Chapter 10,
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.
“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!
(He rescued who?)
Oh, listen, do!
I am talking of Pooh?
(Of who?)
Of Pooh!
(I’m sorry I keep forgetting).
Well. Pooh was a Bear of Enormous Brain –
(Just say it again!)
Of enormous brain –
(Of enormous what?)
Well, he ate a lot,
And I don’t know if he could swim or not,
But he managed to float
On a sort of boat
(On a sort of what?)
Well, a sort of pot –
So now let’s give him three hearty cheers
(So now let’s give him three hearty whitches?)
And hope he’ll be with us for years and years,
And grow in health and wisdom and riches!
3 Cheers for Pooh!
(For who?)
For Pooh –
3 Cheers for Bear
(For where?)
For Bear –
3 Cheers for the wonderful Winnie-the-Pooh!
(Just tell me, somebody – WHAT DID HE DO?)
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