The War of the Ring Read Online Free PDF

fortunes change.] Men issue on horses. But the host is vast, only it is disconcerted by the Wood. Almost [? the watchers could]
    believe it had moved up the valley as the battle raged.
    Trees should come right up to Dike. In the midst out rides Gandalf from the wood. And rides through the orcs as if they were rats and crows.

    My father began a new text of the chapter before important elements in the story and in the physical setting had been darified, and as a result this (the first completed manuscript) is an extremely complicated document. It was only after he had begun it that he extended the ride from Eodoras by a further day, and described the great storm coming up out of the East (TT pp. 131-2); and when he began it he had not yet realised that Helm's Dike was not the scene of the great assault: 'what really happened' was that the men manning the Dike were driven in, and the defence of the redoubt was at the line of a great wall further up at the mouth of the gorge - the 'Deeping Wall' - and the Hornburg. At this point in the manuscript the story can be seen changing as my father wrote: in Eomer's reply to Aragorn's question 'Shall we soon find ground where we can turn and stand?' (p. 13) he begins as before with an account of the fortification of the Dike ('crowned with a rampart of great stones, piled in ancient days'), but by the end of his reply he is saying that the Dike cannot be held:

    '... But we cannot long defend it, for we have not enough strength. It is near two miles from end to end, and is pierced by two wide breaches. We shall not be able to stand at bay till we get to the Stanrock, and come behind the wall that guards the entrance to the Deep. That is high and strong, for Heorulf had it repaired and raised not long ago.'

    Immediately after this the Deeping Stream entered, and the two breaches in the Dike were reduced to one: there 'a stream flows down out of the Deep, and beside it the road runs from Helm's Gate to the valley.'(20) At this stage, however, the final story was still not reached, but follows the outline just given (p. 18):

    The King and the main part of his host now rode on to man the Stanrock and Heorulf's wall. But the Westmarchers would not yet abandon the dike while any hope remained of Heorulf's return. Eomer and Aragorn and a few picked men stayed with them guarding the breach; for it seemed to Eomer that they might do great harm to the advance-guard of the enemy and then escape swiftly ere the main strength of the orcs and wild men forced the passage.

    The story from this point was built up in a textually extremely complex series of short drafts leading to more finished forms, while earlier portions of the chapter were changed to accommodate the evolving conception of the redoubt as the scene of the battle. To follow this evolution in all its detail would require a very great deal of space, and I record only certain rejected narrative ideas and other particular points of interest.
    Before the story (TT pp. 138-40) of the sortie of Eomer and Aragorn from the postern gate emerged, the repulse of the attack on the great gates of the Hornburg was differently conceived: Now with a great cry a company of the wild men moved forward, among them they bore the trunk of a great tree. The orcs crowded about them. The tree was swung by many strong hands, and smote the timbers with a boom. At that moment there was a sudden call. Among the boulders upon the flat and narrow rim beneath the fastness and the brink a few brave men had lain hidden. Aragorn was their leader. 'Up now, up now,'
    he shouted. 'Out Branding, out!' A blade flashed like white fire.
    'Elendil, Elendil!' he shouted, and his voice echoed in the cliffs.
    'See, see!' said Eomer. 'Branding has gone to war at last. Why am I not there? We were to have drawn blades together.'
    None could withstand the onset of Aragorn, or the terror of his sword. The orcs fled, the hill-men were hewn down, or fled leaving their ram upon the ground.