ENG 2110 Lecture Notes - Lecture 2: List Of Tom Sawyer Characters, Old Scratch

• School: University of Ottawa
• Department: English
• Course: ENG 2110
• Professor: Miles Tittle

Document Summary

I ain"t doing my duty by that boy, and that"s the lord"s truth, goodness knows. Spare the rod and spile the child, as the good book says. I"m a-laying up sin and suffering for us both, i know. Scratch, but laws-a-me! he"s my own dead sister"s boy, poor thing, and i ain"t got the heart to lash him, somehow. Every time i let him off, my conscience does hurt me so, and every time i hit him my old heart most breaks. Aunt polly says this after tom escapes her grasp. Here aunt polly shows both her frustration and amusement with tom"s mischief. This shows her inner conflict about her treatment of tom. When she disciplines tom it is out of a sense of duty more than out of annoyance or anger with him. Oh come, now, you don"t mean to let on that you like it? . Well i don"t see why i oughtn"t to like it.