IV: The Ways of the Changelings explained

What happens

Themes in this chapter

• Identity and Self

  The switched identities of Tom and Chambers create a profound dissonance between their true selves and their social roles. Roxy's self-deception, where she comes to genuinely worship Tom as her master, further blurs the lines between performance and reality.

• Nature vs. Nurture

  The chapter contrasts the upbringing of Tom (indulged, sickly, tyrannical) and Chambers (neglected, strong, meek), suggesting that environment and treatment shape character more than inherent nature.

• Deception and Appearance

  Roxy's initial deception of switching the babies leads to a lifetime of performative roles. Her mock reverence for Tom becomes genuine, illustrating how sustained deception can alter reality and self-perception.

Characters to notice

• Roxana

  Roxy is freed by Percy Driscoll on his deathbed. She struggles with her feelings toward Tom, alternating between vengeful thoughts and doting love. She plans to leave Dawson's Landing to work as a chambermaid on a steamboat.

• Tom Driscoll

  Tom is the usurping heir, a 'bad baby' from the start. He is indulged, sickly, and cruel to Chambers, using him as a proxy for theft and as a bodyguard. He is left a pauper after his father's estate collapses but is comforted by his uncle's promise of inheritance.

• Chambers

  Chambers, the true heir raised as a slave, is physically strong, meek, and docile. He endures Tom's abuse and is bought by Judge Driscoll to prevent being sold down the river.

• Judge Driscoll

  Judge Driscoll takes in Tom after his brother's death and buys Chambers to prevent a scandal. He promises to make Tom his heir.

• Pudd'nhead Wilson

  Wilson chats with Roxy and Jasper, offering to copy the boys' fingerprints. He suspects Roxy's superstition about his 'glass mystery' when she declines.

• Mrs. Percy Driscoll

  Mentioned as part of the Driscoll family; Percy Driscoll dies, leaving his estate and son to his brother.

Key passages

• “I done so much for him⁠—I lift’ him away up to what he is⁠—en dis is what I git for it.”

  Roxy feels betrayed that after all she has done to elevate Tom to his high status, he treats her poorly.

  Roxy's internal conflict between pride in her son's position and resentment at his ingratitude.

• “the little counterfeit rift of separation between imitation-slave and imitation-master widened and widened, and became an abyss, and a very real one⁠—and on one side of it stood Roxy, the dupe of her own deceptions, and on the other stood her child, no longer a usurper to her, but her accepted and recognized master.”

  The false distinction Roxy created between herself as a slave and Tom as her master grew into a genuine divide, so that she came to truly see him as her master.

  Illustrates how Roxy's performative deference became a sincere belief, deepening the irony of the switched identities.

• “Tom always made Chambers go in swimming with him, and stay by him as a protection. When Tom had had enough, he would slip out and tie knots in Chambers’s shirt, dip the knots in the water and make them hard to undo, then dress himself and sit by and laugh while the naked shiverer tugged at the stubborn knots with his teeth.”

  Tom forced Chambers to accompany him swimming for safety, then played a cruel trick by knotting Chambers's wet shirt and laughing as Chambers struggled to untie it.

  Exemplifies Tom's habitual cruelty and the power imbalance between the two boys.