Текст книги "The Book of Lost Tales, Part One"

Автор книги: John Ronald Reuel Tolkien

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(vi) The Gods of Death and the Fates of Elves and Men

(pp. 76–7)

This section of the tale contains its most surp1rising and difficult elements. Mandos and his wife Nienna appear in the account of the coming of the Valar into the world at the beginning of the tale (p. 66), where they are named ‘Fantur of Death, Vefбntur Mandos’ and ‘Fui Nienna’, ‘mistress of death’. In the present passage it is said that Vefбntur named his dwelling Vк by his own name, whereas afterwards (The Silmarillion p. 28) he was called by the name of his dwelling; but in the early writing there is a distinction between the region (Mandos) and the halls (Vк and Fui) within the region. There is here no trace of Mandos as the ‘Doomsman of the Valar’, who ‘pronounces his dooms and his judgements only at the bidding of Manwл’, one of the most notable aspects of the later conception of this Vala; nor, since Nienna is the wife of Mandos, has Vairл the Weaver, his wife in the later story, appeared, with her tapestries that portray ‘all things that have ever been in Time’ and clothe the halls of Mandos ‘that ever widen as the ages pass’—in the Lost Tales the name Vairл is given to an Elf of Tol Eressлa. Tapestries ‘picturing those things that were and shall be’ are found here in the halls of Aulл (p. 74).

Most important in the passage concerning Mandos is the clear statement about the fate of Elves who die: that they wait in the halls of Mandos until Vefбntur decrees their release, to be reborn in their own children. This latter idea has already appeared in the tale of The Music of the Ainur (p. 59), and it remained my father’s unchanged conception of Elvish ‘immortality’ for many years; indeed the idea that the Elves might die only from the wounds of weapons or from grief was never changed—it also has appeared in The Music of the Ainur (ibid.): ‘the Eldar dwell till the Great End unless they be slain or waste in grief’, a passage that survived with little alteration in The Silmarillion (p. 42).

With the account of Fui Nienna, however, we come upon ideas in deep contradiction to the central thought of the later mythology (and in this passage, also, there is a strain of another kind of mythic conception, in the ‘conceits’ of ‘the distilling of salt humours whereof are tears’, and the black clouds woven by Nienna which settle on the world as ‘despairs and hopeless mourning, sorrows and blind grief’). Here we learn that Nienna is the judge of Men in her halls named Fui after her own name; and some she keeps in the region of Mandos (where is her hall), while the greater number board the black ship Morniл—which does no more than ferry these dead down the coast to Arvalin, where they wander in the dusk until the end of the world. But yet others are driven forth to be seized by Melko and taken to endure ‘evil days’ in Angamandi (in what sense are they dead, or mortal?); and (most extraordinary of all) there are a very few who go to dwell among the Gods in Valinor. We are far away here from the Gift of Ilъvatar, whereby Men are not bound to the world, but leave it, none know where;* and this is the true meaning of Death (for the death of the Elves is a ‘seeming death’, The Silmarillion p. 42): the final and inescapable exit.

But a little illumination, if of a very misty kind, can be shed on the idea of Men, after death, wandering in the dusk of Arvalin, where they ‘camp as they may’ and ‘wait in patienc1e till the Great End’. I must refer here to the details of the changed names of this region, which have been given on p. 79. It is clear from the early word-lists or dictionaries of the two languages (for which see the Appendix on Names) that the meaning of Harwalin and Arvalin (and probably Habbanan also) was ‘nigh Valinor’ or ‘nigh the Valar’. From the Gnomish dictionary it emerges that the meaning of Eruman was ‘beyond the abode of the Mбnir’ (i.e. south of Taniquetil, where dwelt Manwл’s spirits of the air), and this dictionary also makes it clear that the word Mбnir was related to Gnomish manos, defined as ‘a spirit that has gone to the Valar or to Erumбni’, and mani ‘good, holy’. The significance of these etymological connections is very unclear.

But there is also a very early poem on the subject of this region. This, according to my father’s notes, was written at Brocton Camp, Staffordshire, in December 1915 or at Йtaples in June 1916; and it is entitled Habbanan beneath the Stars. In one of the three texts (in which there are no variants) there is a title in Old English: pa gebletsode [‘blessed’] felda under pa m steorrum, and in two of them Habbanan in the title was emended to Eruman; in the third Eruman stood from the first. The poem is preceded by a short prose preamble.

Habbanan beneath the Stars

Now Habbanan is that region where one draws nigh to the places that are not of Men. There is the air very sweet and the sky very great by reason of the broadness of the Earth. In Habbanan beneath the skies

Where all roads end however long

There is a sound of faint guitars

And distant echoes of a song,

For there men gather into rings

Round their red fires while one voice sings—

And all about is night.

Not night as ours, unhappy folk,

Where nigh the Earth in hazy bars,

A mist about the springing of the stars,

There trails a thin and wandering smoke

Obscuring with its veil half-seen

The great abysmal still Serene.

A globe of dark glass faceted with light

Wherein the splendid winds have dusky flight;

Untrodden spaces of an odorous plain

That watches for the moon that long has lain

And caught the meteors’ fiery rain—

Such there is night.

There on a sudden did my heart perceive

That they who sang about the Eve,

Who answered the bright-shining stars

With gleaming music of their strange guitars,

These were His wandering happy sons

Encamped upon those aлry leas

Wh1ere God’s unsullied garment runs

In glory down His mighty knees.

A final evidence comes from the early Qenya word-list. The original layer of entries in this list dates (as I believe, see the Appendix on Names) from 1915, and among these original entries, under a root mana (from which Manwл is derived), is given a word manimo which means a soul who is in manimuine ‘Purgatory’.

This poem, and this entry in the word-list, offer a rare and very suggestive glimpse of the mythic conception in its earliest phase; for here ideas that are drawn from Christian theology are explicitly present. It is disconcerting to perceive that they are still present in this tale. For in the tale there is an account of the fates of dead Men after judgement in the black hall of Fui Nienna. Some (‘and these are the many’) are ferried by the death-ship to (Habbanan) Eruman, where they wander in the dusk and wait in patience till the Great End; some are seized by Melko and tormented in Angamandi ‘the Hells of Iron’ and some few go to dwell with the Gods in Valinor. Taken with the poem and the evidence of the early ‘dictionaries’, can this be other than a reflection of Purgatory, Hell, and Heaven?

This becomes all the more extraordinary if we refer to the concluding passage of the tale of The Music of the Ainur (p. 59), where Ilъvatar said: ‘To Men I will give a new gift and a greater’, the gift that they might ‘fashion and design their life beyond even the original Music of the Ainur that is as fate to all things else’, and where it is said that ‘it is one with this gift of power that the Children of Men dwell only for a short time in the world alive, yet do not perish utterly for ever…’ In the final form given in The Silmarillion pp. 41–2 this passage was not very greatly changed. The early version does not, it is true, have the sentences:

But the sons of Men die indeed, and leave the world; wherefore they are called the Guests, or the Strangers. Death is their fate, the gift of Ilъvatar, which as Time wears even the Powers shall envy.

Even so, it seems clear that this central idea, the Gift of Death, was already present.

This matter I must leave, as a conundrum that I cannot solve. The most obvious explanation of the conflict of ideas within these tales would be to suppose The Music of the Ainur later than The Coming of the Valar and the Building of Valinor; but as I have said (p. 61) all the appearances are to the contrary.

Lastly may be noticed the characteristic linguistic irony whereby Eruman ultimately became Araman. For Arvalin meant simply ‘near Valinor’, and it was the other name Eruman that had associations with spirits of the dead; but Araman almost certainly simply means ‘beside Aman’. And yet the same element man– ‘good’ remains, for Aman was derived from it (‘the Unmarred State’).

Two minor matters in the conclusion of the tale remain to be noticed. Here Nornorл is the Herald of the Gods; afterwards this was Fionwл (later Eonwл), see p. 63. And in the reference to ‘that low place amid the hills where Valinor may just be glimpsed’, near to Taniquetil, we have the first mention of the gap in the Mountains of Valinor where was the hill of the city of the Elves.

On blank pages near the end of the text of this tale my father wrote a list of secondary names of the Valar (as Manwл Sъlimo, etc.). Some of these names appear in the text of the Tales; those that do not are given in the Appendix on Names under the primary names. It emerges from this list that Уmar-Amillo is the twin of Salmar-Noldorin (they are named as brothers in the tale, p. 75); that Nielнqui (p. 75) is the daughter of Oromл and Vбna; and that Melko has a son (‘by Ulbandi’) called Kosomot: this, it will emerge later, was Gothmog Lord of Balrogs, whom Ecthelion slew in Gondolin.

IV

THE CHAINING OF MELKO

Following the end of Rъmil’s tale of The Coming of the Valar and the Building of Valinor there is a long interlude before the next one, though the manuscript continues without even interrupting the paragraph. But on the cover of the notebook The Chaining of Melko is given as a separate title, and I have adopted this. The text continues in ink over an erased pencil manuscript.

That night Eriol heard again in his sleep the music that had so moved him on the first night; and the next morning he went again into the gardens early. There he met Vairл, and she called him Eriol: ‘that was the first making and uttering of that name’. Eriol told Vairл of the ‘dream-musics’ he had heard, and she said that it was no dream-music, but rather the flute of Timpinen, ‘whom those Gnomes Rъmil and Littleheart and others of my house call Tinfang’. She told him that the children called him Tinfang Warble; and that he played and danced in summer dusks for joy of the first stars: ‘at every note a new one sparkles forth and glisters. The Noldoli say that they come out too soon if Tinfang Warble plays, and they love him, and the children will watch often from the windows lest he tread the shadowy lawns unseen.’ She told Eriol that he was ‘shier than a fawn—swift to hide and dart away as any vole: a footstep on a twig and he is away, and his fluting will come mocking from afar’.

‘And a marvel of wizardry liveth in that fluting,’ said Eriol, ‘if that it be indeed which I have heard now for two nights here.’

‘There be none,’ said Vairл, ‘not even of the Solosimpi, who can rival him therein, albeit those same pipers claim him as their kin; yet ’tis said everywhere that this quaint spirit is neither wholly of the Valar nor of the Eldar, but is half a fay of the woods and dells, one of the great companies of the children of Palъrien, and half a Gnome or a Shoreland Piper.¹ Howso that be he is a wondrous wise and strange creature, and he fared hither away with the Eldar long ago, marching nor resting among them but going always ahead piping strangely or whiles sitting aloof. Now does he play about the gardens of the land; but Alalminуrл he loves the best, and this garden best of all. Ever and again we miss his piping for long months, and we say: “Tinfang Warble has gone heart-breaking in1 the Great Lands, and many a one in those far regions will hear his piping in the dusk outside tonight.” But on a sudden will his flute be heard again at an hour of gentle gloaming, or will he play beneath a goodly moon and the stars go bright and blue.’

‘Aye,’ said Eriol, ‘and the hearts of those that hear him go beating with a quickened longing. Meseemed ’twas my desire to open the window and leap forth, so sweet was the air that came to me from without, nor might I drink deep enough, but as I listened I wished to follow I know not whom, I know not whither, out into the magic of the world beneath the stars.’

‘Then of a sooth ’twas Timpinen who played to you,’ said Vairл, ‘and honoured are you, for this garden has been empty of his melody many a night. Now, however, for such is the eeriness of that sprite, you will ever love the evenings of summer and the nights of stars, and their magic will cause your heart to ache unquenchably.’

‘But have you not all heard him many times and often, that dwell here,’ said Eriol, ‘yet do not seem to me like those who live with a longing that is half understood and may not be fulfilled.’

‘Nor do we so, for we have limpл,’ said she, ‘limpл that alone can cure, and a draught of it giveth a heart to fathom all music and song.’

‘Then,’ said Eriol, ‘would I might drain a goblet of that good drink’ but Vairл told him that that might only be if he sought out Meril the queen.

Of this converse of Eriol and Vairл upon the lawn that fair day-tide came it that Eriol set out not many days thereafter—and Tinfang Warble had played to him many times by dusk, by starry light and moongleam, till his heart was full. In that was Littleheart his guide, and he sought the dwellings of Meril-i-Turinqui in her korin of elms.

Now the house of that fair lady was in that very city, for at the foot of the great tower which Ingil had built was a wide grove of the most ancient and beautiful elms that all that Land of Elms possessed. High to heaven they rose in three lessening storeys of bright foliage, and the sunlight that filtered through was very cool—a golden green. Amidst of these was a great green sward of grass smooth as a web of stuffs, and about it those trees stood in a circle, so that shades were heavy at its edge but the gaze of the sun fell all day on its middle. There stood a beautiful house, and it was builded all of white and of a whiteness that shone, but its roof was so o’ergrown with mosses and with houseleek and many curious clinging plants that of what it was once fashioned might not be seen for the glorious maze of colours, golds and red-russets, scarlets and greens.

Innumerable birds chattered in its eaves; and some sang upon the housetops, while doves and pigeons circled in flights about the korin’s borders or swooped to settle and sun upon the sward. Now all that dwelling was footed in flowers. Blossomy clusters were about it, ropes and tangles, spikes and tassels all in bloom, flowers in panicles and umbels or with great wide faces gazing at the sun. There did they loose upon the faintly stirring airs their several odours blended to a great fragrance of exceeding marvellous enchantment, but their hues and colours were scattered and gathered seemingly as chance and the happiness of their growth directed them. All day long there went a hum of bees among those flowers: bees fared about the roof and all the scented beds and ways; even about the cool porches of the house. Now Littleheart and Eriol climbed the hill and it was late afternoon, and the sun shone brazen upon the weste1rn side of Ingilв™ tower. Soon came they to a mighty wall of hewn stone blocks, and this leaned outward, but grasses grew atop of it, and harebells, and yellow daisies.

A wicket they found in the wall, and beyond was a glade beneath the elms, and there ran a pathway bordered of one side with bushes while of the other flowed a little running water whispering over a brown bed of leafy mould. This led even to the swardв™ edge, and coming thither said Littleheart pointing to that white house: вehold the dwelling of Meril-i-Turinqui, and as I have no errand with so great a lady I will get me back again.в™Then Eriol went over the sunny lawn alone until he was nigh shoulder-high in the tall flowers that grew before the porches of the door; and as he drew near a sound of music came to him, and a fair lady amid many maidens stepped forth as it were to meet him. Then said she smiling: вelcome, O mariner of many seasв”herefore do you seek the pleasure of my quiet gardens and their gentle noise, when the salt breezes of the sea and the snuff of winds and a swaying boat should rather be your joy?в™/p>

For a while Eriol might say nought thereto, being tongue-tied by the beauty of that lady and the loveliness of that place of flowers; yet at length he muttered that he had known sea enough, but of this most gracious land he might never be sated. вay,в™said she, вn a day of autumn will come the winds and a driven gull, maybe, will wail overhead, and lo! you will be filled with desire, remembering the black coasts of your home.в™sup>2 вay, lady,в™said Eriol, and now he spoke with eager voice, вay, not so, for the spirit that flutes upon twilit lawns has filled my heart with music, and I thirst for a draught of limpГ!в™/u>

Then straightway did the smiling face of Meril grow grave, and bidding her maidens depart she prayed Eriol follow her to a space nigh to the house, and this was of cool grass but not very short. Fruit-trees grew there, and about the roots of one, an apple-tree of great girth and age, the soil was piled so that there was now a broad seat around its bole, soft and grass-covered. There sat Meril and she gazed upon Eriol and said: вnow you then what it is that you ask?в™and he said: в know nought save that I desire to know the soul of every song and of all music and to dwell always in fellowship and kinship with this wondrous people of the Eldar of the Isle, and to be free of unquenchable longing even till the Faring Forth, even till the Great End!в™/p>

But Meril said: вellowship is possible, maybe, but kinship not so, for Man is Man and Elda Elda, and what IlГvatar has made unalike may not become alike while the world remains. Even didst thou dwell here till the Great End and for the health of limpГ found no death, yet then must thou die and leave us, for Man must die once. And hearken, O Eriol, think not to escape unquenchable longing with a draught of limpГв”or only wouldst thou thus exchange desires, replacing thy old ones with new and deeper and more keen. Desire unsatisfied dwells in the hearts of both those races that are called the Children of IlГvatar, but with the Eldar most, for their hearts are filled with a vision of beauty in great glory.в™вet, O Queen,в™said Eriol thereto, вet me but taste of this drink and become an agelong fellow of your people: O queen of the EldaliГ, that I may be as the happy children of Mar Vanwa TyaliГva.в™вay, not yet can I do that,†said Meril, вor в™is a graver matter far to give this drink to one who has known life and days already in the lands of Men than for a child to drink who knows but little else; yet even these did we keep a long while ere we gave them the wine of song, teaching them first much lore and testing their hearts and souls. Therefore I bid you now bide still longer and learn all that you may in this our isle. Lo, what do you know of the world, or of the ancient days of Men, or of the roots which those things that now are have far back in time, or what of the EldaliГ and all their wisdom, that you should claim our cup of youth and poesy?в™/p>

вhe tongue of Tol EressГa do I know, and of the Valar have I heard, and the great worldв™ beginning, and the building of Valinor; to musics have I hearkened and to poesy and the laughter of the Elves, and all I have found true and good, and my heart knows and it saith to me that these shall I always henceforth love, and love aloneв™Ђthus answered Eriol, and his heart was sore for the refusal of the Queen.

вet nothing do you know of the coming of the Elves, of the fates wherein they move, nor their nature and the place that IlГvatar has given to them. Little do you reck of that great splendour of their home in Eldamar upon the hill of KГr, nor all the sorrow of our parting. What know you of our travail down all the dark ways of the world, and the anguish we have known because of Melko; of the sorrows we have suffered, and do yet, because of Men, of all the fears that darken our hopes because of Men? Know you the wastes of tears that lie between our life in Tol EressГa and that time of laughter that we knew in Valinor? O child of Men who wouldst be sharer of the fates of the EldaliГ, what of our high desires and all those things we look for still to beв”or lo! if you drink this drink all these must you know and love, having one heart with usв”ay, even at the Faring Forth, should Eldar and Men fall into war at the last, still must you stand by us against the children of your kith and kin, but until then never may you fare away home though longings gnaw youв”nd the desires that at whiles consume a full-grown man who drinketh limpГ are a fire of unimagined tortureв”new you these things, O Eriol, when you fared hither with your request?в™/p>

вay, I knew them not,в™said Eriol sadly, вhough often have I questioned folk thereof.в™/p>

вhen lo!в™said Meril, в will begin a tale, and tell you some of it ere the long afternoon grows dimв”ut then must you fare hence again in patienceв™and Eriol bowed his head.

вhen,в™said Meril, вow I will tell you of a time of peace the world once knew, and it is known as вњelkoв™ Chainsв³ Of the Earth I will tell you as the Eldar found it and of the manner of their awakening into it.

Behold, Valinor is built, and the Gods dwell in peace, for Melko is far in the world delving deep and fortifying himself in iron and cold, but Makar and MeГssГ ride upon the gales and rejoice in earthquakes and the overmastering furies of the ancient seas. Light and beautiful is Valinor, but there is a deep twilight upon the world, for the Gods have gathered so much of that light that had before flowed about the airs. Seldom now falls the shimmering rain as it was used, and there reigns a gloom lit with pale streaks or shot with red where Melko spouts to heaven from a fire-torn hill.

Then PalГrien Yavanna fared forth from her fruitful gardens to survey the wide lands of her domain, and wandered the dark continents sowing seed and brooding upon hill and dale. Alone in that agelong gloaming she sang songs of the utmost enchantment, and of such deep magic were they that they floated about the rocky places and their echoes lingered for years of time in hill and empty plain, and all the good magics of all later days are whispers of the memories of her echoing song.

Then things began to grow there, fungus and strange growths heaved in damp places and lichens and mosses crept stealthily across the rocks and ate their faces, and they crumbled and made dust, and the creeping plants died in the dust, and there was mould, and ferns and warted plants grew in it silently, and strange creatures thrust their heads from crannies and crept over the stones. But Yavanna wept, for this was not the fair vigour that she had thought of—and thereupon Oromл came to her leaping in the dusk, but Tuivбna would not leave the radiance of Kulullin nor Nessa the green swards of her dancing.

Then Oromл and Palъrien put forth all their might, and Oromл blew great blasts upon his horn as though he would awake the grey rocks to life and lustihead. Behold, at these blasts the great forest reared and moaned about the hills, and all the trees of dark leaf came to being, and the world was shaggy with a growth of pines and odorous with resinous trees, and firs and cedars hung their blue and olive draperies about the slopes, and yews began the centuries of their growth. Now was Oromл less gloomy and Palъrien was comforted, seeing the beauty of the first stars of Varda gleaming in the pale heavens through the shadows of the first trees’ boughs, and hearing the murmur of the dusky forests and the creaking of the branches when Manwл stirred the airs.

At that time did many strange spirits fare into the world, for there were pleasant places dark and quiet for them to dwell in. Some came from Mandos, aged spirits that journeyed from Ilъvatar with him who are older than the world and very gloomy and secret, and some from the fortresses of the North where Melko then dwelt in the deep dungeons of Utumna. Full of evil and unwholesome were they; luring and restlessness and horror they brought, turning the dark into an ill and fearful thing, which it was not before. But some few danced thither with gentle feet exuding evening scents, and these came from the gardens of Lуrien.

Still is the world full of these in the days of light, lingering alone in shadowy hearts of primeval forests, calling secret things across a starry waste, and haunting caverns in the hills that few have found:—but the pinewoods are yet too full of these old unelfin and inhuman spirits for the quietude of Eldar or of Men.

When this great deed was done then Palъrien would fain rest from her long labours and return to taste the sweet fruits of Valinor, and be refreshed beneath the tree of Laurelin whose dew is light, and Oromл was for beechwoods on the plains of the great Gods; but Melko who long time had delved in fear because of the wrath of the Valar at his treacherous dealing with their lamps burst forth now into a great violence, for he had thought the world abandoned by the Gods to him and his. Beneath the very floors of Ossл he caused the Earth to quake and split and his lower fires to mingle with the sea. Vaporous storms and a great roaring of uncontrolled sea-motions burst upon the world, and the forests groaned and snapped. The sea leapt upon the land and tore it, and wide regions sank beneath its rage or were hewn into scattered islets, and the coast was dug into caverns. The mountains rocked and their hearts melted, and stone poured like liquid fire down their ashen sides and flowed even to the sea, and the noise of the great battles of the fiery beaches came roaring even through the Mountains of Valinor and drowned the singing of the Gods. Then rose Kйmi Palъrien, even Yavanna that giveth fruits, and Aulл w1ho loveth all her works and the substances of the earth, and they climbed to the halls of Manwл and spake to him, saying that all that goodliness was going utterly to wreck for the fiery evil of Melko’s untempered heart, and Yavanna pleaded that all her agelong labour in the twilight be not drowned and buried. Thither, as they spake, came Ossл raging like a tide among the cliffs, for he was wroth at the upheaval of his realm and feared the displeasure of Ulmo his overlord. Then arose Manwл Sъlimo, Lord of Gods and Elves, and Varda Tinwetбri was beside him, and he spake in a voice of thunder from Taniquetil, and the Gods in Valmar heard it, and Vefбntur knew the voice in Mandos, and Lуrien was aroused in Murmuran.

Then was a great council held between the Two Trees at the mingling of the lights, and Ulmo came thither from the outer deeps; and of the redes there spoken the Gods devised a plan of wisdom, and the thought of Ulmo was therein and much of the craft of Aulл and the wide knowledge of Manwл.

Behold, Aulл now gathered six metals, copper, silver, tin, lead, iron, and gold, and taking a portion of each made with his magic a seventh which he named therefore tilkal,* and this had all the properties of the six and many of its own. Its colour was bright green or red in varying lights and it could not be broken, and Aulл alone could forge it. Thereafter he forged a mighty chain, making it of all seven metals welded with spells to a substance of uttermost hardness and brightness and smoothness, but of tilkal he had not sufficient to add more than a little to each link. Nonetheless he made two manacles of tilkal only and four fetters likewise. Now the chain was named Angaino, the oppressor, and the manacles Vorotemnar that bind forever, but the fetters Ilterendi for they might not be filed or cleft.

But the desire of the Gods was to seek out Melko with great power—and to entreat him, if it might be, to better deeds; yet did they purpose, if naught else availed, to overcome him by force or guile, and set him in a bondage from which there should be no escape.

Now as Aulл smithied the Gods arrayed themselves in armour, which they had of Makar, and he was fain to see them putting on weapons and going as to war, howso their wrath be directed against Melko. But when the great Gods and all their folk were armed, then Manwл climbed into his blue chariot whose three horses were the whitest that roamed in Oromл’s domain, and his hand bore a great white bow that would shoot an arrow like a gust of wind across the widest seas. Fionwл his son stood behind him and Nornorл who was his herald ran before; but Oromл rode alone upon a chestnut horse and had a spear, and Tulkas strode mightily beside his stirrup, having a tunic of hide and a brazen belt and no weapon save a gauntlet upon his right hand, iron-bound. Telimektar his son but just war-high was by his shoulder with a long sword girt about his waist by a silver girdle. There rode the Fбnturi upon a car of black, and there was a black horse upon the side of Mandos and a dappled grey upon the side of Lуrien, and Salmar and Уmar came behind running speedily, but Aulл who was late tarrying overlong at his smithy came last, and he was not armed, but caught up his long-handled hammer as he left his forge and fared hastily to the borders of the Shadowy Sea, and the fathoms of his chain were borne behind by four of his smithy-folk.

Upon those shor1es Falman-Ossл met them and drew them across on a mighty raft whereon he himself sat in shimmering mail; but Ulmo Vailimo was far ahead roaring in his deep-sea car and trumpeting in wrath upon a horn of conches. Thus was it that the Gods got them over the sea and through the isles, and set foot upon the wide lands, and marched in great power and anger ever more to the North. Thus they passed the Mountains of Iron and Hisilуmл that lies dim beyond, and came to the rivers and hills of ice. There Melko shook the earth beneath them, and he made snow-capped heights to belch forth flame, yet for the greatness of their array his vassals who infested all their ways availed nothing to hinder them on their journey. There in the deepest North beyond even the shattered pillar Ringil they came upon the huge gates of deep Utumna, and Melko shut them with great clangour before their faces.