his boat on to the shore to get at Bilbo.
     

 “Ugh!” he said, “it is cold and clammy!”-and so he guessed. “Fish!
Fish!” he cried. “It is fish!”
     Gollum was dreadfully disappointed; but Bilbo asked another riddle as
quick as ever be could, so that Gollum had to get back into his boat
and think.
     “No-legs lay on one-leg, two-legs sat near on three-legs, four-legs
got some.”
     It was not really the right time for this riddle, but Bilbo was in a
hurry. Gollum might have had some trouble guessing it, if he had asked
it at another time. As it was, talking of fish, “no-legs” was not so
very difficult, and after that the rest was easy. “Fish on a little
table, man at table sitting on a stool, the cat has the bones”-that of
course is the answer, and Gollum soon gave it. Then he thought the
time had come to ask something hard and horrible. This is what he
said:
     “This thing all things devours:
     Birds, beasts, trees, flowers;