Disappear! We have got to get busy very quick, if that is to happen!”
     Balin was told off to watch the guard and the butler and give warning
if they stirred. The rest went into the adjoining cellar with the
trapdoors.
     There was little time to lose. Before long, as Bilbo knew, some elves
were under orders to come down and help the butler get the empty
barrels through the doors into the stream. These were in fact already
standing in rows in the middle of the floor waiting to be pushed off.
Some of them were wine-barrels, and these were not much use, as they
could not easily be opened at the end without a deal of noise, nor
could they easily be secured again. But among them were several others
which had been used for bringing other stuffs, butter,
     They soon found thirteen with room enough for a dwarf in each. In fact
some were too roomy, and as they climbed in the dwarves thought
anxiously of the shaking and the bumping they would get inside, though
Bilbo did his best to find straw and other stuff to pack them in as
cosily as could be managed in a short time. At last twelve dwarves
were stowed. Thorin had given a lot of trouble, and turned and twisted
in his tub and grumbled like a large dog in a small kennel; while
Balin, who came last, made a great fuss about his air-holes and said