Moominpappa at Sea by Tove Jansson Page A

feel the warmth and dazzling brightness of the sun. He had come upon a glade in the middle of the thicket.
    It was a very small glade, about as big as two beds placed side by side. Inside it was warm and there were
bees buzzing round the flowers. On all sides the forest stood guard. Above his head the birch trees waved to and fro, a thin green roof which the sun could look through. It was complete. Moomintroll had found perfection. Nobody had been here before him; it was all his own.
    He sat carefully down in the grass and shut his eyes. To have a really safe hiding-place had always been one of his most serious ambitions, he had always been looking for one, and had found quite a number in the past. But none of them had been as good as this. It was both hidden and open. Only the birds could see him, the ground was warm and he was protected on all sides. He sighed.
    Something bit Moomintroll’s tail. It stung like mad. He jumped up and he knew at once what it was. Ants. Tiny, vindictive red ants. There were swarms of them in the grass. They were running in all directions – another one bit him in the tail. Moomintroll withdrew slowly, his eyes red with disappointment; he was terribly offended. Naturally, they were living here before he had appeared on the scene. But if one lives in the ground, one just doesn’t see anything of what’s up above; an ant has no idea of what birds or clouds look like, or for that matter doesn’t know anything about the things which are important to a Moomintroll for instance.
    There were many kinds of justice. According to one kind, which was a little complicated perhaps, but absolutely fair, the glade belonged to him and not to the ants. ‘But how can I get them to understand?’ he
thought. ‘They could just as easily live somewhere else. Just a little way off, only a few yards. Was there no way of explaining to them? If the worst came to the worst, couldn’t one just draw a boundary line and divide the glade?’

    They were back again. They had located him and started to attack. Moomintroll fled. He was fleeing from paradise in disgrace, but he was fully determined to return. The place had been waiting for him all his life, perhaps for several hundred years! It was his because he liked it more than anybody else did. If a million ants all loved it at the same time, they couldn’t feel as strongly as he did. Or so he believed.
    *

    ‘Pappa,’ said Moomintroll.
    But Moominpappa wasn’t listening, because just at that moment he had got the right grip on a big round boulder, and with a great thud it rolled down the slope. It made two very clear sparks and left a faint but enchanting smell of gunpowder behind. Now it was lying at the bottom, just where it should lie. It was wonderful to roll stones, first pushing with all one’s might, then feeling them beginning to move, just a little at first – then a little more – and then giving way and rolling into the sea with a colossal splash, leaving one standing there trembling with effort and pride.
    ‘Pappa!’ shouted Moomintroll.
    Moominpappa turned round and waved to his son. ‘It’s lying just where it should lie!’ he exclaimed. ‘This is going to be a jetty, a kind of breakwater.’ He waded into the sea and with a great deal of puffing and blowing, began to roll another, even larger boulder along the bottom, with his nose right under the water. It was much easier to lift and roll stones under the water. Moominpappa wondered why. But the great thing was that it made one feel tremendously strong…
    ‘I want to ask you something!’ shouted Moomintroll. ‘About red ants! It’s important!’
    Moominpappa lifted his nose out of the water and listened.
    ‘Red ants!’ repeated Moomintroll. ‘Can one talk to them? Do you think they would understand if I put up a notice for them? Could they read it?’

    ‘Red ants?’ said Moominpappa in amazement. ‘Of course they can’t read. They wouldn’t understand a thing. Now I must