LotR -- Book 1 - Chapter 04 – A Short Cut to Mushrooms

[Thinlómien]

Fourteen, you say? Frodo, Sam & Pippin + Mr & Mrs Maggot + three daughters + two sons + one farmhand + three dogs. Makes sense, doesn't it?

A bit more seriously though, I always liked this chapter as well. While other posters on this thread have mainly considered it a humorous chapter, I must say I think it is partly one of the scariest in the book.

I mean, look at these quotes:

Ho! Ho! Ho! they began again louder. They stopped short suddenly. Frodo sprang to his feet. A long-drawn wail came down the wind, like the cry of some evil and lonely creature. It rose and fell, and ended on a high piercing note. Even as they sat and stood, as if suddenly frozen, it was answered by another cry, fainter and further off, but no less chilling to the blood. There was then a silence, broken only by the sound of the wind in the leaves.

"It was not bird or beast," said Frodo. "It was a call, or a signal - there were words in that cry, though I could not catch them. But no hobbit has such a voice."

Every time I read them, they just make a chill run down my spine. They must be among the creepiest passages in the whole book.

Also, the episode of Merry The Black Rider is very scary. I remember when my father read LotR aloud to me and my little sister when we were about 6 and 4 years old and that passage was simply horror. I was sure the Black Riders had finally found them and I was so relieved when it turned out that the rider was Merry. The passage is very impressive - especially as when something is read aloud to you, you can't even accidentally see the next phrases that reveal the truth.