Winnie-the-Pooh - A. A. Milne (pocket ebook reader TXT) 📗

you got eyes? Look at me!”

“I am looking, Roo, dear,” said Kanga rather severely. “And you know what I told you yesterday about making faces. If you go on making faces like Piglet’s, you will grow up to look like Piglet⁠—and then think how sorry you will be. Now then, into the bath, and don’t let me have to speak to you about it again.”

Before he knew where he was, Piglet was in the bath, and Kanga was scrubbing him firmly with a large lathery flannel.

“Ow!” cried Piglet. “Let me out! I’m Piglet!”

“Don’t open the mouth, dear, or the soap goes in,” said Kanga. “There! What did I tell you?”

“You⁠—you⁠—you did it on purpose,” spluttered Piglet, as soon as he could speak again⁠ ⁠… and then accidentally had another mouthful of lathery flannel.

“That’s right, dear, don’t say anything,” said Kanga, and in another minute Piglet was out of the bath, and being rubbed dry with a towel.

“Now,” said Kanga, “there’s your medicine, and then bed.”

“W-w-what medicine?” said Piglet.

“To make you grow big and strong, dear, You don’t want to grow up small and weak like Piglet, do you? Well, then!”

At that moment there was a knock at the door.

“Come in,” said Kanga, and in came Christopher Robin.

“Christopher Robin, Christopher Robin!” cried Piglet. “Tell Kanga who I am! She keeps saying I’m Roo. I’m not Roo, am I?”

Christopher Robin looked at him very carefully, and shook his head.

“You can’t be Roo,” he said, “because I’ve just seen Roo playing in Rabbit’s house.”

“Well!” said Kanga. “Fancy that! Fancy my making a mistake like that.”

“There you are!” said Piglet. “I told you so. I’m Piglet.”

Christopher Robin shook his head again.

“Oh, you’re not Piglet,” he said. “I know Piglet well, and he’s quite a different colour.”

Piglet began to say that this was because he had just had a bath, and then he thought that perhaps he wouldn’t say that, and as he opened his mouth to say something else, Kanga slipped the medicine spoon in, and then patted him on the back and told him that it was really quite a nice taste when you got used to it.

“I knew it wasn’t Piglet,” said Kanga. “I wonder who it can be.”

“Perhaps it’s some relation of Pooh’s,” said Christopher Robin. “What about a nephew or an uncle or something?”

Kanga agreed that this was probably what it was, and said that they would have to call it by some name.

“I shall call it Pootel,” said Christopher Robin. “Henry Pootel for short.”

And just when it was decided, Henry Pootel wriggled out of Kanga’s arms and jumped to the ground. To his great joy Christopher Robin had left the door open. Never had Henry Pootel Piglet run so fast as he ran then, and he didn’t stop running until he had got quite close to his house. But when he was a hundred yards away he stopped running, and rolled the rest of the way home, so as to get his own nice comfortable colour again.⁠ ⁠…

So Kanga and Roo stayed in the Forest. And every Tuesday Roo spent the day with his great friend Rabbit, and every Tuesday Kanga spent the day with her great friend Pooh, teaching him to jump, and every Tuesday Piglet spent the day with his great friend Christopher Robin. So they were all happy again.

VIII In Which Christopher Robin Leads an Expotition to the North Pole

One fine day Pooh had stumped up to the top of the Forest to see if his friend Christopher Robin was interested in Bears at all. At breakfast that morning (a simple meal of marmalade spread lightly over a honeycomb or two) he had suddenly thought of a new song. It began like this:

“Sing Ho! for the life of a Bear!”

When he had got as far as this, he scratched his head, and thought to himself “That’s a very good start for a song, but what about the second line?” He tried singing “Ho,” two or three times, but it didn’t seem to help. “Perhaps it would be better,” he thought, “if I sang Hi for the life of a Bear.” So he sang it⁠ ⁠… but it wasn’t. “Very well, then,” he said, “I shall sing that first line twice, and perhaps if I sing it very quickly, I shall find myself singing the third and fourth lines before I have time to think of them, and that will be a Good Song. Now then:”

Sing Ho! for the life of a Bear!
Sing Ho! for the life of a Bear!
I don’t much mind if it rains or snows,
’Cos I’ve got a lot of honey on my nice new nose,
I don’t much care if it snows or thaws,
’Cos I’ve got a lot of honey on my nice clean paws!
Sing Ho! for a Bear!
Sing Ho! for a Pooh!
And I’ll have a little something in an hour or two!

He was so pleased with this song that he sang it all the way to the top of the Forest, “and if I go on singing it much longer,” he thought, “it will be time for the little something, and then the last line won’t be true.” So he turned it into a hum instead.

Christopher Robin was sitting outside his door, putting on his Big Boots. As soon as he saw the Big Boots, Pooh knew that an Adventure was going to happen, and he brushed the honey off his nose with the back of his paw, and spruced himself up as well as he could, so as to look Ready for Anything.

“Good morning, Christopher Robin,” he called out.

“Hallo, Pooh Bear. I can’t get this boot on.”

“That’s bad,” said Pooh.

“Do you think you could very kindly lean against me, ’cos I keep pulling so hard that I fall over backwards.”

Pooh sat down, dug his feet into the ground, and pushed hard against Christopher Robin’s back, and Christopher Robin pushed hard against his, and pulled and pulled at his boot until he had got