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recalled, that “this is the finest I have ever made, and it should be allowed to mature for a few years till there is an occasion of sufficient importance that its quality and maturity will justify the opening of it!”
    This splendid speech had been witnessed by Rat and Toad, Otter and his son Portly, as well — it was in the days before Nephew was on the scene — and the Mole had felt much embarrassed to have been so carried away by the occasion, and the drink, that he had dared say so much, and so portentously.
    “I fear I was a little the worse for wear on that occasion,” confessed the Mole, watching as the Badger prepared to open the bottle; “but if you please —”
    “Yes, Mole, what is it?”
    “Well, I am — I am not quite sure but —”
    “Why, Mole, you look most strange.”
    “I feel strange, Badger, most strange. But if you please, do not open that particular bottle quite yet, for you see I — I do not think the time is yet right.”
    Mole slumped back in the chair as the Badger put the hallowed bottle back in its place, unopened. Mole looked more startled at himself than anything else, while the Badger seemed not at all displeased.
    “I hope that great day may soon come, my good friend,” said the Badger, pouring them out instead a glass of that good old standby, Mole’s mischievous sloe and blackberry drink.
    “And when it does,” continued the Mole, “and it will, I feel strangely sure it will, then I pray that our friends Ratty and Toad will be here to share it, and Otter and Portly too!”
    “And your fine Nephew!” concluded the Badger, raising his glass and turning their future wish into the present toast.
    “Now then, Mole, I believe that we have some important things to talk over and we must not put them off a moment longer. You spoke a little earlier of the vision you had had of what we choose to call Beyond.”
    “Yes, yes I did,” said the Mole, putting down his glass and leaning forward.
    The two animals talked then for a long time, right on to the coming of dawn. Of much more than the Mole’s vision they spoke, though of nothing that did not in some sense bear upon it, and return to it. Of the long history of the River Bank they spoke, of Toad’s father; of the coming of the Rat, and the Mole’s own quiet emergence from his own small territory into the wider world of the Willows and the River Bank; and finally when the Mole thought all was said that could be said, the Badger began to talk of certain people, certain incidents and certain places beyond the River Bank — upstream of the River Bank indeed, which intimately concerned his own history — and explained a good deal concerning those old worn childhood books in the spare bedroom, and the small clothes, and the calendar with its fateful words “The Final Date”.

    The Mole now understood that the date concerned was the last on which the Badger had been able to hold any hope that he who had once worn those clothes, and he who had once enjoyed the books, would ever return to the River Bank from that place to which he had set off so foolishly as it had then seemed: which was, which must surely be Beyond.
    “One thing’s certain, Mole,” said the Badger, when they were finally sated with talk; “your voyage with Ratty will have to be revived. Your instincts in this matter must be trusted and acted upon!”
    “But he is quite adamant,” said the Mole dubiously “and I could not possibly try to dissuade him from a course he wants to take and I have agreed to.”
    “Nor should you try! No, this is something that needs careful handling. Leave it to me and I dare say that Rat will change his mind!”
     
    “Mole! Mole!”
    It was the Rat’s voice, and the Rat’s knock, some days later at Mole End.
    “Come in, Ratty, come in!” cried the Mole, opening the door, now back home and fully recovered. “You are most welcome.”
    “Now listen, Mole old chap, for I’ve something to say and there’s no time to