Chapter Six The Journey from Platform Nine and Three-Quarters

Summary

(Harry rides the Hogwarts express to school and makes friends with Ron.)

Uncle Vernon drops Harry off at King’s Cross Station, and Harry begins to panic about trying to find the elusive Platform 9 ¾. Fortunately, Harry runs into the Weasley family and they help him walk through the wall that leads to Platform 9 ¾. Harry meets most of the Weasley family and shares a compartment with Ron when he gets on the train. Harry tells Ron about his life and Ron tells Harry about how he feels overshadowed by his older brothers’ accomplishments. Harry buys a load of sweets for the train ride and in one of the Chocolate Frogs he finds a wizard trading card with Albus Dumbledore on it.

A girl named Hermione stops by the compartment and tells the boys that sheÂ’s read all her textbooks already. After she leaves, Ron mentions to Harry that he heard about a break-in at Gringotts. Ron then tells Harry about Quidditch. Malfoy, flanked by his bully friends Crabbe and Goyle, stops by the compartment to see if Harry Potter really is on the train. Ron and Draco almost get in a fight after Draco insults RonÂ’s family, but Scabbers fends the three intruders off by biting GoyleÂ’s hand.

After those three leave, the train arrives at Hogwarts and Hagrid rounds up all the first-years. Hagrid puts the first- years into four-man boats, and Harry and Ron share a boat with Neville and Hermione. The fleet makes its way across the school lake towards Hogwarts castle and soon reaches the shore. The first-years then leave their boats and make their way up the school steps.

KingÂ’s Cross is an actual train station in London which has routes that run up to Scotland.

Fred and George Weasley call Mrs. Weasley “Mom,” while in the British version they call her “Mum.” “The only thing I was uncomfortable about was that an American copy editor changed all the ‘mums’ to ‘moms,’ and I just wasn’t happy with that. Mrs. Weasley is not a ‘mom.’ So that’s been reversed and they’ve been kept as ‘mums’ for the other books.” (Conversations, 52)

Scabbers, like many of RonÂ’s possessions, is a hand-me-down because his family is poor. But although Harry is now rich with wizard money, Harry can relate to Ron because Harry is as poor in the MugglesÂ’ world as Ron is in the wizardsÂ’ world.

Famous Witches and Wizards Cards - Agrippa, Morgana, Hengist of Woodcroft, Alberic Grunnion, Circe, Paracelsus, Merlin, and Cliodna.

Heinrich Agrippa was from Renaissance Germany. The Church accused him of heresy and jailed him after he wrote On Occult Philosophy, his 1529 book that used Hebrew and Greek texts to show that magic was the best connection to God.

Hengist was a Saxon.

Philippus Paracelsus was a Swiss chemist during the 1500s who was labeled as a sorcerer for his study of alchemy and divination.

Merlin is the wizard of the King Arthur legends. Just as Dumbledore hid baby Harry from Voldemort by giving him to the Dursleys, Merlin hid baby Arthur with Sir Anton.

Cliodna is the goddess of beauty, the afterlife, and the sea from Irish mythology.

Marcus Vipsanius was a Roman statesman who helped Augustus defeat Antony.

Morgan le Fay is the sorceress of Arthurian legend.

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