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Book one The Fellowship of the Ring Chapter one A Long Expected Party

When Mr. Bilbo Baggins of Bag End announced that  he would shortly be celebrating his eleventy-first  

birthday with a party of special magnificence,  there was much talk and excitement in Hobbiton. 

Bilbo was very rich and very peculiar, and had  been the wonder of the Shire for sixty years,  

ever since his remarkable disappearance and  unexpected return. The riches he had brought back  

from his travels had now become a local legend,  and it was popularly believed, whatever the old  

folk might say, that the Hill at Bag End was full  of tunnels stuffed with treasure. And if that was  

not enough for fame, there was also his prolonged  vigour to marvel at. Time wore on, but it seemed  

to have little effect on Mr. Baggins. At ninety he  was much the same as at fifty. At ninety-nine they  

began to call him well-preserved; but unchanged  would have been nearer the mark. There were some  

that shook their heads and thought this was  too much of a good thing; it seemed unfair  

that anyone should possess (apparently) perpetual  youth as well as (reputedly) inexhaustible wealth. 

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

But so far trouble had not come; and as  Mr. Baggins was generous with his money,  

most people were willing to forgive  him his oddities and his good fortune.  

He remained on visiting terms with his relatives  (except, of course, the Sackville-Bagginses),  

and he had many devoted admirers among the  hobbits of poor and unimportant families.  

But he had no close friends, until some  of his younger cousins began to grow up. 

The eldest of these, and Bilbo's  favourite, was young Frodo Baggins.  

When Bilbo was ninety-nine he adopted Frodo as  his heir, and brought him to live at Bag End;  

and the hopes of the Sackville-Bagginses were  finally dashed. Bilbo and Frodo happened to  

have the same birthday, September 22nd. 'You  had better come and live here, Frodo my lad,'  

said Bilbo one day; 'and then we can celebrate  our birthday-parties comfortably together.'  

At that time Frodo was still in his tweens, as the  hobbits called the irresponsible twenties between  

childhood and coming of age at thirty-three. Twelve more years passed. Each year the Bagginses  

had given very lively combined birthday-parties at  Bag End; but now it was understood that something  

quite exceptional was being planned for that  autumn. Bilbo was going to be eleventy-one, 111,  

a rather curious number, and a very  respectable age for a hobbit (the Old  

Took himself had only reached 130);  and Frodo was going to be thirty-three,  

33, an important number: the  date of his 'coming of age'. 

Tongues began to wag in Hobbiton and Bywater;  and rumour of the coming event travelled all  

over the Shire. The history and character of Mr.  Bilbo Baggins became once again the chief topic  

of conversation; and the older folk suddenly  found their reminiscences in welcome demand. 

No one had a more attentive audience than  old Ham Gamgee, commonly known as the Gaffer.  

He held forth at The Ivy Bush, a small inn on the  Bywater road; and he spoke with some authority,  

for he had tended the garden at Bag End for forty  years, and had helped old Holman in the same job  

before that. Now that he was himself growing  old and stiff in the joints, the job was mainly  

carried on by his youngest son, Sam Gamgee. Both  father and son were on very friendly terms with  

Bilbo and Frodo. They lived on the Hill itself,  in Number 3 Bagshot Row just below Bag End. 

'A very nice well-spoken gentlehobbit is Mr.  Bilbo, as I've always said,' the Gaffer declared.  

With perfect truth: for Bilbo was very polite to  him, calling him 'Master Hamfast', and consulting  

him constantly upon the growing of vegetables –  in the matter of 'roots', especially potatoes,  

the Gaffer was recognized as the leading authority  by all in the neighbourhood (including himself). 

'But what about this Frodo that lives with him?'  asked Old Noakes of Bywater. 'Baggins is his name,  

but he's more than half a Brandybuck,  they say. It beats me why any Baggins  

of Hobbiton should go looking for a wife away  there in Buckland, where folks are so queer.' 

'And no wonder they're queer,' put in Daddy  Twofoot (the Gaffer's next-door neighbour),  

'if they live on the wrong side of the Brandywine  River, and right agin the Old Forest. That's a  

dark bad place, if half the tales be true.' 'You're right, Dad!' said the Gaffer. 'Not  

that the Brandybucks of Buckland live in the Old  Forest; but they're a queer breed, seemingly.  

They fool about with boats on that big river – and  that isn't natural. Small wonder that trouble came  

of it, I say. But be that as it may, Mr. Frodo is  as nice a young hobbit as you could wish to meet.  

Very much like Mr. Bilbo, and in more than looks.  After all his father was a Baggins. A decent  

respectable hobbit was Mr. Drogo Baggins;  there was never much to tell of him, till  

he was drownded.' 'Drownded?' said  

several voices. They had heard this and  other darker rumours before, of course;  

but hobbits have a passion for family  history, and they were ready to hear it again. 

'Well, so they say,' said the Gaffer. 'You  see: Mr. Drogo, he married poor Miss Primula  

Brandybuck. She was our Mr. Bilbo's first  cousin on the mother's side (her mother being  

the youngest of the Old Took's daughters); and Mr.  Drogo was his second cousin. So Mr. Frodo is his  

first and second cousin, once removed either way,  as the saying is, if you follow me. And Mr. Drogo  

was staying at Brandy Hall with his father-in-law,  old Master Gorbadoc, as he often did after his  

marriage (him being partial to his vittles,  and old Gorbadoc keeping a mighty generous  

table); and he went out boating on the Brandywine  River; and he and his wife were drownded,  

and poor Mr. Frodo only a child and all.' 'I've heard they went on the water after  

dinner in the moonlight,' said Old Noakes;  'and it was Drogo's weight as sunk the boat.' 

'And I heard she pushed him in, and he pulled her  in after him,' said Sandyman, the Hobbiton miller. 

'You shouldn't listen to all you  hear, Sandyman,' said the Gaffer,  

who did not much like the miller. 'There isn't no  call to go talking of pushing and pulling. Boats  

are quite tricky enough for those that sit still  without looking further for the cause of trouble.  

Anyway: there was this Mr. Frodo left an  orphan and stranded, as you might say,  

among those queer Bucklanders, being brought  up anyhow in Brandy Hall. A regular warren,  

by all accounts. Old Master Gorbadoc never had  fewer than a couple of hundred relations in the  

place. Mr. Bilbo never did a kinder deed than when  he brought the lad back to live among decent folk. 

'But I reckon it was a nasty knock for those  Sackville-Bagginses. They thought they were  

going to get Bag End, that time when he went off  and was thought to be dead. And then he comes back  

and orders them off; and he goes on living and  living, and never looking a day older, bless him!  

And suddenly he produces an heir, and  has all the papers made out proper. The  

Sackville-Bagginses won't never see the inside  of Bag End now, or it is to be hoped not.' 

'There's a tidy bit of money tucked away  up there, I hear tell,' said a stranger,  

a visitor on business from Michel Delving in  the Westfarthing. 'All the top of your hill  

is full of tunnels packed with chests of gold  and silver, and jools, by what I've heard.' 

'Then you've heard more than I can speak to,'  answered the Gaffer. 'I know nothing about jools.  

Mr. Bilbo is free with his money, and there seems  no lack of it; but I know of no tunnel-making.  

I saw Mr. Bilbo when he came back, a matter of  sixty years ago, when I was a lad. I'd not long  

come prentice to old Holman (him being my dad's  cousin), but he had me up at Bag End helping him  

to keep folks from trampling and trapessing  all over the garden while the sale was on.  

And in the middle of it all Mr. Bilbo comes  up the Hill with a pony and some mighty big  

bags and a couple of chests. I don't doubt they  were mostly full of treasure he had picked up in  

foreign parts, where there be mountains of gold,  they say; but there wasn't enough to fill tunnels.  

But my lad Sam will know more about  that. He's in and out of Bag End.  

Crazy about stories of the old days, he is, and  he listens to all Mr. Bilbo's tales. Mr. Bilbo  

has learned him his letters – meaning no harm,  mark you, and I hope no harm will come of it. 

'Elves and Dragons! I says to him. Cabbages and  potatoes are better for me and you. Don't go  

getting mixed up in the business of your betters,  or you'll land in trouble too big for you,  

I says to him. And I might say it to others,' he  added with a look at the stranger and the miller. 

But the Gaffer did not convince his audience. The  legend of Bilbo's wealth was now too firmly fixed  

in the minds of the younger generation of hobbits. 'Ah, but he has likely enough been adding to what  

he brought at first,' argued the  miller, voicing common opinion.  

'He's often away from home. And look  at the outlandish folk that visit him:  

dwarves coming at night, and that old  wandering conjuror, Gandalf, and all.  

You can say what you like, Gaffer, but Bag  End's a queer place, and its folk are queerer.' 

'And you can say what you like, about what  you know no more of than you do of boating,  

Mr. Sandyman,' retorted the Gaffer, disliking  the miller even more than usual. 'If that's  

being queer, then we could do with a bit more  queerness in these parts. There's some not  

far away that wouldn't offer a pint of beer to a  friend, if they lived in a hole with golden walls.  

But they do things proper at Bag End. Our Sam says  that everyone's going to be invited to the party,  

and there's going to be presents, mark you,  presents for all – this very month as is.' 

That very month was September,  and as fine as you could ask.  

A day or two later a rumour (probably  started by the knowledgeable Sam) was  

spread about that there were going to  be fireworks – fireworks, what is more,  

such as had not been seen in the Shire for nigh  on a century, not indeed since the Old Took died. 

Days passed and The Day drew nearer.  An odd-looking waggon laden with  

odd-looking packages rolled into Hobbiton one  evening and toiled up the Hill to Bag End.  

The startled hobbits peered out  of lamplit doors to gape at it. It  

was driven by outlandish folk, singing strange  songs: dwarves with long beards and deep hoods.  

A few of them remained at Bag End. At the end  of the second week in September a cart came in  

through Bywater from the direction of Brandywine  Bridge in broad daylight. An old man was driving  

it all alone. He wore a tall pointed blue  hat, a long grey cloak, and a silver scarf.  

He had a long white beard and bushy eyebrows  that stuck out beyond the brim of his hat.  

Small hobbit-children ran after the cart all  through Hobbiton and right up the hill. It had  

a cargo of fireworks, as they rightly guessed. At  Bilbo's front door the old man began to unload:  

there were great bundles of fireworks of all  sorts and shapes, each labelled with a large red G

and the elf-rune,

. That was Gandalf's mark,  

of course, and the old man was Gandalf the Wizard,  whose fame in the Shire was due mainly to his  

skill with fires, smokes, and lights. His real  business was far more difficult and dangerous,  

but the Shire-folk knew nothing about it. To them  he was just one of the 'attractions' at the Party.  

Hence the excitement of the hobbit-children. 'G  for Grand!' they shouted, and the old man smiled.  

They knew him by sight, though he only appeared  in Hobbiton occasionally and never stopped long;  

but neither they nor any but the oldest of  their elders had seen one of his firework  

displays – they now belonged to a legendary past. When the old man, helped by Bilbo  

and some dwarves, had finished unloading,  Bilbo gave a few pennies away; but not a  

single squib or cracker was forthcoming,  to the disappointment of the onlookers. 

'Run away now!' said Gandalf. 'You  will get plenty when the time comes.'  

Then he disappeared inside with  Bilbo, and the door was shut.  

The young hobbits stared at the door in vain  for a while, and then made off, feeling that  

the day of the party would never come. Inside Bag End, Bilbo and Gandalf were  

sitting at the open window of a small  room looking out west on to the garden.  

The late afternoon was bright and peaceful. The  flowers glowed red and golden: snapdragons and  

sunflowers, and nasturtians trailing all over the  turf walls and peeping in at the round windows. 

'How bright your garden looks!' said Gandalf. 

'Yes,' said Bilbo. 'I am very fond indeed  of it, and of all the dear old Shire;  

but I think I need a holiday.' 'You mean to go on with your plan then?' 

'I do. I made up my mind months  ago, and I haven't changed it.' 

'Very well. It is no good saying any more.  Stick to your plan – your whole plan,  

mind – and I hope it will turn out for  the best, for you, and for all of us.' 

'I hope so. Anyway I mean to enjoy myself  on Thursday, and have my little joke.' 

'Who will laugh, I wonder?'  said Gandalf, shaking his head. 

'We shall see,' said Bilbo. The next day more carts rolled  

up the Hill, and still more carts. There might  have been some grumbling about 'dealing locally',  

but that very week orders began to pour out of  Bag End for every kind of provision, commodity,  

or luxury that could be obtained in Hobbiton or  Bywater or anywhere in the neighbourhood. People  

became enthusiastic; and they began to tick  off the days on the calendar; and they watched  

eagerly for the postman, hoping for invitations. Before long the invitations began pouring out,  

and the Hobbiton post-office was blocked, and  the Bywater post-office was snowed under, and  

voluntary assistant postmen were called for. There  was a constant stream of them going up the Hill,  

carrying hundreds of polite variations  on Thank you, I shall certainly come. 

A notice appeared on the gate at Bag End:  NO ADMITTANCE EXCEPT ON PARTY BUSINESS.  

Even those who had, or pretended to have  Party Business were seldom allowed inside.