In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit. Not a nasty, dirty, wet
hole, filled with the ends of worms and an oozy smell, nor yet a dry, bare,
sandy hole with nothing in it to sit down on or to eat: it was a hobbit-hole, and that means comfort.
It had a perfectly round door like a porthole, painted green, with a shiny yellow brass knob in the exact middle. The door opened on to a tubeshaped
hall like a tunnel: a very comfortable tunnel without smoke, with
panelled walls, and floors tiled and carpeted, provided with polished chairs,
and lots and lots of pegs for hats and coats - the hobbit was fond of
visitors. The tunnel wound on and on, going fairly but not quite straight into
the side of the hill - The Hill, as all the people for many miles round called
it - and many little round doors opened out of it, first on one side and then
on another. No going upstairs for the hobbit: bedrooms, bathrooms, cellars,
pantries (lots of these), wardrobes (he had whole rooms devoted to clothes),
kitchens, dining-rooms, all were on the same floor, and indeed on the same
passage. The best rooms were all on the left-hand side (going in), for these
were the only ones to have windows, deep-set round windows looking over his
garden and meadows beyond, sloping down to the river.
This hobbit was a very well-to-do hobbit, and his name was Baggins. The
Bagginses had lived in the neighbourhood of The Hill for time out of mind, and
people considered them very respectable, not only because most of them were
rich, but also because they never had any adventures or did anything
unexpected: you could tell what a Baggins would say on any question without
the bother of asking him. This is a story of how a Baggins had an adventure,
found himself doing and saying things altogether unexpected. He may have lost
the neighbours' respect, but he gained- well, you will see whether he gained
anything in the end.
The mother of our particular hobbit ... what is a hobbit? I suppose
hobbits need some description nowadays, since they have become rare and shy of
the Big People, as they call us. They are (or were) a little people, about
half our height, and smaller than the bearded Dwarves. Hobbits have no beards.
There is little or no magic about them, except the ordinary everyday sort
which helps them to disappear quietly and quickly when large stupid folk like
you and me come blundering along, making a noise like elephants which they can
hear a mile off. They are inclined to be at in the stomach; they dress in
bright colours (chiefly green and yellow); wear no shoes, because their feet
grow natural leathery soles and thick warm brown hair like the stuff on their
heads (which is curly); have long clever brown fingers, good-natured faces,
and laugh deep fruity laughs (especially after dinner, which they have twice a
day when they can get it). Now you know enough to go on with. As I was saying,
the mother of this hobbit - of Bilbo Baggins, that is - was the fabulous
Belladonna Took, one of the three remarkable daughters of the Old Took, head
of the hobbits who lived across The Water, the small river that ran at the
foot of The Hill. It was often said (in other families) that long ago one of
the Took ancestors must have taken a fairy wife. That was, of course, absurd,
but certainly there was still something not entirely hobbit-like about them, -
and once in a while members of the Took-clan would go and have adventures.
They discreetly disappeared, and the family hushed it up; but the fact
remained that the Tooks were not as respectable as the Bagginses, though they
were undoubtedly richer. Not that Belladonna Took ever had any adventures
after she became Mrs. Bungo Baggins
