LotR - Prologue

[davem]

From the '37 Hobbit:

But funnily enough he need not have been alarmed. for one thing Gollum had learned long long ago was never, never, to cheat at the riddle-game, which is a sacred one & of immense antiquity. Also there was the sword. He simply sat & whispered.

‘What about the present?’ asked Bilbo, not that he cared very much, still he felt that he had won it, pretty fairly, & in very difficult circumstances too.

‘Must we give it the thing, preciouss? Yess, we must!. we must fetch it, preciouss, & give it the present we promised.’ So Gollum paddled back to his boat, & Bilbo thought he had heard the last of him. but he had not. The hobbit was just thinking of going back up the passage - having had quite enough of Gollum & the dark water’s edge - when he heard him wailing & squeaking away in the gloom...

Bilbo turned round & waited, wondering what it could be that the creature was making such a fuss about. This proved very fortunate afterwards. For Gollum came back & made a tremendous spluttering & whispering & croaking; & in the end Bilbo gathered that Gollum had had a ring, a ring that he had been given for a birthday present, ages & ages before in old days when such rings were less uncommon...


I don’t know how many times Gollum begged Bilbo’s pardoned. He kept on saying: ‘We are ssorry; we didn’t mean to cheat, we meant to give it our only only present, if it won the competition.’ He even offered to catch Bilbo some nice juicy fish to eat as a consolation...

‘Finding’s keeping!’ he said to himself; & being in a very tight place, I daresay, he was right. Anyway the ring belonged to him now.

‘Never mind!’ he said, ‘The ring would have been mine now, if you had found it; so you would have lost it anyway. And I will let you off on one condition.’

‘Yes, what iss it? What does it wish us to do, my preciouss?’

Help me to get out of these places,’ said Bilbo.

Now Gollum had to agree to this, if he was not to cheat.

Unfortunately, for copyright reasons I can't quote the whole thing. It is included in the Annotated Hobbit, but those are the most important sections. Whether we consider Bilbo's original account as constituting a 'lie' is down to the individual.

Its interesting that he would claim that magic rings were once 'less uncommon', & expected his readers (& Gandalf) to believe that at one time they were actually so common that even Hobbits would give them to each other as birthday presents! Did he expect his readers to believe that there was once a time when individuals in possesion of magic rings were appearing & disappearing at will?


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