A.A. Milne - Winnie-the-Pooh

‘Yes, well never mind about that. There you would be, and there I should catch you. Now the first thing to think of is, What do Heffalumps like? I should think acorns, shouldn’t you? We’ll get a lot of – I say, wake up, Pooh!’

Pooh, who had gone into a happy dream, woke up with a start, and said that Honey was a much more trappy thing than Haycorns. Piglet didn’t think so; and they were just going to argue about it, when Piglet remembered that, if they put acorns in the Trap, he would have to find the acorns, but if they put honey, then Pooh would have to give up some of his own honey, so he said, ‘All right, honey then,’ just as Pooh remembered it too, and was going to say, ‘All right, haycorns.’

‘Honey,’ said Piglet to himself in a thoughtful way, as if it were now settled. ‘ I’ll dig the pit, while you go and get the honey.’

‘Very well,’ said Pooh, and he stumped off.

As soon as he got home, he went to the larder; and he stood on a chair, and took down a very large jar of honey from the top shelf. It had HUNNY written on it, but, just to make sure, he took off the paper cover and looked at it, and it looked just like honey. ‘But you never can tell,’ said Pooh. ‘I remember my uncle saying once that he had seen cheese just this colour.’ So he put his tongue in, and took a large lick. ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘it is. No doubt about that. And honey, I should say, right down to the bottom of the jar. Unless, of course,’ he said, ‘somebody put cheese in at the bottom just for a joke. Perhaps I had better go a little further … just in case … in case Heffalumps don’t like cheese … same as me … Ah!’ And he gave a deep sigh. ‘I was right. It is honey, right the way down.’

Having made certain of this, he took the jar back to Piglet, and Piglet looked up from the bottom of his Very Deep Pit, and said, ‘Got it?’ and Pooh said, ‘Yes, but it isn’t quite a full jar,’ and he threw it down to Piglet, and Piglet said, ‘No, it isn’t! Is that all you’ve got left?’ and Pooh said, ‘Yes.’ Because it was. So Piglet put the jar at the bottom of the Pit, and climbed out, and they went off home together.

‘Well, good night, Pooh,’ said Piglet, when they had got to Pooh’s house. ‘And we meet at six o’clock to-morrow morning by the Pine Trees, and see how many Heffalumps we’ve got in our Trap.’

‘Six o’clock, Piglet. And have you got any string?’

‘No. Why do you want string?’

‘To lead them home with.’

‘Oh! … I think Heffalumps come if you whistle.’

‘Some do and some don’t. You never can tell with Heffalumps. Well, good night!’

‘Good night!’

And off Piglet trotted to his house TRESPASSERS W, while Pooh made his preparations for bed.

Some hours later, just as the night was beginning to steal away, Pooh woke up suddenly with a sinking feeling. He had had that sinking feeling before, and he knew what it meant. He was hungry . So he went to the larder, and he stood on a chair and reached up to the top shelf, and found – nothing.

‘That’s funny,’ he thought. ‘I know I had a jar of honey there. A full jar, full of honey right up to the top, and it had HUNNY written on it, so that I should know it was honey. That’s very funny.’ And then he began to wander up and down, wondering where it was and murmuring a murmur to himself. Like this:

It’s very, very funny

’Cos I know I had some honey;

’Cos it had a label on,

Saying HUNNY.

A goloptious full-up pot too,

And I don’t know where it’s got to,

No, I don’t know where it’s gone –

Well, it’s funny.

He had murmured this to himself three times in a singing sort of way, when suddenly he remembered. He had put it into the Cunning Trap to catch the Heffalump.

‘Bother!’ said Pooh. ‘It all comes of trying to be kind to Heffalumps.’ And he got back into bed.

But he couldn’t sleep. The more he tried to sleep, the more he couldn’t. He tried Counting Sheep, which is sometimes a good way of getting to sleep, and, as that was no good, he tried counting Heffalumps. And that was worse. Because every Heffalump that he counted was making straight for a pot of Pooh’s honey, and eating it all . For some minutes he lay there miserably, but when the five hundred and eighty-seventh Heffalump was licking its jaws, and saying to itself, ‘Very good honey this, I don’t know when I’ve tasted better,’ Pooh could bear it no longer. He jumped out of bed, he ran out of the house, and he ran straight to the Six Pine Trees.

The Sun was still in bed, but there was a lightness in the sky over the Hundred Acre Wood which seemed to show that it was waking up and would soon be kicking off the clothes. In the half-light the Pine Trees looked cold and lonely, and the Very Deep Pit seemed deeper than it was, and Pooh’s jar of honey at the bottom was something mysterious, a shape and no more. But as he got nearer to it his nose told him that it was indeed honey, and his tongue came out and began to polish up his mouth, ready for it.

‘Bother!’ said Pooh, as he got his nose inside the jar. ‘A Heffalump has been eating it!’ And then he thought a little and said, ‘Oh, no, I did. I forgot.’

Indeed, he had eaten most of it. But there was a little left at the very bottom of the jar, and he pushed his head right in, and began to lick. …

By and by Piglet woke up. As soon as he woke he said to himself, ‘Oh!’ Then he said bravely, ‘Yes,’ and then, still more bravely, ‘Quite so.’ But he didn’t feel very brave, for the word which was really jiggeting about in his brain was ‘Heffalumps.’

What was a Heffalump like?

Was it Fierce?

Did it come when you whistled? And how did it come?

Was it Fond of Pigs at all?

If it was Fond of Pigs, did it make any difference what sort of Pig ?

Supposing it was Fierce with Pigs, would it make any difference if the Pig had a grandfather called TRESPASSERS WILLIAM ?

He didn’t know the answer to any of these questions … and he was going to see his first Heffalump in about an hour from now!

Of course Pooh would be with him, and it was much more Friendly with two. But suppose Heffalumps were Very Fierce with Pigs and Bears? Wouldn’t it be better to pretend that he had a headache, and couldn’t go up to the Six Pine Trees this morning? But then suppose that it was a very fine day, and there was no Heffalump in the trap, here he would be, in bed all the morning, simply wasting his time for nothing. What should he do?