The Treason of Isengard (11 page)

At the same moment, [struck out: from the direction of the Ferry,] another horse came thundering along the lane. As it passed the gate a horn rang out.(23) It rent the night like fire on a hill-top... [@ c. as before] Far away answering horns were heard; the alarm was spreading. Buckland was aroused.

But the Black Riders rode like a gale to the North Gate. Let the little people blow! Sauron would deal with them later. In the meanwhile they had earned his thanks: Baggins was caught like a fox in a hole. They rode down the watchmen, leaped the gate, and vanished.

And that is how Hamilcar Bolger first crossed the Brandywine Bridge.

This version evidently belongs with the story in the time-scheme D

(p. 12), where on September 29 'the Riders attack Crickhollow and carry off Ham, pursued by Gandalf' - although there this took place at midnight, whereas here it was 'the cold hour before dawn'. Gandalf arrived just too late, and (and as will appear later) thought that it was Frodo who had been taken; but the further story of Hamilcar Bolger must be briefly postponed (see pp. 68 ff.).

Frodo's 'dream of the tower' had been removed from the night at Bree to the night at Crickhollow (see pp. 33 - 6), and his sleep at Bree is now described as it is in FR: 'his dreams were again troubled with the noise of wind and of galloping hoofs ... far off he heard a horn blowing wildly.'

New writing (i.e. replacement of the 'third phase' manuscript) continues as far as the departure of the hobbits with Trotter from Bree and their coming into open country. At this stage Folco was still Folco, not Pippin; but the text of FR (pp. 189 - 93) was reached in all but trifling details.(24) The later story of Merry's ponies now appears, changed from the earlier (VI.164) in which Tom Bombadil, when he found them, went to the inn at Bree to find out what had happened to the hobbits, and paid Mr Butterbur for the ponies; the relationship between Bombadil and Butterbur had been abandoned (pp. 10, 37).

From the point where the companions saw the houses and hobbit-holes of Staddle on their left (FR p. 193) the 'third phase' manuscript was retained, and lightly corrected, as far as the arrival of Trotter, Frodo, and Merry on the summit of Weathertop. As the manuscript stood at this stage the text of FR was very nearly attained, but some additions were later: such as the lights in the eastward sky seen from the Midgewater Marshes, the burnt turf and blackened stones on the summit of Weathertop, and the ring of ancient stonework about it; apparently the alteration of Trotter's remark that 'not all the rangers are to be trusted, nor all the birds and beasts', which goes back to the original form of the story (VI.167), to 'not all the birds are to be trusted, and there are other spies more evil than they are' was also a much later change. Strider's account in FR (p. 197) of the great watchtower on Weathertop and its ruin is not entered on the manuscript at all, an J the text remains here unchanged from its earliest form (VI.169, 355). Sam's song of Gil-galad was written at this time, and entered into the manuscript.(25)

On the summit of Weathertop the old story underwent an important change. Gandalf's message on a paper that fluttered from the cairn of stones (VI.170, 355) has gone, and the text of FR (p. 199) is reached (without, as already noted, any mention of a fire: the stone on which the marks were found was not 'flatter than the others, and whiter, as if it had escaped the fire', but 'smaller than the others, and of different colour, as if it had been rubbed clean'). The scratches on the stone were X: IIII (the Old English G-rune still being used), interpreted to mean that Gandalf had been there on 4 October. The marks were however changed to read X: I.III, and a new passage was inserted (and subsequently rejected):

'But there's a dot between the first 1 and the next three,' said Sam poring over the stone. 'It doesn't say G.4, but G.1.3.'

'Quite right!' agreed Trotter. 'Then if Gandalf made these marks, it might mean that he was here from the first to the third; or perhaps that he and another were here on the third.'

This is odd, because Sam stayed down in the dell and did not go up to the summit of Weathertop; moreover this inserted discussion takes place at the summit, so that it is no help to suppose that Trotter brought the stone down with him to the dell. - Later, the marks were changed again to X:III.

To Frodo's 'It would be a great comfort to know that he was on the way to Rivendell' Trotter replies simply: 'It would indeed! But in any case, as he is not here himself, we must look after ourselves, and make our own way to Rivendell as best we can.' In answer to Merry's question 'How far is Rivendell?' Trotter at first replied very much as in the original version (VI.171), but distinguished between three weeks in fair weather and a month in foul weather from Brandywine Bridge to the Ford, and concludes: 'So we have at least twelve days' journey before us,(26) and very likely a fortnight or more.' This was rejected in the act of writing and the text of FR substituted, in which Trotter states the time it took from Weathertop to the Ford without comput-ing it so elaborately: 'twelve days from here to the Ford of Bruinen, where the Road crosses the Loudwater that runs out of Rivendell.'

In the 'third phase' the chapter ended with Trotter, Frodo, and Merry slipping down from the summit, and the next chapter began with 'Sam and Folco had not been idle' (in the dell). In the new version the chapter continues, and as in FR includes the attack by the Black Riders. The passage opens exactly as in FR (p. 201), and Gandalf s supplies of cram, bacon, and dried fruits (VI.357) have gone, but Trotter has different things to report from his examination of the tracks in the dell, and he does not assert that Rangers had been there recently, and that it was they who had left the firewood.

'It is just as I feared,' he said when he came back. 'Sam and Folco [) Pippin] have trampled the soft ground, and the marks are spoilt or confused. There has been somebody here in boots lately, which means somebody who is not a Ranger, but that is all I can say for certain. But I don't quite like it: it looks as if there had been more than one pair of boots.' To each of the hobbits there came the thought of the cloaked and booted riders. If they had already found the dell, the sooner Trotter took them somewhere else the better. But Trotter was still considering the meaning of the footprints.

'There was also something even more strange,' he went on: 'I think there are hobbit-tracks, too: only I can't now be sure that there is a third set, different from Folco's [> Pippin's] and Sam's.'

'But there aren't any hobbits in this part of the world, are there?' said Merry.

'There are four here now,' answered Trotter, 'and one more can't be called impossible; but I have no idea what that would mean.'

'It might mean that these black fellows have got the poor wretch as a prisoner,' said Sam. He viewed the bare dell with great dislike...

Sam's remark is of course a mere surmise, and he speaks without any particular reference: boots and hobbit-tracks merely suggest the possibility that the Riders might have a hobbit with them. But though Trotter's remarks are inconclusive, and within the narrative inten-tionally so, it is obvious that the story of Hamilcar Bolger's ride with Gandalf is present here.

Merry's question to Trotter beginning 'Can the Riders see?' now takes the same form as in FR (p. 202), and Trotter's reply is similar but less elaborate.(29)

In this text, as noted above, Trotter does not say anything about its being a Rangers' camp in the dell, and the firewood is left unexplained.

Where in FR he says simply: 'Let us take this wood that is set ready for the fire as a sign', here he adds: 'Whoever left it, brought it and put it here for a purpose; for there are no trees near. Either he meant to return, or thought that friends in need might follow him. There is little shelter or defence here, but fire will make up for both. Fire is our friend in the wilderness.'(30)

The passage in the previous version (VI.358) describing Trotter's tales as they sat by the fire in the dell was changed, presumably at this time, to its reduced form in FR (p. 203); and his story of Beren and Luthien now appears in the form that it has in FR (pp. 205 - 6). The song itself is missing; but the final form was apparently achieved at this time, since it is found written out roughly but in finished composition among draft papers of this period.(31)

Chapter XII: 'Flight to the Ford'.

This chapter was constituted from the existing text, with replacement of some pages; but in this case the whole manuscript was kept together.

Folco is still Folco in the passages of new writing, but was corrected to Pippin or Peregrin throughout.

The River Hoarwell or Mitheithel, and the Last Bridge, have now emerged, and the Ettenmoors and Ettendales (32) of FR (the Dimrilldale(s) of the 'third phase') are now the Entish Lands and Entish Dales (see p. 10 and note 14, and p. 14 and note 18). The 'Riven River' or

'Rivendell River' of the 'third phase' (VI.360) is now the Loudwater or Bruinen (note 27); and Trotter tells his companions that the Hoarwell joins the Loudwater away in the South: 'Some call it the Greyflood after that' (FR p. 212).

Trotter finds the elf-stone in the mud on the Last Bridge; but the passage in which he speaks of the country to the north of the Road remains virtually as it was in the earliest form of the story (VI.192 - 3; cf.

FR p. 214): he does not say that he once dwelt in Rivendell, and the history of Angmar and the North Kingdom had not emerged (cf. pp.

37, 56).

The removal of the names 'Bert' and 'William' from the Stone Trolls was also a later decision; but it was now that Sam's 'Troll Song' was introduced (after some hesitation). My father's original intention had been to have Bingo sing it at The Prancing Pony (see VI.142, notes 11

and 12), and he had made a rough, uncompleted version for that occasion, developed and much changed from the original Leeds song The Root of the Boot of the 1920s (given in Vol. VI, see pp. 142 - 4).(33) The 'Troll Song' is found here in three distinct and carefully written versions, beside much rough working; the third version was taken up into the manuscript. The 'Bree' version, which I did not print in Vol. VI, was already much closer to the first of these than to The Root of the Boot, from which my father rejected all such references as 'churchyard',

'aureole', 'wore black on a Sunday', etc. I give the first text here, in the form in which it was written out fair in ink; there are many pencilled variants, here ignored. For the development of the second and third versions see note 35.

In The Root of the Boot the Troll's opponent was named Tom, and his uncle John; in the 'Bree' version he was John, and his uncle Jim, with John changed back to Tom while the text was being worked on.

In all three of the present texts the names are John and Jim, as they still were when my father sang the song to Mr and Mrs George Sayer at Malvern in 1952;(34) in FR they are Tom and his uncle Tim.

A troll sat alone on his seat of stone,

And munched and mumbled a bare old bone;

For many a year he had gnawed it near,

And sat there hard and hungry.

Tongue dry! Wrung dry!

For many a year he had gnawed it near

And sat there hard and hungry.

Then up came John with his big boots on.

Said he to the troll: 'Pray, what is yon?

For it looks like the shin o' my nuncle Jim,

As went to walk on the mountain.

Huntin'! Countin'!

It looks like the shin o' my nuncle Jim,

As went to walk on the mountain.'

'My lad,' said the troll, 'this bone I stole;

But what be bones that lie in a hole?

Thy nuncle were dead as a lump o' lead,

Before I found his carkis.

Hark'ee! Mark'ee!

Thy nuncle were dead as a lump o' lead,

Before I found his carkis.'

Said John: I doan t see why the likes o thee

Without axin' leave should go makin' free

With the leg or the shin o' my kith and my kin,

So hand the old bone over!

Rover! Trover!

So give me the shin o' my kith and my kin,

And hand the old bone over!'

'For a couple o' pins,' says the troll, and grins,

'I'll eat thee too, and gnaw thy shins.

A bit o' fresh meat will go down sweet,

And thee shall join thy nuncle!

Sunk well! Drunk well!

A bit o' fresh meat u ill go down sweet,

And thee shall join thy nuncle.'

But just as he thought his dinner was caught,

He found his hands had hold of naught;

But he caught a kick both hard and quick,

For John had slipped behind him.

Mind him! Blind him!

He caught a kick both hard and quick,

For John had slipped behind him.

The troll tumbled down, and he cracked his crown;

But John went hobbling back to town,

For that stony seat was too hard for feet,

And boot and toe u ere broken.

Token! Spoken!