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Chapter 8
THE SCOURING OF THE SHIRE
It was after nightfall when, wet and tired, the travellers came
at last to the Brandywine, and they found the way barred. At
either end of the Bridge there was a great spiked gate; and
on the further side of the river they could see that some new
houses had been built: two-storeyed with narrow straightsided
windows, bare and dimly lit, all very gloomy and un-
Shirelike.
They hammered on the outer gate and called, but there
was at first no answer; and then to their surprise someone
blew a horn, and the lights in the windows went out. A voice
shouted in the dark:
‘Who’s that? Be off ! You can’t come in. Can’t you read
the notice: No admittance between sundown and sunrise?’
‘Of course we can’t read the notice in the dark,’ Sam
shouted back. ‘And if hobbits of the Shire are to be kept out
in the wet on a night like this, I’ll tear down your notice when
I find it.’
At that a window slammed, and a crowd of hobbits with
lanterns poured out of the house on the left. They opened
the further gate, and some came over the bridge. When they
saw the travellers they seemed frightened.
‘Come along!’ said Merry, recognizing one of the hobbits.
‘If you don’t know me, Hob Hayward, you ought to. I am
Merry Brandybuck, and I should like to know what all this is
about, and what a Bucklander like you is doing here. You
used to be on the Hay Gate.’
‘Bless me! It’s Master Merry, to be sure, and all dressed
up for fighting!’ said old Hob. ‘Why, they said you was dead!
Lost in the Old Forest by all accounts. I’m pleased to see you
alive after all!’