goblins are so near that he smelt them,” he thought, “then they’ll
have heard his shrieking and cursing. Careful now, or this way will
lead you to worse things.”
     The passage was low and roughly made. It was not too difficult for the
hobbit, except when, in spite of all care, he stubbed his poor toes
again, several times, on nasty jagged stones in the floor. “A bit low
for goblins, at least for the big ones,” thought Bilbo, not knowing
that even the big ones, the ores of the mountains, go along at a great
speed stooping low with their hands almost on the ground.
     Soon the passage that had been sloping down began to go up again, and
after a while it climbed steeply. That slowed Bilbo down. But at last
the slope stopped, the passage turned a corner, and dipped down again,
and there, at the bottom of a short incline, he saw, filtering round
another corner-a glimpse of light. Not red light, as of fire or
lantern, but a pale out-of-doors sort of light. Then Bilbo began to
run.
     Scuttling as fast as his legs would carry him he turned the last
corner and came suddenly right into an open space, where the light,
after all that time in the dark, seemed dazzlingly bright. Really it
was only a leak of sunshine in through a doorway, where a great door,