Dear Members: I have a question that goes beyond trivia into some
unnamed realm, but I have a nagging curiosity about this.  If there is
an answer to be found, I am sure it will be here on the Forum.

Whenever I read the whitewashing scene in  _The Adventures of Tom
Sawyer_, I am always struck by the clause:

        “Sighing he dipped his brush and passed it along the topmost
plank....”

This suggests to me that the boards of the fence run horizontally with
the “topmost plank” being the one farthest from the ground.  Yet every
illustration of this scene, as well as the fence at the Mark Twain
Boyhood Home, has the boards of the fence running vertically. And so I
ask:

        1. Is every representation of this famous scene in error?

        2. Did Twain violate one of his own principles of writing: an author
                shall "say what he is proposing to say..."?

        3. Are Twain’s words a regional turn of phrase unfamiliar to my
eastern ear?

        4. Should I go get a life?


Any thoughts on the matter beyond complete agreement with #4?

John