Tales Before Tolkien (7 page)

He took his key. It turned in the lock to the sounds of Æolian music. A door opened upon slow hinges, and disclosed a winding stair within. The key vanished from his fingers. Tangle went up. Mossy followed. The door closed behind them. They climbed out of the earth; and, still climbing, rose above it. They were in the rainbow. Far abroad, over ocean and land, they could see through its transparent walls the earth beneath their feet. Stairs beside stairs wound up together, and beautiful beings of all ages climbed along with them.

They knew that they were going up to the country whence the shadows fell.

And by this time I think they must have got there.

Puss-cat Mew

by E. H. Knatchbull-Hugessen

In a letter from 1971, Tolkien recalled that as a child (“before 1900”) he used to be read to from an old collection that “contained one story I was then very fond of called ‘Puss-cat Mew.' ” The tale has several Tolkienian resonances. It purports to give the story behind the nursery rhyme of the same title—something that Tolkien himself would do years later in his two “Man in the Moon” poems, one of which gives the background to the familiar childhood rhyme “Hey diddle diddle, the cat and the fiddle” while the other tells the story behind why “The Man in the Moon came down too soon.” Both of Tolkien's poems are collected in
The Adventures of Tom Bombadil,
but the first poem will be familiar to readers of
The Lord of the Rings,
for it is the one that Frodo sings in the inn at Bree.

“Puss-cat Mew” tells the story of a young man named Joe Brown who journeys into a large and gloomy forest where Ogres, Dwarfs, and Fairies dwell. One scene, where by trickery Joe keeps two Ogres and a Dwarf fighting, is similar to the scene in
The Hobbit
where Gandalf keeps the three trolls quarreling. One illustration found in the original publication of the story depicts an Ogre disguised as a tree, uncannily foreshadowing Tolkien's Ents in
The Lord of the Rings.
(This illustration is reprinted with note 23 to chapter 2 in the revised edition, published in 2002, of
The Annotated Hobbit.
)

“Puss-cat Mew” by E. H. Knatchbull-Hugessen first appeared in his collection
Stories for My Children
(1869).

Every child knows the sweet nursery rhyme of “Puss-cat Mew,”—

“Puss-cat Mew jumped over a coal;

In her best petticoat burnt a great hole;

Puss-cat Mew shan't have any milk

Till her best petticoat's mended with silk.”

But very few children, or big people either, know
who
Puss-cat Mew was, or what was the history upon which those lines were made. I do not know that I should ever have found it out, only that I happened to overhear the White Stable Cat talking to the Brown Kitten that lives in the cottage over the road. I was lying down on the croquet-ground bank, smoking my cigarette, and thinking of the pretty blue sky up at which I was looking, and watching the fleecy white clouds that slowly followed each other over the face of it, and wondering whether it would rain next day, or be fine and bright enough for Ned's cricket-match, when I heard soft voices talking near me. I raised myself on my elbow to listen, and soon discovered whence they came. The White Cat had got the Brown Kitten into the arbour between the croquet-ground and the kitchen-garden, and, whilst they were watching the young robins which had just been fledged, and plainly expecting that one would hop within reach before long, they were talking over old times and old legends, and the White Cat was telling the whole story about Puss-cat Mew—which by this means I am able to tell to you.

There was, so she said, many years ago a worthy couple who had an only son, to whom they were tenderly attached. The boy grew up strong and hearty, and was withal of a clever turn of mind and a right cheerful disposition. But, somehow or other, he could never fancy his father's trade, which was that of a miller, and was seized with a great desire to see more of the world than he could do by remaining at home. His parents did not appear (so far as the White Cat knew) to have offered any great opposition to his wishes; so after the usual kissing and crying on the part of his mother, and good advice on the part of the honest old father, our young friend boldly started off on his travels.

He journeyed on merrily enough for a year or more, during which time he had many adventures, but none worth relating, until one day he came to a large and gloomy forest, in which he hoped to find shade and rest, and possibly some adventures worth telling when he got home again. The first thing, however, which met his eye was a large board nailed against a tree, with an inscription upon it. He walked up, no doubt expecting to see “Trespassers, beware!” written up, or “Whosoever is found trespassing in these woods will be prosecuted according to law,” or some other gratifying announcement, such as usually greets the eyes of a weary traveller just as he is proposing to himself a pleasant change from the dusty highway to the soft moss of the shady wood before him.

No such words, however, greeted the eyes of
our
traveller. Something much more curious and unusual did he read. This was the inscription:

“Within this wood do Ogres dwell,

And Fairies here abide as well;

Go back, go back, thou miller's son,

Before thy journey is begun.”

“Well,” exclaimed the young man, when he had read these words, “this beats cock-fighting! How can they know here that I am a miller's son? and how could they have found out that I was coming just to this place, and so have got this board put up all ready? However, if they know as much as this, they might also have known that Joe Brown is not the chap to turn back for a trifle when he has once started. Go back, indeed! Not for Joe! None of my noble name ever yet knew what fear was, and I am quite resolved that I will never disgrace my family!”

With these brave words on his lips and noble sentiments in his heart, Joe Brown marched forward boldly into the wood, and proceeded for some considerable distance without meeting anything to annoy him in the slightest degree. The turf was soft under his feet, the trees above his head afforded the most welcome shade, and the birds poured forth their sweet melody in a manner which rejoiced his heart, and made him think that he had never heard better music in his life. At last, however, he came to a rather open space, when he saw immediately before him, some thirty or forty yards off, an old dead Oak, with two great branches, with scarce a leaf upon them, spreading out right and left. Almost as soon as he noticed the Tree, he perceived, to his intense surprise, that it was visibly agitated, and trembled all over. Gradually, as he stood stock-still with amazement, this trembling rapidly increased, the bark of the tree appeared to become the skin of a living body, the two dead limbs became the gigantic arms of a man, a head popped up from the trunk, and an enormous Ogre stood before the astonished traveller. Stood, but only for an instant; for, brandishing a stick as big as a young tree, he took a step forward, uttering at the same moment such a tremendous roar as overpowered the singing of all the birds, and made the whole forest re-echo with the awful sound.

There was no time for Joe to think of escape, and the difficulty would have been great had he had plenty of time; but at the very moment of the giant's advance, and before the echo of his roar had died away, a low, sweet voice whispered in the wayfarer's ear, in soothing and reassuring accents, “Stand hard, Joey;” and he had scarcely time to look down and perceive that the words came from a beautifully-marked Tortoiseshell Cat before he began to find his legs stiffen, his body harden; and almost before he could say “Jack Robinson” (which, by the way, was an expression he would probably never have thought of), he was turned into a Hawthorn-tree of apparent age and respectability, having a hollow place in its trunk, into which the Cat quietly crept and lay perfectly still.

With another roar, the Ogre made two or three strides forward, taking about ten yards in each stride, and then suddenly pulled up short, and stared around stupidly.

“I saw a Mortal,” he growled, in a voice that made the Hawthorn-tree feel as if every berry would fall off him—“I swear I saw a Mortal, but I don't see him now! It's those bothering Fairies again—I know it is—confound them and their tricks!”

And he stamped so hard on the ground that every mole and rabbit for a mile round felt it; and, in fact, there was a paragraph in the
Mole Chronicle
next day, stating that the shock of an earthquake had been distinctly felt at that particular time on that very day.

“Spiflicate those Fairies!” again said the Ogre in an angry tone, using the worst word he knew of, which had the great merit of being understood by nobody. “Here have I been waiting in my oak dress for hours to catch a Mortal, and spank my great grandfather if those Fairies haven't sold me again! It is really too bad that this should go on!” And he then moved sulkily off, muttering the well-known “Fe-fi-fo-fum,” which is so popular a song among Ogres.

As soon as he was well out of sight, the Tortoiseshell Cat stepped purring out of the hole in the Hawthorn-tree, and began to rub herself gently against the trunk. Joe Brown felt his bark again becoming skin, his sap blood, and his branches arms, and in a few moments was again himself. He stretched immediately, yawned and sneezed, to be sure that he was just as he had been before, and, having satisfied himself in this respect, turned to thank his friend and deliverer the Cat. But there was no Cat there. He stood transfixed with amazement. How had she disappeared? Where had she gone to? “And what the dickens was he to do?” He uttered these last words audibly, and had scarcely done so when a voice near him exclaimed—

“Don't say ‘dickens,' Joe Brown; it is merely a substitute for a worse word, which your friends in this wood much object to.”

And, as he turned round to see who or what had now spoken to him, the same voice, which appeared to proceed from an old Hornbeam Pollard which stood near, chanted these words in a low but clear voice:

“Within this forest Ogres dwell,

And Fairies here abide as well:

If these two races could agree,

No chance of life, O man, for thee.

But, though the Ogres of the wood

Eat human flesh, and thirst for blood,

An honest man will ever find

The Fairies friendly to his kind.

In vain the Ogres rage and fume,

And form of trees in fraud assume,

The Fairies watch by night and day

To rob them of expected prey.

And you, poor mortal, only must

To fairy aid entirely trust;

For if you on yourself rely,

By Ogre cruelty you'll die.

So if in danger or in doubt,

On Fairies call to help you out,

And, all your scrapes to pull you through,

Call—and at once—for ‘Puss-cat Mew.' ”

“Well, I never!” said Joe, when the voice ceased. And no more he ever had, nor any one else that I ever heard of. And there he stood for a minute, thinking what to do next. It was plainly a place in which there was plenty to be found in the way of adventures, and, of course, it was highly satisfactory to think that there would be always a friend at hand, in the shape of a Fairy, to get you out of any difficulty. On the other hand, he thought it rather beneath him to have to be turned into a tree—or anything else; for, as far as he could see, he might as well be turned next time into a thistle, or a fungus, or any other unpleasant thing, and he didn't quite like the idea. Besides, he had only the word of a voice—evidently belonging to a partisan of the Fairies—to tell him that his friends were really the stronger: and from what he had already seen it appeared to him that unless a Fairy was there in the very nick of time, an Ogre of the kind which he had seen might destroy him in a moment before help could come. He thought therefore that, after all, he was better out of the forest than in it; for although he did not desire to shun danger, he was wise enough to know that it is no proof of a brave man to run blindly into it; and he therefore determined to leave the forest, and keep round the outside till he got beyond it on his journey. He then turned round to retrace his steps, when, to his astonishment, he again heard a voice singing to him in these words—

“Of courage we know that Joe Brown has no lack,

Fa de jo dum, fol de rol do;

He chose to go on when he
might
have gone back,

Fa de jo dum, fol de rol lo.

But his choice it was made when he entered the wood,

Fa de jo dum, fol de rol do,

And he
can't
go back now—don't he wish that he could?

Fa de jo dum, fol de rol lo.”

“All right,” rejoined Joe, “my name's Easy” (which was an entire falsehood, as we know that it was “Brown”). “If I can't go back, I'll go forward.” And on he marched with a firm step, for he thought this voice seemed to be chaffing him, and he didn't like to be chaffed by a fellow whom he couldn't even see to chaff back again! So he pushed on for a little way, and then sat down under a fir-tree, and began to eat some bread and cheese which he had brought with him.

As everything seemed perfectly quiet around him, and he experienced no interruption, he began to think that what had happened must really have been a dream, and that, after all, a bold heart and his own right arm were the best things to rely on, and that it was nonsense to suppose that any Fairy could really help him, or that any danger would occur to him from which he could not extricate himself by his own caution and courage. As this thought took full possession of his mind, he could not help finishing it aloud with the remark—

“And as to ‘Puss-cat Mew,' what good can it possibly be to me to call out such a name as
that
if I was in trouble?”

Scarcely were the words out of his mouth when a low sigh reached his ears, and he plainly heard the sound of some creature running away over the dead leaves; but though he turned quickly, he could see no one.

He finished his bread and cheese, and was just thinking of lighting his pipe, when, to his great surprise, he felt a light tap on his shoulder, followed by a cuff on the side of the head, which knocked his wide-awake off, and made his ears tingle for a long time afterwards. Looking up in surprise and rage, he beheld, close to him, a most decided Ogre. Ten feet or more was he in height—with a fur-cap on his head, a grim and most forbidding countenance, very red nose, eyes bloodshot and set deep in his head, prominent teeth looking uncomfortably sharp, and a chin with a bristly beard, which had evidently not been shaved for a fortnight. Wishing to act upon the plan which he had laid down for himself, and determined not to lose heart, Joe put the best face upon the matter at once.