towers

Chapter 4
TREEBEARD
Meanwhile the hobbits went with as much speed as the dark
and tangled forest allowed, following the line of the running
stream, westward and up towards the slopes of the mountains,
deeper and deeper into Fangorn. Slowly their fear of
the Orcs died away, and their pace slackened. A queer stifling
feeling came over them, as if the air were too thin or too
scanty for breathing.
At last Merry halted. ‘We can’t go on like this,’ he panted.
‘I want some air.’
‘Let’s have a drink at any rate,’ said Pippin. ‘I’m parched.’
He clambered on to a great tree-root that wound down into
the stream, and stooping drew up some water in his cupped
hands. It was clear and cold, and he took many draughts.
Merry followed him. The water refreshed them and seemed
to cheer their hearts; for a while they sat together on the brink
of the stream, dabbling their sore feet and legs, and peering
round at the trees that stood silently about them, rank upon
rank, until they faded away into grey twilight in every
direction.
‘I suppose you haven’t lost us already?’ said Pippin, leaning
back against a great tree-trunk. ‘We can at least follow the
course of this stream, the Entwash or whatever you call it,
and get out again the way we came.’
‘We could, if our legs would do it,’ said Merry; ‘and if we
could breathe properly.’
‘Yes, it is all very dim, and stuffy, in here,’ said Pippin. ‘It
reminds me, somehow, of the old room in the Great Place of
the Tooks away back in the Smials at Tuckborough: a huge
place, where the furniture has never been moved or changed
for generations. They say the Old Took lived in it year after