The Treason of Isengard (25 page)

'One at least is saved,' said Gandalf; 'for there I got my grey horse, and I name him Greyfax. Not even the Chief of the Nine could go with such tireless speed; and by day his coat glistens like silver, and at night it is as unseen as a shadow. So swift was my going from Rohan that 1 reached the Shire within a week of the appointed day, and I came to his (41) home and found he was gone..I found in fact the Sackville-Bagginses there and was

[?ordered off]. I went to the Gaffer's and he was hard to comfort; but I had need of comfort myself, for amidst his confused talk I gathered that the Riders had come even as you left; and I rode to Buckland and all was in uproar; but I found Crickhollow broken and empty, and on the threshold I picked up a cloak that was Frodo's.

'That was my worst moment. I rode then on the trail of the Black Riders like the wind, and I came behind them as they rode through Bree. They threw down the gates... and passed by like a wind. The Breelanders I guess are quaking still, and expect the end of the world. This was on the night after you had left, I now know. Next day I rode on, and in two days I reached Weathertop, and there I found two of the Enemy already, but they drew off before my [?wrath). But that night ... gathered, and I was besieged on the top, but I perceived they had not got you.

The text ends with the words: 'Fled at sunrise'. - With only slight prevision (as it appears), a massive new element and dimension had entered the history. There were of course certain essential features lacking. Most important, Saruman was not acting independently of the Dark Tower (see note 35); and while Gandalf's great ride from Rohan on 'Greyfax' now enters, there is no suggestion that the relations of Rohan with Mordor will have any especial significance in the story (though those relations are now differently conceived: see note 40) - and Gandalf's remark 'In Rohan I found evil already at work' (FR p. 275) is absent.

The story of Hamilcar Bolger's ride with Gandalf has finally gone (see p. 75), as has that of Gandalf's visit to Tom Bombadil (see p. 111).

A notable feature is the evolution of the 'colours' of the wizards, Gandalf, Saruman, and Radagast, which came to the final form in the course of the writing of this draft. Saruman is at first 'the Grey',(42) becoming at once 'the White', and Radagast immediately takes on the epithet 'Grey' (p. 132). But Gandalf then becomes 'the Grey',(43) and Saruman calls Radagast 'the Brown' in the text as written on p. 133.

NOTES.

1. This text has been put together from pages used in a subsequent version that went to Marquette University and others that were left behind. Many changes were made to it afterwards, but in the citations that I make from it here I take account only of those that were made in ink and at or very near to the time of composition.

2. Elrond still says of Boromir that he 'brings tidings that must be considered', but as in the original version (VI.409) we are again not told what they were, and no explanation is given of his journey to Rivendell. Subsequently in this version, however, Gandalf says that Boromir 'is resolved to return as soon as he can to his own land, to the siege and war that he has told of.'

3. That my father had the earlier text before him is shown by the recurrence here of the casual error (which I did not observe in Vol. VI) 'Elwing daughter of Luthien': Elwing was the daughter of Dior, son of Luthien.

4. In the preceding sentence, 'In time the Lord of the Ring would find out its hiding-place', just as in the first version (VI.402 and note 25) Lord of the Rings was first written but changed at once to Lord of the Ring.

Hobbit, was repeated. See pp. 159 - 60.

6. See note 2.

7. That Bilbo gave Frodo Sting and his mailcoat appears in the original outline for 'The Council of Elrond', VI.397. Bilbo does not here, as he does in FR, produce the pieces of Frodo's sword, nor indeed refer to the fact of its having been broken, though the story of its being broken at the Ford of Bruinen goes back to the beginning (VI.197). - The coat of mail (which Bilbo still calls his

'elf-mail') is described as 'studded with pale pearls' ('white gems', FR); cf. the original text of The Hobbit, before it was changed to introduce 'mithril': 'It was of silvered steel, and ornamented with pearls' (VI.465, note 35).

8. See p. 287 note 3.

9. The illegible word probably begins with F and might be 'Fire'.

10. It is possible that the Sword that was Broken actually emerged from the verse 'All that is gold does not glitter': on this view, in the earliest form of the verse in which the Broken Sword is referred to (p. 80, note 18) the words a king may yet be without crown, A blade that was broken be brandished were no more than a further exemplification of the general moral.

11. Gollum's escape, though only now emerging, had been a necessity of the story ever since Gandalf told Bingo (VI.265) that 'the Wood-elves have him in prison', if Gollum was to reappear at the end, as had long been foreseen (see VI.380 - 1).

12. Afterwards it is Treebeard who says this (The Two Towers III.4, p. 75): 'There is something very big going on, that I can see, and what it is maybe I shall learn in good time, or in bad time.'

13. Cf. the outline given on p. 116: 'My [i.e. Aragorn's] fathers were driven out of your city when Sauron raised a rebellion', and

'There Tarkil's sires had been King'.

14. For previous uses of this dialogue in other contexts see pp. 50 and 105 note 3.

15. The illegible word is an abbreviation, perhaps 'bet.', which my father used elsewhere for 'between'; if this is what it is, he may have intended (the manuscript is very hasty) to write 'between the Black Mountains and the Sea'. Harfalas is not named here on the First Map (p. 309, map III).

16. Cf. p. 119: 'Of their kings [i.e. of the Men of Westernesse] Elendil was the chief.

17. Text (III), the revised ending to The Fall of Numenor, says that

'the sea covered all that was left ... even up to the feet of Eredlindon' (pp. 122 - 3), but this can be accommodated to the map by supposing that it refers to the northern extent of the range (where it bent North-east).

18. In the Introduction to Unfinished Tales (p. 14) I said that 'though the fact is nowhere referred to it is clear that Himring's top rose above the waters that covered drowned Beleriand. Some way to the west of it was a larger island named Tol Fuin, which must be the highest part of Taur-nu-Fuin.' When I wrote that I did not know of the existence of this text. - The later form Himring had appeared already in the second text of the Lhammas (V.177, 189), and in the Quenta Silmarillion (V.263, 268); Himling here and on the map are surprising, but can have no significance for dating.

19. This is Old Norse forn 'ancient'.

20. Cf. Of the Rings of Power, in The Silmarillion p. 294: 'All living things were divided in that day, and some of every kind, even of beasts and birds, were found in either host, save the Elves only.

They alone were undivided and followed Gil-galad.'

21. In this text there is no reference to the death of Anarion. It is made clear that he did not go to the War of the Last Alliance.

22. Contrast FR: 'But if the passages of the River should be won, what then?' In FR (pp. 258 - 9) Boromir describes the assault on Osgiliath: 'A power was there that we have not felt before. Some said that it could be seen, like a great black horseman, a dark shadow under the moon'; but 'still we fight on, holding all the west shores of Anduin'. An addition to the present text may belong to this time or later: 'Nine horsemen in black led the host of Minas Morgol that day and we could not withstand them.' See p. 151.

23. Here the 'third version' draft takes up again after the missing page (p. 120).

24. Cf. the next version (p. 149): ' "It has much to do with it," said Gandalf, "and if Elrond is willing I will give my account now." '

25. Cf. The Hobbit, Chapter VII 'Queer Lodgings': ' "I am a wizard," continued Gandalf. "I have heard of you, if you have not heard of me; but perhaps you have heard of my good cousin Radagast who lives near the Southern borders of Mirkwood?" ' -

On Radagast's appearance in the story see p. 76 and note 15.

26. The change of Grey to White followed the same change in the next sentence, which was made in the act of writing; a little further on Saruman the White was written thus from the first.

27. Can this have been suggested by Beorn's acquaintance with Radagast? (see note 25).

28. I cannot make out the two concluding words, though the first might be 'gathered'. But whatever the words are, the meaning is clearly that Saruman had acquired the last of the Rings - and wore it on his finger, as appears subsequently in this text (cf. FR

p. 271). - In the last text of 'Ancient History' that has been given Gandalf refers to the discussion of the Rings at the White Council, and to those who 'go in for such things'; see p. 22.

29. The Seven Rivers: see pp. 310 - 12.

30. It is seen subsequently (see note 37) that this addition was made while the writing of this text was in progress; and it is seen from the addition that Radagast first entered the story as the means by which Gandalf was lured to Saruman's dwelling. The abrupt haste of Radagast's departure seemed to Gandalf 'very strange', and it is possible that when first drafting the story my father supposed that Radagast's part was not simply that of innocent emissary: later, at Isengard, Saruman says (p. 133) 'He must have played his part well nonetheless'. This is not in FR. When the addition here was made, Radagast became also the means by which the Eagles knew where to find Gandalf (see p. 130); and this development necessarily disposed of the idea that Radagast had been corrupted - but Gandalf's fear that he had been remains: 'At first I feared, as Saruman wished that I should, that Radagast had also fallen' (p. 134; this is preserved in FR, p. 274).

- This is the first appearance of the name Orthanc, though its first actual use in the narrative is probably in the description of Isengard that immediately follows.

31. Galeroc: see pp. 68 and note 4, 70.

32. The illegible words are perhaps 'fingers and all' ('butterfingers').

33. The name Isengard first occurs here (cf. Angrobel or Irongarth, p. 71), and it is placed, not at the southern end of the Misty Mountains, but in the north of the Black Mountains.

34. This is the first description of Isengard. - There is a faint pencilled addition at this point: 'But something strange in their look and voices struck me; and I dismounted from my horse and left him without. And that was well, for' (here the addition breaks off).

This was perhaps a thought, abandoned as soon as written, for some other story of Gandalf s escape, and his need for a horse to take him back to the Shire. The great speed of Galeroc had been emphasised earlier (p. 68: 'there is no horse in Mordor or in Rohan that is as swift as Galeroc').

35. Cf. FR pp. 273-4: 'for Saruman was mustering a great force on his own account, in rivalry of Sauron and not in his service yet.'

36. Before writing this passage about Frodo's dream (' "Who sent the eagles?"...) my father first put ' "And how did you get away?"

said Frodo.' It was thus probably at this very point that he decided to introduce Frodo's vision of Gandalf on the pinnacle of Orthanc into his dream in the house of Tom Bombadil (FR

p. 138; for previous narratives of his dream on that night see VI.118 - 20, 328). His vision of Gandalf imprisoned in the Western Tower had also of course to be removed (see p. 35).

37. It is seen from this passage that the addition discussed in note 30

was put in while the draft was in course of composition.

38. On the form Gwaewar (Gwaihir in LR) see V.301.

39. The name following Rohan is very unclear, but can scarcely be other than the first occurrence of Riddermark. Rohiroth, Rochi-roth is found on the earliest rough map of the region, VI.439-40.

40. Cf. VI.422 (the earliest text of 'The Ring Goes South'): 'The Horse-kings have long been in the service of Sauron.'

41. 'his', though Frodo has not been mentioned, because 'the appointed day' replaced 'Frodo's departure'.

42. In the plot dated 26 - 27 August 1940 (p. 70), where Saruman first appears, he was 'Saramond the White or Grey Saruman'.

43. He calls himself 'Gandalf the Grey' in the version of his conversation with Frodo at Rivendell cited on p. 82, but that is not earlier than the present text.

VII.

THE COUNCIL OF ELROND (2).

The Fifth Version.

A fifth version of 'The Council of Elrond' followed, and is conveniently placed here, though it is not necessarily the case that these revisions proceeded in unbroken sequence while other writing remained at a standstill. This version incorporated the changed sequence of speakers (pp. 129 - 30) and Gandalf's story, and changed the history of Elendil and his sons; but for this rewriting and reconstruction my father made use of existing material, whence arises the extraordinarily complicated state of the manuscript. Many emendations were made to this version at different times. In this case they can be readily separated into two groups, on the basis of a typescript that was made of the fifth version after a certain amount of change had been carried out.