[Nurumaiel]

Blanco grimaced horribly, twisting his mouth, scrunching his nose, and squinting his eyes, which made Posco grinned in an embarrassed way. "Relatives," Blanco groaned. "What business do folk from Buckland have moving to Bywater, anyway? Of course it was good to get her away. I'd rather have to go visit her once in awhile than have her at my doorstep every day."

Toby smiled in an amused, puzzled way. "Who is this 'her?'"

"My aunt Malva. She's terrible and hideous. The way she finds fault in every thing a poor hobbit does. I can't begin to express my annoyance when she sniffs and turns up her nose when we go out to our local inn. 'How hideous to go to a filthy inn and drink filthy ale!' she cries. Poor Posco here can't get on her good side. He's always getting dirty; perhaps you've noticed. She loathes it. 'Posco dear...' by the way, it is awful the way she says 'dear.' 'Posco dear,' she says, 'you digust me with your filthy habits of wallowing in the dirt like your uncle's pigs!' Isn't that awful? Comparing dear Posco to a pig! We recently got a letter from her saying that she desired her 'dear and beloved nephews' to come visit her here in Bywater. We've been in misery for three whole days and we decided to run away for a night or two. Oh, and you must wonder why Marcho and Bingo are here. Marcho is because our mother, despite our very experienced age, didn't want us going all the way from Buckland to Bywater alone, so she had Marcho who is very old and wise take care of us. As for Bingo my aunt took a fancy to him because he's alway so sweet and polite. She enjoys making life miserable for him and seeing that he isn't in truth very miserable. At least she doesn't get upset when he bears all her unjust words patiently like she does with us. If I just smile at her she flies into a terrible rage." He rolled his eyes and buried his face in his mug, glowering.

Marcho grumbled almost inaudibly, "At least a cup of ale stops him from talking." Posco thought about their other aunts who were indescribably sweet and gentle. How did that one aunt get to be so awful? Let Blanco take care of the talking about it, though. Marcho was right; he did talk a lot, but ale did stop him.

He soon returned to his talking however, before Toby could put in a word of comment about the dreadful aunt. "Well, Mister Toby, what do you think of that?" he said. "She's awful!" He emphasized his point by slamming his mug on the table. "Do you have any aunts like that?"