This little part of the book confused me, also, when I stopped to think of it. Despite the explanation Gandalf gives that Bilbo didn't want to be thought of as a thief.
It's my understanding that later editions of the Hobbit were revised, so that the finding of the Ring would reflect the later events occurring in LoTR. I've never read an editon of the Hobbit published before the 1970s, so I have no comparison. But I suspected that the discussion of the "changing ring story" is in reference to passages in the Hobbit that have since been changed! [img]smilies/eek.gif[/img]
Are there any Tolkien collectors out there who have 1930s copies of The Hobbit, who can tell us if these early editions have a different version of the events then the later editions?
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