74 pages • 2 hours read
Harriet Beecher StoweUncle Tom's Cabin
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1851A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 17-21 Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 17: “The Freeman’s Defense”
At the Quaker house, George tells Eliza that he will try to be a better Christian. They prepare for the imminent departure for the last leg of their journey to Canada. Tom Loker and his crew are hot on their trail, according to Phineas, a Quaker man who will escort them. George apologizes again and again for involving them; however, the Quakers contend that it is their moral obligation to help those in need.
George and Jim arm themselves with pistols. The Quakers will help them escape, but they are pacifist; they cannot help the fight if it comes to it. Simeon calms George by reading the Psalm contrasting the end of the good with the end of the wicked.
After many farewells, Eliza, George, Harry, Jim, and Jim’s elderly mother, whom Jim managed to rescue, load into Phineas’s carriage, and they are off. Loker, Marks, and the vigilantes that they have gathered quickly gain on them. After miles of pursuit, they must make their stand in a rocky grotto; there is only enough room for one man at a time to enter, making them prime targets for George and Jim’s pistols.
After some deliberation, Loker decides to go in first.
