Once upon a time, not so long ago,
there was a little girl and her name was Emily.
And she had a shop – there it is.It was rather an unusual shop
because it didn’t sell anything.
You see, everything in that shop window
was a thing that somebody had once lost,
and Emily had found,
and brought home to Bagpuss.

Emily’s cat Bagpuss:
the most important –
the most beautiful –
the most magical –
saggy old cloth cat in the whole wide world.

Well now, one day Emily found a thing
and she brought it back to the shop
and put it down in front of Bagpuss
who was in the shop window fast asleep as usual.
But then Emily said some magic words:

Bagpuss, dear Bagpuss,
old fat furry catpuss,
wake up and look at this thing that I bring.
Wake up, be bright,
be golden and light;
Bagpuss, oh hear what I sing.

And Bagpuss was wide awake.
And when Bagpuss wakes up
all his friends wake up too:
the mice on the mouse-organ woke up and
stretched; Madeleine, the rag doll; Gabriel,
the toad; and last of all, Professor Yaffle,
who was a very distinguished old woodpecker.

He climbed down off his bookend and went to see
what it was that Emily had brought.

The voiceover from the beginning of UK children’s TV programme Bagpuss, 1974.