Winnie-the-Pooh and Piglet were standing on the bridge, watching the water calmly flow by underneath, when Pooh said “Piglet, I was just thinking about a hum. Would you like to hear it?”
“Oh yes, please,” said Piglet, who always liked the hums Pooh made up.
“It’s not really finished,” said Pooh, “but I thought that maybe if it heard me telling you that I was going to hum it to you, it would get busy about being finished.”
“I hope so,” said Piglet, because this made him feel like he was helping too.
“Well here it is, Piglet,” said Pooh. And he recited:
“Piglet and Pooh, on a bridge one day,
Looked at the water and oh, look at that
there’s a boat floating down the river
with a cat.”
“That’s very nice,” said Piglet. He didn’t quite understand the hum, but he liked it anyway because Pooh had made it up.”
“No, no, Piglet,” said Pooh, “That didn’t come out right at all. Just after the ‘one day’ it all went in a different direction because…”
“Because of what, Pooh?” asked Piglet.
“Because,” said Pooh, “there’s a boat floating down the river with a cat. Look and see, Piglet.”
Pooh pointed up the river, and Piglet did look and see. As the boat came closer, he noticed something else.
“Pooh,” he said excitedly, “I think there are two cats!”
Pooh looked again. “Yes indeed, Piglet, there are two cats in that boat”, said he. “I wonder what they’re doing.”
The two cats were sitting facing each other in the boat, and they were paying close attention to something between them. They didn’t look up to see where they were until Pooh called “Hulloo! Cats on the boat! Hulloo there!”
The cats stopped whatever they had been doing and looked at Pooh and Piglet. Then they looked around. One cat was spotted in many different colors, and the other had gray and white stripes. “I say,” said the colored cat, “where have we floated to, Basil?”
“I’m sure I can’t say,” replied the striped cat, whose name was Basil. “I can only suppose, Humphrey, that we’re a trifle farther down the river than the last time I noticed.”
“Oh quite so,” replied Basil. “Bit of a nuisance, this river-floating thing, what?”
“To be sure,” said Humphrey. “It’s not like a pond, is it? In a pond, if you decide to float near the lily pads and play a game of ‘able-whackets’ to pass the time, there you stay until your game is finished.”
“And I have won,” said Basil.
“Or lost,” suggested Humphrey.
“That, sir, is a most unfathomable outcome.”
“Not at all, sir, not at all. Recall, if you will, the events of Thursday last.”
“The events you refer to, sir, would they involve a market-wagon?”
“Indeed, sir, a market-wagon was centrally relevant to my narrative.”
“And two cats in the back, engaged in a rousing contest of able-whackets?”
“I believe, sir, that you have it precisely.”
“Ah, then your case is proven, sir. I do recall those events, and ‘struth, those two cats were none other than yourself and myself.”
“That is just how I recall it as well.”
“And I do indeed recall that you, sir, prevailed in that particular contest.”
“As I did, sir.”
“Indeed.”
With that, Humphrey and Basil rose from their seats, bowed formally to each other, and sat down again, each picking up a small set of playing cards in their paws. While they had been talking, Pooh and Piglet had been listening and watching as the boat slowly floated nearer and nearer to the side of the river, and finally stopped, caught in a small eddy behind a few reeds. Pooh stumped off the bridge and over to where the boat — and the cats — were. Piglet came too, but stayed behind Pooh because he was a Very Small Animal and wasn’t sure about cats, even cats who bowed formally.
The cats were once again attending to their game and not looking anywhere else. They didn’t seem to have noticed that their boat had stopped floating down the river.
“Ahem,” said Pooh, clearing his throat in the sort of way you do when you have something to say but you aren’t sure just how you’re going to start saying it.
“Ahem,” he said again, “Excuse me, but your boat has stopped.”
“Boat?” asked Humphrey, looking up from his cards in surprise.
“Stopped?” asked Basil, pricking his ears in a curious sort of way.
“Who are you?” they both said together, looking at Pooh.
“I’m Pooh,” said Pooh. “You’ve floated down the river to the Hundred Acre Wood, which is where we live. Piglet and me. And Pooh. That’s me. And the others, of course, they live here too.”
“Ah, capital,” said Basil.
“Excellent,” said Humphrey.
“Well met,” said Basil.
“And bon chance”, added Humphrey.
“I say,” said Basil, “isn’t that French?”
“I dare say, “ replied Humphrey, “that it is.”
“Didn’t know you spoke French, old fellow,” said Basil.
“Not so much, but bon chance is just something you say, don’t you know. It’s not like you’re really speaking French when you say it.”
“No, I ‘spose not.”
“No more than saying gesundheit when someone sneezes means you speak…” At this, Humphrey trailed off because although he knew gesundheit came from Some Other Language, he wasn’t at all clear about which language that might be.
“Slibervian, that would be,” suggested Basil.
“Ah, yes, of course. Slibervian is just the one I was searching for, old chap. My thanks to you.”
“No need to mention it, old bean. Delighted to be of service.”
With that, the cats rose again and bowed to each other, then sat back down and took up their cards. They continued their game for a little while, and Piglet and Pooh, not knowing quite what else to do, watched. After a short time, the cat named Basil put down his cards and said to Humphrey: “I demand the good money! Hold out your flipper. This is for the loss of the good game called Able Whackets and a precious hard thump.”
Humphrey handed some coins to Basil, who had wrapped a handkerchief around his paw. Then Humphrey held out his paw, palm up, and Basil whacked it with the paw wrapped in the handkerchief.
“Pooh,” whispered Piglet, “what are they doing?”
“I don’t know,” whispered Pooh back. “It seems to have something to do with their game, Piglet.”
Now that their game had finished, Humphrey and Basil looked at Pooh and Piglet.
“Ah, yes, I remember both of you,” said Humphrey, whose paw didn’t seem any the worse for being whacked. “I believe you said you were Local Residents?”
“Er…yes,” said Pooh, who wasn’t completely sure what a ‘resident’ was, but thought he knew what Humphrey was getting at.
“Capital,” said Basil. “Perhaps, good sirs, you could direct us in the Art and Science of floating back up this river?”
“I don’t think,” said Pooh, “that it works quite that way. You see, we play Poohsticks on that bridge, and the sticks float only in one direction.”
“That’s right,” said Piglet, who was feeling better about the cats, “if they floated the other way it wouldn’t work at all.”
“I see the logic of it,” nodded Humphrey. “Basil, my good friend, I believe our method of conveyance down the river must needs differ from that of our return.”
“That could indeed be the case,” replied Basil. “What do you suggest, my good man?”
“My contemplation of the issue reveals only one solution,” said Humphrey. “We must undertake to travel overland. We shall use the river itself as our map.”
“Aha,” said Basil, “a capital idea, sir! Let us proceed apace!”
So saying, the cats stood up once again, bowed to each other, and stepped out of the boat. They then bowed to Piglet and Pooh. Piglet bowed back, but not so low that he had to take his eyes off Basil and Humphrey, because he wasn’t feeling altogether comfortable with cats yet. Pooh bowed back, but not very low at all because of eating just a bit too much honey yesterday. As well as most of the days before that.
“We bid you farewell,” said Humphrey to Pooh and Piglet.
“And bon chance”, said Basil.
As the two cats trotted away, staying close to the river, Piglet hear Humphrey say “my dear fellow, is it the case that you, too, speak French?”
“Not so much,” replied Basil.
Their conversation continued, but by then they were too far away to hear. Piglet looked at the boat the cats had left behind.
“Pooh,” he said, “Basil and Humphrey left their playing cards behind. In the boat.”
“Yes they did,” said Pooh solemnly. “I think, Piglet, that playing cards are meant to stay in boats.”
“Oh Pooh,” said Piglet, “do you really think so? That means that we shouldn’t take the cards to play that game unless we sit in the boat.”
“That is just what it means, Piglet,” said Pooh. “And I think, Piglet, that I don’t want to sit in that boat. A boat, you see, might Tip Over when it feels like it. I don’t like the idea of getting Tipped.”
“Neither do I,” said Piglet in a relieved sort of way. He wasn’t sure about the boat, but he especially didn’t like the idea of getting Whacked at the end of the card game.
“It’s time, Piglet,” said Pooh, “to go have a Little Something. Let’s go to my house, Piglet, because I have just the sort of Little Something that it’s time to have. And then let’s go to Christopher Robin’s house and tell him about Humphrey and Basil. I think that’s just the sort of thing he would like to hear about.”
“Yes, let’s,” said Piglet. And so they did.
