The Lord of the Rings: The Road to Isengard (Part Five and Last)

The Tale

‘Now Gandalf rode to the great pillar of the Hand, and passed it, and as he did so the Riders saw to their wonder that the Hand appeared no longer white. It was stained as with dried blood; and looking closer they perceived that its nails were red.’ Gandalf leads them further down the road, into the obscuring mists.

At last they reach the gates of Isengard, a little past noon. But to their surprise the iron gates are twisted and thrown down, the bowl of the valley filled with steaming and bubbling water, filled with floating wreckage. The power of Saruman has been cast down, apparently. But in the middle, unbroken, but wreathed in winding cloud, the dark spike of Orthanc still rears itself in the pale sunlight.

The king and his company marvel at the ruin and cannot imagine how it was accomplished. But then they see, sitting on a heap of rubble next to the gateway, two small, grey-clad figures ‘taking their ease’. They are surrounded by bottles and bowls and plates. One seems asleep and the other is sitting, blowing long wreathes and rings of smoke from its mouth. They are indeed, Merry and Pippin, found again at last.

As Théoden, Eomer, and their men gaze in wonder, Merry (the smoking hobbit) suddenly becomes aware of them and jumps to his feet, bowing low. Seeming to ignore his old friends of the Fellowship, he welcomes the King to Isengard, and introduces himself and Pippin as the doorwardens, giving him their formal names Meriadoc and Peregrin (and digging into Pippin with his foot to wake him up). Doubtless Saruman would be here to welcome them himself, but right now he’s closeted with one Wormtongue.

Gandalf laughs at all his formality and politeness and says surely Saruman didn’t give them this job. No, says Merry, it was Treebeard, ‘who has taken over the management of Isengard’ and asked him to greet the Lord of Rohan with fitting words.

Gimli cries out, and what about us, your friends? We’ve chased you two hundred leagues, through waste and war, to rescue you, and here we find you idling and feasting – and smoking! ‘Hammer and tongs! I am so torn between rage and joy, that if I do not burst, it will be a marvel!’

Pippin opens an eye, and placidly answers that they find the hobbits sitting on a field of victory, enjoying a few well-earned rewards, a reply that elicits a burst of skepticism from the Dwarf. The Riders laugh at the exchange, and Théoden says they are clearly witnessing the reunion of dear old friends.

Théoden says the days are fated to be filled with marvels. He asks Gandalf if these are his companions the Halflings, that some among his folk call the Holbytla? Pippin tells him that they are Hobbits, if you please, and Théoden says the name is strangely changed from his tongue, but not unfitting. Pippin is amazed to learn that his folk know anything about Hobbits. Théoden says there are no stories, just a general legend. But he’s never heard that they can spout smoke.

Merry eagerly begins to tell him the history of pipes and pipeweed, but Gandalf cautions the King about the garrulity of Hobbits, who will sit on the edge of ruin and talk about the stories of their kinfolk to the ninth degree. He asks Merry where is Treebeard?

The hobbit tells him he’s gone to the North side to get a clean drink of water. And is Saruman thus left unguarded? Well, there is the water, and several other Ents are on watch. And has Treebeard left no message, Gandalf asks.

Merry was coming to that, but he was hindered by other questions. If Gandalf and Théoden will ride to the northern wall, they will find Treebeard and food of the best selected for them, ‘discovered and selected by your humble servants.’

Gandalf asks if Théoden will ride with him and meet Treebeard, for Treebeard is Fangorn, the oldest Ent and the ‘oldest of all living things.’

‘I will come with you,’ said Théoden. ‘Farewll, my hobbits! May we meet again in my house! There you shall sit beside me and tell me all that your hearts desire: the deeds of your grandsires as far as you can reckon them … Farewell!’

‘The hobbits bowed low. ‘So that is the King of Rohan!’ said Pippin in an undertone. ‘A fine old fellow. Very polite.’

Bits and Bobs

I’ve always wondered if Gandalf put the whammy on the White Hand, or if they only noticed the red as they passed it. I’ve never seen any place that accounted for it. Just a small detail, but I wonder.

Merry’s formality with the King and his idea of ‘fitting words’ strikes me as a strange combination of his memory of ceremonial speech (as in Rivendell or Lorien) and the Hobbit notion of dignity. Such an example is his phrase that Treebeard has ‘taken over the management of Isengard’, as if it were an inn that had simply switched owners. Merry’s father’s name Saradoc recalls the Celtic name Caradoc, and Pippin’s father’s name Paladin is the Frankish term for any of the Twelve Peers of Emperor Charlemagne, and has come to mean any especially chivalric knight (and also an entire class in D&D).

The words of Gimli that he might burst recalls the fate of other dwarves in lore and legend, some of whom burst at the touch of sunlight, or who, becoming outraged, pull themselves apart and sink into the earth (like Rumpelstiltskin).

The fact that Theoden’s people dwelt in the North long ago accounts for the similarity of between their speech and the speech of the Hobbits, and bears something of the resemblance between Anglo-Saxon and English. Indeed, it sparks the creation of one of Merry’s later books, Old Words and Names in the Shire. In real life Tolkien, having created the name Hobbit, felt he must come up with a possible ancestry for it, and found Anglo-Saxon hol-bytla (‘hole- builder’) to answer the need quite handily.

I also have to remark that the King’s first amazement at pipe-smoking recalls the effect of Hank Morgan’s smoking in A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court, a book Tolkien had read but was not entirely pleased with. Here it is another juxtaposition between the 'legendary' and the 'modern' mode, as is Pippin's down-to-earth comment to Theoden's ornate farewell.