CEMETERY “EXPOTITION”

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31635, 22 March 1968, Page 1

CEMETERY “EXPOTITION”

The police patrol must have wondered what it had stumbled on to last evening. There in a comer of the Barbadoes Street cemetery huddled a sinister circle of muffled figures, their faces illuminated by the flickering glow of candle flames. The Mafia? The Ku Klux Klan? No, just the Canterbury University Pooh Society holding its annual meeting. The group of about 50 students—all dedicated to maintaining the popularity of A. A. Milne’s tales for children—gathered on the pavement at nightfall. Without a giggle or a fur-

tive glance they solemnly opened their meeting by reciting the poem about the four friends—“ Ernest was an elephant, a great big fellow . . . but James was only a snail” That done, they filed into the gloomy cemetery grounds and clustered in the shadow of a large white tombstone, commemorating a gentleman who died in 1880, 48 years before the publication of “The House at Pooh Corner.” Sitting in the long grass, the moonlight glinting on the cemetery railings and marble headstones, the Pooh Society did its annual business.

A motion was passed to the effect that members would very much like to have more money, and another urged the recovery of a useful pot which appeared to have been lost. The president reported that the woozle hunt had been a complete failure. When the formal business became too boring, through being inaudible to most of those present (one was even trying to listen through an old-fashioned ear trumpet), the meeting decided to conduct a reading about the search for the heffalump. No sooner had they reached the most exciting part—where Piglet comes

across Pooh In the very deep trap—than a strong contingent of police arrived, some in uniform, some not. The president could think of nothing better to say than “the meeting is adjourned,” and the leading policeman could think of nothing more appropriate than the time-honoured “Move along, please.” Almost without a sound, the Pooh Society arose and filed off to a convenient house nearby. With them, they carried “a little something” to be consumed at 11 o’clock more than likely something very similar to Tigger’s breakfastextract of malt.