feet from source to earth, it seemed to us.

Jem said Mr. Avery misfigured, Dill said he must drink a gallon a day, and the ensuing contest to determine relative distances and respective prowess only made me feel left out again, as I was untalented in this area.

Jem said Mr. Avery misfigured, Dill said he must drink a gallon a day, and the ensuing contest to determine relative distances and respective prowess only made me feel left out again, as I was untalented in this area.

Jem was not one to dwell on past defeats: it seemed the only message he got from Atticus was insight into the art of cross examination.

Jem was not one to dwell on past defeats: it seemed the only message he got from Atticus was insight into the art of cross examination.

The back of the Radley house was less inviting than the front: a ramshackle porch ran the width of the house; there were two doors and two dark windows between the doors.

That we would be obliged to dodge the unseen from all directions was confirmed when Dill ahead of us spelled G-o-d in a whisper.

He put his arms over his head and went rigid.

In the glare from the streetlight, I could see Dill hatching one: his eyes widened, his fat cherub face grew rounder.

"Ah- I won 'em from him," he said vaguely.

Boo Radley's insane fingers picking the wire to pieces; the chinaberry trees were malignant, hovering, alive.

Sometimes I did not understand him, but my periods of bewilderment were short-lived.

Sometimes when we made a midnight pilgrimage to the bathroom we would find him reading.

The night-crawlers had retired, but ripe chinaberries drummed on the roof when the wind stirred, and the darkness was desolate with the barking of distant dogs.