Moominmamma stared at the black pool with a look of extreme disapproval on her face.
"I think," she said, "that this is the right moment for us all to go on a nice picnic."
And she went straight back to the lighthouse and started to pack.
When she had got everything together that they would need for a picnic, she opened the window and started to bang the gong. She watched them all running toward the lighthouse, and did not feel the slightest bit guilty, although she knew that the gong was supposed to be used only in cases of extreme urgency. [...]
"Keep quite calm!" she cried. "There's no fire! We're going on a picnic as soon as we possibly can."
"A picnic?" exclaimed Moominpappa. "How could you bang the gong just for a picnic?"
"There's danger in the air," Moominmamma shouted back. "If we don't go for a picnic this very instant, anything might happen to us!Tove Jansson (words and illustration), from Moominpappa at Sea, 1965
Translated by Kingsley Hart
1 maids a-milking:
I've been thinking about when and how I was introduced to Moomins. I believe I would have been 8 or 9. My mother would have bought them for me, the firm believer in children's literature that she is. And we were only allowed television Sunday nights, so the Moomins were my first experience of dread that didn't come from my own anxiety, or maybe the fragments of my parents' lives that I'd intercept. Dread, but cute, and manageable at 8. Although barely, and memorable.
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