Mrs. Henry Lafayette Dubose is an elderly women who lives down the street from the Finch’s. When the kids go down town, they run by her house, trying to avoid her, because she is very mean. Mrs. Dubose says exactly what is on her mind. Scout describes Mrs. Dubose as plain hell. Mrs. Dubose, like many others in Maycomb, is racist and upsets the kids by calling Atticus a negro lover. This angers Jem, so he goes on a rage, cutting off all the tops of Mrs. Dubose’s camellias. Jem’s punishment is to read to Mrs. Dubose every day of the month. Jem doesn’t like reading for Mrs. Dubose because she rudely corrects him when he reads. When Jem reads for Mrs. Dubose, Scout usually tags along. The kids notice Mrs. Dubose having fits- twitching, drooling, and the like. Even though the kids tell Atticus the insulting things she calls him, he still speaks to her in a polite and kind way. Shortly after the month passes, Mrs. Dubose passed away. Later, Atticus told Jem about Mrs. Dubose’s addiction to morphine. Atticus informed Jem that his reading distracted her so she could die free of pain-killers, while fighting a battle against a serious illness. Atticus told Jem how brave she was. Before she died, she made Jem a candy box with a camellia flower in it, that the black care-taker Jessie brings him. Jem, thinking Mrs. Dubose was mocking him, disposed of the box in anger. After, Atticus says that Mrs. Dubose sent the flower to show him her appreciation for reading to her. Scout later sees Jem admiring the flower.

 

Mrs. Henry Lafayette Dubose

Quotes Describing Mrs. Dubose:

 

“Not only Finch waiting on tables but one in the courthouse lawing for a Negro! Yes indeed, what has the world come to when a Finch goes against his raisings? I’ll tell you!” 

 

"What are you doing in those overalls? You should be in a dress and camisole, young lady! You'll grow up waiting on tables if somebody doesn't change your ways-a Finch waiting on tables at the O.K. CaM-hah!"

 



Dr. Reynolds is the Maycomb doctor. "Had brought Jem and me into the world, had led us through every childhood disease known to man including the time Jem fell out of the tree house, and he had never lost our friendship. Dr. Reynolds said that if we were boil-prone things would have been different...” He is well known to Jem and Scout. He has a strong bond with the Finches.