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Timeline Event

Galadriel invites Frodo and Sam to look into her Mirror

Event Type: General

Age: 3rd Age - Ring War

Date: February 15, 3019

Description:

One evening Frodo and Sam were walking together in the cool twilight. Both of them felt restless.... On Frodo suddenly the shadow of parting had fallen: he knew somehow that the time was very near when he must leave Lothlórien.

'What do you think of Elves now, Sam?' he said. 'I asked you the same question once before...; but you have seen more of them since then.'

'I have indeed!' said Sam. 'And I reckon there's Elves and Elves. They're all Elvish enough, but they're not all the same. Now these folk aren't wanderers or homeless, and seem a bit nearer to the likes of us: they seem to belong here, more even than Hobbits do in the Shire. Whether they've made the land, or the land's made them, it's hard to say, if you take my meaning. It's wonderfully quiet here. Nothing seems to be going on, and nobody seems to want it to. If there's any magic about, it's right down deep, where I can't lay my hands on it, in a manner of speaking.'

'You can see and feel it everywhere,' said Frodo.

'Well,' said Sam, 'you can't see nobody working it. No fireworks like poor Gandalf used to show.... I fancy now that [the Lady] could do some wonderful things, if she had a mind. I'd dearly love to see some Elf-magic, Mr. Frodo!'

'I wouldn't,' said Frodo. 'I am content. And I don't miss Gandalf's fireworks, but his bushy eyebrows, and his quick temper, and his voice.'

'You're right,' said Sam. 'And don't think I'm finding fault.... I've never heard of a better land than this.... I don't want to leave. All the same, I'm beginning to feel that if we've got to go on, then we'd best get it over.

'It's the job that's never started as takes longest to finish, as my old gaffer used to say. And I don't reckon that these folk can do much more to help us, magic or no. It's when we leave this land that we shall miss Gandalf worse....'

'I am afraid that's only too true, Sam,' said Frodo. 'Yet I hope... we shall see the Lady of the Elves again.'

Even as he spoke, they saw... the Lady Galadriel approaching.... She spoke no word, but beckoned to them.

Turning aside, she led them toward the southern slopes of the hill of Caras Galadhon, and passing through a high green hedge they came into an enclosed garden.... [It] lay open to the sky. The evening star had risen and was shining with white fire above the western woods. Down a long flight of steps the Lady went into a deep green hollow, through which ran murmuring the silver stream that issued from the fountain on the hill. At the bottom, upon a low pedestal carved like a branching tree, stood a basin of silver, wide and shallow, and beside it stood a silver ewer.

With water from the stream Galadriel filled the basin to the brim, and breathed on it, and when the water was still again she spoke. 'Here is the Mirror of Galadriel,' she said. 'I have brought you here so that you may look in it, if you will.'....

'What shall we look for, and what shall we see?' asked Frodo, filled with awe.

'Many things I can command the Mirror to reveal,' she answered, 'and to some I can show what they desire to see. But the Mirror will also show things unbidden, and those are often stranger and more profitable than things which we wish to behold. What you will see, if you leave the Mirror free to work, I cannot tell. For it shows things that were, and things that are, things that yet may be. But which it is that he sees, even the wisest cannot always tell. Do you wish to look?'

Frodo did not answer.

'And you?' she said, turning to Sam. 'For this is what your folk would call magic, I believe; though I do not understand clearly what they mean; and they seem also to use the same word of the deceits of the Enemy. But this, if you will, is the magic of Galadriel. Did you not say that you wished to see Elf-magic?'

'I did,' said Sam, trembling a little between fear and curiosity. 'I'll have a peep, Lady, if you're willing.'

The Fellowship of the Ring, LoTR Book 2, Ch 7, The Mirror of Galadriel

Contributors:
Elena Tiriel 14Feb10

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