I'm reading The Hobbit to my wife and my 4-month baby girl, too! Well, more like reading it to my wife, anyway. And JRRT definitely goes put of his way to explain that Hobbits are really stealthy people.

I'm doing the same for my kids, but I'm a bit further along. Another few quotes...

"Hobbits are not quite like ordinary people; and after all if their
holes are nice cheery places and properly aired, quite different from the
tunnels of the goblins, still they are more used to tunnelling than we are,
and they do not easily lose their sense of direction underground-not when
their heads have recovered from being bumped. Also they can move very
quietly, and hide easily, and recover wonderfully from falls and bruises,
and they have a fund of wisdom and wise sayings that men have mostly never
heard or have forgotten long ago."

"Having made up his mind he crept along as cleverly as he could. Hobbits are
clever at quietness, especially in woods, as I have already told you; also
Bilbo had slipped on his ring before he started. That is why the spiders
neither saw nor heard him coming."

and one last big one...

"Old Smaug is weary and asleep," he thought. "He can't, see me and he
won't hear me. Cheer up Bilbo!" He had forgotten or had never heard about
dragons' sense of smell.

Quote from: jhkim;621709"There is little or no magic about [hobbits], except the ordinary everyday sort which helps them to disappear quietly and quickly when large stupid folk like you and me come blundering along, making a noise like an elephant which they can hear a mile off." [...]Again, highlights that the narrator is not a hobbit.

That's also the first passage that came to my mind upon reading the OP. Not sure if the source was already given, but it's from the opening pages of the LotR, the introduction 'On Hobbits'.

The later parts of The Hobbit, with Bilbo sneaking into Smaug's lair (and only his odour revealing his presence to the dragon) are hard to assess because... well... by that point the protagonist was equipped with a level 30 ring of invisibility.

See, I always got the impression from Tolkien that hobbits were not stealthy by nature, but were often overlooked and ignored due to their stature. They were more or less an 'everyman' of Middle-Earth and easily forgotten.

Quote from: jeff37923;621728See, I always got the impression from Tolkien that hobbits were not stealthy by nature, but were often overlooked and ignored due to their stature. They were more or less an 'everyman' of Middle-Earth and easily forgotten.

That's obviously the literary implication he was trying to make.  It doesn't change the emulative function of that in the world.

RPGPundit

Quote from: jhkim;621709"There is little or no magic about [hobbits], except the ordinary everyday sort which helps them to disappear quietly and quickly when large stupid folk like you and me come blundering along, making a noise like an elephant which they can hear a mile off."

(Besides stating the stealthiness of all hobbits, this quote shows that the book is not narrated by Bilbo or another hobbit.  The narrator is the author. Bilbo writes a similar book in the fiction, but this version of the story is told by a human.)  

In the part about the trolls:

"But at any rate hobbits can move quietly in the wood, absolutely quietly.  They take pride in it, and Bilbo had sniffed more than once at what he called "all this dwarvish racket," as they went along, though I don't suppose you or I would have noticed anything at all on a windy night, not if the whole cavalcade had passed two feet off.  As for Bilbo walking primly towards the red light, I don't suppose even a weasel would have stirred a whisker at it.  So, naturally, he got right up to the fire - for fire it was - without disturbing anyone."  

Again, highlights that the narrator is not a hobbit.

Perhaps I should have typed it out. Thanks.

Quote from: Sacrosanct;621336With the release of the B/X stuff, there seems to be a renewed discussion around halflings and if they should have thief skills too because Bilbo was stealthy.  But was he really?  I admit it's been a while since I read the book, but I don't recall him being stealthy at all until after he got the ring (which would make anyone stealthy).  His big attempt at stealth was an utter failure (the trolls).  Just because Gandalf said, "No one might notice a hobbit", is that justification that halflings are extra stealthy?

Part of it, I think, is that when they called the calss "thief" there was immediate associations with Bilbo's title as "Burgler" in the Hobbit. The introduction of the Thief Class was also the time that quite a bit of influx of Tolkien influences were added to the game. From the other side of it, Tolkien's implication and basis for Hobbits, "Hobs" from English folkore (also called Brownies, hobgoblins etc), were the house spirits of Britain. The assumption si ultimately this is what happened to the hobbits: they became stealthy spirits of hearth and home as magic diappears from the wolrd and Middengard becomes our Earth. Just as the elves eventually became the spirits he wrote of in Smith of Wotton Major.

I prefer lately to think of halflings as vicious little bastards rather than the folksy charm of Tolkien's hobbit.

My favorite quote on the subject comes not from Tolkien but from the parody book "Bored of the Ring" where it say something along the lines of "The hobbits sent a company of sling-wielding snipers to participate in the last great war, but nobody knew which side they were on".

Those are my halflings.

RPGPundit

Quote from: RPGPundit;622721I prefer lately to think of halflings as vicious little bastards rather than the folksy charm of Tolkien's hobbit.

My favorite quote on the subject comes not from Tolkien but from the parody book "Bored of the Ring" where it say something along the lines of "The hobbits sent a company of sling-wielding snipers to participate in the last great war, but nobody knew which side they were on".

Those are my halflings.

RPGPundit

I like the Warhammer Fantasy (1st edition Halflings) which are close to that, being almost a perfect counterpart to Discworld's "Nobby Nobbs"; dirty, grimy little bastards that will steal your food when your not looking.

I never really liked the Tolkien Hobbit until I played Lord of the Rings Online. The Shire in the game is hilarious.

Quote from: RPGPundit;622721I prefer lately to think of halflings as vicious little bastards rather than the folksy charm of Tolkien's hobbit.

My favorite quote on the subject comes not from Tolkien but from the parody book "Bored of the Ring" where it say something along the lines of "The hobbits sent a company of sling-wielding snipers to participate in the last great war, but nobody knew which side they were on".

Those are my halflings.

RPGPundit

In a 3.5 game I ran. The only requirement I had of the players was that they play halflings. Otherwise I cast open the floodgates. I allowed everything and anything. We ended up with a halfling druid with eerie magic powers, a half dragon/half halfling, and a pair of halfling barbarian old timey circus strongmen.

Quote from: thedungeondelver;621650"'e're now 'oo are you?"

Troll's purses are mischief, and this one was no exception.

Quote from: RPGPundit;622721I prefer lately to think of halflings as vicious little bastards rather than the folksy charm of Tolkien's hobbit.

My favorite quote on the subject comes not from Tolkien but from the parody book "Bored of the Ring" where it say something along the lines of "The hobbits sent a company of sling-wielding snipers to participate in the last great war, but nobody knew which side they were on".

Those are my halflings.

RPGPundit

Mine too.  In my Homebrew Altus Adventum setting, halflings are very similar to Roman legions, using great feats of teamwork and strategy to slice the hell out of any enemy.  I believe one of their racial traits was that any ally within 10' gains a +1 to hit due to the tactical leadership of the halfling.

Quote from: Sacrosanct;622802Mine too.  In my Homebrew Altus Adventum setting, halflings are very similar to Roman legions, using great feats of teamwork and strategy to slice the hell out of any enemy.  I believe one of their racial traits was that any ally within 10' gains a +1 to hit due to the tactical leadership of the halfling.

That's not really related to what I was implying in my quote.. I really don't think of halflings as tactical geniuses...

RPGPundit

Quote from: RPGPundit;622993That's not really related to what I was implying in my quote.. I really don't think of halflings as tactical geniuses...

RPGPundit

I meant the similarity that they are less rotound stealthy happy go lucky hobbits, and more bloodthirsty killers