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Read Ebook: Winnie-the-Pooh by Milne A A Alan Alexander Shepard Ernest H Ernest Howard Illustrator
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Ebook has 813 lines and 26146 words, and 17 pages
There was another little silence, and then he called down to you again.
"Christopher Robin!"
"Yes?"
"Have you an umbrella in your house?"
"I think so."
"I wish you would bring it out here, and walk up and down with it, and look up at me every now and then, and say 'Tut-tut, it looks like rain.' I think, if you did that, it would help the deception which we are practising on these bees."
Well, you laughed to yourself, "Silly old Bear!" but you didn't say it aloud because you were so fond of him, and you went home for your umbrella.
"Oh, there you are!" called down Winnie-the-Pooh, as soon as you got back to the tree. "I was beginning to get anxious. I have discovered that the bees are now definitely Suspicious."
"Shall I put my umbrella up?" you said.
"Yes, but wait a moment. We must be practical. The important bee to deceive is the Queen Bee. Can you see which is the Queen Bee from down there?"
"No."
"A pity. Well, now, if you walk up and down with your umbrella, saying, 'Tut-tut, it looks like rain,' I shall do what I can by singing a little Cloud Song, such as a cloud might sing.... Go!"
So, while you walked up and down and wondered if it would rain, Winnie-the-Pooh sang this song:
"How sweet to be a Cloud Floating in the Blue!" It makes him very proud To be a little cloud.
The bees were still buzzing as suspiciously as ever. Some of them, indeed, left their nests and flew all round the cloud as it began the second verse of this song, and one bee sat down on the nose of the cloud for a moment, and then got up again.
"Yes?"
"Are they?"
"Quite the wrong sort. So I should think they would make the wrong sort of honey, shouldn't you?"
"Would they?"
"Yes. So I think I shall come down."
"How?" asked you.
"Christopher Robin, you must shoot the balloon with your gun. Have you got your gun?"
"Of course I have," you said. "But if I do that, it will spoil the balloon," you said.
When he put it like this, you saw how it was, and you aimed very carefully at the balloon, and fired.
"Did I miss?" you asked.
"I'm so sorry," you said, and you fired again, and this time you hit the balloon, and the air came slowly out, and Winnie-the-Pooh floated down to the ground.
"Is that the end of the story?" asked Christopher Robin.
"That's the end of that one. There are others."
"About Pooh and Me?"
"And Piglet and Rabbit and all of you. Don't you remember?"
"I do remember, and then when I try to remember, I forget."
"They didn't catch it, did they?"
"No."
"Well, that comes into the story."
Christopher Robin nodded.
"I do remember," he said, "only Pooh doesn't very well, so that's why he likes having it told to him again. Because then it's a real story and not just a remembering."
Christopher Robin gave a deep sigh, picked his Bear up by the leg, and walked off to the door, trailing Pooh behind him. At the door he turned and said, "Coming to see me have my bath?"
"I might," I said.
"I didn't hurt him when I shot him, did I?"
"Not a bit."
IN WHICH POOH GOES VISITING AND GETS INTO A TIGHT PLACE
Well, he was humming this hum to himself, and walking along gaily, wondering what everybody else was doing, and what it felt like, being somebody else, when suddenly he came to a sandy bank, and in the bank was a large hole.
So he bent down, put his head into the hole, and called out:
"Is anybody at home?"
There was a sudden scuffling noise from inside the hole, and then silence.
"What I said was, 'Is anybody at home?'" called out Pooh very loudly.
"No!" said a voice; and then added, "You needn't shout so loud. I heard you quite well the first time."
"Bother!" said Pooh. "Isn't there anybody here at all?"
"Nobody."
"Hallo, Rabbit, isn't that you?"
"No," said Rabbit, in a different sort of voice this time.
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