The Book of Lost Tales - J. R. Tolkien [162]
The coming of the message was followed by ‘the councils (counsels C) of the Gods and the uproar of the Elves’, but in C nothing is said of ‘the sorrow and wrath of the Gods’ or ‘the veil dropped between Valmar and Kôr’ referred to in B: where the meaning can surely only be that the March of the Elves from Valinor was undertaken in direct opposition to the will of the Valar, that the Valar were bitterly opposed to the intervention of the Elves of Valinor in the affairs of the Great Lands. There may well be a connection here with Vairë’s words (I. 19): ‘When the fairies left Kôr that lane [i.e. Olórë Mallë that led past the Cottage of Lost Play] was blocked for ever with great impassable rocks’. Elsewhere there is only one other reference to the effect of the message from across the sea, and that is in the words of Lindo to Eriol in The Cottage of Lost Play (I.16):
Inwë, whom the Gnomes call Inwithiel……was King of all the Eldar when they dwelt in Kôr. That was in the days before hearing the lament of the world [i.e. the Great Lands] Inwë led them forth to the lands of Men.
Later, Meril-i-Turinqi told Eriol (I.129) that Inwë, her grandsire’s sire, ‘perished in that march into the world’, but Ingil his son ‘went long ago back to Valinor and is with Manwë’ and there is a reference to Inwë’s death in B.
In C the Solosimpi only agreed to accompany the expedition on condition that they remain by the sea, and the reluctance of the Third Kindred, on account of the Kinslaying at Swanhaven, survived (The Silmarillion p. 251). But there is no suggestion that the Elves of Valinor were transported by ship, indeed the reverse, for the Solosimpi ‘fare along all the beaches of the world’, and the expedition is a ‘March’ though there is no indication of how they came to the Great Lands.
Both outlines refer to Eärendel being driven eastwards on his homeward voyage from Kôr, and to his finding the dwellings at Sirion’s mouth ravaged when he finally returned there; but B does not say who carried out the sack and captured Elwing. In C it was a raid by Orcs of Melko; cf. the entry in the Name-list to The Fall of Gondolin (p. 215): ‘Egalmoth…got even out of the burning of Gondolin, and dwelt after at the mouth of Sirion, but was slain in a dire battle there when Melko seized Elwing’.
Neither outline refers to Elwing’s escape from captivity. Both mention Eärendel’s going back to the ruins of Gondolin—in C he returns there with Voronwë and finds Men and Gnomes; another entry in the Name-list to The Fall of Gondolin (p. 215) bears on this: ‘Galdor…won out of Gondolin and even the onslaught of Melko upon the dwellers at Sirion’s mouth and went back to the ruins with Eärendel.’
Both outlines mention the departure of the Elves from the Great Lands, after the binding of Melko, to Tol Eressëa, C adding a reference to ‘wars with Men’ and to the Eldar being ‘unable to endure the strife of the world’, and both refer to Eärendel’s going there subsequently, but the order of events seems to be different: in B Eärendel on his way back from Kôr ‘sights Tol Eressëa and the fleet of the Elves’ (presumably the fleet returning from the Great Lands), whereas in C the departure of the Elves is not mentioned until after Eärendel’s return to Sirion. But the nature of these outlines is not conveyed in print: they were written at great speed, catching fugitive thoughts, and cannot be pressed hard. However, with the fate of Elwing B and C seem clearly to part company: in B there is a simple reference to her death, apparently associated with the curse of the Nauglafring, and from the order in which the events are set down it may be surmised that her death took place on the journey to Tol Eressëa; C specifically refers to the ‘sinking’ of Elwing and the Nauglafring—but says that Elwing became a seabird, an idea that survived (The Silmarillion p. 247). This perhaps gives more point to Eärendel’s going to the Isle of Seabirds, mentioned in both B and C: in the latter he ‘hopes that Elwing