Alan Sisto

We're going to first go back to chapter nine at the sign of the Prancing Pony, where we read that one of the travelers, a squint-eyed ill-favored fellow, was foretelling that more and more people would be coming north in the near future.

If room isn't found for them, they'll find it for themselves.

They've a right to live same as other folk, he said loudly.

The local inhabitants did not look pleased at the prospect.

To try the shepherd's pie?

It's really good tonight.

Yeah.

I was working on my needle point the other day.

I don't think they were talking about that.

After they drag the unconscious Mary back to the end, after he was exposed to the Black Breath, Aragorn says, they will know all the news now, for they have visited Bill Ferny, and probably that Southerner was a spy as well.

He was, actually.

Aragorn's right.

And then finally, on their way out of Bree, we read, the hobbits took no notice of the inquisitive heads that peeped out of doors or popped over walls and fences as they passed.

Can I just say, for the first time ever, I caught the alliteration in that phrase.

that peeped out of doors or popped over walls and fences as they passed.

I am, but I also love the way Tolkien adds musicality to his prose.

It's why I'm always going to argue for people reading it out loud.

Anyway, the passage continues.

But as they drew near to the further gate, Frodo saw a dark, ill-kept house behind a thick hedge, the last house in the village.

In one of the windows, he caught a glimpse of a sallow face with sly, slanting eyes, but it vanished at once.