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Chapter 1,

IN WHICH WE ARE INTRODUCED TO

WINNIE-THE-POOH AND SOME BEES, AND THE STORIES BEGIN

HERE is Edward Bear, coming downstairs now, bump, bump, bump, on the back of

his head, behind Christopher Robin. It is, as far as he knows, the only way of coming

downstairs, but sometimes he feels that there really is another way, if only he could

stop bumping for a moment and think of it.

And then he feels that perhaps there isn't. Anyhow, here he is at the bottom, and

ready to be introduced to you. Winnie-the-Pooh.

When I first heard his name, I said, just as you are going to say, “But I thought

he was a boy?”

“So did I,” said Christopher Robin.

“Then you can't call him Winnie?”

“I don't.”

“But you said-”

“He's Winnie-ther-Pooh. Don't you know what 'ther' means?”

“Ah, yes, now I do,” I said quickly; and I hope you do too, because it is all the

explanation you are going to get.

Sometimes Winnie-the-Pooh likes a game of some sort when he comes

downstairs, and sometimes he likes to sit quietly in front of the fire and listen to a

story. This evening-

“What about a story?” said Christopher Robin.

“What about a story?” I said.

“Could you very sweetly tell Winnie-the-Pooh one?”

“I suppose I could,” I said. “What sort of stories does he like?”

“About himself. Because he's that sort of Bear.”

“Oh, I see.”

“So could you very sweetly?”

“I'll try,” I said.

So I tried.

Once upon a time, a very long time ago now, about last Friday, Winnie-the-Pooh

lived in a forest all by himself under the name of Sanders.

(“What does 'under the name' mean?” asked Christopher Robin. “It means he had

the name over the door in gold letters, and lived under it.”

“Winnie-the-Pooh wasn't quite sure,” said Christopher Robin.

“Now I am,” said a growly voice.

“Then I will go on,” said I.)

One day when he was out walking, he came to an open place in the middle of the

forest, and in the middle of this place was a large oak-tree, and, from the top of the

tree, there came a loud buzzing-noise.

Winnie-the-Pooh sat down at the foot of the tree, put his head between his paws

and began to think.

First of all he said to himself: “That buzzing-noise means something. You don't get

a buzzing-noise like that, just buzzing and buzzing, without its meaning something.

If there's a buzzing-noise, somebody's making a buzzing-noise, and the only reason

for making a buzzing-noise that I know of is because you're a bee.”

Then he thought another long time, and said: “And the only reason for being a

bee that I know of is making honey.”

And then he got up, and said: “And the only reason for making honey is so as I

can eat it.” So he began to climb the tree

He climbed and he climbed and he climbed and as he climbed he sang a little song

to himself. It went like this:

Isn't it funny

How a bear likes honey?

Buzz! Buzz! Buzz!

I wonder why he does?

Then he climbed a little further.. . and a little further... and then just a little

further. By that time he had thought of another song.

It's a very funny thought that, if Bears were Bees,

They'd build their nests at the bottom of trees.

And that being so (if the Bees were Bears),

We shouldn't have to climb up all these stairs.

He was getting rather tired by this time, so that is why he sang a Complaining

Song. He was nearly there now, and if he just s t o o d o n t h a t branch...

Crack !

“Oh, help!” said Pooh, as he dropped ten feet on the branch below him.

“If only I hadn't-“ he said, as he bounced twenty feet on to the next branch.

“You see, what I meant to do,” he explained, as he turned head-over-heels, and

crashed on to another branch thirty feet below, “what I meant to do-”

“Of course, it was rather-“ he admitted, as he slithered very quickly through the

next six branches.

“It all comes, I suppose,” he decided, as he said good-bye to the last branch,

spun round three times, and flew gracefully into a gorse-bush, “it all comes of liking

honey so much. Oh, help!”

He crawled out of the gorse-bush, brushed the prickles from his nose, and began

to think again. And the first person he thought of was Christopher Robin.

(“Was that me?” said Christopher Robin in an awed voice, hardly daring to believe

it.

“That was you.”

Christopher Robin said nothing, but his eyes got larger and larger, and his face

got pinker and pinker.)

So Winnie-the-Pooh went round to his friend Christopher Robin, who lived behind

a green door in another part of the Forest.

“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!”

“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.

“It's like this,” he said. “When you go after honey with a balloon, the great thing

is not to let the bees know you're coming. Now, if you have a green balloon, they

might think you were only part of the tree, and not notice you, and if you have a

blue balloon, they might think you were only part of the sky, and not notice you, and

the question is: Which is most likely?”

“Wouldn't they notice you underneath the balloon?” you asked.

“They might or they might not,” said Winnie-the-Pooh. “You never can tell with

bees.” He thought for a moment and said: “I shall try to look like a small black cloud.

That will deceive them.”

“Then you had better have the blue balloon,” you said; and so it was decided.

Well, you both went out with the blue balloon, and you took your gun with you,

just in case, as you always did, and Winnie-the-Pooh went to a very muddy place

that he knew of, and rolled and rolled until he was black all over; and then, when the

balloon was blown up as big as big, and you and Pooh were both holding on to the

string, you let go suddenly, and Pooh Bear floated gracefully up into the sky, and

stayed there-level with the top of the tree and about twenty feet away from it.

“Hooray!” you shouted.

“Isn't that fine?” shouted Winnie-the-Pooh down to you. “What do I look like?”

“You look like a Bear holding on to a balloon,” you said.

“Not,” said Pooh anxiously, “-not like a small black cloud in a blue sky?”

“Not very much.”

“Ah, well, perhaps from up here it looks different. And, as I say, you never can tell

with bees.”

There was no wind to blow him nearer to the tree, so there he stayed. He could

see the honey, he could smell the honey, but he couldn't quite reach the honey.

After a little while he called down to you.

“Christopher Robin!” he said in a loud whisper.

“Hallo!”

“I think the bees suspect something!”

“What sort of thing?”

“I don't know. But something tells me that they're suspicious!”

“Perhaps they think that you're after their honey?”

“It may be that. You never can tell with bees.”

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!

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.

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.

“Christopher-ow!-Robin,” called out the cloud.

“Yes?”

“I have just been thinking, and I have come to a very important decision. These

are the wrong sort of bees.”

“Are they?”

“Quite the wrong sort. So I should think they would make the wrong sort of

honey, shouldn't you?”

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