The house at Pooh Corner

by Alan Alexander Milne

  "But he'll notice you, Pooh."

  "He'll notice me, and I shall notice him," said Pooh, thinking it out. "We'll notice each other for a long time, and then he'll say: 'Ho-ho!'"

  Piglet shivered a little at the thought of that "Ho-ho!" and his ears began to twitch.

  "W-what will you say?" he asked.

  Pooh tried to think of something he would say, but the more he thought, the more he felt that there is no real answer to "Ho-ho!" said by a Heffalump in the sort of voice this Heffalump was going to say it in.

  "I shan't say anything," said Pooh at last. "I shall just hum to myself, as if I was waiting for something."

  "Then perhaps he'll say 'Ho-ho!' again?" suggested Piglet anxiously.

  "He will," said Pooh.

  Piglet's ears twitched so quickly that he had to lean them against the side of the Trap to keep them quiet.

  "He will say it again," said Pooh, "and I shall go on humming. And that will Upset him. Because when you say 'Ho-ho!' twice, in a gloating sort of way, and the other person only hums, you suddenly find, just as you begin to say it the third time that-that-well, you find …"

  "What?"

  "That it isn't," said Pooh.

  "Isn't what?"

  Pooh knew what he meant, but, being a Bear of Very Little Brain, couldn't think of the words.

  "Well, it just isn't," he said again.

  "You mean it isn't ho-ho-ish any more?" said Piglet hopefully.

  Pooh looked at him admiringly and said that that was what he meant – if you went on humming all the time, because you couldn't go on saying "Ho-ho!" for ever.

  "But he'll say something else," said Piglet.

  "That's just it. He'll say? What's all this?" And then I shall say – and this is a very good idea, Piglet, which I've just thought of – I shall say: `It's a trap for a Heffalump which I've made, and I'm waiting for the Heffalump to fall in.' And I shall go on humming. That will Unsettle him."

  "Pooh!" cried Piglet, and now it was his turn to be the admiring one. "You've saved us!"

  "Have I?" said Pooh, not feeling quite sure.

  But Piglet was quite sure; and his mind ran on, and he saw Pooh and the Heffalump talking to each other, and he thought suddenly, and a little sadly, that it would have been rather nice if it had been Piglet and the Heffalump talking so grandly to each other, and not Pooh, much as he loved Pooh; because he really had more brain than Pooh, and the conversation would go better if he and not Pooh were doing one side of it, and it would be comforting afterwards in the evenings to look back on the day when he answered a Heffalump back as bravely as if the Heffalump wasn't there. It seemed so easy now. He knew just what he would say:

  HEFFALUMP (gloatingly): "Ho-ho!"

  PIGLET (carelessly): "Tra-la-la, tra-la-la."

  HEFFALUMP (surprised, and not quite so sure of himself): "Ho-ho!"

  PIGLET (more carelessly still): "Tiddle-um-tum, tiddle-um-tum."

  HEFFALUMP (beginning to say Ho-ho and turning it awkwardly into a cough): "H'r'm! What's all this?"

  PIGLET (surprised): "Hullo! This is a trap I've made, and I'm waiting for a Heffalump to fall into it."

  HEFFALUMP (greatly disappointed): "Oh!" (After a long silence): "Are you sure?"

  PIGLET: "Yes."

  HEFFALUMP: "Oh!" (nervously): "I-I thought it was a trap I'd made to catch Piglets."

  PIGLET (surprised): "Oh, no!"

  HEFFALUMP: "Oh!" (Apologetically): "I-I must have got it wrong then."

  PIGLET: "I'm afraid so." (Politely): "I'm sorry." (He goes on humming.)

  HEFFALUMP: "Well-well-I-well. I suppose I'd better be getting back?"

  PIGLET (looking up carelessly): "Must you? Well, if you see Christopher Robin anywhere, you might tell him I want him."

  HEFFALUMP (eager to please): "Certainly! Certainly!" (He hurries off.)

  POOH (who wasn't going to be there, but we find we can't do without him."): "Oh, Piglet, how brave and clever you are!"

  PIGLET (modestly): "Not at all, Pooh." (And then, when Christopher Robin comes, Pooh can tell him about it.)

  While Piglet was dreaming this happy dream, and Pooh was wondering again whether it was fourteen or fifteen, the Search for Small was still going on all over the Forest. Small's real name was Very Small Beetle, but he was called Small for short, when he was spoken to at all, which hardly ever happened except when somebody said: "Really, Small!" He had been staying with Christopher Robin for a few seconds, and he had started round a gorse-bush for exercise, but instead of coming back the other way, as expected, he hadn't, so nobody knew where he was.

  "I expect he's just gone home," said Christopher Robin to Rabbit.

  "Did he say Good-bye-and-thank-you-for-a-nice-time?" said Rabbit.

  "He'd only just said how-do-you-do," said Christopher Robin.

  "Ha!" said Rabbit. After thinking a little, he went on: "Has he written a letter saying how much he enjoyed himself, and how sorry he was he had to go so suddenly?"

  Christopher Robin didn't think he had.

  "Ha!" said Rabbit again, and looked very important. "This is Serious. He is Lost. We must begin the Search at once."

  Christopher Robin, who was thinking of something else, said: "Where's Pooh?" – but Rabbit had gone. So he went into his house and drew a picture of Pooh going a long walk at about seven o'clock in the morning, and then he climbed to the top of his tree and climbed down again, and then he wondered what Pooh was doing, and went across the Forest to see.

  It was not long before he came to the Gravel Pit, and he looked down, and there were Pooh and Piglet, with their backs to him, dreaming happily.

  "Ho-ho!" said Christopher Robin loudly and suddenly.

  Piglet jumped six inches in the air with Surprise and Anxiety, but Pooh went on dreaming.

  "It's the Heffalump!" thought Piglet nervously. "Now, then!" He hummed in his throat a little, so that none of the words should stick, and then, in one most delightfully easy way, he said: "Tra-la-la, tra-la-la," as if he had just thought of it. But he didn't look round, because if you look round and see a Very Fierce Heffalump looking down at you, sometimes you forget what you were going to say.

  "Rum-tum-tum-tiddle-um," said Christopher Robin in a voice like Pooh's. Because Pooh had once invented a song which went:

  Tra-la-la, tra-la-la,

  Tra-la-la, tra-la-la,

  Rum-tum-tum-tiddle-um.

  So whenever Christopher Robin sings it, he always sings it in a Pooh – voice, which seems to suit it better.

  "He's said the wrong thing," thought Piglet anxiously. "He ought to have said, 'Ho-ho!' again. Perhaps I had better say it for him." And, as fiercely as he could, Piglet said: "Ho-ho!"

  "How did you get there, Piglet?" said Christopher Robin in his ordinary voice.

  "This is Terrible," thought Piglet. "First he talks in Pooh's voice, and then he talks in Christopher Robin's voice, and he's doing it so as to Unsettle me. "And being now Completely Unsettled, he said very quickly and squeakily: "This is a trap for Poohs, and I'm waiting to fall in it, ho-ho, what's all this, and then I say ho-ho again."

  "What?" said Christopher Robin.

  "A trap for ho-ho's," said Piglet huskily. "I've just made it, and I'm waiting for the ho-ho to come-come."

  How long Piglet would have gone on like this I don't know, but at that moment Pooh woke up suddenly and decided that it was sixteen. So he got up; and as he turned his head so as to soothe himself in that awkward place in the middle of the back where something was tickling him, he saw Christopher Robin.

  "Hallo!" he shouted joyfully.

  "Hallo, Pooh."

  Piglet looked up, and looked away again. And he felt so Foolish and Uncomfortable that he had almost decided to run away to Sea and be a Sailor, when suddenly he saw something.

  "Pooh!" he cried. "There's something climbing up your back."

  "I thought there was," said Pooh.

  "It's Small!" cried Piglet.

  "Oh, that's who it i
s, is it?" said Pooh.

  "Christopher Robin, I've found Small!" cried Piglet.

  "Well done, Piglet," said Christopher Robin.

  And at these encouraging words Piglet felt quite happy again, and decided not to be a Sailor after all. So when Christopher Robin had helped them out of the Gravel Pit, they all went off together hand-in-hand.

  And two days later Rabbit happened to meet Eeyore in the Forest.

  "Hallo, Eeyore," he said, "what are you looking for?"

  "Small, of course," said Eeyore. "Haven't you any brain?"

  "Oh, but didn't I tell you?" said Rabbit. "Small was found two days ago."

  There was a moment's silence.

  "Ha-ha," said Eeyore bitterly. "Merriment and what-not. Don't apologize. It's just what would happen."

  Chapter IV.

  In which it is shown that Tiggersdon't climb trees

  One day when Pooh was thinking, he thought he would go and see Eeyore, because he hadn't seen him since yesterday. And as he walked through the heather, singing to himself, he suddenly remembered that he hadn't seen Owl since the day before yesterday, so he thought that he would just look in at the Hundred Acre Wood on the way and see if Owl was at home.

  Well, he went on singing, until he came to the part of the stream where the stepping-stones were, and when he was in the middle of the third stone he began to wonder how Kanga and Roo and Tigger were getting on, because they all lived together in a different part of the Forest. And he thought, "I haven't seen Roo for a long time, and if I don't see him to-day it will be a still longer time." So he sat down on the stone in the middle of the stream, and sang another verse of his song, while he wondered what to do.

  The other verse of the song was like this:

  I could spend a happy morning

  Seeing Roo,

  I could spend a happy morning

  Being Pooh.

  For it doesn't seem to matter,

  If I don't get any fatter

  (And I don't get any fatter),

  What I do.

  The sun was so delightfully warm, and the stone, which had been sitting in it for a long time, was so warm, too that Pooh had almost decided to go on being Pooh in the middle of the stream for the rest of the morning, when he remembered Rabbit.

  "Rabbit," said Pooh to himself. "I like talking to Rabbit. He talks about sensible things. He doesn't use long, difficult words, like Owl. He uses short, easy words, like 'What about lunch?' and 'Help yourself, Pooh.' I suppose, really, I ought to go and see Rabbit."

  Which made him think of another verse:

  Oh, I like his way of talking,

  Yes, I do.

  It's the nicest way of talking

  Just for two.

  And a Help – yourself with Rabbit

  Though it may become a habit,

  Is a pleasant sort of habit

  For a Pooh.

  So when he had sung this, he got up off his stone, walked back across the stream, and set off for Rabbit's house.

  But he hadn't got far before he began to say to himself:

  "Yes, but suppose Rabbit is out?"

  "Or suppose I get stuck in his front door again, coming out, as I did once when his front door wasn't big enough?"

  "Because I know I'm not getting fatter, but his front door may be getting thinner."

  "So wouldn't it be better if."

  And all the time he was saying things like this he was going more and more westerly, without thinking... until suddenly he found himself at his own front door again.

  And it was eleven o'clock.

  Which was Time-for-a-little-something...

  Half an hour later he was doing what he had always really meant to do, he was stumping off to Piglet's house. And as he walked, he wiped his mouth with the back of his paw, and sang rather a fluffy song through the fur. It went like this:

  I could spend a happy morning

  Seeing Piglet.

  And I couldn't spend a happy morning

  not seeing Piglet.

  And it doesn't seem to matter

  If I don't see Owl and Eeyore (or any of the others),

  And I'm not going to see Owl or Eeyore (or any of the others)

  Or Christopher Robin.

  Written down like this, it doesn't seem a very good song, but coming through pale fawn fluff at about half-past eleven on a very sunny morning, it seemed to Pooh to be one of the best songs he had ever sung. So he went on singing it.

  Piglet was busy digging a small hole in the ground outside his house.

  "Hallo, Piglet," said Pooh.

  "Hallo, Pooh," said Piglet, giving a jump of surprise. "I knew it was you."

  "So did I," said Pooh. "What are you doing?"

  "I'm planting a haycorn, Pooh, so that it can grow up into an oak-tree, and have lots of haycorns just outside the front door instead of having to walk miles and miles, do you see, Pooh?"

  "Supposing it doesn't?" said Pooh.

  "It will, because Christopher Robin says it will, so that's why I'm planting it."

  "Well," said Pooh, "if I plant a honeycomb outside my house, then it will grow up into a beehive."

  Piglet wasn't quite sure about this.

  "Or a piece of a honeycomb," said Pooh, "so as not to waste too much. Only then I might only get a piece of a beehive, and it might be the wrong piece, where the bees were buzzing and not hunnying. Bother."

  Piglet agreed that that would be rather bothering.

  "Besides, Pooh, it's a very difficult thing, planting unless you know how to do it," he said; and he put the acorn in the hole he had made, and covered it up with earth, and jumped on it.

  "I do know," said Pooh, "because Christopher Robin gave me a mastershalum seed, and I planted it, and I'm going to have mastershalums all over the front door."

  "I thought they were called nasturtiums," said Piglet timidly, as he went on jumping.

  "No," said Pooh. "Not these. These are called mastershalums."

  When Piglet had finished jumping, he wiped his paws on his front, and said, "What shall we do now?" and Pooh said, "Let's go and see Kanga and Roo and Tigger," and Piglet said, "Y-yes. L-let's" – because he was still a little anxious about Tigger, who was a Very Bouncy Animal, with a way of saying How-do-you-do, which always left your ears full of sand, even after Kanga had said, "Gently, Tigger dear," and had helped you up again. So they set off for Kanga's house.

  Now it happened that Kanga had felt rather motherly that morning, and Wanting to Count Things-like Roo's vests, and how many pieces of soap there were left, and the two clean spots in Tigger's feeder; so she had sent them out with a packet of watercress sandwiches for Roo and a packet of extract-of-malt sandwiches for Tigger, to have a nice long morning in the Forest not getting into mischief. And off they had gone.

  And as they went, Tigger told Roo (who wanted to know) all about the things that Tiggers could do.

  "Can they fly?" asked Roo.

  "Yes," said Tigger, "they're very good flyers, Tiggers are. Strornry good flyers."

  "Oo!" said Roo. "Can they fly as well as Owl?"

  "Yes," said Tigger. "Only they don't want to."

  "Why don't they want to?" well, they just don't like it somehow."

  Roo couldn't understand this, because he thought it would be lovely to be able to fly, but Tigger said it was difficult to explain to anybody who wasn't a Tigger himself.

  "Well," said Roo, "can they jump as far as Kangas?"

  "Yes," said Tigger. "When they want to."

  "I love jumping," said Roo. "Let's see who can jump farthest, you or me."

  "I can," said Tigger. "But we mustn't stop now, or we shall be late."

  "Late for what?"

  "For whatever we want to be in time for," said Tigger, hurrying on.

  In a little while they came to the Six Pine Trees.

  "I can swim," said Roo. "I fell into the river, and I swimmed. Can Tiggers swim?"

  "Of course they can. Tiggers can do everything." />
  "Can they climb trees better than Pooh?" asked Roo, stopping under the tallest Pine Tree, and looking up at it.

  "Climbing trees is what they do best," said Tigger. "Much better than Poohs."

  "Could they climb this one?"

  "They're always climbing trees like that," said Tigger. "Up and down all day."

  "Oo, Tigger, are they really?"

  "I'll show you," said Tigger bravely, "and you can sit on my back and watch me. "For of all the things which he had said Tiggers could do, the only one he felt really certain about suddenly was climbing trees.

  "Oo, Tigger-oo, Tigger-oo, Tigger!" squeaked Roo excitedly.

  So he sat on Tigger's back and up they went.

  And for the first ten feet Tigger said happily to himself, "Up we go!"

  And for the next ten feet he said:

  "I always said Tiggers could climb trees."

  And for the next ten feet he said:

  "Not that it's easy, mind you."

  And for the next ten feet he said:

  "Of course, there's the coming-down too. Backwards."

  And then he said:

  "Which will be difficult..."

  "Unless one fell..."

  "When it would be..."

  "EASY."

  And at the word "easy," the branch he was standing on broke suddenly, and he just managed to clutch at the one above him as he felt himself going... and then slowly he got his chin over it... and then one back paw... and then the other... until at last he was sitting on it, breathing very quickly, and wishing that he had gone in for swimming instead.

  Roo climbed off, and sat down next to him.

  "Oo, Tigger," he said excitedly, "are we at the top?

  "No," said Tigger.

  "Are we going to the top?"

  "No," said Tigger.

  "Oh!" said Roo rather sadly. And then he went on hopefully: "That was a lovely bit just now, when you pretended we were going to fall-bump-to-the-bottom, and we didn't. Will you do that bit again?"

  "No," said Tigger.

  Roo was silent for a little while, and then he said, "Shall we eat our sandwiches, Tigger?" And Tigger said, "Yes, where are they?" And Roo said, "At the bottom of the tree." And Tigger said, "I don't think we'd better eat them just yet." So they didn't.