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 for-

give 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 re-

spectable 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 young-

est 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 neighbour-hood (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 Brandy-

bucks 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 outboating 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