Underage Magic during war & at the MoM

[eloiseherisson at aol.com]

No: HPFGUIDX 93817

Eloise:
> > Who also wonders why there was no immediate consequence to the Ton
>> Tongue Toffee incident, which *was* a piece of underage magic
>> performed on a Muggle in a house which seems closely monitored. 

Carol: 
> I'm still not convinced that the MoM knows *who* is performing the
> magic, but Arthur must have had some way of covering up his own spells
> for "sorting out" the problem--or possibly he informed the MoM that
> he'd be picking up Harry that day, so they knew that an adult wizard
> would be in the house and magic that day could be ignored. 

Eloise:
Good point. Perhaps this *was* the cover, although it doesn't necessarily 
cover for the Statute of Secrecy. But perhaps Arthur, because of his work, has 
some sort of exemption there.

Carol: 
As for the
> candy that Fred dropped, Dudley's picking it up and eating it was not
> an act of underage magic. The magic to create it had already been
> performed, either at Hogwarts or The Burrow, where so much magic is
> being performed all the time that F and G's high jinks probably go
> unnoticed. 

Eloise:
Ooh! You should work for the MOM! 
I think it's a nice distinction, personally. The magic *to create the toffee* 
had been performed somewhere else, but the *application* of the magic stored, 
as it were, inside the toffee, happened in Privet Drive and on a Muggle.

Carol: 
> Also, even though magic was performed in the house on that day (and
> the MoM didn't necessarily know who performed it), no Muggles other
> than the Dursleys were present. As someone (Viridis?) pointed out, the
> MoM must know that the Dursleys know that Harry is a wizard. 

Eloise:
I did too, I think. 
But we're back to the beginning, here. The hover charm was performed *out of 
sight* of any Muggles, even of the Dursleys (it "risked notice" by Muggles) 
and the MOM didn't know and apparently didn't care who performed it. The fact 
that the charm was performed was enough to get Harry a warning.

Carol: 
<snip>
> Again, the Ton-tongue toffee incident wasn't technically underage
> magic but it did lead to magic being performed in the house. Either
> Arthur had some way of covering it up, as I think he must have, or the
> MoM knew the magic wasn't Harry's, which doesn't fit with the Dobby
> incident.

Eloise:
Exactly my point. What I was getting at was that the response to the other 
incidences was so swift. You would almost have expected Malfalda Hopkirk's owl 
to be swooping in before Arthur could set things right. I think there are some 
loose ends here and that Arthur having informed the Ministry of his visit is 
the only thing that goes any way towards explaining it. 

~Eloise



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