The History of the Hobbit

by John D. Rateliff

  The text resumes on manuscript page 119 (1/1/9:1); as previously noted, on this new kind of paper Tolkien wrote only on the front (as opposed to front-and-back, his practice with the preceding sheets). Therefore henceforth 1 page = 1 sheet.

  So they just stopped dead, or sat down, and waited. But Bilbo slipped on his ring; and that is why, when the elves bound the dwarves with ropes in a long line (one behind the other), and counted them, they did not bind or count the little hobbit. Nor did they hear or feel him trotting along behind the torch-light as they led off their prisoners into the forest. Each dwarf was blindfold, and none of them had any idea of the way they were taking; but Bilbo had tied his thread to a tree by the path, and was unwinding it all the way along.TN1

  At last it gave out. He had just time to fasten one end to a big stone and lay it beside an huge tree, when he saw that only a little way in front the torches had stopped. They had come to a wooden bridge, under which a dark river flowed swift and strong; and at the far end of the bridge on the other side of the water opened the dark mouth of a huge cave in the side of a steep slope of trees that ran down till their feet were in the stream.

  Soon the elves and their prisoners began to cross the bridge. Bilbo did not like the look of the cave mouth, and for some time he hesitated; but in the end he scuttled over the bridge and was just in time to pass the gates of the Wood-elves Cavern before it closed behind them with a clang.

  The passages were lit with torch light, and the woodelves sang as they marched along the twisting, crossing, and echoing paths. These were not like the goblin-cities: smaller, less deep underground, and filled with a cleaner air. In a great hall with pillars cut out of the living stone, the Elven-king sat on a chair of carven wood. On his head was [a] crown of red-berries, for the autumn was come again. In the spring he wore a crown of woodland flowers. In his hand he had a carven staff of oak.

  The prisoners were brought before him, and he told his men to unbind them: ‘for they need no ropes here’ said he, ‘there is no escape through my magic doors, for those who [know not >] are brought once inside’.

  Long and searchingly he questioned the dwarvesTN2 about their doings and where they were going, and where they were coming from.TN3 But they were surly and wd. not answer him, any more than Gandalf had. Indeed less; for they were angry at their treatment.

  ‘What have we done, O king’ said Balin,TN4 the eldest left now Gandalf was gone; ‘Is it a crime to be lost in the forest, trapped by spiders; Are the spiders your tame beasts or your pets, if killing them makes you angry?’

  [That made >] Asking such a question made him angry at any rate, for the woodelves think the spiders vile and unclean. ‘It is a crime to walk in my realm without leave’ said the king. ‘Do you forget that you were in my realm, using the road my people have made? Do you forget you twiceTN5 pursued and vexed my people in the forest, and roused the spiders with your riot and clamour? At least I have a right to know what brings you here. And if you will not tell me now, I will keep you here until you have learnt sense and manners’.

  So he ordered the dwarves each to be put in different cells, and given [drink &] food, but not allowed to pass the doors of their little prisons, until one at least of them was willing to tell him more.

  Poor little Bilbo – it was a weary long time he lived in that deep place, all alone and always in hiding, never daring hardly to take off his ring, hardly daring to sleep, even tucked away in the darkest and remotest corners he could find. For something to do, he took to wandering about the wood-king’s palace. Magic shut the gates, but he could sometimes get out, if he was quick. Companies of the wood-elves, sometimes with their king at their head would from time to time ride out [on >] to hunting, or to other business in the woods or the lands to the East.TN6 Then if Bilbo was very nimble he could [nip >] slip out just behind them; though it was a dangerous business. More than once he was nearly caught in the doors as they crashed together when the last elf passed; yet he did not dare to march among them, because of his shadow,TN7 and for fear of being bumped into and discovered. It was not often that he went out, because it was so difficult to get back[. If he >], and he did not wish to desert the dwarves; nor indeed did he know where in the world to go without them. Unless he kept up with the hunting elves all day – a hard and tiring task – he would somehow have to wander about miserably in the forest alone, until a chance of return came. Then he was very hungry, for he was no hunter. Inside the caves he could pick up a living of some sort by stealing food from store or table when no one was at hand. ‘I am like a burglar that cannot get away, but must go on miserably burgling the same house day after day’ he thought. ‘This is the dreariest and dullest part of all this wretched, tiresome, uncomfortable adventure! I wish I was back in my hobbit-hole by my own warm fireside, with the lamp shining.’TN8

  Eventually, however, Bilbo by watching and following the guards, and taking what chances he could, managed to find where each dwarf was. He found all their 12 cells in different parts of the underground palace, and soon he was beginning to know his way about quite well.

  What was his surprise one day to overhear the guards talking, and to hear that there was another dwarf in prison too – in a specially deep dark place. He guessed, of course, that it was Gandalf. And he soon found out that he was right, though it was some time before he could manage to find the place [or >] when no one was about, and have a word with the chief dwarf.

  Gandalf was too wretched to be angry any longer at his misfortune.TN9 and he could hardly believe it when he heard one evening Bilbo’s little voice at the keyhole. Very soon [they >], however, he came to the other side of the door, and spoke long and eagerly with the hobbit outside.

  So it was that Bilbo was able in secret to take Gandalf’s message to each of the other dwarves in prison, that the chief dwarf was there too, and that no one was to reveal their [business >] errand to the king – not yet, not till Gandalf gave the word. For Gandalf was determined not to ransom himself & his companions with promises of a share in the treasure, until all hope of escaping some other way had disappeared. The other dwarves were almost equally determined – they [knew >] feared the woodelves [share >] would claim all too big a share and the shares of each of them would suffer seriously. Often now they wished they had Bladorthin with them. Before he had always seemed to turn up to help them out of a fix, but now probably all the dark width of Mirkwood was between them. They hoped that one day he would turn up smiling and persuade the grim Elf-king, but they did not expect it. Nor did it happen. From this fix it was just purely Mr Baggins [entirely] on his own, who rescued them.TN10

  This is how it happened. Bilbo nosing and wandering about had discovered a very interesting thing. The great gates were not the only entrance to the [Caves >] Caverns. A stream flowed under part of the lowest caves and joined the main forest-stream a little further to the East, beyond the steep slope [in >] from which the main mouth opened.

  Where this underground water came forth out of the hillside there was a water-gate. The rocky roof came down close to the water, and from it a portcullis could be dropped right to the bed of the stream to prevent anyone coming in or out that way. But it was often open for a good deal of traffic went out by the water gate; and if anyone had come in by it, he would have found himself in a dark rough tunnel leading only into the hill. But at one point the roof of the tunnel had been cut away and covered with great oaken trap-doors. These [were in the >] opened up into the king’s cellars. There were barrels and barrels and barrels; for the woodelves, and their king specially loved wine; but none grew in those parts,TN11 and it was brought from far away, from their kindred in the south, or from the vineyards of men in distant lands. Hiding by one of the huge [> large] barrels Bilbo discovered the trapdoors and their use, and listening to the talk heard how wine came up the rivers or over land to the Long Lake and a town of men that had grown up there, built out on bridges far into the lake as a protection against enemies of all sorts and especially agains
t the dragon of the Mountain.

  From the Lake-townTN12 it was brought up the Forest River. The barrels were often all just fastened together like big rafts and poled or rowed against the stream; sometimes they were piled on flat boats. When the barrels were empty they cast them through the trapdoors, opened the water-gate and out the barrels floated on the stream, bobbing along while they were carried by the current to a place where the bank jutted out far down the stream and near to the very Eastern edge of Mirkwood. There they were collected and tied together and floated back to Lake town which stood near the place where the Forest river ran into the Lake.

  For a long time Bilbo used to think about this water gate, and wonder how [> if] it could be used for the escape of his friends. At last he had a desperate idea.

  The evening meal had been taken to the prisoners. The guards were tramping away down the passages taking the torch-light with them leaving everything in darkness. Then Bilbo heard the king’s butler, bidding the chief of the guards goodnight. ‘And come down with me’ he said ‘and taste the new wine that has just come in. I shall be hard at work clearing the cellars of the empty wood [far into >] tonight; so let us have a drink first to help the labour’.TN13

  Bilbo thought at last the chance had come when his idea might be tried. He followed the butler and the chief of the guards, until he saw them sit in one of the cellars; and soon they began to drink the wine and to make merry. What luck favoured him here, I cannot tell. It must be potent wine to make a wood-elf drowsy. But this it would seem was the heady brew of the great gardens of Dorwinion in the warm South, not meant for his soldiers or his servants, but for the king’s feasts only, and for smaller bowls, not the butler’s jugs. Soon the chief guard fell asleep and not long after the butler put his head on the table and snored beside him.TN14

  Then in crept the hobbit, and soon the chief guard had no keys; but Bilbo was going as fast as he could, [though his bundle >] heavy though the great bunch seemed to his small arms, along the passages to the cells. His heart was in his mouth, in spite of his ring, for he could not prevent an occasional clink, which set him all a tremble.

  First he unlocked Balin’s door and locked it again as soon as the dwarf was outside. Balin was most surprised, I can tell you, for Bilbo had yet said nothing about his idea. [He wanted >] Glad though he was to get out of his wearisome little stony room, he wanted to know what Bilbo was going to do and all about it.

  ‘No time just now’ said the hobbit. ‘You just follow me. We must all keep together, and not risk getting separated. [If you >] We all must go or none, and this is our last chance. If this is found out, we’ll never have another. Goodness knows where the king will put you then, with chains on hand and feet, probably, too’.

  So he went from door to door until his following had grown to twelve; and they were none too nimble after their long imprisonment. Bilbo’s heart thumped every time they bumped into one another, or grumbled or whispered in the dark. ‘Drat the dwarvish racket!’ he said often to himself. Still nothing happened, and no one met them. As a matter of fact there was a great feast in the woods that night, ere the winter should come on; and in the halls above there was merrymaking too.TN15

  [The last >] At last they came to Gandalf’s dungeon, far down in a deep place, and fortunately [not far >] near to the cellars.

  ‘Upon my word’ said Gandalf, when Bilbo opened the door, and whispered to him to come out and join his friends, ‘upon my word the wizard spoke true, as usual. A pretty fine burglar you make it seems, when the time comes. I’m sure we are at all forever at your service, whatever happens after this. But what comes next?’

  At last Bilbo felt the time had come to explain his idea, but he did not feel at all sure how the dwarves would take it. And he was quite right. They did not like it at all at first.

  ‘We shall be bruised and battered, or drowned, for certain’ they [said >] muttered. ‘We thought you had got some sensible idea, when you managed to get hold of the keys; but this is a mad notion’.

  ‘Very well’ said Bilbo very downcast, and also rather annoyed, ‘Come along back to your nice cells, and I will lock you all in, and we shall be all happy and comfortable, and as we were, and no harm done’.

  The [mere] thought of it was too much for them. So in the end they just had to do as he suggested, because of course it was out of the question for them to try to find their way up into the upper halls, or to fight their way out of the gates that closed by magic.

  Into the cellar they crept past the door through which the chief guard and the butler cd be seen still happily snoring with smiles upon their faces. There would be a different expression on the chief guard’s face next day; but before they went on Bilbo kindheartedly put the keys back on his belt.

  ‘That will save him some of the trouble’ he thought. ‘He wasn’t a bad fellow – and how it will puzzle ’em all too. They will [wonder >] think that we had a very strong magic indeed to pass between locked doors and disappear. Disappear! We have got to get busy very quick, if that is to happen.’

  Balin was told off to watch the guard and the butler, and give warning if they stirred. There was little time to spare. Before long as Bilbo knew [the elves whose >] some elves were under orders to come down, and get the empty barrels through the trap-door into the stream. There they were already standing in rows in the middle of the floor waiting to be [stuffed >] pushed away.

  Some were wine barrels, and these could not be opened without a deal of noise, or easily secured again.TN16 But among them were many others that had been used for bringing other stuffs of all sorts to the king’s palace. They soon found thirteen with plenty room enough for a dwarf each. In fact some were too roomy, and the dwarfs as they climbed in, thought anxiously of the shaking and bumping they would get inside. Bilbo did his best to find straw and such like stuff to pack them in as cosily as could be.TN17 The last he had to stuff himself, and fasten on the lid. Soon twelve dwarves were packed. GandalfTN18 gave a lot of trouble, and turned and twisted in his tub and grumbled like a dog in a small kennel. Last came Balin, who now left his watch. Not a bit too soon. Bilbo had hardly finished fixing on his lid: when there came a sound of voices and lights. A number of elves came laughing and talking into the cellars, and singing snatches of song.

  They had left a feast in one of the halls and were bent on returning as soon as they could.TN19

  ‘Where is old Galion the butler’ said one. ‘I haven’t seen him at the tables tonight. He ought to be here now, to show us what is to be done.’

  ‘I shall be angry if the old slowcoach is late’ said another. ‘I have no wish to wait down here, while the song is up’.

  ‘Ha! ha!’ came a cry ‘here is the old villain, with his head on a jug’ Galion did not at all like being shaken and wakened; and still less being laughed at.

  ‘You’re late’ he said. ‘Here am I waiting and waiting while you fellows drink and enjoy yourselves and forget your tasks. Small wonder, if I fall asleep for weariness’.

  ‘Small wonder’ said they ‘when the explanation stands close to hand. Come give us a draught of the same, and we will fall to. No need to wake the old turn-key guard. He has had his share by the looks of it.’ So they drank once round and became mighty merry all of a sudden. ‘Save us Galion’ cried some. ‘You began your feasting early. You have stacked some full casks here instead of empty ones, if there is anything in weight’.

  ‘Get on with your job’ grumbled the butler ‘There is nothing in the feeling of weight in an idle toss-pot’s arms. Those are the ones to go and no others. Do as I say’.

  ‘[On > Well >] Very well very well’ they cried ‘On your own head be it, if you have the king’s best wine pushed into the river, for the lake men to make merry on for nothing; or his full buttertubs.’TN20

  Roll – roll – roll – roll.

  roll-roll-rolling down the hole

  Heave-ho Splash-plump

  down they go! down they bump!

  So they sang as firs
t one [tub and then >] barrel then another rumbled to the dark opening, and was pushed off [with a >] into the dark water some feet below. Some were wine-barrels, or tubs really empty. Some were tubs neatly packed with a dwarf each. Down they all went together bump on top of one another, jostling in the water, bobbing away down the current and knocking against the walls of the tunnel.

  It was at this point that Bilbo [wasn’t in >] saw the weak point of his plan. Very likely you have already thought of it, and are laughing at him; but I don’t suppose you would have done half as well yourself in his place. Of course he wasn’t in a barrel himself[; and so >]! It looked as if he would get left behind and lose his friends altogether (nearly all of them had disappeared through the dark trapdoor already) and have to stay lurking as a permanent burglar in the elf-caves for ever!TN21 For even suppose he could have got out of the front-gates at once (which he couldn’t)TN22 he had a precious small chance of [catching >] finding them all again before they came to the place where all the barrels were collected. Goodness knows, too, what would happen there, for he had not had time to tell the dwarves all he had learnt, or what his idea was of the best thing to do at that point.

  The elves being very merry were beginning to sing a song round the river-door. Some had gone to haul on the ropes which pulled up the watergate ready to let out the barrels when they were all afloat below.

  Down the swift dark stream you go

  Back to woods you once did know

  Leave the halls and caverns deep,

  Leave the northern mountains steep,

  where the forest wide and dim

  Stoops in shadow grey and grim!

  Float beyond the world of trees

  Out into the whispering breeze,

  past the rushes, past the reeds,

  past the marsh’s waving weeds;

  through the mist that riseth white

  Up from mere and pool at night!