By Mark Twain
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Mark Twain's Notes and Explanatory Read the Introduction |
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Huck introduces himself, Tom Sawyer, the Widow Douglas and other characters, and discusses recent events that are mentioned in "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer" including the six thousand dollars in gold that Tom and Huck recovered from the murderous Injun Joe. Then he describes his life with the Widow and her sister Miss Watson. Read Chapter 1 |
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Huck sneaks out at night to join Tom Sawyer. After playing a trick on Jim, Miss Watson's slave, they join other boys from town to visit a cave and start a gang. Read Chapter 2 |
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Huck expresses skepticism both over the power of prayer and Tom Sawyer's claims about enchantment. He resigns from Tom's gang. He hears reports about his father's death, but realizes the drowned corpse that was found wasn't really his father. Read Chapter 3 |
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Huck finds he is becoming acclimated to living with the widow and going to school. He worries that his Pap is around and offers his money to Judge Thatcher and asks Jim to tell his fortune. Read Chapter 4 |
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Just as Huck feared, his father shows up. Pap tells Huck to quit going to school, and tries to get Huck's money from Judge Thatcher. Then Pap reforms, but it doesn't last. Read Chapter 5 |
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Pap takes Huck off to live in a cabin in the woods. Pap complains about the government and, while drunk, threatens Huck's life. Huck decides to escape. Read Chapter 6 |
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Huck finds a drift canoe and decides to use it to run away to Jackon's Island. While Pap is away, Huck fakes his own death before running off. Read Chapter 7 |
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Huck finds Jim is also living on Jackson's Island. Jim admits to Huck that he has run away. Read Chapter 8 |
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Jim and Huck explore Jackson's Island. They find useful items floating along on the flooded Mississippi. They find a house floating along, containing a dead man. Jim won't let Huck look at the body. Read Chapter 9 |
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A snake bites Jim but he survives. Huck, dressed as a girl, goes over to town. Read Chapter 10 |
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Over in town Huck discovers from Mrs. Judith Loftus that Jim is wanted for his murder, and that Judith's husband and other men are going to Jackson's Island to see if they can find Jim. Jim and Huck leave Jackson's Island and head off down the river on a raft. Read Chapter 11 |
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Against Jim's better judgement they explore an old steamboat wreck, and end up getting trapped on the wreck with a gang of murderers. Read Chapter 12 |
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Jim and Huck get away from the wreck on the last remaining lifeboat. Huck tries to rescue the gang from the wreck, but can't. Read Chapter 13 |
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Jim and Huck find a bunch of goods such as cigars in the life boat. They sit around discussing kings and the French language. Read Chapter 14 |
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Huck and Jim lose each other in a fog. When Huck finds Jim he plays a trick on him, causing Jim to become very upset. Huck apologizes. Read Chapter 15 |
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Huck's conscience begins to bother him over the fact that he is helping Jim run away. He almost hands Jim over to a group of men, but at the last moment pretends his father is on the raft, and sick with smallpox. Later, a steamboat runs through their raft, and Huck and Jim are separated again. Read Chapter 16 |
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Huck is taken in by the Grangerford clan. He enjoys their hospitality and admires the poetry of the late Emmeline Grangerford. Read Chapter 17 |
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Huck discovers the Grangerfords have been feuding with the Sheperdsons for 40 years. He is unwittingly used as a go-between for secret sweethearts Sophia Grangerford and Harney Sheperdson. One of the Grangerford slaves takes Huck to Jim, who has been hiding out in a swamp. Huck gets caught up in the feud, but escapes with Jim down the river. Read Chapter 18 |
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Huck and Jim meet the King and the Duke, a couple of rapscallions, who take over their raft and expect Huck and Jim to wait on them. Read Chapter 19 |
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The King scams money from a tent revival, while the Duke earns money and prints posters for himself, including a fake wanted poster for Jim, while the owners of a print shop are off at the revival. Read Chapter 20 |
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The King and the Duke plan their Shakespearean show. Huck witnesses the murder of Boggs by Colonel Sherburn and is swept along in the lynch mob out to get Sherburn. Read Chapter 21 |
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Sherburn turns away the lynch mob. Huck goes to the circus. The Shakepearean show is a flop, so the Duke creates the Royal Nonesuch. Read Chapter 22 |
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The Duke and the King scam the town with the Royal Nonesuch. Back on the river, Jim mourns for his family. Read Chapter 23 |
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The King and the Duke fall into a new scam, to swindle Mary Jane Wilkes and her sisters out of their inheritence by pretending to be their uncles from England. Read Chapter 24 |
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A friend of the family, Doc Robinson, tries to expose the King and Duke for frauds, but Mary Jane Wilkes refuses to believe they are frauds. Read Chapter 25 |
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Disgusted with the King and the Duke, Huck decides to steal a bag of gold from them and give it back to Mary Jane Wilkes. Read Chapter 26 |
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Huck steals the bag of gold, and is almost caught, so stashes the bag in Peter Wilkes's coffin. He fools the King and the Duke into thinking that the Wilkses's slaves stole the bag of gold. Read Chapter 27 |
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Huck tells Mary Jane who the King and the Duke really are. He makes her promise to wait until he and Jim get away before she says anything. As the King and Duke are auctioning off the Wilkses's property, the real William and Harvey Wilkes arrive. Read Chapter 28 |
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The real Harvey Wilkes tries to prove his identity by describing the tattoo on his brother's chest. When the body is dug up, the bag of gold is found. In the commotion, Huck gets away. He and Jim try to leave the King and the Duke behind, but they catch up and board the raft. Read Chapter 29 |
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The King and the Duke argue over who really stole the money. The Duke forces the King to admit he did. Then they get drunk together. Read Chapter 30 |
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The King and the Duke sell Jim. When Huck finds out, he considers writing to Miss Watson to tell her where Jim is, reasoning that it would be better for Jim to be a slave among people he knows. He also feels guilty for helping Jim run away. But he decides he can't tell on Jim, saying "all right then, I'll go to hell!" Read Chapter 31 |
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Huck discovers that the people who are holding Jim, the Phelpses are Tom Sawyer's aunt and uncle, and the Phelpses believe that Huck is Tom, come to visit. Read Chapter 32 |
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Huck intercepts Tom when he arrives by steamboat, and explains the situation. To his surprise, Tom promises to help Huck steal Jim out of slavery. When they get to the Phelps's, Tom pretends to be his younger brother Sid. Huck thinks that Jim will reveal the Royal Nonesuch scam to the town, and fears for the safety of the King and the Duke, but when Huck and Tom try to warn them, they see the King and the Duke tarred and feathered and being ridden out of town on a rail. Read Chapter 33 |
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Huck finds Jim in a small hut on the Phelps's property. He and Tom plot to free Jim - but Tom wants to make the rescue - or "evasion" - as difficult as possible. Read Chapter 34 |
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Tom contrives more outlandish difficulties for the evasion. Read Chapter 35 |
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Some of Tom's outlandish ideas are unworkable, and so he agrees to pretend some of them. Read Chapter 36 |
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Tom and Huck play tricks on Aunt Sally until she doubts her sanity and no longer pays attention to missing household articles, which they swipe for the evasion. Tom and Huck make a witch pie. Read Chapter 37 |
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Tom imposes further difficulties on Huck and Jim. He is annoyed when Jim complains about some of his more outlandish and dangerous ideas, and so Jim apologizes. Read Chapter 38 |
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Tom increases the difficulty and danger of the evasion even further by posting scary pictures around the Phelps's house and by sending them a note warning them that a gang was going to try to free Jim. Read Chapter 39 |
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In response to Tom's note, a posse of farmers are gathered to stop Jim from getting away. When Tom and Huck finally get Jim out, they are chased by the farmers and Tom is shot in the leg. Although he is risking his freedom, Jim agrees to stay with Tom while Huck goes for a doctor in town. Read Chapter 40 |
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The doctor is afraid to travel with Huck in his canoe, and so leaves Huck on shore while he goes to help Tom. Huck falls asleep,and bumps into Uncle Silas while looking for the doctor and Tom. Aunt Sally stays up all night, worried about Tom. Read Chapter 41 |
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The farmer posse considers lynching Jim as a warning to other runaway slaves, but decide they didn't want to have to reimburse Jim's owner. The doctor testifies that Jim "ain't no bad nigger." When Tom recovers, he reveals that it was he and Huck who set Jim free. When Aunt Sally tells him that Jim has been captured, Tom reveals that Miss Watson died and freed Jim in her will. Aunt Polly arrives to reveal that "Sid" is really Tom, and "Tom" is really Huck Finn. Read Chapter 42 |
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Tom gives Jim $40 for being a good prisoner. Jim considers himself rich. Tom suggests that they all get an outfit and go have adventures in the Territory, but Huck says he can't afford an outfit, since his father probably drank up his money. Tom says that his father hadn't been around in months, then Jim reveals that the dead man on the washed out house was Huck's father. Huck decides to leave before the others for the Territory because Aunt Sally wants to adopt him. Read Chapter The Last |
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