The Count left Annuminas by the Barrière d'Utumne, and flew to the Tower of Minas-à-Nord, which afforded a charming view of Terre-moyenne. Northward tourists might look, and see the Carrot (or the Snowman Channel, as the Forodois in their arrogance call it); westward they looked and saw the beaches of the Numatic; to the east, the cheese-farms of Brie, the delightful if sinister chalets of Rivendeau and the cross-beamed hotels of the dwargues; to the south, the azure coasts and tobacco-plantations of the Farthing-Midi. However, the Count had not come for sightseeing. He entered a small wooden door, and found himself in a miniature garden, whose flowers glowed red and golden: snap-dragons and sunflowers, and nasturtiums trailing all over the turf walls. Never had Yavanne, the laughing and fresh goddess of our good elvish gardeners, and the greatest connoisseur of cigars in the Elder Days, known so minutious and pure a cult as in that little enclosure. Its only flaw was that it was infested with dormice, March hares, and mad hatters.
Suddenly Monte Fato came across a bonhobbite of some fifty years, who was gathering mushrooms.
"You are gathering your harvest, monsieur?" said the Count with a smile.
"Pardon, monsieur," said the bonhobbite. "Gardening is my passion."
The Count conquered the bonhobbite's soul by helping to pick mushrooms.
"Were you here to see the palantir?" asked the bonhobbite.
