The History of Middle Earth: Volume 7 - The Treason of Isengard

by J. R. R. Tolkien; Christopher Tolkien

  'No indeed,' said Trotter, and they saw that he had turned his boat and had come back almost alongside without their seeing him. 'No: I did not know we had come so far yet: the Anduin flows faster than I reckoned. The rapids of Pensarn (5) are ahead. They are not very long nor very fierce, yet too dangerous to venture on in the dark for those who know the Great River little or only from tales. See,' he said, 'the current has flung us right over to the east shore: in a little we shall be on the shoals. Let us turn and go back to the western side, above the rocks.'

  Even as he spoke there was a twanging, and arrows whistled over and among them. One smote Frodo between the shoulders but fell back, foiled by the hidden coat of mail; another passed through Trotter's hair; and a third stood fast in the gunwale of the middle boat close by Merry's hand.

  'To the west bank!' shouted Boromir and Trotter together. They leaned forward straining at the paddles - even Sam now took a hand, but it was not so easy. The current was flowing strong. Each one expected at any minute to feel the sting of a blackfeathered orc-arrow. But it was now grown very dark, dark even for the keen night-eyes of goblins; goblins were on the bank, they did not doubt. When they had come into midstream as far as they could judge, and out of the swirl of waters running into the narrow channel, Legolas laid down his paddle, and lifting the bow he had brought from Lorien strung it, and turned, peering back into the gloom. Across the water there came shrill cries; but he could see nothing. The enemy were shooting wildly now and few arrows came near the boats: it was grown very dark: there was not even a grey glimmer on the face of the river, only here and there the broken twinkle reflecting a misty star.

  As he gazed into the blackness away east the clouds broke and the white rind of the new moon appeared riding slowly up the sky; [but its faint light did little to illumine the further shore.](6) Sam looked up at it in wonder.(7) Even as he did so a dark shape, like a cloud yet not a cloud, low and ominous, for a moment shut off the thin crescent and winged its way towards them, until it appeared as a great winged shape black against the dark heaven.(8) Fierce voices greeted it from across the water. Frodo felt a sudden chill about his heart, and a cold like the memory of an old wound in his shoulder: he crouched down in the boat.

  Suddenly the great bow of Legolas sang. He heard an arrow whistle/whine. He looked up. The winged shape swerved: there was a harsh croaking cry and it seemed to fall, vanishing down into the darkness of the eastern shore; the sky seemed clean again. They heard a tumult as of many voices murmuring and lamenting [written above: cursing], and then silence. No more arrows came towards them.

  'Praised be the bow of Galadriel and the keen eye of Legolas!' said Gimli. 'That was a mighty shot in the dark.'

  'But what it hit who can say,' said Boromir.

  'I cannot,' said Gimli. 'Yet I liked that shape as little as the shadow of the Balrog of Moria.'

  'It was not a Balrog,' said Frodo, still shivering. 'I think it was...' He did not finish.

  'You think what?' asked Boromir quickly.

  'I do not know,' said Frodo. 'Whatever it was its fall seems to have dismayed the enemy.'

  'So it seems,' said Trotter. 'Yet where they are, and how many, or what they will do next, we do not know. This night must be watchful!'

  At last the boats were brought to the western bank again. Here they moored them close inshore. They did not lie on the land that night, but remained in the boats with weapons close to hand. One sat alert and vigilant watching either bank while the other [? read others) dozed uneasily.

  Sam (9) looked at the moon again, slipping down now swiftly to the horizon. 'It is very strange,' he murmured drowzily. 'The moon I suppose does not change his courses in Wilderland? Then I must be wrong in my reckoning. If you remember, the old moon was at its end as we lay on the flet up in that tree.(10) Well now I can't remember how long we were in that country: it was certainly three nights, and I seem to remember a good many more - but I am certain sure it was not a month. Yet here we are: seven days from Lorien and up pops a New Moon. Why, anyone would think we had come straight from Nimrodel without stopping a night or seeing Caras Galadon. Funny it seems.'

  'And that Sam is probably about the truth of it,' said Trotter.

  'Whether we were in the past or the future or in a time that does not pass, I cannot say: but not I think till Silverlode bore us back to Anduin did we return to the stream of time that flows through mortal lands to the Great Sea. At least, so I guess: but maybe I dream and talk nonsense. Yet do either of you remember seeing any moon in Lorien, old or young? I remember only stars by night and sun by day.(11)

  The text, becoming ragged at the end, now peters out in pencilled notes for its continuation:

  In morning Trotter and Legolas go forward to find path. They lie hid among rocks all day and at evening laboriously cart their boats to end of the rapids. (Hear the sound as they pass.) No sign on far shore. Below rapids stream is soon quiet and deep again - but less broad. They creep along the west bank by night. They pass into the gullies of Sarn Gebir. Pinewoods. About dawn on 10th day come to Eregon [later > Tol Brandor or -ir] and hear roar and [?foam] of Rauros. Inaccessible isle high peak many birds.(12)

  In the journey down Anduin at this stage the chronology differed by one day from that in FR, for the attack at the head of the rapids took place at the end of the seventh day (p. 352), not of the eighth (FR pp. 400 - 1), and much detail remained to be changed or added: notably the incident of Gollum, the 'log with eyes', was absent. This story was written on a separate sheet while the drafting of the chapter was still in progress, and was immediately achieved in the final form at almost all points. Some of the Company were sleeping that night on the eyot and some in the boats; and after Frodo had seen Gollum's eyes and had put his hand on the hilt of Sting the original text continues:

  Immediately they [the eyes] went out, and there was a soft splash and a dark shape shot away downstream into the night. Nothing else occurred, until the first grey of dawn peeped in the East. Trotter awoke on the eyot and came down to the boats. But Frodo now knew that Sam had not been deceived; and also that he must warn Trotter.

  'So you know about our little footpad, do you?...

  Primary drafting from the point reached (the discussion of Time in Lorien) is of an extreme roughness, some of it scribbled faintly between the lines of the candidates' writing on examination scripts, and it is not entirely complete and consecutive. In this case the fair copy manuscript, following immediately on the primary drafting, is the first complete text, and it is most convenient to turn now to this manuscript.

  In this version Chapter XXI bore a succession of titles, all of them pencilled in subsequently: 'Southward'; 'The Company is Scattered'; 'Sarn Gebir'; 'Breaking of the Fellowship'; and finally 'The Great River' - this last not struck out, and obviously arising when my father had decided that his original ideas for XXI had so expanded as to require two chapters to fulfil the narrative. As usual, in point of expression the fair copy advances very largely to the form in FR, although a good deal of change in respect of the actual narrative had still to come.

  To the original opening of the chapter (p. 350) my father made the following alteration and addition on the manuscript of the draft:

  Sam woke him. He was lying in a bed of blankets and furs under tall grey-stemmed trees near the bank of the Great River, in a corner of quiet woodland where a small stream (the Limlight) flowed in from the western mountains.

  This is the first mention of the Limlight in the texts. In the fair copy the chapter opens:

  Frodo was roused by Sam. He found that he was lying, well wrapped, under tall grey-skinned trees in a quiet corner of the woodlands. [Beside them a stream ran down from the western mountains far away and joined the Great River close by their camp] on the western bank of the Great River Anduin.

  The sentence I have bracketed was struck out as soon as written. That their first night camp on the journey down the River was beside the inflow of Limlight agrees with maps IV and I
V (p. 317), where the Limlight, here first shown, joins Anduin not far south of Silverlode (see Map II, square M 12)., on map IV the confluence is much further south (p. 319).

  Where the draft has 'Rauros and the Isle of Eregon' (p. 350) the new text has 'Rauros and the Isle' (changed later to 'the Tindrock Isle', as in FR). Trotter's policy of letting them drift with the stream as they wished appears; but the chronology remains here as in the draft: Nonetheless they saw no sign of any (13) enemy that day. The dull grey hours passed without event. As this second day of their voyage wore on, the lands changed slowly...' The 'Withered Wold' of the draft becomes 'the withered wolds' (and was then struck out). The flight of the black swans is still absent.

  Trotter now speaks of the latitude and climate, the Bay of Belfalas, and their distance from the Shire - but here he first said 'I doubt if you are much more than sixty leagues south of the Sarn Ford at the southern end of your Shire', this being changed at once to the reading of FR; and he says that 'ere long we shall come to the mouth of the Limlight' (see above),(14) defining the Limlight, as in FR, as the north boundary of Rohan. But he says here 'Of old all that lay between Limlight and Entwash belonged to the Horsemasters' (FR: 'all that lay between Limlight and the White Mountains belonged to the Rohir- rim').

  In the next part of the chapter (after the episode of Gollum in the river) the story advances to the form in FR, but it was still at the end of the seventh day of the journey, not of the eighth, that they came to the rapids, and there is no mention at this point of the weather, or of the New Moon, which in FR (p. 400) was first seen on the seventh night. Though the bird-haunted cliffs of Sarn Gebir and the flocks of birds circling high above are described in the same words as in FR (p. 401) there is no mention of the eagle seen far off in the western sky. Following the mention of the birds, the new version continues thus:

  Trotter had glanced often at them doubtfully, wondering if Gollum had been up to some mischief. But now it was dark: the East was overcast, but in the West many stars were shining.

  After they had been paddling for about an hour, Trotter told Sam to lie forward in the boat and keep a sharp look-out ahead. 'We shall soon come to the gates of Sarn-Gebir,' he said; 'and the river is difficult and dangerous there, if I remember rightly. It runs in deep swift channels under overhanging cliffs, and there are many rocks and eyots in the stream. But I do not know these reaches, for I have never journeyed by water in these parts before. We must halt early tonight, if we can, and go on by daylight.'

  It was close on midnight, and they had been drifting for a while, resting after a long spell of paddling, when suddenly Sam cried out.

  After Boromir's shouted remonstrance ('This is a bad time of day to shoot the rapids!') Trotter, struggling to back and turn his boat, said to Frodo: 'I am out of my reckoning. I didn't know we had come so far. We must have passed the gates of Sarn-Gebir in the dark. The Rapids of Pensarn must be just ahead' (the last two sentences were crossed out, probably immediately). There is no indication here of what 'the gates of Sarn-Gebir' might be (see p. 359).

  The attack by Orcs from the east bank, and the struggle to get the boats back to the west bank, follows the draft pretty closely, with some changed or added detail: an arrow passed through Trotter's hood, not his hair; Frodo 'lurched forward with a cry'. The weather is changed from the obscure statements in the draft (note 6): the clouds in the east mentioned earlier had now almost entirely covered the sky, and so 'it was very dark, dark even for the night-eyes of orcs' as they paddled the boats back. The same is said of the New Moon 'riding slowly up the sky' in 'a sudden break in the cloud-cover away in the East' as in the draft (see note 7); here it is seen 'passing behind dark isles of cloud and out into black pools of night.' In FR (p. 401) it had set hours before.

  Sam's remarks about Time in Lothlorien remain almost exactly as in the draft (p. 354), as does Trotter's reply (in FR given to Frodo), except that he now says (as does Frodo in FR): 'In that land, maybe, we were in some time that elsewhere has long gone by.' Then Frodo speaks:

  'The power of the Lady was on us,' said Frodo. 'There are days and nights and seasons in Lothlorien; but while she holds the ring, the world grows no older in her realm.'

  'That should not have been said,' muttered Trotter, half rising and looking towards the other boats; 'not outside Lorien, not even to me.'(15)

  The warm and foggy morning that succeeded the night of the attack and the argument between Aragorn and Boromir about the course to follow were roughly sketched in initial drafting, where the conversation proceeds thus:

  'I do not see why we should pass the rapids or follow this cursed River any further,' said Boromir. 'If Pensarn lies before us, then we can abandon these cockles and strike westward, and so come round the east shoulders of Sarn-Gebir and cross the Entwash into my own land of Ondor.'

  'We can, if we make for Minas Tirith,' said Trotter. 'But that is not yet agreed. And even so such a course is perhaps more perilous than it seems. The land is flat and shelterless south and east [read west] of Sarn-Gebir, and the [? first] ford over Entwash is a great way west.(16) Since the Enemy took ... Osgiliath that land may be full of foes: what do we know of events of late in Rohan or in Ondor?'

  'Yet here the Enemy marches all along the east bank,' said Boromir. 'And when you come to Rauros what will you do? You must then either turn back hitherward, or cross the hills of Gebir and land in the marshes, and still have the Entwash to cross.'

  'The River is at least a path that cannot be missed. In the vale of Entwash fog is a mortal peril. I would not abandon the boats until we must,' said Trotter. 'And I have a fancy that in some

  high place above the Falls we may be able to see some sign that

  shall direct us.'

  That a 'high place' would be the scene of a decisive moment in the unfolding of the story had already been conceived: the summit of the island in the River whence Frodo looked out (p. 324); but there is no suggestion in Trotter's words here that this 'high place' would be an ancient post of the men of Ondor.

  In the fair copy manuscript Boromir objects: But the Enemy holds the eastern bank. And even if you pass the gates of Gebir, and come unmolested to the Tindrock, what will you do then? Climb down from the hills and land in the marshes?' Here, the 'gates of Gebir' are the later Gates of Argonath; thus the earlier references (p. 357), where Trotter places the 'gates' before the rapids, had already been rejected. Of Trotter's reply to Boromir's scoffing question there are three forms: a draft text in pencil taking up at this point, and two versions in the fair copy manuscript. The first version in the manuscript has Trotter reply:

  'Say rather, climb down from the hills to Rauros-foot and then take boat again, and hope to slip unseen up the mouths of Entwash - if we go to Minas Tirith. Do you choose to forget the ancient path, Boromir, and the high seat upon Tol-Brandir, that were made in the days of Valandil?(17) I at least have a mind to stand in that high place before I decide my course. There maybe we shall see some sign that will direct us.'

  This version of Trotter's reply was struck out, and the pencilled draft (which continues on for some distance) seems to have been written at this point. This draft begins:

  'No,' said Trotter. 'Do you choose to forget, Eoromir, the North Stair, and the high seat upon Tol-Brandir that were made in the days of Isildur? I at least have a mind to stand in that high place again before I decide my course. There maybe we shall see some sign that will guide us. Thence we [may] perhaps descend by the ancient way to Rauros-foot and take again to the water; and those who make for Minas Tirith may slip unseen up the mouths of Entwash.'

  Finally, the second version written in the manuscript is as in FR (p. 406), but still with 'in the days of Isildur' for 'in the days of the great kings', and the high seat is still upon the isle - which is here Tol-Brandor for Tol-Brandir of the previous versions. The isle there- fore was not inaccessible; and this is puzzling, for the inaccessibility of Tol Brandir is found both in the outline given on p. 328 and in the prel
iminary draft material for the present chapter (p. 355).

  Trotter's words before he and Legolas set off into the fog to find a path take this form (and are very similar in the draft):

  'No road was ever made along this bank by the men of Ondor: for even in their great days their realm did not reach beyond Sarn-Gebir, and the high seat upon the Tindrock was their northmost watchtower. Yet there must be some path, or the remains of one; for light boats used to journey out of Wilderland down to Osgiliath; and still did so, until Sauron returned to Mordor.'

  'But he has returned,' said Boromir; 'and if you go forward, you are likely to meet some peril, whether you find a path or no.'

  The story of the exploration made by Trotter and Legolas, their return, the portage of the boats and baggage, and the departure of the Company next morning, reaches in the fair copy virtually the text of FR, with Pensarn for Sarn Gebir as the name of the rapids and the Gates of Sarn-Gebir for the Gates of Argonath. From painfully difficult writing the original description of the Pillars of the Kings can be extracted out of the initial drafting, of which I give the following as an example:

  The great pillars seemed to rise up like giants before him as the river whirled him like a leaf towards them. Then he saw that [they] were carved, or had been carved many ages ago, and still preserved through the suns and rains of many forgotten years the likenesses that had been hewn upon them. Upon great pedestals founded in the deep water stood two great kings of stone gazing through blurred eyes northwards. The left hand of each was raised beside his head palm outwards in gesture of [?warning] and refusal: in each right hand there was a sword. On each head there was a crumbling crown and helm. There was still a power in these silent wardens of a long-vanished kingdom.