The Return Of The Shadow Part 25

'I have known about the existence of your Ring for years.'

'Have you indeed?' said Bilbo. 'How, I should like to know! Come on, then: you had better make a clean breast of it before I go.

'Well, it was like this. It was the Sackville-Bagginses that were your undoing.'

'They would be,' grunted Bilbo.

Frodo then tells the story of his observing Bilbo's escape, by becoming invisible, from the Sackville-Bagginses while out walking one day. This, in very brief form, had been used in the fifth version of 'A Long-expected. Party' (p. 242), when Bingo told it to Gandalf after the Party - there, merely as an example of how Bilbo had used the Ring for small-scale disappearances to avoid boredom and inconvenience (for of course in the 'received' story Bingo knew about the Ring because Bilbo had told him about it). It was then, in more elaborate form, given to Merry in 'A Conspiracy is Unmasked' (p. 300) as an explanation of how Merry knew of the existence of the Ring (and so was dropped from the sixth version of A Long-expected Party, p. 315). Now, in the present text, my father simply lifted the story word for word from 'A Conspiracy (is) Unmasked' and gave it to Frodo, as his explanation to Bilbo of how he learnt about the Ring; and Frodo continues here, again almost word for word, with Merry's account of how he got a sight of Bilbo's book: 'That doesn't explain it all,' said Bilbo, with a gleam in his eye. 'Come on, out with it, whatever it is! '

'Well, after that I kept my eyes open,' stammered Frodo. 'I - er - in fact I rather kept a watch on you. But you must admit it was very intriguing - and I was only in my early tweens. So one day I came across your book.'

'My book!' said Bilbo. 'Good heavens above. Is nothing safe!' 'Not too safe,' said Frodo. 'But I only got one rapid glance. You never left the book about, except just that once: you were called out of the study, and I came in and found it lying open. I should like a rather longer look, Bilbo. I suppose you are leaving it to me now?'

'No I am not! ' said Bilbo decisively. 'It isn't finished. Why, one of my chief reasons for leaving is to go somewhere where I can get on with it in peace without a parcel of rascally nephews prying round the place, and a string of confounded visitors hanging on to the bell.'

'You shouldn't be so kind to everyone,' said Frodo. 'I am sure you needn't go away.

'Well, I am going,' said Bilbo. 'And about that Ring: I suppose I needn't describe it now, or how I got it. I thought of giving it to you.'

At this point my father interrupted the text and wrote across the page: 'This won't do because of the use of the Ring at the party!' - i.e., Bilbo could not have the intention to give it to Frodo then, before the Party. But without changing anything that he had written he went on with the story thus: He fumbled in his pocket and drew out a small golden ring attached by another ring to a fine chain. He unfastened it, laid it in the palm of his hand, and looked long at it.

'Here it is! ' he said with sigh.

Frodo held out his hand. But Bilbo put the ring straight back in his pocket. [A puzzled look >] An odd look came over his face. 'Er, well,' he stammered, 'I'll give it you I expect last thing before I go - or leave it in my locked drawer or something.'

Frodo looked puzzled and stared at him, but said nothing.

The last lines of the text come after the Party: Bilbo.... goes and dresses as in the older version (but with armour under his cloak)(6) and says goodbye. 'The - er - ring,' he said, 'is in the drawer' - and vanished into [the] darkness.

I think that this new version is to be a.s.sociated with the opening notes under 'Alterations of Plot' in $3 above: it represents a movement away from the idea that Bilbo was troubled about the Ring, that it was his prime motive for leaving (rather, his tiredness, his desire for peace, is mentioned). He has never even spoken to Frodo about it. It seems that my father's intention had been that Bilbo should simply hand it to Frodo there and then, without any suggestion of inner struggle; but he only realised, as he wrote, that 'This won't do'- because Bilbo must retain the Ring till the actual moment of his departure. The gift would therefore have to be postponed from the present occasion; and it was only now that he took up the suggestion in 'A Long-expected Party', where Bilbo said to Gandalf: 'I am not going to throw it away. In any case I find it impossible to make myself do that - I simply put it back in my pocket.'(7) The curious result is that the scene actually ends now with a demonstration, in Bilbo's embarra.s.sed and ambiguous behaviour, precisely of the sinister effect that the Ring has in fact had on its owner; and this would be developed into the quarrel with Gandalf in FR, pp. 41 - 3.

(5) Turning now to those papers dated August 1939 that are concerned with larger projections of the story to come after the sojourn in Rivendell, there is first a suggestion that a Dragon should come to the s.h.i.+re and that by its coming the hobbits should be led to show that they are made of 'sterner stuff', and that 'Frodo (Bingo)' should 'actually come near the end of his money - now it was dragon gold. He is "lured"?' There is here a reference to 'Bilbo remarks on old sheet of notes' - obviously those given on pp. 41 - 2 (where the same suggestion of a Dragon coming to Hobbiton was made).

(6) Following these notes on the same page is a brief list of narrative elements that might enter much further on: Island in sea. Take Frodo there in end.

Radagast ? (8) Battle is raging far off between armies of Elves and Men v[ersus the] Lord.

Adventures .. Stone-Men.

With the first of these cf. the note given on p. 41: 'Elrond tells him [Bilbo) of an island', etc. The reference to the 'battle raging' probably belongs to the end of the story, when the Ring goes into the Crack of Doom.

Most interesting is the last item here. A note by my father found with the LR papers states that he looked through (some, at least, of) the material in 1964; and it was very probably at that time that he scrawled against the words 'Adventures .. Stone-Men': Thought of as just an 'adventure'. The whole of the matter of Gondor (Stone-land) grew from this note. (Aragorn, still called Trotter, had no connexion with it then, and was at first conceived as one of the hobbits that had wanderl.u.s.t.) (7) This is a convenient place to give a page of pencilled notes which bears no date and in which 'Bingo' appears. At the head of the page stand the words: 'City of Stone and civilized men'. Then follows an extremely abbreviated outline of the end of the story.

At end When Bingo [written above: Frodo] at last reaches Crack and Fiery Mountain he cannot make himself throw the Ring away. ? He hears Necromancer's voice offering him great reward - to share power with him, if he will keep it.

At that moment Gollum - who had seemed to reform and had guided them by secret ways through Mordor - comes up and treacherously tries to take Ring. They wrestle and Gollum takes Ring and falls into the Crack.

The mountain begins to rumble.

Bingo flies away [i.e. flees away].

Eruption.

Mordor vanishes like a dark cloud. Elves are seen riding like lights rolling away a dark cloud.

The City of Stone is covered in ashes.

Journey back to Rivendell.

What of s.h.i.+re? Sackville-Baggins....... Bingo makes peace, and settles down in a little hut on the high green quarters.

... lands........ the four ridge - until one day he goes with the Elves west beyond the towers. Better- no land was tilled, all the hobbits were busy making swords.

The illegible words might just possibly be interpreted thus: 'Sackville- Baggins [and] his friends hurt [the] lands. There was war between the four quarters.'

Since there is here a reference to 'the City of Stone', while my father said in 1964 that the whole idea of Gondor arose from the reference to 'Stone-Men' in a note dated August 1939, it would have to be concluded on a strict interpretation that this outline comes from that time or later; on the other hand, the hero is still 'Bingo', so that this outline would seem to be the earlier. I think, however, that the contradiction may be only apparent, since in other notes dated August 1939 my father seems still to have been hesitant about the name 'Bingo', and I would therefore ascribe the outline just given to much the same time as the rest of these notes. It obviously leaves out some things that my father must already have known (more or less): such as how Gollum reappeared. But it is most remarkable to find here - when there is no suggestion of the vast structure still to be built - that the corruption of the s.h.i.+re, and the crucial presence of Gollum on the Fiery Mountain, were very early elements in the whole.

(8) On the reverse of the page bearing this outline is the following: 'The ring is destroyed,' said Bilbo, 'and I am feeling sleepy. We must say goodbye, Bingo [written above: Frodo] - but it is a good place to say goodbye, in the House of Elrond, where memory is long and kind. I am leaving the book of my small deeds here. And I don't think I shall go to rest till I have written down your tale too. Elrond will keep it - no doubt after all hobbits have gone their ways into the past. Well, Bingo my lad, you and I were very small creatures, but we've played our part. We've played our part. An odd fate we have shared, to be sure.'

It seems then that at this time my father foresaw that Bilbo died in Rivendell.

(9) There is one further page dated 'August 1939', and this is of great interest. It is a series of pencilled notes like the others, and is headed 'Plot from XII on'.

Have to wait till Spring? Or have to go at once.

They go south along the Mountains. Later or early? Snowstorm in the Red Pa.s.s. Journey down the R. Redway.

Adventure with Giant Tree Beard in Forest.

Mines of Moria. These again deserted - except for Goblins.

Land of Ond. Siege of the City.

They draw near the borders of Mordor.

In dark Gollum comes up. He feigns reform? Or tries to throttle Frodo? - but Gollum has now a magic ring given by Lord and is invisible. Frodo dare not use his own.

Cavalcade of evil led by seven Black Riders.

See Dark Tower on the horizon. Horrible feeling of an Eye searching for him.

Fiery Mountain.

Eruption of Fiery Mountain causes destruction of Tower.

A pencilled marginal note asks whether 'Bingo' (with 'Frodo' written beside) should be captured by the Dark Lord and questioned, but be saved 'by Sam?'.

Subsequently my father emended these notes in ink. In the first line, against 'Or have to go at once', he wrote 'at once', he directed that 'Mines of Moria...' should precede 'Adventure with Giant Tree Beard in Forest' and come between 'Snowstorm in the Red Pa.s.s' and 'Journey down the R. Redway', and after 'These again deserted - except for Goblins' he added 'Loss of Gandalf'.

Some features of this outline have occurred already; the feigned reform of Gollum, his attack on Frodo, and the eruption of the Fiery Mountain, in $7; the acquisition of a ring by Gollum in Mordor in $1. But we meet here for the first time other major ingredients in the later work. The Ring crosses the Misty Mountains by 'the Red Pa.s.s', which will survive in the Redhorn Pa.s.s, or Redhorn Gate. The Mines of Moria now first reappear from The Hobbit - at any rate under that name: the mention in Queries and Alterations note 11 (p. 226) of the colony founded by the Dwarves Balin, Ori, and Oin from the Lonely Mountain in 'rich hills in the South' does not show that the identification had been made. The actual link lay no doubt in Elrond's words in The Hobbit (Chapter III, 'A Short Rest'): 'I have heard that there are still forgotten treasures to be found in the deserted caverns of the mines of Moria, since the dwarf and goblin war', and the words here 'These again deserted - except for Goblins', taken with those in Queries and Alterations (ibid.) 'But after a time no word was heard of them', clearly imply the story in The Lard of the Rings. The land of the Stone-Men (see $6) is the 'Land of Ond', and the 'City of Stone' ($7) will be besieged. Here also there is the first hint of the story of the capture of Frodo and his rescue by Sam Gamgee from the tower of Cirith Ungol; and most notable of all, perhaps, the first mention of the Searching Eye in the Dark Tower.

These are references to narrative 'moments' which my father foresaw: they do not const.i.tute an articulated narrative scheme. They may very well not be in the succession that he even then perceived. Thus in this outline Gollum's treachery is brought in long before Frodo reaches the Fiery Mountain, which in view of what is said in $7 can hardly have been his meaning; and the Mines of Moria are named after the pa.s.sage of the Misty Mountains. This was corrected later in ink, but it may not have been his conception when he wrote these notes: for in none of the (six) mentions of the Mines of Moria in The Hobbit is there any suggestion of where they were (cf. his letter to W. H. Auden in 1955: 'The Mines of Moria had been a mere name', Letters no. 163).

(10) Something must be said here of 'Giant Treebeard', for he emerged into a sc.r.a.p of actual narrative at this time (and had been mentioned by Gandalf to Frodo in Rivendell. p. 363: I was caught in Fangorn and spent many weary days as a prisoner of the Giant Treebeard'). There exists a single sheet of ma.n.u.script, which began as a letter dated 'July 27 - 29th 1939, but which my father covered on both sides with fine ornamental script (one side of the sheet is reproduced opposite). Among the writings on the page are the words 'July Summer Diversions' and lines from Chaucer's Reeve 's Tale - for these 'Diversions' were a series of public entertainments held at Oxford in the course of which my father, attired as Chaucer, recited that Tale. But the page is chiefly taken up with a text on which he afterwards pencilled Tree Beard.

When Frodo heard the voice he looked up, but he could see nothing through the thick entangled branches. Suddenly he felt a quiver in the gnarled tree-trunk against which he was leaning, and before he could spring away he was pushed, or kicked, forward onto his knees. Picking himself up he looked at the tree, and even as he looked, it took a stride towards him. He scrambled out of the way, and a deep rumbling chuckle came down out of the tree-top.

'Where are you, little beetle?' said the voice. 'If you don't let me know where you are, you can't blame me for treading on you. And please, don't tickle my leg! '

The emergence of Treebeard. 'I can't see any leg,' said Frodo. 'And where are you?''You must be blind,' said the voice. 'I am here.' 'Who are you?' 'I am Treebeard,' the voice answered. 'If you haven't heard of me before, you ought to have done; and anyway you are in my garden.'

'I can't see any garden,' said Frodo. 'Do you know what a garden looks like?' 'I have one of my own: there are flowers and plants in it, and a fence round it; but there is nothing of the kind here.' 'O yes! there is. Only you have walked through the fence without noticing it; and you can't see the plants, because you are down underneath them by their roots.'

It was only then when Frodo looked closer that he saw that what he had taken for smooth tree-stems were the stalks of gigantic flowers - and what he had thought was the stem of a monstrous oaktree was really a thick gnarled leg with a rootlike foot and many branching toes.

This is the first image of Treebeard: seeming in its air to come rather from the old Hobbit than the new. Six lines in Elvish tengwar are also written here, which transliterated read: Fragment from The Lord of the Rings, sequel to The Hobbit.

Frodo meets Giant Treebeard in the Forest of Neldoreth while seeking for his lost companions: he is deceived by the giant who pretends to be friendly, but is really in league with the Enemy.

The forest of Neldoreth, forming the northern part of Doriath, had appeared in the later Annals of Beleriand (V. 126, 148); the name from the old legends (like that of Glorfindel, see p. 214) was to be re-used. Six months earlier, in a letter of 2 February 1939, my father had said that 'though there is no dragon (so far) there is going to be a Giant' (Letters no. 35, footnote to the text). If my suggested a.n.a.lysis of the chronology is correct (see p. 309) 'Giant Treebeard' had already appeared, as Gandalf's captor, at the end of the third phase (p. 363).

(11) There remains one further text (extant in two versions) to be given in this chapter; this is the story of Peregrin Boffin (see under $$2, 3 above). One form of it is found as part of a rather roughly written two- page ma.n.u.script that begins as a new text of 'A Long-expected Party': very closely related to the sixth or third phase version of that chapter, but certainly following it. I take it up from the point 'At ninety he seemed much the same as ever' (FR p. 29).

At ninety-nine they began to call him well-preserved, though unchanged would have been nearer the mark. Some were heard to say that it was too much of a good thing, this combination of apparently perpetual youth with seemingly inexhaustible wealth.

'It will have to be paid for,' they said. 'It isn't natural, and trouble will come of it! '

But trouble had not yet come, and Mr Baggins was extremely generous with his money, so most people (and especially the poorer and less important hobbits) pardoned his oddities. In a way the inhabitants of Hobbiton were (secretly) rather proud of him: the wealth that he had brought back from his travels became a local legend, and it was widely believed, whatever the old folk might say, that most of the Hill was full of tunnels stuffed with treasure.

'He may be peculiar, but he does no harm,' said the younger folk. But not all of his more important relatives agreed. They were suspicious of his influence on their children, and especially of their sons meeting Gandalf at his house. Their suspicions were much increased by the unfortunate affair of Peregrin Boffin.

Peregrin was the grandson of Bilbo's mother's second sister Donnamira Took. He was a mere babe, five years old, when Bilbo came back from his journey; but he grew up a dark-haired and (for a hobbit) lanky lad, very much more of a Took than a Boffin. He was always trotting round to Hobbiton, for his father, Paladin Boffin, lived at Northope, only a mile or two behind the Hill. When Peregrin began to talk about mountains and dwarves, and forests and wolves, Paladin became alarmed, and finally forbade his son to go near Bag-end, and shut his door on Bilbo.

Bilbo took this to heart, for he was extremely fond of Peregrin, but he did nothing to encourage him to visit Bag-end secretly. Peregrin then ran away from home and was found wandering about half-starved up on the moors of the Northfarthing. Finally, the day after he came of age (in the spring of Bilbo's eightieth year)(9) he disappeared, and was never found in spite of a search all over the s.h.i.+re.

In former times Gandalf had always been held responsible for the occasional regrettable accidents of this kind; but now Bilbo got a large share of the blame, and after Peregrin's disappearance most of his younger relations were kept away from him. Though in fact Bilbo was probably more troubled by the loss of Peregrin than all the Boffins put together.

He had, however, other young friends, who for one reason or another were not kept away from him. His favourite soon became Frodo Baggins, grandson of Mirabella the third of the Old Took's remarkable daughters, and son of Drogo (one of Bilbo's second cousins). Just about the time of Peregrin's disappearance Frodo was left an orphan, when only a child of twelve, and so he had no anxious parents to keep him out of bad company. He lived with his uncle Rory Brandybuck, and his mother's hundred and one relatives in the Great Hole of Bucklebury: Brandy Hall.

Here this new opening ends. A slightly shorter version is found as a rider to the ma.n.u.script of the third phase version itself: there are some differences of wording but none of substance. Bilbo is here said to have taken the delinquent back to Northope and apologised to Paladin Boffin, when Peregrin 'sneaked round to him secretly', and Bilbo 'stoutly denied having anything to do with the events.'

The village of Northope later became Overhill, and was so corrected on the second of these texts.(10) - Paladin is already fixed as the name of the father of Peregrin: these Boffins are - as names - the origin of Paladin and Peregrin Took in LR. Donnamira Took, second of the Old Took's daughters, appears in the family tree of the Tooks given on p. 317, where she is the wife of Hugo Boffin (as in LR, but there without recorded issue): their son was Jago Boffin, and his son was Fosco, Bilbo's first cousin (once removed), who was 54 at the time of the Party. In the third phase version of 'Ancient History' (p. 319) Jo b.u.t.ton, who saw the 'Tree- men' beyond the North Moors, is said to have worked for Fos...o...b..ffin of Northope, and this is presumably the same person as the Fos...o...b..ffin of the family tree, grandson of Donnamira. In this case Peregrin Boffin (Trotter) - who was 64 at the time of the Party (see note g), though of course he had then long since disappeared from the s.h.i.+re - has stepped into Fosco's genealogical place, and his father Paladin into that of Jago. But only into the genealogical place: the Boffin of Northope for whom Jo b.u.t.ton was working has obviously nothing to do with the renegade Peregrin.

It will be seen that in this account Frodo and Trotter were second cousins, and both were first cousins once removed of Bilbo.(11) NOTES.

1. With 'unexpected party' for 'long-expected party' cf. p. 245, note 1.

2. Actually, the third and fourth drafts of the first phase: by 'original draft of the Tale' my father meant the form of 'A Long-expected Party' as it stood when submitted to Allen and Unwin (see p. 40).

3. I do not understand the force of this sentence.

4. The reference to The Hobbit is to Chapter I 'An Unexpected Party', a pa.s.sage already cited (p. 224).

5. the Rivers: the plural form is clear.

6. That Bilbo wore his 'elf-armour' under his cloak when he went is said in $2; see pp. 371 - 2.

7. This is the wording of the sixth (third phase) version, little changed from that of the fifth (p. 239).

8. Radagast had occurred in The Hobbit: in Chapter VII 'Queer Lodgings' Gandalf spoke to Beorn of 'my good cousin Radagast who lives near the Southern borders of Mirkwood.'

9. Peregrin Boffin was five years old when Bilbo returned from his great adventure. The calculation is: 51 to 79 ('the spring of his eightieth year') = 28, plus 5 = 33 ('coming of age'). According to this story Peregrin/Trotter was Sr years old when Frodo and his companions met him at Bree (Bilbo finally departed when he was x r x; Peregrin/Trotter was then 64, and Frodo left the s.h.i.+re 17 years later). As he said at Bree, 'I'm older now than I look' (pp. 153, 342); Aragorn was 87 when he said the same thing (FR p. 177).

10. Northope > Overhill also on p. 319. - The name Northope appears here on my father's original map of the s.h.i.+re (p. 107, item I), but it was struck out and replaced, not by Overhill, but by The Yale. This is a convenient place to notice the history of this name. Long after, my father wrote in The Yale on the s.h.i.+re map in a copy of the First Edition of FR, placing it south of Whitfurrows in the Eastfarthing, in such a way as to show that he intended a region, like 'The Marish', not a particular place of settlement (the road to Stock runs through it); and at the same time, on the same copy, he expanded the text in FR p. 86, introducing the name: 'the lowlands of the Yale' (for the reason for this change of text, which was published in the Second Edition, see p. 66, note 10). The s.h.i.+re map in the Second Edition has The Yale added here, but in relation to a small black square, as if it were the name of a farm or small hamlet; this must have been a misunderstanding. I cannot explain the meaning of The Yale. Northope contains a place-name element hope that usually means 'a small enclosed valley'.

11. My father's earlier suggestion concerning Trotter (p. 223) also made him Bilbo's first cousin (Fosco Took).

THE STORY CONTINUED.

XXIII. IN THE HOUSE OF ELROND.

In the next stage of the work it is difficult to deduce the chronology of composition, or to relate it to important further revisions made to the 'third phase' of the story as far as Rivendell. Determination of the chronology depends on the form taken by certain key elements, and if these happen to be absent certainty becomes impossible.

At any rate, after 'Bingo' had become 'Frodo' my father continued Frodo's interrupted conversation with Gloin at the feast in the house of Elrond (see p. 369). This continuation is in two forms, the second closely following the first, and already in the first form the latter part of 'Many Meetings' in FR is quite closely approached; but there are certain major differences. I give here the second form (in part).(1) 'And what has become of Balin and Ori and Oin?' asked Frodo.

A shadow pa.s.sed over Gloin's face. 'Balin took to travelling again,' he answered. 'You may have heard that he visited Bilbo in Hobbiton many years ago(2): well, not very long after that he went away for two or three years. Then he returned to the Mountain with a great number of dwarves that he discovered wandering masterless in the South and East. He wanted Dain to go back to Moria - or at least to allow him to found a colony there and reopen the great mines. As you probably know, Moria was the ancestral home of the dwarves of the race of Durin, and the forefathers of Thorin and Dain dwelt there, until they were driven by the goblin invasions far into the North. Now Balin reported that Moria was again wholly deserted, since the great defeat of the goblins, but the mines were still rich, especially in silver. Dain was not willing to leave the Mountain and the tomb of Thorin, but he allowed Balin to go, and he took with him many of the folk of the Mountain as well as his own following; and Ori and Oin went with him. For many years things went well, and the colony throve; there was traffic once more between Moria and the Mountain, and many gifts of silver were sent to Dain. Then fortune changed. Our messengers were attacked and robbed by cruel Men, well-armed. No messengers came from Moria; but rumour reached us that the mines and dwarf-city were again deserted. For long we could not learn what had become of Balin and his people - but now we have news, and it is evil. It is to tell these tidings and to ask for the counsel of - of those that dwell in Rivendell that I have come. But to-night let us speak of merrier things! '

At the head of the page my father wrote the words that stand in this place in FR (p. 241): '"We do not know," he answered. "It is largely on his account that I have come to ask for the counsel of - of those that dwell in Rivendell. But for to-night let us speak of merrier things."' In FR the story of Balin was taken up into 'The Council of Elrond' and greatly enlarged.

Gloin's account of the works of the Dwarves in Dale and under the Lonely Mountain (FR pp. 241 - 2) is present in the old version.(3) At the end, when Gloin said: 'You were very fond of Bilbo, weren't you?' Frodo replied simply 'Yes', and then 'they went on to talk about the old adventures of Bilbo with the dwarves, in Mirkwood, and among the Wood-elves, and in the caverns of the Mountain.'

The entrance into the Hall of Fire, and the discovery and recognition of Bilbo, are already very close to FR (for early references to Bilbo at Rivendell see pp. 126, 225). The Hall of Fire is said in both texts to be nearly as large as the 'Hall of Feasting' or 'Great Hall', in the second this hall 'appeared to have no windows'; and in both there were many fires burning: Bilbo sat beside the furthest, with his cup and bread on a low table beside him (in FR there were no tables).

Bilbo says 'I shall have to get that fellow Peregrin to help me' (cf. p. 369) and Elrond replies that he will have Ethelion (4) found (in Chapter XI of the 'third phase' Glorfindel calls Trotter Dufinnion, p. 361). 'Messengers were sent to find Bilbo's friend. It was said that he had been in the kitchens, for his help was as much esteemed by the cooks as by the poets.' It had been said in the earlier part of the chapter (p. 365) that Frodo could not see Trotter at the feast, and his absence survived into FR (p. 243), but with a very different reason for it.

Whatever Bilbo may have had to say of himself is not reported in the original story. The entire pa.s.sage (FR pp. 243 - 4) in which Bilbo tells of his journey to Dale, of his life in Rivendell, and his interest in the Ring - and the distressing incident when he asks to see it - is absent.