Winnie-The-Pooh and All, All, All

How sweet to be a Cloud
Floating in the Blue!
Every little cloud
Always sings aloud.

How sweet to be a Cloud
Floating in the Blue!
It makes him very proud
To be a little cloud.

CHAPTER NINE
in which Piglet is entirely surrounded by water
It rained and it rained and it rained. Piglet told himself that never in all his life, and he was goodness knows how old – three, was it, or four? – never had he seen so much rain. Days and days and days.

‘If only,’ he thought, as he looked out of the window, ‘I had been in Pooh’s house, or Christopher Robin’s house, or Rabbit’s house when it began to rain, then I should have had Company all this time, instead of being here all alone, with nothing to do except wonder when it will stop.’ And he imagined himself with Pooh, saying, ‘Did you ever see such rain, Pooh?’ and Pooh saying, ‘Isn’t it awful, Piglet?’ and Piglet saying, ‘I wonder how it is over Christopher Robin’s way,’ and Pooh saying, ‘I should think poor old Rabbit is about flooded out by this time.’ It would have been jolly to talk like this, and really, it wasn’t much good having anything exciting like floods, if you couldn’t share them with somebody.

For it was rather exciting. The little dry ditches in which Piglet had nosed about so often had become streams, the little streams across which he had splashed were rivers, and the river, between whose steep banks they had played so happily, had sprawled out of its own bed and was taking up so much room everywhere, that Piglet was beginning to wonder whether it would be coming into his bed soon.

‘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 it on.

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.

Rabbit, who had begun to write very busily, looked up and said:

‘It is because you are a very small animal that you will be Useful in the adventure before us.’

Piglet was so excited at the idea of being Useful that he forgot to be frightened any more, and when Rabbit went on to say that Kangas were only Fierce during the winter months, being at other times of an Affectionate Disposition, he could hardly sit still, he was so eager to begin being useful at once.

‘What about me?’ said Pooh sadly. ‘I suppose I shan’t be useful?’

‘Never mind, Pooh,’ said Piglet comfortingly. ‘Another time perhaps.’

Roo is, if you promise to go away from the Forest and never come back.” Now don’t talk while I think.’

Pooh went into a corner and tried saying ‘Aha!’ in that sort of voice. Sometimes it seemed to him that it did mean what Rabbit said, and sometimes it seemed to him that it didn’t. ‘I suppose it’s just practice,’ he thought. ‘I wonder if Kanga will have to practise too so as to understand it.’

‘There’s just one thing,’ said Piglet, fidgeting a bit. ‘I was talking to Christopher Robin, and he said that a Kanga was Generally Regarded as One of the Fiercer Animals. I am not frightened of Fierce Animals in the ordinary way, but it is well known that if One of the Fiercer Animals is Deprived of Its Young, it becomes as fierce as Two of the Fiercer Animals. In which case “Aha!” is perhaps a foolish thing to say.’

‘Piglet,’ said Rabbit, taking out a pencil, and licking the end of it, ‘you haven’t any pluck.’

‘It is hard to be brave,’ said Piglet, sniffing slightly, ‘when you’re only a Very Small Animal.’

“Aha!” means “We’ll tell you where Baby

‘I do,’ said Pooh.

Well, it just happened that you had been to a party the day before at the house of your friend Piglet, and you had balloons at the party. You had had a big green balloon; and one of Rabbit’s relations had had a big blue one, and had left it behind, being really too young to go to a party at all; and so you had brought the green one and the blue one home with you.

‘Which one would you like?’ you asked Pooh. He put his head between his paws and thought very carefully.

‘Good morning, Christopher Robin,’ he said.

‘Good morning, Winnie-ther-Pooh,’ said you.

‘I wonder if you’ve got such a thing as a balloon about you?’

‘A balloon?’

‘Yes, I just said to myself coming along: “I wonder if Christopher Robin has such a thing as a balloon about him?” I just said it to myself, thinking of balloons, and wondering.’

‘What do you want a balloon for?’ you said.

Winnie-the-Pooh looked round to see that nobody was listening, put his paw to his mouth, and said in a deep whisper: ‘Honey!’

‘But you don’t get honey with balloons!’

always think of a proper one afterwards.

Outside his house he found Piglet, jumping up and down trying to reach the knocker.

‘Hallo, Piglet,’ he said.

‘Hallo, Pooh,’ said Piglet.

‘What are you trying to do?’

‘I was trying to reach the knocker,’ said Piglet. ‘I just came round – ’

‘Let me do it for you,’ said Pooh kindly. So he reached up and knocked at the door. ‘I have just seen Eeyore,’ he began, ‘and poor Eeyore is in a Very Sad Condition, because it’s his birthday, and nobody has taken any notice of it, and he’s very Gloomy – you know what Eeyore is – and there he was, and – What a long time whoever lives here is answering this door.’ And he knocked again.

‘But Pooh,’ said Piglet, ‘it’s your own house!’

‘Oh!’ said Pooh. ‘So it is,’ he said. ‘Well, let’s go in.’

So in they went. The first thing Pooh did was to go to the cupboard to see if he had quite a small jar of honey left; and he had, so he took it down.

‘I’m giving this to Eeyore,’ he explained, ‘as a present. What are you going to give?’

‘Couldn’t I give it too?’ said Piglet. ‘From both of us?’

‘No,’ said Pooh. ‘That would not be a good plan.’

‘All right, then, I’ll give him a balloon. I’ve got one left from my party. I’ll go and get it now, shall I?’

‘That, Piglet, is a very good idea. It is just what Eeyore wants to cheer him up. Nobody can be uncheered with a balloon.’

So off Piglet trotted; and in the other direction went Pooh, with his jar of honey