This quote
illustrates the human impulse for people to try to distance themselves from other people's
troubles and say these problems couldn't happen to them. Of course, given the scanty knowledge
about sanitation, health, and medicine at the time, any American city could have ended up
struggling with a plague, but the other cities would rather turn their backs on Philadelphia and
let it suffer on its own than offer help.
The quote is probably chosen to
head this chapter because the chapter shows Mattie on her own, like Philadelphia, left to cope
with her grandfather's illness while they are outside of the city. As she notes:
We have no food or water. Were at least ten miles out of the
city.
Mattie has to figure out what to do, with her
ailing grandfather relying on her. Unlike the way neighboring cities behave, Mattie sticks by
her grandfather. As he says to her:
I knew you wouldnt
leave me to face the enemy alone.
Mattie shows her
resourcefulness in coping on her own by finding water and a raspberry bush so that they can have
food and drink.
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