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Winnie-the-Pooh

‘I shall call this boat The Brain of Pooh,’ said Christopher Robin, and The Brain of Pooh set sail forthwith in a south-westerly direction, revolving gracefully.

You can imagine Piglet’s joy when at last the ship came in sight of him. In after-years he liked to think that he had been in Very Great Danger during the Terrible Flood, but the only danger he had really been in was the last half-hour of his imprisonment, when Owl, who had just flown up, sat on a branch of his tree to comfort him, and told him a very long story about an aunt who had once laid a seagull’s egg by mistake, and the story went on and on, rather like this sentence, until Piglet who was listening out of his window without much hope, went to sleep quietly and naturally, slipping slowly out of the window towards the water until he was only hanging on by his toes, at which moment, luckily, a sudden loud squawk from Owl, which was really part of the story, being what his aunt said, woke the Piglet up and just gave him time to jerk himself back into safety and say, ‘How interesting, and did she?’ when – well, you can imagine his joy when at last he saw the good ship, Brain of Pooh (Captain, C. Robin; 1st Mate, P. Bear) coming over the sea to rescue him. …

And as that is really the end of the story, and I am very tired after that last sentence, I think I shall stop there.

CHAPTER TEN

in which Christopher Robin gives a Pooh Party, and we say good-bye

One day when the sun had come back over the Forest, bringing with it the scent of may, and all the streams of the Forest were tinkling happily to find themselves their own pretty shape again, and the little pools lay dreaming of the life they had seen and the big things they had done, and in the warmth and quiet of the Forest the cuckoo was trying over his voice carefully and listening to see if he liked it, and wood-pigeons were complaining gently to themselves in their lazy comfortable way that it was the other fellow’s fault, but it didn’t matter very much; on such a day as this Christopher Robin whistled in a special way he had, and Owl came flying out of the Hundred Acre Wood to see what was wanted.

‘Owl,’ said Christopher Robin, ‘I am going to give a party.’

‘You are, are you?’ said Owl.

‘And it’s to be a special sort of party, because it’s because of what Pooh did when he did what he did to save Piglet from the flood.’

‘Oh, that’s what it’s for, is it?’ said Owl.

‘Yes, so will you tell Pooh as quickly as you can, and all the others, because it will be to-morrow?’

‘Oh, it will, will it?’ said Owl, still being as helpful as possible.

‘So will you go and tell them, Owl?’

Owl tried to think of something very wise to say, but couldn’t, so he flew off to tell the others. And the first person he told was Pooh.

‘Pooh,’ he said. ‘Christopher Robin is giving a party.’

‘Oh!’ said Pooh. And then seeing that Owl expected him to say something else, he said, ‘Will there be those little cake things with pink sugar icing?’

Owl felt that it was rather beneath him to talk about little cake things with pink sugar icing, so he told Pooh exactly what Christopher Robin had said, and flew off to Eeyore.

‘A party for Me?’ thought Pooh to himself. ‘How grand!’ And he began to wonder if all the other animals would know that it was a special Pooh Party, and if Christopher Robin had told them about The Floating Bear and The Brain of Pooh and all the wonderful ships he had invented and sailed on, and he began to think how awful it would be if everybody had forgotten about it, and nobody quite knew what the party was for; and the more he thought like this, the more the party got muddled in his mind, like a dream when nothing goes right. And the dream began to sing itself over in his head until it became a sort of song. It was an

ANXIOUS POOH SONG

3 Cheers for Pooh!

(For who?)

For Pooh –

(Why what did he do?)

I thought you knew;

He saved his friend from a wetting!

3 Cheers for Bear!

(For where?)

For Bear –

He couldn’t swim,

But he rescued him!