Ch. 1 - Peter Pan

If you ask your mother whether she knew about Peter Pan when she was a
little girl she will say, "Why, of course, I did, child," and if you
ask her whether he rode on a goat in those days she will say, "What a
foolish question to ask, certainly he did." Then if you ask your
grandmother whether she knew about Peter Pan when she was a girl, she
also says, "Why, of course, I did, child," but if you ask her whether
he rode on a goat in those days, she says she never heard of his
having a goat. Perhaps she has forgotten, just as she sometimes
forgets your name and calls you Mildred, which is your mother's name.
Still, she could hardly forget such an important thing as the goat.
Therefore there was no goat when your grandmother was a little girl.
This shows that, in telling the story of Peter Pan, to begin with the
goat (as most people do) is as silly as to put on your jacket before
your vest.

Of course, it also shows that Peter is ever so old, but he is really
always the same age, so that does not matter in the least. His age is
one week, and though he was born so long ago he has never had a
birthday, nor is there the slightest chance of his ever having one.
The reason is that he escaped from being a human when he was seven
days' old; he escaped by the window and flew back to the Kensington
Gardens.

If you think he was the only baby who ever wanted to escape, it shows
how completely you have forgotten your own young days. When David
heard this story first he was quite certain that he had never tried to
escape, but I told him to think back hard, pressing his hands to his
temples, and when he had done this hard, and even harder, he
distinctly remembered a youthful desire to return to the tree-tops,
and with that memory came others, as that he had lain in bed planning
to escape as soon as his mother was asleep, and how she had once
caught him half-way up the chimney. All children could have such
recollections if they would press their hands hard to their temples,
for, having been birds before they were human, they are naturally a
little wild during the first few weeks, and very itchy at the
shoulders, where their wings used to be. So David tells me.

I ought to mention here that the following is our way with a story:
First, I tell it to him, and then he tells it to me, the understanding
being that it is quite a different story; and then I retell it with
his additions, and so we go on until no one could say whether it is
more his story or mine. In this story of Peter Pan, for instance, the
bald narrative and most of the moral reflections are mine, though not
all, for this boy can be a stern moralist, but the interesting bits
about the ways and customs of babies in the