Harry exited the train and found himself on a small station with candle lite lamp post. There was a bobbing light approaching from the darkness calling out in a familiar voice. "Firs' years! Firs' years over here!" Hagrid shouted over the hustle and bustle. Harry quickly approached him. All right there, Harry?" Hagrid asked with a smile.
Harry nodded and fell in line with the other First Years. "C'mon, follow me. Anymore firs' years? Mind yer step, now!" Hagrid called out as he led them away from the train platform. "Firs' years follow me!" It was quite dark and equally as slippery as Hagrid led them down a narrow and steep path.
"Yeh'll get yer firs' sight o' Hogwarts in a sec," Hagrid called over his shoulder, "jus' round this
bend here."
Somewhere in front of Harry there was a loud "Oooooh!"The narrow path had opened suddenly onto the edge of a great black lake. Perched atop a high mountain on the other side, its windows sparkling in the starry sky, was a vast castle with many turrets and towers.
"No more'n four to a boat!" Hagrid called, pointing to a fleet of little boats sitting in the water by
the shore. Harry climbed into a boat with Blaise, Pansy, and Theodore. To their right they could see Draco in a boat with whom Harry assumed were Crabbe and Goyle. Rather large boys with dull expression on their faces.
.
"Everyone in?" shouted Hagrid, who had a boat to himself. "Right then, FORWARD!"
And the fleet of little boats moved off all at once, gliding across the lake, which was as smooth as glass. Everyone was silent, staring up at the great castle overhead. It towered over them as they sailed nearer and nearer to the cliff on which it stood.
"Heads down!" yelled Hagrid as the first boats reached the cliff; they all bent their heads and the little boats carried them through a curtain of ivy that hid a wide opening in the cliff face. They were carried along a dark tunnel, which seemed to be taking them right underneath the castle, until they reached a kind of underground harbor, where they clambered out onto rocks and pebbles.
Eventually they reached the massive double doors of Hogwarts. Hagrid raised a gigantic fist and knocked three times on the castle door. The door swung open at once. A tall, black-haired witch in emerald-green robes stood there. She had a very stern face and Harry's first thought was that this was not someone to cross. "The firs' years, Professor McGonagall," said Hagrid gesturing to them.
"Thank you, Hagrid. I will take them from here." said Professor McGonagall. Hagrid nodded and made his way.
She pulled the door wide. The entrance hall was so big you could have fit the whole of the Dursleys' house in it. The stone walls were lit with flaming torches like the ones at Gringotts, the ceiling was too high to make out, and a magnificent marble staircase facing them led to the upper floors.
They followed Professor McGonagall across the flagged stone floor. Harry could hear the drone of hundreds of voices from a doorway to the right. Harry assumed the rest of the school must already be here. Professor McGonagall showed the first years into a small, empty chamber off the hall. They crowded in, standing rather closer together than they would usually have done, peering about nervously.
"Welcome to Hogwarts," said Professor McGonagall. "The start-of-term banquet will begin shortly, but before you take your seats in the Great Hall, you will be sorted into your houses. The Sorting is a very important ceremony because, while you are here, your house will be something like your family within Hogwarts. You will have classes with the rest of your house, sleep in your house dormitory, and spend free time in your house common room."
"The four houses are called Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw, and Slytherin. Each house has its own noble history and each has produced outstanding witches and wizards. While you are at Hogwarts, your triumphs will earn your house points, while any rule breaking will lose house
points. At the end of the year, the house with the most points is awarded the house cup, a great
honor. I hope each of you will be a credit to whichever house becomes yours.
"The Sorting Ceremony will take place in a few minutes in front of the rest of the school. I
suggest you all smarten yourselves up as much as you can while you are waiting." McGonagall said looking them all over.
"I shall return when we are ready for you," said Professor McGonagall. "Please wait quietly."
She left the chamber. Harry swallowed. Blaise and Theodore had explained earlier that the Sorting was some sort of enchanted Hat that would read your mind and personality.
After a brief introduction to some of the school's resident ghost Professor McGonagall returned. One by one, the ghosts floated away through the opposite wall. "Now, form a line," Professor McGonagall told the first years, "and follow me." Feeling oddly as though his legs had turned to lead, Harry got into line behind a boy with sandy hair, with Pansy behind him, and they walked out of the chamber, back across the hall, and through a pair of double doors into the Great Hall.
Harry had never even imagined such a strange and splendid place. It was lit by thousands and thousands of candles that were floating in midair over four long tables, where the rest of the students were sitting. These tables were laid with glittering golden plates and goblets. At the top of the hall was another long table where the teachers were sitting. Professor McGonagall led the first years up here, so that they came to a halt in a line facing the other students, with the teachers behind them. The hundreds of faces staring at them looked like pale lanterns in the flickering candlelight. Dotted here and there among the students, the ghosts shone misty silver. Mainly to avoid all the staring eyes, Harry looked upward and saw a velvety black ceiling dotted with stars.
He heard someone behind him whisper, "It's bewitched to look like the sky outside. I read about it in Hogwarts, A History." It was hard to believe there was a ceiling there at all, and that the Great Hall didn't simply open on to the heavens. Harry quickly looked down again as Professor McGonagall silently placed a four-legged stool in front of the first years. On top of the stool she put a pointed wizard's hat. This hat was patched and frayed and extremely dirty. Aunt Petunia wouldn't have let it in the house.
Noticing that everyone in the hall was now staring at the hat, he stared at it, too. For a few seconds, there was complete silence. Then the hat twitched. A rip near the brim opened wide like a mouth — and the hat began to sing:
"Oh, you may not think I'm pretty,
But don't judge on what you see,
I'll eat myself if you can find
A smarter hat than me.
You can keep your bowlers black,
Your top hats sleek and tall,
For I'm the Hogwarts Sorting Hat
And I can cap them all.
There's nothing hidden in your head
The Sorting Hat can't see,
So try me on and I will tell you
Where you ought to be.
You might belong in Gryffindor,
Where dwell the brave at heart,
Their daring, nerve, and chivalry
Set Gryffindors apart;
You might belong in Hufflepuff,
Where they are just and loyal,
Those patient Hufflepuffs are true
And unafraid of toil;
Or yet in wise old Ravenclaw,
if you've a ready mind,
Where those of wit and learning,
Will always find their kind;
Or perhaps in Slytherin
You'll make your real friends,
Those cunning folk use any means
To achieve their ends.
So put me on! Don't be afraid!
And don't get in a flap!
You're in safe hands (though I have none)
For I'm a Thinking Cap!"
The whole hall burst into applause as the hat finished its song. It bowed to each of the four tables and then became quite still again. Professor McGonagall now stepped forward holding a long roll of parchment.
"When I call your name, you will put on the hat and sit on the stool to be sorted," she said.
"Abbott, Hannah!"
A pink-faced girl with blonde pigtails stumbled out of line, put on the hat, which fell right down over her eyes, and sat down. A moments pause —
"HUFFLEPUFF!" shouted the hat.
The table on the right cheered and clapped as Hannah went to sit down at the Hufflepuff table. Harry saw the ghost of the Fat Friar waving merrily at her.
"Bones, Susan!"
"HUFFLEPUFF!" shouted the hat again, and Susan scuttled off to sit next to Hannah.
"Boot, Terry!"
"RAVENCLAW!"
The table second from the left clapped this time; several Ravenclaws stood up to shake hands with Terry as he joined them.
"Brocklehurst, Mandy" went to Ravenclaw too, but "Brown, Lavender" became the first new Gryffindor, and the table on the far left exploded with cheers; Harry could see the same redheaded twins from Kings Cross catcalling.
"Bulstrode, Millicent" then became a Slytherin. He heard murmurs of agreement from Blaise and Draco. He was starting to feel definitely sick now. He remembered being picked for teams during gym at his old school. He had always been last to be chose, not because he was no good, but because no one wanted Dudley to think they liked him.
"Finch-Fletchley, Justin!"
"HUFFLEPUFF!"
Sometimes, Harry noticed, the hat shouted out the house at once, but at others it took a little while to decide. "Finnigan, Seamus," the sandy-haired boy next to Harry in the line, sat on the stool for almost a whole minute before the hat declared him a Gryffindor.
"Granger, Hermione!"
"GRYFFINDOR!" shouted the hat.
A horrible thought struck Harry, as horrible thoughts always do when you're very nervous. What if he wasn't chosen at all? What if he just sat there with the hat over his eyes for ages, until Professor McGonagall jerked it off his head and said there had obviously been a mistake and he'd better get back on the train?
When Neville Longbottom, the boy who kept losing his toad, was called, he fell over on his way
to the stool. The hat took a long time to decide with Neville. When it finally shouted, "GRYFFINDOR," Neville ran off still wearing it, and had to jog back amid gales of laughter to give it to "MacDougal, Morag."
Draco swaggered forward when his name was called and got his wish at once: the hat had barely touched his head when it screamed, "SLYTHERIN!" Malfoy went to join Crabbe and Goyle, looking pleased with himself.
There weren't many people left now. "Moon"... ,
"Nott, Theodore"...
"SLYTHERIN"
"Parkinson, Pansy"... ,
"SLYTHERIN"
Then a pair of twin girls, "Patil" and "Patil"... , then "Perks, Sally-Anne"... , and then, at last —
"Potter, Harry!"
As Harry stepped forward and the whispering began. "Potter, did she say?". "The Harry Potter?"
The last thing Harry saw before the hat dropped over his eyes was the hall full of people craning to get a good look at him. Next second he was looking at the black inside of the hat. He waited. "Hmm," said a small voice in his ear. "Difficult. Very difficult. Plenty of courage, I see. Not a bad mind either. There's talent, A my goodness, yes — and a nice thirst to prove yourself, now that's interesting... So where shall I put you?"
Harry gripped the edges of the stool and thought over and over again. 'Slytherin, Slytherin'
"Slytherin, eh?" said the small voice. "Ah, I see. You've got yourself friends there. But what about Gryffindor. You'd be a great wizard in Gryffindor, you know, it's all here in your head, and Gryffindor could be a home away from, oh, I see, any home would be better. But you're dead set on Slytherin, no doubt about that. Well, if you're sure. Better be SLYTHERIN!"
CHAPTER END