Bree to Weathertop

I am falling woefully behind on my reading. I was hoping to cover one book a month in the History of Middle-earth series. I was able to get slightly ahead of schedule by starting The Return of the Shadow in May; but here we are on July 10th and I am not quite half-way through. I must pick up the pace a bit and grind through the journey much like Bingo and his friends are currently doing.

I've covered the leg of the journey from Bree (the night of the attack on the Inn) to Weathertop (Trotter spies the Black Riders approaching). Minus the finer details (timelines, distances, names of characters) it is very similar to what is written in The Fellowship of the Ring. That makes for a dry blog entry but a chance to make up some days in the journey (I feel dismayed like Bingo who can't quite seem to catch up to Gandalf). I will highlight a couple items that stood out to me:

• Clearly Bree is a hobbit village; even Bill Ferny is referred to has a hobbit.
• The ponies of Bingo and friends are driven away in the Inn attack and found there way to Fatty Lumpkin (Tom Bombadil's pony). Two interesting things: Tom, fearing something happened to Bingo, went to Bree to learn what he could. And Fatty was quite pleased for he now had friends to share his stories and workload with. There are glimpses of some of Tolkien's thoughts on fairy stories to be found in his work--like animals talking and thinking
• Bingo comments on his shrining waistline quipping he'll become a wraith before long. "'Don't speak of such things!' said Trotter quickly, and with surprising earnestness" (p. 168, The Return of the Shadow).