AT HIS DOOR

Evening Post, Volume CXI, Issue 74, 28 March 1931, Page 20

AT HIS DOOR

CHRISTOPHER ROBIN TO-DAY

Just cold enough for a fire; ;ju«H course, they were real peofjle. Even Mr. Bark enough, for shadows to make menj 1 Sfcepard, who illustrated the books, patterns in the nursery. came to the nursery and drew the ' So, ia the gloaming (writes Cecil toys from life; and Christopher Eobin Hunt in the. "Daily Mail") I knocked too." on Christopher Bobin's door, feeling, "But although there are Christopher perhaps, a trifle sad to think that tho Eobin wallpapers, and lampshades, and days "When We Were'"Very Young" notepaper, and music, and toys, we are past. But then they are not really," want him to forget all about it now. for Christopher Eobin lives always You see, that was when he was very ' with Winnie the Pooh and Eeyore tho young, and now he's growing up, away donkey and a dozen others —immortal at school." like Peter Pan. But some of us cannot believe that "You see Christopher Eobin has he will ever grow up. Certainly, his gone to school," Mrs. Milne said, as father will_ never loss that ,-joyous she- showed me a new toy representing youthful spirit. the little laa in black oilskins and sou'- For, you see, Mr. A. A. Milne was wester. writing- stories long before. ChristoWinnie the Pooh, the great big beat pher Eobin arrived. 5s getting old now and just a wcet bit He made only.. £20. from his pen in disreputable; but bears'like that, with the. fust year, then £120 the next a million lovers, never really die. year, and then —but what does it mat- ■ And all those funny animals were in- ter, since he has given us Christopher trodueed to,the nursery, which now has Eobin? _ , its own Christopher Eobin frieze. "I was always .interested .m ■his "We used to sit and make them all work," said Mrs. Milne, as we recalltalk," said Christopher's mother, "and ed,those early struggles. "I loved his give them, funny names aid all kiuds writing Jong, before X ever met him. I of different voices. Wo were all in it. was so fascinated by it that my godWe all loved the animals, and gradu- father, Sir Owen Seamau, arranged our ally it grew and grew till something meeting, iad'to be done-about it." And then ? go from the nursery fantasies, creat- But Mrs. Milne passed with a smile %il to Vive joy to one tiny brown-haired to talking of her husband'a methods. Joy (and two delightfully understand- "No," she said, "I never wtfote my- ' «isg grown-ups) grew stories that have self, mercifully, but Often my husband Itfought Christopher Bobiu -wondrous vsed to dictate his work to me as he fame. "■ ' • '. walked about tho room. He's always : Asfe the postman, iE you don** «piite thinking about his work. We discuss it Relieve the millions o£ friends that at all louia. Sometimes at our country little lad has won. He has more let- house, eacfc 'week-end, he thinks about lers in a week than, come to manjr a it for hours as He strolls, round the BJoor in a long year. garden. ■ ■ ' "One day/ said Mrs. Milne,/fa., "Now, of ieourse, I do not do the IWiole school wrote to him. It was actual writing. A secretary, takes his ■father lovely, wasn't it! Sixty quaint wonderfully neat manuscripts, for he letters from a school near Birmingham writes everything by hand, and I Just ' and a covering note from the headmis: act as a buffer between, him and the tress. worries." "Christopher Eobin went to see them Mr. Blilno is strong, mingles his 'once ana they still send him, presents, work with plenty of golf and avoids the We send them primroses, too, at Easter strain of public appearances and social time. • ' . ■ rounds. "Hundreds of kiddies write,'.' said But he lias always believed in hard Mrs. Milne, "from all over the world, work and regular work in congenial It is all so real to them. And, of surroundings.