"To Kill a Mockingbird" by Harper Lee, Chapters 1–3 Part 2

The class murmured apprehensively, should she prove to harbor her share of the peculiarities indigenous to that region.

I never deliberately learned to read, but somehow I had been wallowing illicitly in the daily papers.

In Calpurnia's teaching, there was no sentimentality: I seldom pleased her and she seldom rewarded me.

After a dreary conversation in our living room one night about his entailment, before Mr. Cunningham left he said, "Mr. Finch, I don't know when I'll ever be able to pay you."

Entailment was only a part of Mr. Cunningham's vexations.

If I could have explained these things to Miss Caroline, I would have saved myself some inconvenience and Miss Caroline subsequent mortification, but it was beyond my ability to explain things as well as Atticus, so I said, "You're shamin' him, Miss Caroline. Walter hasn't got a quarter at home to bring you, and you can't use any stovewood."

My sojourn in the corner was a short one.

Jem's free dispensation of my pledge irked me, but precious noontime minutes were ticking away.

Atticus was expounding upon farm problems when Walter interrupted to ask if there was any molasses in the house.

She was furious, and when she was furious Calpurnia's grammar became erratic.

Jem and Walter returned to school ahead of me: staying behind to advise Atticus of Calpurnia's iniquities was worth a solitary sprint past the Radley Place.

He gave a short contemptuous snort.

"Whole school's full of 'em. They come first day every year and then leave. The truant lady gets 'em here 'cause she threatens 'em with the sheriff, but she's give up tryin' to hold 'em. She reckons she's carried out the law just gettin' their names on the roll and runnin' 'em here the first day. You're supposed to mark 'em absent the rest of the year..."

"Ain't got no mother," was the answer, "and their paw's right contentious."

She had always been too hard on me, she had at last seen the error of her fractious ways, she was sorry and too stubborn to say so.

He waited in amiable silence, and I sought to reinforce my position: "You never went to school and you do all right, so I'll just stay home too. You can teach me like Granddaddy taught you 'n' Uncle Jack."

In Maycomb County, hunting out of season was a misdemeanor at law, a capital felony in the eyes of the populace.

"It's against the law, all right," said my father, "and it's certainly bad, but when a man spends his relief checks on green whiskey his children have a way of crying from hunger pains. I don't know of any landowner around here who begrudges those children any game their father can hit."

"I'm afraid our activities would be received with considerable disapprobation by the more learned authorities."

Atticus kept us in fits that evening, gravely reading columns of print about a man who sat on a flagpole for no discernible reason, which was reason enough for Jem to spend the following Saturday aloft in the treehouse.