Chapter 5 Summary

Memoir--The narrator describes an event that happened at the end of Greece's war with Turkey. Six cabinet ministers about to be executed were brought out into a courtyard covered with wet dead leaves and placed against the wall of a hospital. One of the ministers has typhoid fever and cannot stand, so he is left to sit in a pool of water, head on his knees until the first volley is fired.

Story--The short story in this chapter is named "The Battler." It takes place at a time when Nick Adams is "riding the rails," hitching rides on trains without paying the fare. A great many out-of-work men made a practice of moving from place to place by rail. Nick has been sucker-punched by a brakeman and knocked down beside the track to prevent him from riding the train. He ends up fingering...