[Nar]

Thanks for bumping my question up, Frodo, and for the thoughtful response. I'm interested in your comment about a mission-thing-- glad I'm not the only one. Are you thinking elf too, or something else? Did dwarves hate orcs as much as elves did? Maybe not quite as much. As for who Grima was aiming at, I don't think at Merry or Pippin. I think Gandalf said it was either Saruman or Theoden and Aragorn, and maybe both. I tend to think it was both, the question is who did he aim at first, and who did he shift towards next? I think Grima aimed the thing at Theoden and Aragorn, and then his arm twitched towards Saruman at the last moment.

I know what you mean about Grima being pitiable at Bag End. Don't you find that he's not at all pitiable when he's high up in Theoden's house, doing all that damage, or turned out, or locked up with his master? I was thinking 'Yeah, serves you right!' at that point. It's only at the end at Bag End that I suddenly felt 'Oh, the poor miserable wretch, let him stay.' A lot of that feeling had to do with how much I trusted Frodo's judgement and intuitions at that point: if Frodo thought Grima has a chance of no longer being a blight and a curse on his fellow man, maybe he did. What's pitiable is not that Grima's degenerated, I would expect that: he's completely betrayed his king, a kind and generous man who trusted him, loved him, defended him to everyone and NEVER called him Wormtongue. Degeneration is only to be expected, what's pitiable at Bag End is that Grima suddenly seems as if he now knows he's degenerated, and that's human, so there seems to be a chance, --but then he's finished, no more chances.

What makes me wonder about Saruman is the physical degeneration in the Bag-End Grima that seems to go along with the moral degeneration that I would expect. The ring might have had a similar effect, softening Gollum's body so it shifted to reflect the damage to his fea. I think Saruman might have tried something like that out of boredom, curiosity and restless malice, as I said before.

Thank you for your comments, lindil. I, too have always had the feeling that there WAS an orc-man breeding program directed by Saruman, because of that southerner from Bree-- he looked like an orc, why else would that be? I think I read that 'Uruk' was a term for the large, bold soldier breed of orc and connected with Morder 'the black Uruks of Mordor' I can't remeber where that phrase is but it's in LotR. 'Even the ........., the black Uruks of Mordor, could not have .......' That's as much of the quote as I can remember. So Ugluk is using a general term with 'Uruk' I think, a type of orc, and I would guess '-hai' is a plural or means troop, maybe someone else knows that one. This does not mean that he and his 'fighting Uruk-hai' did not derive in part from Saruman's interference, but I tend to think Saruman's breeding program was more a matter of utilizing natural processes that orcs and men do anyway than interfering via MAJOR magic or technology. I tend not to believe in pods or ME genetic engineering, or even that Saruman ever succeeded in shifting the Hroa to the extent that descendants of the Hroa would be affected. I think there's some text somewhere saying that it was actually Sauron who twisted the orcs into being by Morgoth's will, but I still don't think Sauron could twist orcs from any source (whether corrupted beasts, men or elves) without Morgoth's making HIS power available to Sauron. I don't think Sauron actually made any more orcs once he lost Morgoth. Breed them, twist what was already twisted a little further, try to increase size, nastiness, or snuffling bloodhound ability, yes, but by breeding and minor arts. And only 'natural' processes like breeding would affect subsequent generations.

To bring forth a new type of Hroa out of some of the original kinds, a new type of Hroa with the ability to pass down its characteristics, took a Valar, no less. In my opinion, Morgoth's own power was required to soften a natural Hroa enough so that it molded to the corrupted Fea within, Morgoth's power either delivered directly or directed through Sauron. I think the threats to the wellbeing of the Hroa, cajoling, tempting and torments were all in the service of corrupting the Fea, not of actually changing the Hroa. In my opinion, the Hroa could only be softened to conform to the state of the Fea. And I don't think any Fea could be corrupted involuntarily, although when torture and terror were involved (I think they weren't always, temptation must have played a big role) this made the process pitiable and sad and the fall into corruption more understandable, even if it is irredemable within Middle Earth.