returnoftheshadow72

by Miguel

  The main road within Buckland is described (on a rejected page only) as running 'from the Bridge to Standelf and Haysend.' Standelf is never mentioned in the text of LR, though marked on my father's map of the Shire and on both of mine; on all three the road stops there and does not continue to Haysend, which is not shown as a village or any sort of habitation.(5)

  At the first two occurrences of Crickhollow in this chapter the name was first Ringhay, changed to Crickhollow (in the passage cited in note a on p. 283 the name is a later addition to the text). At the third occurrence here Crickhollow was the name first written. Ringhay refers to the 'wide circle of lawn surrounded by a belt of trees inside the outer hedge.'(6) The most important development in this chapter is that after the words 'the far shore seemed to be shrouded in mist and nothing could be seen' (FR p. 109) my father interrupted the narrative with the following note before proceeding:

  From here onwards Odo is presumed to have gone with Merry ahead. The preliminary journey was Frodo, Bingo and Sam only. Frodo has a character a little more like Odo once had. Odo is now rather silent (and greedy).

  Against this my father wrote: 'Christopher wants Odo kept.' Unhappily I have now only a very shadowy recollection of those conversations of half a century ago; and it is not clear to me what the issue really was. On the face of it, my 'wanting Odo kept' should mean that I wanted him kept as a member of the party that walked from Hobbiton, since my father had not proposed that Odo be dropped absolutely; on the other hand, since he had in mind the blending of 'Odo' elements into the character of Frodo Took, it may very well be that he was planning to cut him out of the expedition after the hobbits left Crickhollow. Perhaps the idea that Odo should remain on at Crickhollow was already present as a possibility, and 'Christopher wants Odo kept' was a plea for his survival in the larger narrative, as a member of the major expedition. This is no more than guesswork, but if there is anything in it, it seems that my objection temporarily won the day, since at the end of the chapter Odo is fully re-established, and prepared to go with the others into the Old Forest- as indeed he does, in the revision of that chapter in this 'phase'.

  The situation in the text that follows this note on Odo is in any case extraordinarily difficult to interpret. As first written, Merry says that he will ride on and tell Olo that they are coming; when Bingo knocked on the door of (Ringhay) Crickhollow it was opened by Olo Bolger, and Merry refers to 'Olo and I' having got to Crickhollow with the last cartload on the day before; Merry and Olo prepared the supper in the kitchen. 'Olo' here plays the part of Fatty (Fredegar) Bolger in FR (pp. 110 - 11), but after these mentions he disappears from the text (and never appears again). In red ink my father noted: 'If Odo is kept alter in red,' and for a short distance some red ink alterations were made, changing 'You'll be last either way, Frodo' (concerning the order of entry into the bath) to

  'Odo', changing 'three tubs' to 'four tubs', and cutting out the references to 'Olo'.(7)

  The best explanation seems to be that when Odo was to be removed from the walking party and attached to Merry his name was to be changed also. Some alterations were made to preserve the option of retaining the received story. But from the moment when they sat down to supper Odo reappears in the text as first written, not merely as being present (which would only show that Olo had been rejected and Odo restored) but as having walked from Hobbiton (though in this case his name was bracketed). But Frodo Took now makes 'Odo-Pippin' remarks (as 'Oh! That was poetry! ' FR p. 116 - he would hardly have said such a thing previously). See further pp. 323 - 4.

  The bath-song (here sung by Frodo in his new Odoesque character) is all but identical to that which Pippin sings in FR; but in a red ink addition to the text (one of the optional additions made to bring Odo back in his original role) specimens of the 'competing songs' (FR p. 111) sung by Bingo and Odo are given: the first verse of the bath-song which Odo sang as they walked from Farmer Maggot's to the Ferry in the original version (p. 98) and which is thus no longer used, and the first two lines of the bath-chant sung by Odo when they reached their destination (p. 102), these last being struck out.

  The revelation of the conspiracy is almost exactly as in FR, the burden of its exposition being taken here as there by Merry (Pippin's intervention 'You do not understand!...' being given here to Frodo Took). As in FR, Merry recounts the story of how he discovered the existence of Bilbo's ring, which was previously set in a quite different context (see p. 242 and note 25), and tells that he had had a rapid glance at Bilbo's 'memoirs' ('secret book' in FR).(8)

  The report of what Gildor had said, here referred to by Merry rather than by Sam himself, on the subject of Bingo's taking companions reflects the text of that episode at this time (see p. 282): 'I know you have been advised to take us. Gildor told you to, and you can't deny it! ' The song that Merry and Pippin sang in FR (p. 116) is here sung by Merry, Frodo Took, and Odo,(9) and is very different:

  Farewell! farewell, now hearth and hall!

  Though wind may blow and rain may fall,

  We must away ere break of day

  Far over wood and mountain tall.

  The hunt is up! Across the land

  The Shadow stretches forth its hand.

  We must away ere break of day

  To where the Towers of Darkness stand.

  With foes behind and foes ahead,

  Beneath the sky shall be our bed,

  Until at last the Ring is cast

  In Fire beneath the Mountain Red.

  We must away, me must away,

  We ride before the break of day.

  In a rejected version of his answer to Bingo's question whether it would be safe to wait one day at Crickhollow for Gandalf (FR p. 117), a passage rewritten several times, Merry refers to the gate-guards getting a message through to 'my father the Master of the Hall.' Merry's father was Caradoc Brandybuck (Saradoc 'Scattergold' in LR); see p. 251 and note 4.

  When Bingo raises the question of going through the Old Forest, it is Odo who, filled with horror at the thought, voices the objections given in FR to Fatty Bolger (who is going to stay behind).

  The end of the chapter is different from that in FR, and belongs rather with the original version (p. 104). (Merry does not mention, incidentally, that Bingo had ever been into the Forest).

  '... I have often been in - only in the daylight, of course, when the trees are fairly quiet and sleepy. Still, I have some some knowledge of it, and I will try and guide you.'

  Odo was not convinced, and was plainly far less frightened of meeting a troop of Riders on the open road than of venturing into the dubious Forest. Even Frodo was against the plan.

  'I hate the idea,' said Odo. 'I would rather risk pursuers on the Road, where there is a chance of meeting ordinary honest travellers as well. I don't like woods, and the stories about the Old Forest have always terrified me. I am sure Black Riders will be very much more at home in that gloomy place than we shall.' Even Frodo on this occasion sided with Odo.

  'But we shall probably be out of it again before they ever find out or guess that we have gone in,' said Bingo. 'In any case, if you wish to come with me, it is no good taking fright at the first danger: there are almost certainly far worse things than the Old Forest ahead of you. Do you follow Captain Bingo, or do you stay at home?'

  'We follow Captain Bingo,' they said at once.

  'Well, that's settled!' said Merry. 'Now we must tidy up and put the finishing touches to the packing. And then to bed. I shall call you all well before the break of day.'

  When at last he got to bed Bingo could not sleep for some time. His legs ached. He was glad that he was riding in the morning. At last he fell into a vague dream: in which he seemed to be looking out of a window over a dark sea of tangled trees. Down below among the roots there was a sound of something crawling and snuffling.

  A note on the manuscript earlier says 'Pencillings = Odo stays behind.' These pencillings are in fact confined to the section just given. 'Even Frodo on this occasion sid
ed with Odo' is bracketed and replaced by further words of Odo's: 'Also I feel certain it is wrong not to wait for Gandalf.' And after '"We follow Captain Bingo," they said at once' is inserted:

  'I will follow Captain Bingo,' said Merry, and Frodo, and Sam. Odo was silent. 'Look here!' he said, after a pause. 'I don't mind admitting I am frightened of the Forest, but I also think you ought to try and get in touch with Gandalf. I will stay behind here and keep off inquisitive folk. When Gandalf comes as he is sure to I will tell him what you have done, and I will come on after you with him, if he will bring me.' Merry and Frodo agreed that that was a good plan.

  This would be an important development, though ultimately rejected. These alterations derive, however, from a somewhat later stage.

  (ii)

  The Old Forest.

  Having completed 'A Conspiracy is Unmasked', my father continued his revision into the next chapter, afterwards called 'The Old Forest'. In this case he did not make a new manuscript, but merely made corrections to the original text (described on pp. 112 - 14), which as I have said had reached with only the most minor differences the form of the published narrative. The chapter was at this time renumbered, from IV to VI, showing that Chapter V 'A Conspiracy is Unmasked' had been separated off from 'A Short Cut to Mushrooms'. Extensive emendations, made in red ink to the original manuscript, bring the text still closer in detail of wording to that of FR (but the topographical differences noticed on pp. 113 - 14 remain). The parts played in the Willow-man episode are changed by the presence of Sam Gamgee in the party. Bingo and Odo are still the two who are caught in the cracks of the tree, and Frodo Took is still the one pushed into the river; but whereas in the original story it was Marmaduke (i.e. Merry) who rounded up the ponies and rescued Frodo Took from the water, Sam now takes over this part (as in FR), while Merry 'lay like a log.'

  (iii)

  Tom Bombadil.

  The manuscript of the Tom Bombadil chapter, the number changed from V to VII but still title-less, underwent (with one important exception) minimal revision at this stage (there were indeed few changes ever made to it): scarcely more than a mention of Sam sleeping, with Merry, like a log, and the changing of the number of hobbits from four to five. The points of-difference noticed on pp. 120 - 3 werc nearly all left as they were; but Bombadil's remark about Farmer Maggot ('We are kinsfolk, he and I...') was marked with an X, probably at this time. The one substantial change made is of great interest. On the manuscript my father marked 'Insert' before the passage concerning the hobbits' dreams on the first night in Tom Bombadil's house; and that the insertion belongs to this phase is made clear by the fact that Crickhollow was empty (i.e. Odo had gone with the others into the Old Forest).

  As they slept there in the house of Tom Bombadil, darkness lay on Buckland. Mist strayed in the hollow places. The house at Crickhollow stood silent and lonely: deserted so soon after being made ready for a new master.

  The gate in the hedge opened, and up the path, quietly but in haste, a grey man came, wrapped in a great cloak. He halted looking at the dark house. He knocked softly on the door, and waited; and then passed from window to window, and finally disappeared round the corner of the house-end. There was silence again. After a long time a sound of hoofs was heard in the lane approaching swiftly. Horses were coming. Outside the gate they stopped; and then swiftly up the path there came three more figures, hooded, swathed in black, and stooping low towards the ground. One went to the door, one to the corners of the house-end at either side; and there they stood silent as the shadows of black yew-trees, while time went slowly on, and the house and the trees about it seemed to be waiting breathlessly.

  Suddenly there was a movement. It was dark, and hardly a star was shining, but the blade that was drawn gleamed suddenly, as if it brought with it a chill light, keen and menacing. There was a blow, soft but heavy, and the door shuddered. 'Open to the servants of the Lord!' said a voice, thin, cold, and clear. At a second blow the door yielded and fell back, its lock broken.

  At that moment there rang out behind the house a horn. It rent the night like fire on a hill-top. Loud and brazen it shouted, echoing over field and hill: Awake, awake, fear, fire, foe! Awake! Round the corner of the house came the grey man. His cloak and hat were cast aside. His beard streamed wide. In one hand was a horn, in the other a wand. A splendour of light flashed out before him. There was a wail and cry as of fell hunting beasts that are smitten suddenly, and turn to fly in wrath and anguish.

  In the lane the sound of hoofs broke out, and gathering rapidly to a gallop raced madly into the darkness. Far away answering horns were heard. Distant sounds of waking and alarm rose up. Along the roads folk were riding and running northward. But before them all there galloped a white horse. On it sat an old man with long silver hair and flowing beard. His horn sounded over hill and dale. In his hand his wand flared and flickered like a sheaf of lightning. Gandalf was riding to the North Gate with the speed of thunder.

  Against the end of this inserted text my father wrote in pencil: 'This will require altering if Odo is left behind', see the pencilled passage added at the end of the last chapter (p. 302). And at the end of the text, after the words 'a sheaf of lightning', he added in: 'Behind clung a small figure with flying cloak', and the name 'Odo'. The significance of this will become clear later.

  NOTES.

  1. On my father's map of the Shire the Boffins are placed north of Hobbiton, and the Bolgers north of the Woody End (p. 284, note g), but this was an alteration of what he first wrote: the underlying names can be seen to be in the reverse positions.

  2. The spelling Rushy on the published map of the Shire is an error, made first on my elaborate early map (p. 107, item V) through misreading of my father's. The second element is Old English ey 'island'.

  3. On my father's original map it can be roughly calculated (since Bingo estimated that they had eighteen miles to go in a straight line from the place where they passed the night with the Elves to Bucklebury Ferry) that the High Hay was about 43 miles measured in a straight line from its northern to its southern end.

  4. On my father's later maps (see p. 107) measurement can only be very approximate, but on the same basis as the calculation in note 3 the High Hay cannot in these be much more than 20 miles (in a straight line between its ends).

  5. Standelf means 'stone-quarry' (Old English stan-(ge)delf, surviving in the place-name Stonydelph in Warwickshire).

  6. Just as in FR, the hobbits leaving the Ferry passed Buck Hill and Brandy Hall on their left, struck the main road of Buckland, turned north along it for half a mile, and then took the lane to Crickhollow. On my original map of the Shire, made in 1943 (p. 107), the text - which was never changed here - was already wrongly represented, since the main road is shown as passing between the River and Brandy Hall (and the lane to Crickhollow leaves the road south of the hall, so that the hobbits would in fact, according to this map, still pass it on their left). This must have been a simple misinterpretation of the text which my father did not notice (cf. p. 108); and it reappeared on my map published in the first edition of FR. My father referred to the error in his letter to Austin Olney of Houghton Mifflin, 28 July 1965 (Letters no. 274); and it was corrected, after a fashion, on the map as published in the second edition. Karen Fonstad (The Atlas of Middle-earth, p. 121) and Barbara Strachey (Journeys of Frodo, Map 7) show the correct topography clearly.

  7. These alterations to bring Odo back were made at the same time as the notes on the retention of the story that Bingo entered Farmer Maggot's house invisibly (p. 288); cf. p. 297, note 13.

  8. In this text Merry says 'I was only in my tweens', whereas in FR he says 'teens'. In LR (Appendix C) Merry was born in (1382 =) 2982, and so in the year before the Farewell Party he was 13. Here, Merry is conceived to be somewhat older. - To Merry's question about Bilbo's book ('Have you got it, Bingo?') Bingo replies: 'No! He took it away, or so it seems.' Cf. the last note in Queries and Alterations (p. 229): 'Bilbo carries off "memoirs"
to Rivendell.'

  9. Changed from 'Merry and Frodo'.

  THE THIRD PHASE.

  XIX. THE THIRD PHASE (1): THE JOURNEY TO BREE.

  It seems to me extremely probable that the 'second phase' of writing, beginning with the fifth version of 'A Long-expected Party' (Chapter XI V in this book) now petered out, and once again a new start was made on the whole work. This 'third phase' is constituted by a long series of homogeneous manuscripts carrying the story from a sixth version of 'A Long-expected Party' right through to Rivendell. Though subsequently overwritten, interleaved, struck through, or 'cannibalised' to form parts of later texts, these manuscripts were at first clear and neat, and their rather distinctive, regular script makes it possible to reconstitute the series quite precisely despite the punishment they received later, and despite the fact that some parts remained in England when others went to Marquette University. They were indeed fair copies of the now chaotic existing texts, and few important narrative changes were made. But in these new texts 'Bingo' is finally supplanted by 'Frodo', and 'Frodo Took' becomes in turn 'Folco Took', taking over what had been his father's name (see pp. 251, 290). In describing these third phase versions I restrict myself here almost exclusively to the form they had when first written, and ignore the fearsome complexities of their later treatment. There are three pieces of evidence available for the determination of the 'external' date. One is my father's letter of 13 October 1938, in which he said that the book 'has reached Chapter XI (though in rather an illegible state') (Letters no. 34). Another is his letter of a February 1939, in which he recorded that although he had not been able to touch it since the previous December, it had by then 'reached Chapter 12 (and had been re-written several times), running to over 300 MS pages of the size of this paper and written generally as closely.' The third is a set of notes, plot-outlines and brief narrative drafts all bearing the date 'August 1939'. from these, as will be seen later, it is apparent that the third phase was already in being.