In the following excerpt, Browne discusses how Tom Sawyer, at the end of the novel, has a negative moral influence that Huck Finn must struggle to overcome.

Throughout the book Huck's attitude toward the life around him is remarkably ambivalent. Though he clearly is rebelling against respectability and civilization, he rebels because they make him uncomfortable and 111 at ease. He fights them by running away. When he can no longer abide the "pecking" of the widow and Miss Watson, and the privations they force upon him, he flees, but only to the rags and sugar-hogshead of the other side of town. He does not need to go farther. In fact, he must stay within commuting distance of respectable folk. And he quickly and easily returns when a lure is held up to him The agent who entices Huck back from rags to respectability is, of course, Tom...