alice-in-wonderland.txt

BY LEWIS CARROLL ILLUSTRATED BY JOHN TENNIEL

ALICE’S
Adventures in Wonderland


RABBIT-HOLE. 1
ALICE’S ADVENTURES
IN WONDERLAND
ALICE’S ADVENTURES
IN WONDERLAND
BY
LEWIS CARROLL
WITH FORTY-TWO ILLUSTRATIONS
BY JOHN TENNIEL

All in the golden afternoon
Full leisurely we glide;
For both our oars, with little skill,
By little arms are plied,
While little hands make vain pretence
Our wanderings to guide.
Ah, cruel Three! In such an hour,
Beneath such dreamy weather,
To beg a tale of breath too weak
To stir the tiniest feather!
Yet what can one poor voice avail
Against three tongues together?
First published in 1865
by Macmillan & Co., London
Released 1866 by D. Appleton & Co., New York
For information

Thus grew the tale of Wonderland :
Thus slowly, one by one,
Its quaint events were hammered out—
And now the tale is done,
And home we steer, a merry crew,
Beneath the setting sun.
Alice! a childish story take,
And with a gentle hand
Lay it where Childhood’s dreams are twined
In Memory’s mystic band,
Like pilgrim’s withered wreath of flowers
Plucked in a far-off land.
Imperious Prima flashes forth
Her edict ‘to begin it’—
In gentler tone Secunda hopes
‘There will be nonsense in it!’—
While Tertia interrupts the tale
Not more than once a minute.
Anon, to sudden silence won,
In fancy they pursue
The dream-child moving through a land
Of wonders wild and new,
In friendly chat with bird or beast—
And half believe it true.
And ever, as the story drained
The wells of fancy dry,
And faintly strove that weary one
To put the subject by,
“The rest next time—” “It is next time!”
The happy voices cry.

CONTENTS.
CHAPTER PAGE
I. DOWN THE RABBIT-HOLE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
II. THE POOL OF TEARS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
III. A CAUCUS-RACE AND A LONG TALE . . . . . . . . 29
IV. THE RABBIT SENDS IN A LITTLE BILL . . . . . . 41
V. ADVICE FROM A CATERPILLAR . . . . . . . . . . . . 59
VI. PIG AND PEPPER . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
VII. A MAD TEA-PARTY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95
VIII. THE QUEEN’S CROQUET-GROUND . . . . . . . . . . 112
IX. THE MOCK TURTLE’S STORY . . . . . . . . . . . . . 130
X. THE LOBSTER QUADRILLE. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147
XI. WHO STOLE THE TARTS? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 162
XII. ALICE’S EVIDENCE. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 176

CHAPTER I.
DOWN THE RABBIT-HOLE.
ALICE was beginning to get very tired of
sitting by her sister on the bank, and of having
nothing to do: once or twice she had peeped into
the book her sister was reading, but it had no
pictures or conversations in it, “ and what is
burning with curiosity, she ran across the field
after it, and was just in time to see it pop
down a large rabbit-hole under the hedge.
In another moment down went Alice after
it, never once considering how in the world
she was to get out again.
The rabbit-hole went straight on like a
tunnel for some way, and then dipped suddenly
down, so suddenly that Alice had not a moment
to think about stopping herself before she found
herself falling down what seemed to be a very
deep well.
Either the well was very deep, or she fell
very slowly, for she had plenty of time as she
went down to look about her, and to wonder
what was going to happen next. First, she tried
to look down and make out what she was
coming to, but it was too dark to see anything :
then she looked at the sides of the well, and
noticed that they were filled with cupboards
and bookshelves: here and there she saw maps
and pictures hung upon pegs. She took down
the use of a book,” thought Alice, “ without
pictures or conversations ?”
So she was considering in her own mind,
(as well as she could, for the hot day made
her feel very sleepy and stupid,) whether the
pleasure of making a daisy-chain would be
worth the trouble of getting up and picking
the daisies, when suddenly a white rabbit with
pink eyes ran close by her.
There was nothing so very remarkable in
that; nor did Alice think it so very much out
of the way to hear the Rabbit say to itself,
“ Oh dear ! Oh dear ! I shall be too late !”
(when she thought it over afterwards, it occurred
to her that she ought to have wondered
at this, but at the time it all seemed quite
natural); but when the Rabbit actually took a
watch out of its waistcoat-pocket, and looked at
it, and then hurried on, Alice started to her
feet, for it flashed across her mind that she had
never before seen a rabbit with either a waistcoat-pocket
or a watch to take out of it, and,
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her, still it was good practice to say it over)
“ —yes, that ’s about the right distance—but
then I wonder what Latitude or Longitude
I ’ve got to ?” (Alice had not the slightest
idea what Latitude was, or Longitude either, but
she thought they were nice grand words to say.)
Presently she began again. “ I wonder if
I shall fall right through the earth! How funny
it’ll seem to come out among the people that
walk with their heads downwards ! The Antipathies,
I think—” (she was rather glad there
was no one listening, this time, as it didn ’t
sound at all the right word) “ —but I shall
have to ask them what the name of the country
is, you know. Please, Ma’am, is this New
Zealand or Australia?” (and she tried to curtsey
as she spoke—fancy curtseying as you’re falling
through the air ! Do you think you could
manage it?) “And what an ignorant little girl
she’ll think me for asking ! No, it’ll never do
to ask : perhaps I shall see it written up
somewhere.”
RABBIT-HOLE. 5
a jar from one of the shelves as she passed; it
was labelled “ ORANGE MARMALADE,” but
to her great disappointment it was empty: she did
not like to drop the jar for fear of killing somebody
underneath, so managed to put it into
one of the cupboards as she fell past it.
“Well !” thought Alice to herself, “ after
such a fall as this, I shall think nothing of
tumbling down stairs ! How brave they ’ll all
think me at home! Why, I wouldn’t say anything
about it, even if I fell off the top of
the house !” (Which was very likely true.)
Down, down, down. Would the fall never
come to an end ? “ I wonder how many miles
I ’ve fallen by this time ?” she said aloud. “I
must be getting somewhere near the centre of
the earth. Let me see : that would be four
thousand miles down, I think—” (for, you see,
Alice had learnt several things of this sort in
her lessons in the schoolroom, and though this
was not a very good opportunity for showing off
her knowledge, as there was no one to listen to
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Alice was not a bit hurt, and she jumped up
on to her feet in a moment : she looked up,
but it was all dark overhead; before her was
another long passage, and the White Rabbit was
still in sight, hurrying down it. There was
not a moment to be lost: away went Alice like
the wind, and was just in time to hear it say, as
it turned a corner, “Oh my ears and whiskers,
how late it ’s getting !” She was close behind
it when she turned the corner, but the Rabbit
was no longer to be seen : she found herself in
a long, low hall, which was lit up by a row of
lamps hanging from the roof.
There were doors all round the hall, but they
were all locked, and when Alice had been all
the way down one side and up the other, trying
every door, she walked sadly down the middle,
wondering how she was ever to get out again.
Suddenly she came upon a little three-legged
table, all made of solid glass; there was nothing
on it but a tiny golden key, and Alice’s first
idea was that this might belong to one of the
RABBIT-HOLE. 7
Down, down, down. There was nothing else to
do, so Alice soon began talking again. “Dinah ’ll
miss me very much to-night, I should think !”
(Dinah was the cat.) “ I hope they’ll remember
her saucer of milk at tea-time. Dinah, my dear!
I wish you were down here with me ! There
are no mice in the air, I’m afraid, but you
might catch a bat, and that’s very like a mouse,
you know. But do cats eat bats, I wonder?”
And here Alice began to get rather sleepy, and
went on saying to herself, in a dreamy sort
of way, “Do cats eat bats ? Do cats eat bats ?”
and sometimes, “Do bats eat cats?” for, you
see, as she couldn’t answer either question, it
didn’t much matter which way she put it. She
felt that she was dozing off, and had just begun
to dream that she was walking hand in hand
with Dinah, and was saying to her very
earnestly, “Now, Dinah, tell me the truth: did
you ever eat a bat ?” when suddenly, thump !
thump! down she came upon a heap of sticks
and dry leaves, and the fall was over.
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flowers and those cool fountains, but she could
not even get her head though the doorway ;
“ and even if my head would go through,”
thought poor Alice, “ it would be of very little
use without my shoulders. Oh, how I wish I
could shut up like a telescope! I think I could,
if I only knew how to begin.” For, you see, so
many out-of-the-way things had happened lately
that Alice had begun to think that very few
things indeed were really impossible.
There seemed to be no use in waiting by
the little door, so she went back to the table,
half hoping she might find another key on it,
or at any rate a book of rules for shutting
people up like telescopes : this time she found
a little bottle on it, (“which certainly was not
here before,” said Alice,) and tied round the
neck of the bottle was a paper label with the
words “ DRINK ME” beautifully printed on
it in large letters.
It was all very well to say “Drink me,” but
the wise little Alice was not going to do that
RABBIT-HOLE. 9
doors of the hall ; but alas ! either the locks
were too large, or the key was too small, but
at any rate it would not open any of them.
However, on the second time round, she came
upon a low
curtain she had
not noticed before,
and behind
it was
a little door
about fifteen
inches high :
she tried the
little golden
key in the
lock, and to her great delight it fitted !
Alice opened the door and found that it led
into a small passage, not much larger than a
rat-hole: she knelt down and looked along the
passage into the loveliest garden you ever saw.
How she longed to get out of that dark hall,
and wander about among those beds of bright
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so Alice ventured to taste it, and finding it
very nice, (it had, in fact, a sort of mixed
flavour of cherry-tart, custard, pine-apple, roast
turkey, toffy, and hot buttered toast,) she very
soon finished it off.
* * * *
* * *
* * * *
“What a curious feeling !” said Alice, “ I
must be shutting up like a telescope.”
And so it was indeed : she was now only
ten inches high, and her face brightened up
at the thought that she was now the right
size for going through the little door into that
lovely garden. First, however, she waited for a
few minutes to see if she was going to shrink
any further : she felt a little nervous about
this, “ for it might end, you know,” said Alice
to herself, “in my going out altogether, like a
candle. I wonder what I should be like then?”
And she tried to fancy what the flame of a
candle looks like after the candle is blown out,
RABBIT-HOLE. 11
in a hurry: “ no, I ’ll look first,” she said,
“ and see whether
it’s marked ‘poison’
or not:” for she had
read several nice
little stories about
children who had
got burnt, and eaten
up by wild beasts,
and other unpleasant
things, all because
they would not remember
the simple
rules their friends
had taught them, such as, that a red-hot poker
will burn you if you hold it too long ; and
that if you cut your finger very deeply with
a knife, it usually bleeds; and she had never
forgotten that, if you drink much from a bottle
marked “ poison,” it is almost certain to disagree
with you, sooner or later.
However, this bottle was not marked “poison,”
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in a game of croquet she was playing against
herself, for this curious child was very fond of
pretending to be two people. “But it’s no use
now,” thought poor Alice, “ to pretend to be two
people! Why, there ’s hardly enough of me left
to make one respectable person !”
Soon her eye fell on a little glass box that
was lying under the table: she opened it, and
found in it a very small cake, on which the
words “EAT ME” were beautifully marked in
currants. “Well, I’ll eat it,” said Alice, “ and if
it makes me grow larger, I can reach the key ;
and if it makes me grow smaller, I can creep
under the door; so either way I’ll get into the
garden, and I don’t care which happens !”
She ate a little bit, and said anxiously to
herself “Which way? Which way?” holding her
hand on the top of her head to feel which way
it was growing, and she was quite surprised
to find that she remained the same size : to be
sure, this is what generally happens when one
eats cake, but Alice had got so much into the
RABBIT-HOLE. 13
for she could not remember ever having seen
such a thing.
After a while, finding that nothing more
happened, she decided on going into the garden
at once, but, alas for poor Alice! when she got
to the door, she found she had forgotten the
little golden key, and when she went back to
the table for it, she found she could not possibly
reach it: she could see it quite plainly through
the glass, and she tried her best to climb up
one of the legs of the table, but it was too
slippery, and when she had tired herself out
with trying, the poor little thing sat down
and cried.
“Come, there ’s no use in crying like that!”
said Alice to herself, rather sharply, “ I advise
you to leave off this minute !” She generally
gave herself very good advice, (though she
very seldom followed it,) and sometimes she
scolded herself so severely as to bring tears
into her eyes, and once she remembered trying
to box her own ears for having cheated herself
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CHAPTER II.
THE POOL OF TEARS.
“Curiouser and curiouser
!” cried Alice
(she was so much surprised,
that for the
moment she quite forgot
how to speak good
English) ; “ now I ’m
opening out like the
largest telescope that
ever was! Good-bye,
feet !” (for when she
looked down at her
feet, they seemed to
be almost out of sight,
they were getting so
far off) “Oh, my poor
little feet, I wonder
way of expecting nothing but out-of-the-way
things to happen, that it seemed quite dull and
stupid for life to go on in the common way.
So she set to work, and very soon finished
off the cake.
* * * *
* * *
* * * *
DOWN THE RABBIT-HOLE.
16 THE POOL OF TEARS. 17
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who will put on your shoes and stockings for
you now, dears? I’m sure I shan’t be able! I
shall be a great deal too far off to trouble myself
about you: you must manage the best way
you can;—but I must be kind to them,” thought
Alice, “or perhaps they won ’t walk the way I
want to go ! Let me see : I ’ll give them a new
pair of boots every Christmas.”
And she went on planning to herself how she
would manage it. “They must go by the carrier,”
she thought; “ and how funny it’ll seem, sending
presents to one’s own feet! And how odd the
directions will look !
Alice’s Right Foot, Esq.,
Hearthrug,
near the Fender.
(with Alice’s love.)
Oh dear, what nonsense I ’m talking !”
Just at this moment her head struck against the
roof of the hall: in fact she was now rather more
than nine feet high, and she at once took up the
little golden key and hurried off to the garden door.
Poor Alice! It was as much as she could do,
lying down on one side, to look through into
the garden with one eye; but to get through
was more hopeless than ever: she sat down and
began to cry again.
“You ought to be ashamed of yourself,” said
Alice, “ a great girl like you,” (she might well
say this,) “ to go on crying in this way! Stop
this moment, I tell you!” But she went on all
the same, shedding gallons of tears, until there
was a large pool all round her, about four inches
deep and reaching half down the hall.
After a time she heard a little pattering of
feet in the distance, and she hastily dried her
eyes to see what was coming. It was the White
Rabbit returning, splendidly dressed, with a pair
of white kid gloves in one hand and a large
fan in the other : he came trotting along in a
great hurry, muttering to himself as he came,
“Oh! the Duchess, the Duchess! Oh! won’t she
be savage if I ’ve kept her waiting !” Alice
felt so desperate that she was ready to ask help
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Alice took up the fan and gloves, and, as the
hall was very hot, she kept fanning herself all
the time she went on talking : “ Dear, dear !
How queer everything is to-day ! And yesterday
things went on just as usual. I wonder if
I’ve been changed in the night? Let me think:
was I the same when I got up this morning?
I almost think I can remember feeling a little
different. But if I ’m not the same, the next
question is, Who in the world am I? Ah, that’s
the great puzzle !” And she began thinking over
all the children she knew, that were of the
same age as herself, to see if she could have
been changed for any of them.
“I’m sure I ’m not Ada,” she said, “ for her
hair goes in such long ringlets, and mine doesn’t
go in ringlets at all ; and I ’m sure I can ’t be
Mabel, for I know all sorts of things, and she,
oh! she knows such a very little ! Besides, she’s
she, and I’m I, and—oh dear, how puzzling it
all is ! I ’ll try if I know all the things I used
to know. Let me see: four times five is twelve,
of any one; so, when the Rabbit came near her,
she began, in a low, timid voice, “ If you please,
sir——” The Rabbit started violently, dropped
the white kid gloves and the fan, and skurried
away into the darkness as hard as he could go.
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“ I ’m sure those are not the right words,”
said poor Alice, and her eyes filled with tears
again as she went on, “I must be Mabel after
all, and I shall have to go and live in that
poky little house, and have next to no toys to
play with, and oh ! ever so many lessons to
learn ! No, I ’ve made up my mind about it :
if I’m Mabel, I’ll stay down here ! It’ll be no
use their putting their heads down and saying,
‘Come up again, dear !’ I shall only look up
and say, ‘Who am I then ? Tell me that first,
and then, if I like being that person, I’ll come
up: if not, I ’ll stay down here till I ’m somebody
else’—but, oh dear !” cried Alice with a
sudden burst of tears, “ I do wish they would
put their heads down! I am so very tired of
being all alone here !”
As she said this, she looked down at her
hands, and was surprised to see that she had
put on one of the Rabbit’s little white kid gloves
while she was talking. “How can I have done
that?” she thought. “ I must be growing small
and four times six is thirteen, and four times
seven is—oh dear! I shall never get to twenty
at that rate! However, the Multiplication Table
don’t signify : let’s try Geography. London is
the capital of Paris, and Paris is the capital of
Rome, and Rome—no, that’s all wrong, I ’m
certain! I must have been changed for Mabel !
I’ll try and say ‘How doth the little—’ ” and she
crossed her hands on her lap, as if she were
saying lessons, and began to repeat it, but her
voice sounded hoarse and strange, and the words
did not come the same as they used to do :—
“How doth the little crocodile
Improve his shining tail,
And pour the waters of the Nile
On every golden scale !
How cheerfully he seems to grin,
How neatly spreads his claws,
And welcome little fishes in
With gently smiling jaws !”
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again.” She got up and went to the table to
measure herself by it, and found that, as nearly
as she could guess, she was now about two feet
high, and was going on shrinking rapidly: she
soon found out that the cause of this was the
fan she was holding, and she dropped it hastily,
just in time to save herself from shrinking away
altogether.
“That was a narrow escape !” said Alice, a
good deal frightened at the sudden change, but
very glad to find herself still in existence ; “ and
now for the garden !” and she ran with all
speed back to the little door : but, alas ! the
little door was shut again, and the little golden
key was lying on the glass table as before, “ and
things are worse than ever,” thought the poor
child, “for I never was so small as this before,
never! And I declare it ’s too bad, that it is !”
As she said these words her foot slipped,
and in another moment, splash! she was up to
her chin in salt water. Her first idea was that
she had somehow fallen into the sea, “ and in
that case I can go back by railway,” she said
to herself. (Alice had been to the seaside once
in her life, and had come to the general conclusion,
that wherever you go to on the English
coast you find a number of bathing machines
in the sea, some children digging in the sand
with wooden spades, then a row of lodging
houses, and behind them a railway station.)
However, she soon made out that she was in
the pool of tears which she had wept when she
was nine feet high.
“I wish I hadn’t cried so much!” said Alice,
as she swam about, trying to find her way out.
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“I shall be punished for it now, I suppose, by
being drowned in my own tears ! That will be
a queer thing, to be sure! However, everything
is queer to-day.”
Just then she heard something splashing
about in the pool a little way off, and she swam
nearer to make out what it was : at first she
thought it must be a walrus or hippopotamus,
but then she remembered how small she was
now, and she soon made out that it was only
a mouse, that had slipped in like herself.
“Would it be of any use, now,” thought
Alice, “to speak to this mouse ? Everything is
so out-of-the-way down here, that I should think
very likely it can talk : at any rate there ’s
no harm in trying.” So she began: “O Mouse,
do you know the way out of this pool ? I am
very tired of swimming about here, O Mouse!”
(Alice thought this must be the right way of
speaking to a mouse: she had never done such
a thing before, but she remembered having seen
in her brother’s Latin Grammar, “A mouse—
of a mouse—to a mouse—a mouse—O mouse!”)
The Mouse looked at her rather inquisitively,
and seemed to her to wink with one of its
little eyes, but it said nothing.
“Perhaps it doesn’t understand English,”
thought Alice; “I daresay it ’s a French mouse,
come over with William the Conqueror.” (For,
with all her knowledge of history, Alice had no
very clear notion how long ago anything had
happened.) So she began again : “Ou est ma
chatte ?” which was the first sentence in her
French lesson-book. The Mouse gave a sudden
leap out of the water, and seemed to quiver
all over with fright. “Oh, I beg your pardon !”
cried Alice hastily, afraid that she had hurt the
poor animal’s feelings. “ I quite forgot you didn’t
like cats.”
“Not like cats!” cried the Mouse, in a shrill,
passionate voice. “Would you like cats if you
were me?”
“Well, perhaps not,” said Alice in a soothing
tone : “don’t be angry about it. And yet
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I wish I could show you our cat Dinah : I
think you’d take a fancy to cats if you could
only see her. She is such a dear quiet thing,”
Alice went on, half to herself, as she swam lazily
about in the pool, “ and she sits purring so
nicely by the fire, licking her paws and washing
her face—and she is such a nice soft thing
to nurse—and she’s such a capital one for catching
mice——oh, I beg your pardon !” cried Alice
again, for this time the Mouse was bristling
all over, and she felt certain it must be really
offended. “We won’t talk about her any more
if you ’d rather not.”
“We, indeed !” cried the Mouse, who was
trembling down to the end of his tail. “As if I
would talk on such a subject! Our family always
hated cats : nasty, low, vulgar things ! Don’t
let me hear the name again !”
“ I won’t indeed !” said Alice, in a great
hurry to change the subject of conversation.
“ Are you—are you fond—of—of dogs ?” The
mouse did not answer, so Alice went on eagerly:
“There is such a nice little dog near our house
I should like to show you ! A little brighteyed
terrier, you know, with oh ! such long
curly brown hair! And it ’ll fetch things when
you throw them, and it’ll sit up and beg for
its dinner, and all sorts of things—I can’t remember
half of them—and it belongs to a
farmer, you know, and he says it’s so useful,
it’s worth a hundred pounds! He says it kills
all the rats and—oh dear !” cried Alice in a
sorrowful tone. “ I ’m afraid I ’ve offended it
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THE POOL OF TEARS.
CHAPTER III.
A CAUCUS-RACE AND A LONG TALE.
THEY were indeed a queer-looking party that
assembled on the bank—the birds with draggled
feathers, the animals with their fur clinging close
to them, and all dripping wet, cross, and uncomfortable.
The first question of course was, how to get
dry again: they had a consultation about this,
again !” For the Mouse was swimming away
from her as hard as it could go, and making
quite a commotion in the pool as it went.
So she called softly after it: “Mouse dear!
Do come back again, and we won’t talk about
cats or dogs either, if you don’t like them !”
When the Mouse heard this, it turned round
and swam slowly back to her : its face was
quite pale (with passion, Alice thought), and
it said in a low, trembling voice, “Let us get
to the shore, and then I ’ll tell you my history,
and you ’ll understand why it is I hate cats
and dogs.”
It was high time to go, for the pool was
getting quite crowded with the birds and animals
that had fallen into it: there was a Duck
and a Dodo, a Lory and an Eaglet, and several
other curious creatures. Alice led the way,
and the whole party swam to the shore. 
30 A CAUCUS-RACE AND A LONG TALE. 31
favoured by the pope, was soon submitted to
by the English, who wanted leaders, and had
been of late much accustomed to usurpation and
conquest. Edwin and Morcar, the earls of
Mercia and Northumbria—’ ”
“Ugh !” said the Lory, with a shiver.
“ I beg your pardon ?” said the Mouse,
frowning, but very politely : “Did you speak ?”
“Not I !” said the Lory, hastily.
“ I thought you did,” said the Mouse.—“ I
proceed. ‘ Edwin and Morcar, the earls of
Mercia and Northumbria, declared for him ;
and even Stigand, the patriotic archbishop of
Canterbury, found it advisable—”
“Found what?” said the Duck.
“Found it,” the Mouse replied rather crossly:
“of course you know what ‘it’ means.”
“I know what ‘it’ means well enough, when
I find a thing,” said the Duck : “it’s generally
a frog or a worm. The question is, what did
the archbishop find?”
The Mouse did not notice this question, but
and after a few minutes it seemed quite natural
to Alice to find herself talking familiarly with
them, as if she had known them all her life.
Indeed, she had quite a long argument with
the Lory, who at last turned sulky, and would
only say, “ I am older than you, and must know
better;” and this Alice would not allow, without
knowing how old it was, and, as the Lory
positively refused to tell its age, there was no
more to be said.
At last the Mouse, who seemed to be a
person of some authority among them, called
out, “Sit down, all of you, and listen to me!
I’ll soon make you dry enough !” They all sat
down at once, in a large ring, with the Mouse
in the middle. Alice kept her eyes anxiously
fixed on it, for she felt sure she would catch a
bad cold if she did not get dry very soon.
“Ahem!” said the Mouse with an important
air, “are you all ready ? This is the driest thing
I know. Silence all round, if you please !
‘William the Conqueror, whose cause was
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32 A CAUCUS-RACE AND A LONG TALE. 33
had paused as if it thought that somebody ought
to speak, and no one else seemed inclined to
say anything.
“Why,” said the Dodo, “ the best way to
explain it is to do it.” (And as you might like
to try the thing yourself, some winter day, I
will tell you how the Dodo managed it.)
First it marked out a race-course, in a sort
of circle, (“the exact shape doesn ’t matter,” it
said,) and then all the party were placed along
the course, here and there. There was no “One,
two, three, and away,” but they began running
when they liked, and left off when they liked, so
that it was not easy to know when the race was
over. However, when they had been running halfan-hour
or so, and were quite dry again, the Dodo
suddenly called out, “The race is over!” and they
all crowded round it, panting, and asking, “But
who has won ?”
This question the Dodo could not answer
without a great deal of thought, and it sat for
a long time with one finger pressed upon its
hurriedly went on, “ ‘—found it advisable to go
with Edgar Atheling to meet William and offer
him the crown. William’s conduct at first was
moderate. But the insolence of his Normans—’
How are you getting on now, my dear?” it continued,
turning to Alice as it spoke.
“As wet as ever,” said Alice in a melancholy
tone: “it doesn ’t seem to dry me at all.”
“ In that case,” said the Dodo solemnly,
rising to its feet, “ I move that the meeting
adjourn, for the immediate adoption of more
energetic remedies—”
“Speak English!” said the Eaglet. “I don ’t
know the meaning of half those long words,
and, what’s more, I don’t believe you do either!”
And the Eaglet bent down its head to hide a
smile: some of the other birds tittered audibly.
“What I was going to say,” said the Dodo
in an offended tone, “was, that the best thing
to get us dry would be a Caucus-race.”
“What is a Caucus-race ?” said Alice ; not
that she much wanted to know, but the Dodo
D
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34 A CAUCUS-RACE AND A LONG TALE. 35
forehead, (the position in which you usually
see Shakespeare, in the pictures of him,) while
the rest waited in silence. At last the Dodo said,
“Everybody has won, and all must have prizes.”
“ But who is to give the prizes ?” quite a
chorus of voices asked.
“Why, she, of course,” said the Dodo, pointing
to Alice with one finger ; and the whole
party at once crowded round her, calling out in
a confused way, “Prizes! Prizes !”
Alice had no idea what to do, and in despair
she put her hand in her pocket, and pulled
out a box of comfits, (luckily the salt water had
not got into it,) and handed them round as prizes.
There was exactly one a-piece, all round.
“ But she must have a prize herself, you
know,” said the Mouse.
“Of course,” the Dodo replied very gravely.
“What else have you got in your pocket?” he
went on, turning to Alice.
“Only a thimble,” said Alice sadly.
“Hand it over here,” said the Dodo.
Then they all crowded round her once more,
while the Dodo solemnly presented the thimble,
saying, “We beg your acceptance of this elegant
thimble;” and, when it had finished this short
speech, they all cheered.
D 2
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36 A CAUCUS-RACE AND A LONG TALE. 37
so that her idea of the tale was something like
this:——“Fury said to
a mouse, That
he met
in the
house,
‘Let us
both go
to law :
I will
prosecute
you.—
Come, I ’ll
take no
denial ;
We must
have a
trial :
For
really
this
morning
I ’ve
nothing
to do.’ Said the
mouse to
the cur,
‘ Such a
trial,
dear sir,
With no jury or
judge,
would be wasting our breath.’ ‘I ’ll be
judge,
I ’ll be
jury,’
Said
cunning
old Fury;
‘I ’ll try
the whole
cause,
and
condemn
you
to
death.’”
Alice thought the whole thing very absurd,
but they all looked so grave that she did not
dare to laugh, and as she could not think of
anything to say, she simply bowed, and took the
thimble, looking as solemn as she could.
The next thing was to eat the comfits: this
caused some noise and confusion, as the large
birds complained that they could not taste theirs,
and the small ones choked and had to be patted
on the back. However it was over at last, and
they sat down again in a ring, and begged the
Mouse to tell them something more.
“You promised to tell me your history, you
know,” said Alice, “ and why it is you hate—C
and D,” she added in a whisper, half afraid that
it would be offended again.
“Mine is a long and a sad tale!” said the
Mouse, turning to Alice, and sighing.
“ It is a long tail, certainly,” said Alice,
looking down with wonder at the Mouse’s tail ;
“but why do you call it sad ?” And she kept on
puzzling about it while the Mouse was speaking,
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38 A CAUCUS-RACE AND A LONG TALE. 39
and an old crab took the opportunity of saying
to her daughter, “ Ah, my dear ! Let this be
a lesson to you never to lose your temper !”
“Hold your tongue, Ma!” said the young crab,
a little snappishly. “ You ’re enough to try
the patience of an oyster !”
“ I wish I had our Dinah here, I know I
do !” said Alice aloud, addressing nobody in
particular. “She’d soon fetch it back !”
“And who is Dinah, if I might venture to
ask the question ?” said the Lory.
Alice replied eagerly, for she was always
ready to talk about her pet. “ Dinah ’s our
cat. And she’s such a capital one for catching
mice you can ’t think ! And oh, I wish you
could see her after the birds! Why, she ’ll eat
a little bird as soon as look at it !”
This speech caused a remarkable sensation
among the party. Some of the birds hurried
off at once : one old magpie began wrapping
itself up very carefully, remarking, “ I really
must be getting home ; the night-air doesn ’t
“ You are not attending !” said the Mouse
to Alice, severely. “What are you thinking of?”
“I beg your pardon,” said Alice very humbly:
“you had got to the fifth bend, I think ?”
“ I had not !” cried the Mouse, sharply and
very angrily.
“A knot!” said Alice, always ready to make
herself useful, and looking anxiously about her.
“Oh, do let me help to undo it !”
“ I shall do nothing of the sort,” said the
Mouse, getting up and walking away. “You
insult me by talking such nonsense !”
“ I didn ’t mean it !” pleaded poor Alice.
“But you ’re so easily offended, you know !”
The Mouse only growled in reply.
“Please come back, and finish your story!”
Alice called after it; and the others all joined
in chorus, “ Yes, please do !” but the Mouse
only shook its head impatiently, and walked a
little quicker.
“What a pity it wouldn ’t stay !” sighed
the Lory, as soon as it was quite out of sight ;
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A CAUCUS-RACE AND A LONG TALE.
CHAPTER IV.
THE RABBIT SENDS IN A LITTLE BILL.
IT was the White Rabbit, trotting slowly
back again, and looking anxiously about as it
went, as if it had lost something ; and she heard
it muttering to itself, “The Duchess ! The
Duchess! Oh my dear paws! Oh my fur and
whiskers ! She ’ll get me executed, as sure as
ferrets are ferrets! Where can I have dropped
them, I wonder!” Alice guessed in a moment
that it was looking for the fan and the pair
of white kid gloves, and she very goodnaturedly
began hunting about for them, but they were
nowhere to be seen—everything seemed to have
suit my throat!” and a canary called out in a
trembling voice to its children, “Come away, my
dears! It’s high time you were all in bed !” On
various pretexts they all moved off, and Alice
was soon left alone.
“ I wish I hadn ’t mentioned Dinah !” she
said to herself in a melancholy tone. “Nobody
seems to like her, down here, and I ’m sure she’s
the best cat in the world! Oh, my dear Dinah!
I wonder if I shall ever see you any more!”
And here poor Alice began to cry again, for she
felt very lonely and low-spirited. In a little
while, however, she again heard a little pattering
of footsteps in the distance, and she looked
up eagerly, half hoping that the Mouse had
changed his mind, and was coming back to
finish his story.
42 THE RABBIT SENDS IN A LITTLE BILL. 43
turned out of the house before she had found the
fan and gloves.
“How queer it seems,” Alice said to herself,
“to be going messages for a rabbit ! I suppose
Dinah ’ll be sending me on messages next !”
And she began fancying the sort of thing that
would happen : “ ‘Miss Alice ! Come here directly,
and get ready for your walk !’ ‘Coming
in a minute, nurse ! But I ’ve got to watch
this mousehole till Dinah comes back, and see
that the mouse doesn’t get out.’ Only I don’t
think,” Alice went on, “ that they’d let Dinah
stop in the house if it began ordering people
about like that !”
By this time she had found her way into
a tidy little room with a table in the window,
and on it (as she had hoped) a fan and two or
three pairs of tiny white kid gloves: she took
up the fan and a pair of the gloves, and was
just going to leave the room, when her eye fell
upon a little bottle that stood near the lookingglass.
There was no label this time with the
changed since her swim in the pool, and the
great hall, with the glass table and the little
door, had vanished completely.
Very soon the Rabbit noticed Alice, as she
went hunting about, and called out to her in
an angry tone, “Why, Mary Ann, what are you
doing out here? Run home this moment, and
fetch me a pair of gloves and a fan! Quick,
now!” And Alice was so much frightened that
she ran off at once in the direction it pointed
to, without trying to explain the mistake that
it had made.
“He took me for his housemaid,” she said to
herself as she ran. “ How surprised he ’ll be
when he finds out who I am! But I’d better
take him his fan and gloves—that is, if I can
find them.” As she said this, she came upon a
neat little house, on the door of which was a
bright brass plate with the name “W. RABBIT,”
engraved upon it. She went in without knocking,
and hurried upstairs, in great fear lest
she should meet the real Mary Ann, and be
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44 THE RABBIT SENDS IN A LITTLE BILL. 45
words “DRINK ME,” but nevertheless she uncorked
it and put it to her lips. “ I know
something interesting is sure to happen,” she
said to herself, “whenever I eat or drink anything
; so I ’ll just see what this bottle does.
I do hope it’ll make me grow large again, for
really I ’m quite tired of being such a tiny
little thing !”
It did so indeed, and much sooner than she
had expected : before she had drunk half the
bottle, she found her head pressing against the
ceiling, and had to stoop to save her neck from
being broken. She hastily put down the bottle,
saying to herself, “That ’s quite enough—I hope
I shan’t grow any more—As it is, I can’t get
out at the door—I do wish I hadn ’t drunk
quite so much !”
Alas ! It was too late to wish that ! She
went on growing and growing, and very soon
had to kneel down on the floor : in another
minute there was not even room for this, and
she tried the effect of lying down with one
elbow against the door, and the other arm
curled round her head. Still she went on growing,
and, as a last resource, she put one arm
out of the window, and one foot up the chimney,
and said to herself, “Now I can do no more,
whatever happens. What will become of me ?”
Luckily for Alice, the little magic bottle had
now had its full effect, and she grew no larger:
still it was very uncomfortable, and, as there
seemed to be no sort of chance of her ever
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46 THE RABBIT SENDS IN A LITTLE BILL. 47
“Oh, you foolish Alice!” she answered herself.
“How can you learn lessons in here ? Why,
there’s hardly room for you, and no room at all
for any lesson-books !”
And so she went on, taking first one side and
then the other, and making quite a conversation
of it altogether, but after a few minutes she
heard a voice outside, and stopped to listen.
“ Mary Ann ! Mary Ann !” said the voice,
“fetch me my gloves this moment !” Then came
a little pattering of feet on the stairs. Alice
knew it was the Rabbit coming to look for her,
and she trembled till she shook the house, quite
forgetting that she was now about a thousand
times as large as the Rabbit, and had no reason
to be afraid of it.
Presently the Rabbit came up to the door,
and tried to open it, but as the door opened
inwards, and Alice’s elbow was pressed hard
against it, that attempt proved a failure. Alice
heard it say to itself, “Then I’ll go round and
get in at the window.”
getting out of the room again, no wonder she
felt unhappy.
“It was much pleasanter at home,” thought
poor Alice, “when one wasn ’t always growing
larger and smaller, and being ordered about by
mice and rabbits. I almost wish I hadn ’t gone
down that rabbit-hole—and yet—and yet—it ’s
rather curious, you know, this sort of life! I
do wonder what can have happened to me !
When I used to read fairy-tales, I fancied that
kind of thing never happened, and now here I
am in the middle of one ! There ought to be
a book written about me, that there ought !
And when I grow up, I’ll write one—but I’m
grown up now,” she added in a sorrowful tone,
“at least there’s no room to grow up any more
here.”
“ But then,” thought Alice, “ shall I never
get any older than I am now ? That ’ll be a
comfort, one way—never to be an old woman—
but then—always to have lessons to learn ! Oh,
I shouldn ’t like that!”
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48 THE RABBIT SENDS IN A LITTLE BILL. 49
out of this!” (Sounds of more broken glass.)
“Now tell me, Pat, what’s that in the window?”
“ Sure, it’s an arm, yer honour !” (He pronounced
it “ arrum.”)
“ An arm, you goose ! Who ever saw one
that size ? Why, it fills the whole window !”
“Sure, it does, yer honour : but it ’s an arm
for all that.”
“Well, it’s got no business there, at any rate:
go and take it away !”
There was a long silence after this, and Alice
could only hear whispers now and then, such
as, “Sure, I don’t like it, yer honour, at all, at
all !” “Do as I tell you, you coward!” and at
last she spread out her hand again and made
another snatch in the air. This time there were
two little shrieks, and more sounds of broken
glass. “What a number of cucumber frames
there must be !” thought Alice. “ I wonder
what they ’ll do next ! As for pulling me out
of the window, I only wish they could ! I ’m
sure I don’t want to stay in here any longer !”
“That you won’t!” thought Alice, and, after
waiting till she fancied she heard the Rabbit
just under the window, she suddenly spread
out her hand, and
made a snatch in the
air. She did not get
hold of anything, but
she heard a little
shriek and a fall,
and a crash of broken
glass, from which
she concluded that
it was just possible
it had fallen into a
cucumber-frame, or
something of the sort.
Next came an angry voice—the Rabbit’s—
“Pat ! Pat ! Where are you ?” And then a
voice she had never heard before, “Sure then
I’m here ! Digging for apples, yer honour !”
“ Digging for apples, indeed !” said the
Rabbit angrily. “ Here ! Come and help me
E
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50 THE RABBIT SENDS IN A LITTLE BILL. 51
She waited for some time without hearing
anything more : at last came a rumbling of
little cart-wheels, and the sound of a good many
voices all talking together : she made out the
words, “Where ’s the other ladder ?—Why, I
hadn’t to bring but one : Bill ’s got the other—
Bill ! fetch it here, lad !—Here, put ’em up at
this corner—No, tie ’em together first—they
don’t reach half high enough yet—Oh! they’ll
do well enough ; don ’t be particular—Here,
Bill ! catch hold of this rope—Will the roof
bear ?—Mind that loose slate—Oh, it ’s coming
down ! Heads below !” (a loud crash)—“Now,
who did that ?—It was Bill, I fancy—Who ’s
to go down the chimney ?—Nay, I shan ’t !
You do it !—That I won ’t then !—Bill ’s got
to go down—Here, Bill! the master says you ’ve
got to go down the chimney !”
“Oh, so Bill’s got to come down the chimney,
has he ?” said Alice to herself. “Why,
they seem to put everything upon Bill ! I
wouldn ’t be in Bill’s place for a good deal :
this fireplace is narrow,
to be sure, but I think
I can kick a little !”
She drew her foot as
far down the chimney as
she could, and waited till
she heard a little animal
(she couldn ’t guess of
what sort it was) scratching
and scrambling about
in the chimney close above
her : then, saying to herself,
“This is Bill,” she
gave one sharp kick, and
waited to see what would
happen next.
The first thing she
heard was a general
chorus of “There goes
Bill !” then the Rabbit’s
voice alone—“Catch him,
you by the hedge !” then
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52 THE RABBIT SENDS IN A LITTLE BILL. 53
a shower of little pebbles came rattling in at
the window, and some of them hit her in the
face. “ I’ll put a stop to this,” she said to herself
and shouted out, “ You ’d better not do that
again!” which produced another dead silence.
Alice noticed with some surprise that the
pebbles were all turning into little cakes as they
lay on the floor, and a bright idea came into
her head. “ If I eat one of these cakes,” she
thought, “ it’s sure to make some change in my
size; and as it can ’t possibly make me larger,
it must make me smaller, I suppose.”
So she swallowed one of the cakes, and was
delighted to find that she began shrinking
directly. As soon as she was small enough to
get through the door, she ran out of the house,
and found quite a crowd of little animals and
birds waiting outside. The poor little Lizard,
Bill, was in the middle, being held up by two
guinea-pigs, who were giving it something out
of a bottle. They all made a rush at Alice the
moment she appeared, but she ran off as hard
silence, and then another confusion of voices—
“Hold up his head—Brandy now—Don ’t choke
him—How was it, old fellow? What happened
to you ? Tell us all about it !”
Last came a little feeble squeaking voice,
(“That’s Bill,” thought Alice,) “Well, I hardly
know—No more, thank ’ye, I ’m better now—
but I ’m a deal too flustered to tell you—all
I know is, something comes at me like a Jackin-the-box,
and up I goes like a sky-rocket !”
“So you did, old fellow !” said the others.
“We must burn the house down !” said the
Rabbit’s voice, and Alice called out as loud as
she could, “If you do, I ’ll set Dinah at you !”
There was a dead silence instantly, and Alice
thought to herself, “ I wonder what they will
do next ! If they had any sense, they’d take
the roof off.” After a minute or two they
began moving about again, and Alice heard the
Rabbit say, “A barrowful will do, to begin with.”
“A barrowful of what?” thought Alice; but
she had not long to doubt, for the next moment
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54 THE RABBIT SENDS IN A LITTLE BILL. 55
as she could, and soon found herself safe in a
thick wood.
“The first thing I’ve got to do,” said Alice
to herself, as she wandered about in the wood,
“ is to grow to my right size again ; and the
second thing is to find my way into that lovely
garden. I think that will be the best plan.”
It sounded an excellent plan, no doubt, and
very neatly and simply arranged ; the only
difficulty was, that she had not the smallest
idea how to set about it ; and while she was
peering about anxiously among the trees, a
little sharp bark just over her head made her
look up in a great hurry.
An enormous puppy was looking down at
her with large round eyes, and feebly stretching
out one paw, trying to touch her. “Poor little
thing!” said Alice in a coaxing tone, and she
tried hard to whistle to it, but she was terribly
frightened all the time at the thought that it
might be hungry, in which case it would be very
likely to eat her up in spite of all her coaxing.
Hardly knowing what she did, she picked up
a little bit of stick, and held it out to the
puppy; whereupon the puppy jumped into the
air off all its feet at once, with a yelp of
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56 THE RABBIT SENDS IN A LITTLE BILL. 57
“And yet what a dear little puppy it was!”
said Alice, as she leant against a buttercup to
rest herself, and fanned herself with one of the
leaves, “ I should have liked teaching it tricks
very much, if—if I’d only been the right size
to do it! Oh dear! I’d nearly forgotten that
I’ve got to grow up again! Let me see—how
is it to be managed? I suppose I ought to eat
or drink something or other ; but the great
question is, what ?”
The great question certainly was, what ?
Alice looked all round her at the flowers and
the blades of grass, but she could not see anything
that looked like the right thing to eat
or drink under the circumstances. There was a
large mushroom growing near her, about the
same height as herself, and when she had looked
under it, and on both sides of it, and behind
it, it occurred to her that she might as well
look and see what was on the top of it.
She stretched herself up on tiptoe, and
peeped over the edge of the mushroom, and her
delight, and rushed at the stick, and made believe
to worry it; then Alice dodged behind a
great thistle, to keep herself from being run
over, and, the moment she appeared on the
other side, the puppy made another rush at the
stick, and tumbled head over heels in its hurry
to get hold of it; then Alice, thinking it was
very like having a game of play with a carthorse,
and expecting every moment to be trampled
under its feet, ran round the thistle again ;
then the puppy began a series of short charges
at the stick, running a very little way forwards
each time and a long way back, and barking
hoarsely all the while, till at last it sat down
a good way off, panting, with its tongue hanging
out of its mouth, and its great eyes half
shut.
This seemed to Alice a good opportunity for
making her escape, so she set off at once, and
ran till she was quite tired and out of breath,
and till the puppy’s bark sounded quite faint
in the distance.
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THE RABBIT SENDS IN A LITTLE BILL.
CHAPTER V.
ADVICE FROM A CATERPILLAR.
THE Caterpillar and Alice looked at each
other for some time in silence : at last the
Caterpillar took the hookah out of its mouth,
eyes immediately met those of a large blue
caterpillar, that was sitting on the top with its
arms folded, quietly smoking a long hookah, and
taking not the smallest notice of her or of anything
else.
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60 ADVICE FROM A CATERPILLAR. 61
you’ll feel it a little queer, won’t you ?”
“Not a bit,” said the Caterpillar.
“Well, perhaps your feelings may be different,”
said Alice; “all I know is, it would feel
very queer to me.”
“You !” said the Caterpillar contemptuously.
“Who are you ?”
Which brought them back again to the beginning
of the conversation. Alice felt a little
irritated at the Caterpillar’s making such very
short remarks, and she drew herself up and
said, very gravely, “I think, you ought to tell
me who you are, first.”
“Why?” said the Caterpillar.
Here was another puzzling question ; and, as
Alice could not think of any good reason, and
as the Caterpillar seemed to be in a very unpleasant
state of mind, she turned away.
“ Come back !” the Caterpillar called after
her. “I’ve something important to say !”
This sounded promising, certainly : Alice
turned and came back again.
and addressed her in a languid, sleepy voice.
“Who are you ?” said the Caterpillar.
This was not an encouraging opening for a
conversation. Alice replied, rather shyly, “ I—I
hardly know, sir, just at present—at least I
know who I was when I got up this morning,
but I think I must have been changed several
times since then.”
“What do you mean by that ?” said the
Caterpillar sternly. “Explain yourself !”
“ I can’t explain myself, I’m afraid, sir,”
said Alice, “because I’m not myself, you see.”
“I don ’t see,” said the Caterpillar.
“ I’m afraid I can’t put it more clearly,”
Alice replied very politely, “for I can ’t understand
it myself to begin with ; and being so
many different sizes in a day is very confusing.”
“It isn ’t,” said the Caterpillar.
“Well, perhaps you haven’t found it so yet,”
said Alice; “but when you have to turn into a
chrysalis—you will some day, you know—and
then after that into a butterfly, I should think
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62 ADVICE FROM A CATERPILLAR. 63
“Keep your temper,” said the Caterpillar.
“ Is that all ?” said Alice, swallowing down
her anger as well as she could.
“No,” said the Caterpillar.
Alice thought she might as well wait, as
she had nothing else to do, and perhaps after
all it might tell her something worth hearing.
For some minutes it puffed away without speaking,
but at last it unfolded its arms, took the
hookah out of its mouth again, and said, “So
you think you’re changed, do you ?”
“I’m afraid I am, sir,” said Alice; “I can’t
remember things as I used—and I don’t keep
the same size for ten minutes together !”
“ Can’t remember what things ?” said the
Caterpillar.
“Well, I’ve tried to say ‘How doth the
little busy bee,’ but it all came different !”
Alice replied in a very melancholy voice.
“ Repeat ‘You are old, Father William,’ ”
said the Caterpillar.
Alice folded her hands, and began :—
“You are old, father William,” the young man said,
“And your hair has become very white;
And yet you incessantly stand on your head—
Do you think, at your age, it is right ?”
“ In my youth,” father William replied to his son,
“ I feared it might injure the brain;
But now that I’m perfectly sure I have none,
Why, I do it again and again.”
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64 ADVICE FROM A CATERPILLAR. 65
“You are old,” said the youth, “and your jaws are too weak
For anything tougher than suet;
Yet you finished the goose, with the bones and the beak—
Pray, how did you manage to do it ?”
“ In my youth,” said his father, “ I took to the law,
And argued each case with my wife;
And the muscular strength, which it gave to my jaw,
Has lasted the rest of my life.”
“You are old,” said the youth, “as I mentioned before,
And have grown most uncommonly fat ;
Yet you turned a back-somersault in at the door—
Pray, what is the reason of that ?”
“ In my youth,” said the sage, as he shook his grey locks,
“ I kept all my limbs very supple
By the use of this ointment—one shilling the box—
Allow me to sell you a couple.”
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“That is not said right,” said the Caterpillar.
“ Not quite right, I’m afraid,” said Alice
timidly; “some of the words have got altered.”
“ It is wrong from beginning to end,” said
the Caterpillar decidedly, and there was silence
for some minutes.
The Caterpillar was the first to speak.
“What size do you want to be ?” it asked.
“ Oh, I’m not particular as to size,” Alice
hastily replied; “only one doesn’t like changing
so often, you know.”
“I don’t know,” said the Caterpillar.
Alice said nothing : she had never been so
much contradicted in her life before, and she
felt that she was losing her temper.
“Are you content now?” said the Caterpillar.
“Well, I should like to be a little larger, sir,
if you wouldn’t mind,” said Alice : “ three inches
is such a wretched height to be.”
“It is a very good height indeed !” said the
Caterpillar angrily, rearing itself upright as it
spoke (it was exactly three inches high).
“You are old,” said the youth ; “ one would hardly suppose
That your eye was as steady as ever ;
Yet you balanced an eel on the end of your nose—
What made you so awfully clever ?”
“ I have answered three questions, and that is enough,”
Said his father; “ don’t give yourself airs !
Do you think I can listen all day to such stuff?
Be off, or I’ll kick you down stairs !”
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68 ADVICE FROM A CATERPILLAR. 69
which were the two sides of it ; and, as it was
perfectly round, she found this a very difficult
question. However, at last she stretched her
arms round it as far as they would go, and
broke off a bit of the edge with each hand.
“And now which is which ?” she said to herself,
and nibbled a little of the right-hand bit to
try the effect : the next moment she felt a violent
blow underneath her chin : it had struck
her foot!
She was a good deal frightened by this very
sudden change, but she felt that there was no
time to be lost, as she was shrinking rapidly ;
so she set to work at once to eat some of the
other bit. Her chin was pressed so closely
against her foot, that there was hardly room to
open her mouth ; but she did it at last, and
managed to swallow a morsel of the left-hand
bit.
* * * * *
* * * *
* * * * *
“ But I’m not used to it !” pleaded poor
Alice in a piteous tone. And she thought to
herself, “ I wish the creatures wouldn’t be so
easily offended !”
“ You ’ll get used to it in time,” said the
Caterpillar ; and it put the hookah into its
mouth and began smoking again.
This time Alice waited patiently until it
chose to speak again. In a minute or two the
Caterpillar took the hookah out of its mouth,
and yawned once or twice, and shook itself.
Then it got down off the mushroom, and crawled
away into the grass, merely remarking as it
went, “ One side will make you grow taller,
and the other side will make you grow shorter.”
“ One side of what ? The other side of
what?” thought Alice to herself.
“ Of the mushroom,” said the Caterpillar,
just as if she had asked it aloud ; and in
another moment it was out of sight.
Alice remained looking thoughtfully at the
mushroom for a minute, trying to make out
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70 ADVICE FROM A CATERPILLAR. 71
trees under which she had been wandering,
when a sharp hiss made her draw back in a
hurry: a large pigeon had flown into her face,
and was beating her violently with its wings.
“Serpent!” screamed the Pigeon.
“I’m not a serpent!” said Alice indignantly.
“Let me alone !”
“Serpent, I say again !” repeated the Pigeon,
but in a more subdued tone, and added with
a kind of sob, “ I’ve tried every way, and
nothing seems to suit them !”
“I haven ’t the least idea what you’re talking
about,” said Alice.
“I’ve tried the roots of trees, and I’ve tried
banks, and I’ve tried hedges,” the Pigeon went
on, without attending to her ; “ but those
serpents! There’s no pleasing them !”
Alice was more and more puzzled, but she
thought there was no use in saying anything
more till the Pigeon had finished.
“ As if it wasn’t trouble enough hatching
the eggs,” said the Pigeon; “but I must be on
“Come, my head’s free at last!” said Alice in
a tone of delight, which changed into alarm in
another moment, when she found that her
shoulders were nowhere to be found : all she
could see, when she looked down, was an immense
length of neck, which seemed to rise
like a stalk out of a sea of green leaves that
lay far below her.
“What can all that green stuff be ?” said
Alice. “And where have my shoulders got to?
And oh, my poor hands, how is it I can’t see
you ?” She was moving them about as she
spoke, but no result seemed to follow, except a
little shaking among the distant green leaves.
As there seemed to be no chance of getting
her hands up to her head, she tried to get her
head down to them, and was delighted to find
that her neck would bend about easily in any
direction, like a serpent. She had just succeeded
in curving it down into a graceful zigzag, and
was going to dive in among the leaves, which
she found to be nothing but the tops of the
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72 ADVICE FROM A CATERPILLAR. 73
serpent; and there ’s no use denying it. I suppose
you’ll be telling me next that you never
tasted an egg !”
“ I have tasted eggs, certainly,” said Alice,
who was a very truthful child ; “but little girls
eat eggs quite as much as serpents do, you
know.”
“I don’t believe it,” said the Pigeon; “but if
they do, why then they’re a kind of serpent,
that’s all I can say.”
This was such a new idea to Alice, that
she was quite silent for a minute or two, which
gave the Pigeon the opportunity of adding,
“ You ’re looking for eggs, I know that well
enough ; and what does it matter to me
whether you ’re a little girl or a serpent ?”
“It matters a good deal to me,” said Alice
hastily ; “ but I ’m not looking for eggs, as it
happens; and if I was, I shouldn ’t want yours :
I don’t like them raw.”
“Well, be off, then !” said the Pigeon in a
sulky tone, as it settled down again into its
the look-out for serpents night and day! Why,
I haven ’t had a wink of sleep these three
weeks!”
“I’m very sorry you’ve been annoyed,” said
Alice, who was beginning to see its meaning.
“And just as I’d taken the highest tree in
the wood,” continued the Pigeon, raising its
voice to a shriek, “and just as I was thinking
I should be free of them at last, they must
needs come wriggling down from the sky !
Ugh! Serpent!”
“ But I ’m not a serpent, I tell you !” said
Alice. “I ’m a—— I ’m a——”
“Well ! What are you ?” said the Pigeon.
“I can see you ’re trying to invent something !”
“ I—I ’m a little girl,” said Alice, rather
doubtfully, as she remembered the number of
changes she had gone through that day.
“A likely story indeed !” said the Pigeon in
a tone of the deepest contempt. “ I ’ve seen a
good many little girls in my time, but never one
with such a neck as that ! No, no! You ’re a
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74 ADVICE FROM A CATERPILLAR. 75
nest. Alice crouched down among the trees as
well as she could, for her neck kept getting
entangled among the branches, and every now
and then she had to stop and untwist it.
After a while she remembered that she still
held the pieces of mushroom in her hands, and
she set to work very carefully, nibbling first at
one and then at the other, and growing sometimes
taller and sometimes shorter, until she
had succeeded in bringing herself down to her
usual height.
It was so long since she had been anything
near the right size, that it felt quite strange
at first, but she got used to it in a few
minutes, and began talking to herself as usual.
“Come, there ’s half my plan done now! How
puzzling all these changes are ! I’m never sure
what I ’m going to be, from one minute to
another! However, I’ve got back to my right
size: the next thing is, to get into that beautiful
garden—how is that to be done, I wonder?”
As she said this, she came suddenly upon
an open place, with a little house in it about
four feet high. “Whoever lives there,” thought
Alice, “it’ll never do to come upon them this
size: why, I should frighten them out of their
wits!” So she began nibbling at the right-hand
bit again, and did not venture to go near the
house till she had brought herself down to nine
inches high.
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PIG AND PEPPER. 77
to know what it was all about, and crept a
little way out of the wood to listen.
The Fish-Footman began by producing from
under his arm a great letter, nearly as large
as himself, and this he handed over to the
other, saying in a solemn tone, “For the
Duchess. An invitation from the Queen to play
CHAPTER VI.
PIG AND PEPPER.
FOR a minute or two she stood looking at
the house, and wondering what to do next,
when suddenly a footman in livery came running
out of the wood—(she considered him to
be a footman because he was in livery: otherwise,
judging by his face only, she would
have called him a fish)—and rapped loudly at
the door with his knuckles. It was opened by
another footman in livery, with a round face
and large eyes like a frog ; and both footmen,
Alice noticed, had powdered hair that curled
all over their heads. She felt very curious
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78 PIG AND PEPPER. PIG AND PEPPER. 79
crash, as if a dish or kettle had been broken to
pieces.
“Please, then,” said Alice, “ how am I to
get in ?”
“There might be some sense in your knocking,”
the Footman went on without attending
to her, “if we had the door between us. For
instance, if you were inside, you might knock,
and I could let you out, you know.” He was
looking up into the sky all the time he was
speaking, and this Alice thought decidedly
uncivil. “ But perhaps he can’t help it,” she
said to herself ; “ his eyes are so very nearly
at the top of his head. But at any rate he
might answer questions—How am I to get
in?” she repeated, aloud.
“ I shall sit here,” the Footman remarked,
“till to-morrow——”
At this moment the door of the house
opened, and a large plate came skimming out,
straight at the Footman’s head: it just grazed
his nose, and broke to pieces against one of
croquet.” The Frog-Footman repeated, in the
same solemn tone, only changing the order of
the words a little, “From the Queen. An invitation
for the Duchess to play croquet.”
Then they both bowed low, and their curls
got entangled together.
Alice laughed so much at this that she had
to run back into the wood for fear of their
hearing her, and when she next peeped out the
Fish-Footman was gone, and the other was sitting
on the ground near the door, staring stupidly
up into the sky.
Alice went timidly up to the door, and
knocked.
“There ’s no sort of use in knocking,” said
the Footman, “ and that for two reasons. First,
because I ’m on the same side of the door as
you are; secondly, because they’re making such a
noise inside, no one could possibly hear you.”
And certainly there was a most extraordinary
noise going on within—a constant howling
and sneezing, and every now and then a great
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80 PIG AND PEPPER. PIG AND PEPPER. 81
the trees behind him.
“——or next day, maybe,” the Footman continued
in the same tone, exactly as if nothing
had happened.
“How am I to get in?” asked Alice again in
a louder tone.
“Are you to get in at all ?” said the Footman.
“That’s the first question, you know.”
It was, no doubt: only Alice did not like to
be told so. “It’s really dreadful,” she muttered
to herself, “ the way all the creatures argue.
It’s enough to drive one crazy !”
The Footman seemed to think this a good
opportunity for repeating his remark, with
variations. “ I shall sit here,” he said, “on and
off, for days and days.”
“But what am I to do?” said Alice.
“Anything you like,” said the Footman, and
began whistling.
“Oh, there’s no use in talking to him,” said
Alice desperately : “he’s perfectly idiotic !” And
she opened the door and went in.
The door led right into a large kitchen,
which was full of smoke from one end to the
other : the Duchess was sitting on a threelegged
stool in the middle, nursing a baby ; the
cook was leaning over the fire, stirring a large
cauldron which seemed to be full of soup.
“There’s certainly too much pepper in that
soup !” Alice said to herself, as well as she
could for sneezing.
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“They all can,” said the Duchess ; “ and
most of ’em do.”
“I don’t know of any that do,” Alice said
very politely, feeling quite pleased to have got
into a conversation.
“You don’t know much,” said the Duchess ;
“and that’s a fact.”
Alice did not at all like the tone of this
remark, and thought it would be as well to
introduce some other subject of conversation.
While she was trying to fix on one, the cook
took the cauldron of soup off the fire, and at
once set to work throwing everything within
her reach at the Duchess and the baby—the
fire-irons came first ; then followed a shower
of saucepans, plates, and dishes. The Duchess
took no notice of them even when they hit her;
and the baby was howling so much already, that
it was quite impossible to say whether the
blows hurt it or not.
“Oh, please mind what you ’re doing !” cried
Alice, jumping up and down in an agony of
There was certainly too much of it in the
air. Even the Duchess sneezed occasionally ;
and as for the baby, it was sneezing and howling
alternately without a moment’s pause. The
only two creatures in the kitchen that did not
sneeze, were the cook, and a large cat which was
sitting on the hearth and grinning from ear to
ear.
“Please, would you tell me,” said Alice, a
little timidly, for she was not quite sure
whether it was good manners for her to speak
first, “why your cat grins like that ?”
“ It ’s a Cheshire cat,” said the Duchess,
“and that’s why. Pig !”
She said the last word with such sudden
violence that Alice quite jumped; but she saw
in another moment that it was addressed to
the baby, and not to her, so she took courage,
and went on again :—
“ I didn’t know that Cheshire cats always
grinned; in fact, I didn’t know that cats could
grin.”
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84 PIG AND PEPPER. PIG AND PEPPER. 85
terror. “Oh, there goes his precious nose !” as
an unusually large saucepan flew close by it,
and very nearly carried it off.
“ If everybody minded their own business,”
said the Duchess in a hoarse growl, “the world
would go round a deal faster than it does.”
“Which would not be an advantage,” said
Alice, who felt very glad to get an opportunity
of showing off a little of her knowledge. “Just
think of what work it would make with the day
and night ! You see the earth takes twenty-four
hours to turn round on its axis——”
“Talking of axes,” said the Duchess, “ chop
off her head !”
Alice glanced rather anxiously at the cook,
to see if she meant to take the hint; but the
cook was busily stirring the soup, and seemed not
to be listening, so she went on again : “Twentyfour
hours, I think; or is it twelve ? I——”
“Oh, don’t bother me,” said the Duchess ; “I
never could abide figures.” And with that she
began nursing her child again, singing a sort of
lullaby to it as she did so, and giving it a violent
shake at the end of every line :—
“Speak roughly to your little boy,
And beat him when he sneezes;
He only does it to annoy,
Because he knows it teases.”
CHORUS
(in which the cook and the baby joined) :—
“Wow! wow! wow !”
While the Duchess sang the second verse of
the song, she kept tossing the baby violently up
and down, and the poor little thing howled so,
that Alice could hardly hear the words :—
“ I speak severely to my boy,
I beat him when he sneezes ;
For he can thoroughly enjoy
The pepper when he pleases!”
CHORUS
“Wow! wow! wow !”
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86 PIG AND PEPPER. PIG AND PEPPER. 87
or two : wouldn’t it be murder to leave it
behind?” She said the last words out loud, and
the little thing grunted in reply (it had left off
sneezing by this time). “ Don’t grunt,” said
Alice : “ that ’s not at all a proper way of
expressing yourself.”
The baby grunted again, and Alice looked
very anxiously into its face to see what was the
matter with it. There could be no doubt that
it had a very turn-up nose, much more like a
snout than a real nose ; also its eyes were
getting extremely small, for a baby : altogether
Alice did not like the look of the thing at all,
“ —but perhaps it was only sobbing,” she
thought, and looked into its eyes again, to see
if there were any tears.
No, there were no tears. “ If you’re going to
turn into a pig, my dear,” said Alice, seriously,
“I’ll have nothing more to do with you. Mind
now !” The poor little thing sobbed again, (or
grunted, it was impossible to say which,) and
they went on for some while in silence.
“Here! you may nurse it a bit, if you like !”
said the Duchess to Alice, flinging the baby at
her as she spoke. “I must go and get ready to
play croquet with the Queen,” and she hurried
out of the room. The cook threw a fryingpan
after her as she went, but it just missed her.
Alice caught the baby with some difficulty,
as it was a queer-shaped little creature, and held
out its arms and legs in all directions, “just like
a star-fish,” thought Alice. The poor little thing
was snorting like a steam-engine when she
caught it, and kept doubling itself up and
straightening itself out again, so that altogether,
for the first minute or two, it was as much as
she could do to hold it.
As soon as she had made out the proper way
of nursing it, (which was to twist it up into a
sort of knot, and then keep tight hold of its
right ear and left foot, so as to prevent its
undoing itself,) she carried it out into the open
air. “ If I don’t take this child away with me,”
thought Alice, “ they’re sure to kill it in a day
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88 PIG AND PEPPER. PIG AND PEPPER. 89
might do very well as pigs, and was just saying
to herself, “if one only knew the right way
to change them——” when she was a little
startled by seeing the Cheshire Cat sitting on
a bough of a tree a few yards off.
The Cat only grinned when it saw Alice.
It looked goodnatured, she thought : still it
had very long claws and a great many teeth,
so she felt it ought to be treated with respect.
“Cheshire Puss,” she began, rather timidly,
as she did not at all know whether it would
like the name : however, it only grinned a little
wider. “ Come, it ’s pleased so far,” thought
Alice, and she went on, “Would you tell me,
please, which way I ought to walk from here ?”
“That depends a good deal on where you
want to get to,” said the Cat.
“I don ’t much care where——” said Alice.
“Then it doesn’t matter which way you
walk,” said the Cat.
“ ——so long as I get somewhere,” Alice
added as an explanation.
Alice was just beginning to think to herself,
“ Now, what am I to do with this creature
when I get it home ?” when it grunted again,
so violently, that she
looked down into its
face in some alarm.
This time there could
be no mistake about
it : it was neither
more nor less than
a pig, and she felt
that it would be
quite absurd for her
to carry it any further.
So she set the
little creature down, and felt quite relieved to
see it trot away quietly into the wood. “ If
it had grown up,” she said to herself, “it would
have made a dreadfully ugly child: but it makes
rather a handsome pig, I think.” And she began
thinking over other children she knew, who
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“Well, then,” the Cat
went on, “you see a dog
growls when it ’s angry,
and wags its tail when it ’s
pleased. Now I growl when
I’m pleased, and wag my
tail when I’m angry. Therefore
I ’m mad.”
“ I call it purring, not
growling,” said Alice.
“Call it what you like,”
said the Cat. “ Do you
“Oh, you ’re sure to do that,” said the Cat,
“if you only walk long enough.”
Alice felt that this could not be denied, so
she tried another question. “What sort of
people live about here ?”
“In that direction,” the Cat said, waving its
right paw round, “ lives a Hatter : and in that
direction,” waving the other paw, “lives a March
Hare. Visit either you like : they ’re both mad.”
“ But I don’t want to go among mad
people,” Alice remarked.
“ Oh, you can ’t help that,” said the Cat :
“we’re all mad here. I’m mad. You’re mad.”
“How do you know I ’m mad ?” said Alice.
“ You must be,” said the Cat, “ or you
wouldn’t have come here.”
Alice didn ’t think that proved it at all ;
however, she went on: “And how do you know
that you’re mad ?”
“To begin with,” said the Cat, “ a dog ’s not
mad. You grant that ?”
“I suppose so,” said Alice.
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92 PIG AND PEPPER. PIG AND PEPPER. 93
play croquet with the Queen to day ?”
“ I should like it very much,” said Alice,
“but I haven’t been invited yet.”
“ You ’ll see me there,” said the Cat, and
vanished.
Alice was not much surprised at this, she
was getting so used to queer things happening.
While she was looking at the place
where it had been, it suddenly appeared again.
“ By-the-bye, what became of the baby ?”
said the Cat. “I ’d nearly forgotten to ask.”
“It turned into a pig,” Alice answered very
quietly, just as if the Cat had come back in a
natural way.
“ I thought it would,” said the Cat, and
vanished again.
Alice waited a little, half expecting to see it
again, but it did not appear, and after a minute
or two she walked on in the direction in which
the March Hare was said to live. “ I ’ve seen
hatters before,” she said to herself: ”the March
Hare will be much the most interesting, and
perhaps as this is May it won’t be raving mad—
at least not so mad as it was in March.” As
she said this, she looked up, and there was the
Cat again, sitting on a branch of a tree.
“Did you say pig, or fig ?” said the Cat.
“I said pig,” replied Alice; “ and I wish you
wouldn’t keep appearing and vanishing so suddenly:
you make one quite giddy.”
“All right,” said the Cat; and this time it
vanished quite slowly, beginning with the end of
the tail, and ending with the grin, which remained
some time after the rest of it had gone.
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94 PIG AND PEPPER.
CHAPTER VII.
A MAD TEA-PARTY.
THERE was a table set out under a tree in
front of the house, and the March Hare and the
Hatter were having tea at it: a Dormouse was
sitting between them, fast asleep, and the other
two were using it as a cushion, resting their
elbows on it, and talking over its head. “Very
uncomfortable for the Dormouse,” thought Alice;
“only, as it’s asleep, I suppose it doesn’t mind.”
The table was a large one, but the three
were all crowded together at one corner of it:
“ No room ! No room !” they cried out when
they saw Alice coming. “There ’s plenty of
“Well ! I’ve often seen a cat without a grin,”
thought Alice ; “ but a grin without a cat !
It’ s the most curious thing I ever saw in all
my life !”
She had not gone much farther before she
came in sight of the house of the March Hare:
she thought it must be the right house, because
the chimneys were shaped like ears and the roof
was thatched with fur. It was so large a house,
that she did not like to go nearer till she had
nibbled some more of the left-hand bit of mushroom,
and raised herself to about two feet high :
even then she walked up towards it rather
timidly, saying to herself, “ Suppose it should
be raving mad after all! I almost wish I’d gone
to see the Hatter instead !”
96 A MAD TEA-PARTY. A MAD TEA-PARTY. 97
room!” said Alice indignantly, and she sat down
in a large arm-chair at one end of the table.
“Have some wine,” the March Hare said in
an encouraging tone.
Alice looked all round the table, but there
was nothing on it but tea. “ I don ’t see any
wine,” she remarked.
“There isn ’t any,” said the March Hare.
“Then it wasn ’t very civil of you to offer
it,” said Alice angrily.
“ It wasn ’t very civil of you to sit down
without being invited,” said the March Hare.
“ I didn ’t know it was your table,” said
Alice ; “ it ’s laid for a great many more than
three.”
“Your hair wants cutting,” said the Hatter.
He had been looking at Alice for some time
with great curiosity, and this was his first
speech.
“ You should learn not to make personal
remarks,” Alice said with some severity : “ it ’s
very rude.”
The Hatter opened his eyes very wide on
hearing this; but all he said was, “Why is a
raven like a writing-desk ?”
“ Come, we shall have some fun now !”
thought Alice. “I ’m glad they’ve begun asking
riddles—I believe I can guess that,” she
added aloud.
“Do you mean that you think you can find
out the answer to it ?” said the March Hare.
“Exactly so,” said Alice.
“Then you should say what you mean,” the
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98 A MAD TEA-PARTY. A MAD TEA-PARTY. 99
ing to Alice : he had taken his watch out of
his pocket, and was looking at it uneasily, shaking
it every now and then, and holding it to
his ear.
Alice considered a little, and said, “The
fourth.”
“Two days wrong !” sighed the Hatter. “ I
told you butter wouldn ’t suit the works !” he
added, looking angrily at the March Hare.
“ It was the best butter,” the March Hare
meekly replied.
“Yes, but some crumbs must have got in
as well,” the Hatter grumbled: “you shouldn ’t
have put it in with the bread-knife.”
The March Hare took the watch and looked
at it gloomily: then he dipped it into his cup
of tea, and looked at it again : but he could
think of nothing better to say than his first
remark, “ It was the best butter, you know.”
Alice had been looking over his shoulder with
some curiosity. “What a funny watch !” she
remarked. “ It tells the day of the month, and
March Hare went on.
“ I do,” Alice hastily replied ; “ at least—at
least I mean what I say—that ’s the same thing,
you know.”
“Not the same thing a bit !” said the Hatter.
“Why, you might just as well say that ‘ I see
what I eat’ is the same thing as ‘ I eat what I
see’!”
“ You might just as well say,” added the
March Hare, “ that ‘ I like what I get’ is the
same thing as ‘ I get what I like’ !”
“ You might just as well say,” added the
Dormouse, who seemed to be talking in his
sleep, “that ‘ I breathe when I sleep’ is the same
thing as ‘ I sleep when I breathe’ !”
“ It is the same thing with you,” said the
Hatter, and here the conversation dropped, and
the party sat silent for a minute, while Alice
thought over all she could remember about
ravens and writing-desks, which wasn ’t much.
The Hatter was the first to break the silence.
“What day of the month is it?” he said, turnH
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100 A MAD TEA-PARTY. A MAD TEA-PARTY. 101
“No, I give it up,” Alice replied: “what ’s
the answer ?”
“ I haven ’t the slightest idea,” said the
Hatter.
“Nor I,” said the March Hare.
Alice sighed wearily. “ I think you might
do something better with the time,” she said,
“ than waste it in asking riddles that have
no answers.”
“ If you knew Time as well as I do,” said
the Hatter, “you wouldn’t talk about wasting
it. It’s him.”
“I don’t know what you mean,” said Alice.
“ Of course you don’t !” the Hatter said,
tossing his head contemptuously. “I dare say
you never even spoke to Time !”
“Perhaps not,” Alice cautiously replied: “but
I know I have to beat time when I learn
music.”
“Ah! that accounts for it,” said the Hatter.
“ He won’t stand beating. Now, if you only
kept on good terms with him, he’d do almost
doesn’t tell what o’clock it is !”
“Why should it ?” muttered the Hatter.
“Does your watch tell you what year it is ?”
“Of course not,” Alice replied very readily :
“but that ’s because it stays the same year for
such a long time together.”
“Which is just the case with mine,” said
the Hatter.
Alice felt dreadfully puzzled. The Hatter’s
remark seemed to her to have no sort of meaning
in it, and yet it was certainly English. “I don ’t
quite understand you,” she said, as politely as she
could.
“The Dormouse is asleep again,” said the
Hatter, and he poured a little hot tea on to its
nose.
The Dormouse shook its head impatiently,
and said, without opening its eyes, “Of course,
of course : just what I was going to remark
myself.”
“ Have you guessed the riddle yet ?” the
Hatter said, turning to Alice again.
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102 A MAD TEA-PARTY. A MAD TEA-PARTY. 103
anything you liked with the clock. For instance,
suppose it were nine o’clock in the morning,
just time to begin lessons : you’d only have
to whisper a hint to Time, and round goes the
clock in a twinkling! Half-past one, time for
dinner!”
(“ I only wish it was,” the March Hare said
to itself in a whisper.)
“That would be grand, certainly,” said Alice
thoughtfully: “but then—I shouldn’t be hungry
for it, you know.”
“Not at first, perhaps,” said the Hatter: “but
you could keep it to half-past one as long as
you liked.”
“ Is that the way you manage ?” Alice
asked.
The Hatter shook his head mournfully. “Not
I!” he replied. “We quarrelled last March——
just before he went mad, you know——” (pointing
with his teaspoon at the March Hare,)
“——it was at the great concert given by the
Queen of Hearts, and I had to sing
‘Twinkle, twinkle, little bat!
How I wonder what you’re at!’
You know the song, perhaps ?”
“I’ve heard something like it,” said Alice.
“It goes on, you know,” the Hatter continued,
“in this way :—
‘ Up above the world you fly,
Like a teatray in the sky.
Twinkle, twinkle————’ ”
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104 A MAD TEA-PARTY. A MAD TEA-PARTY. 105
again?” Alice ventured to ask.
“Suppose we change the subject,” the March
Hare interrupted, yawning. “ I’m getting tired
of this. I vote the young lady tells us a
story.”
“I’m afraid I don’t know one,” said Alice,
rather alarmed at the proposal.
“Then the Dormouse shall!” they both cried.
“Wake up, Dormouse !” And they pinched it
on both sides at once.
The Dormouse slowly opened his eyes. “ I
wasn’t asleep,” he said in a hoarse, feeble voice:
“I heard every word you fellows were saying.”
“Tell us a story !” said the March Hare.
“Yes, please do !” pleaded Alice.
“And be quick about it,” added the Hatter,
“or you ’ll be asleep again before it ’s done.”
“ Once upon a time there were three little
sisters,” the Dormouse began in a great hurry;
“and their names were Elsie, Lacie, and Tillie;
and they lived at the bottom of a well——”
“What did they live on ?” said Alice, who
Here the Dormouse shook itself, and began
singing in its sleep “Twinkle, twinkle, twinkle,
twinkle——” and went on so long that they had
to pinch it to make it stop.
“Well, I ’d hardly finished the first verse,”
said the Hatter, “when the Queen bawled out
‘He’s murdering the time! Off with his head!’”
“How dreadfully savage !” exclaimed Alice.
“And ever since that,” the Hatter went on
in a mournful tone, “ he won’t do a thing I
ask! It ’s always six o’clock now.”
A bright idea came into Alice’s head. “ Is
that the reason so many tea-things are put out
here?” she asked.
“Yes, that’s it,” said the Hatter with a sigh:
“ it ’s always tea-time, and we ’ve no time to
wash the things between whiles.”
“Then you keep moving round, I suppose?”
said Alice.
“Exactly so,” said the Hatter: “ as the things
get used up.”
“ But when you come to the beginning
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106 A MAD TEA-PARTY. A MAD TEA-PARTY. 107
Alice did not quite know what to say to
this : so she helped herself to some tea and
bread-and-butter, and then turned to the Dormouse,
and repeated her question. “Why did
they live at the bottom of a well ?”
The Dormouse again took a minute or two
to think about it, and then said, “ It was a
treacle-well.”
“There ’s no such thing !” Alice was beginning
very angrily, but the Hatter and the March
Hare went “Sh! sh!” and the Dormouse sulkily
remarked, “ If you can’t be civil, you ’d better
finish the story for yourself.”
“No, please go on !” Alice said very humbly
: “ I won’t interrupt again. I dare say
there may be one.”
“ One, indeed !” said the Dormouse indignantly.
However, he consented to go on. “And
so these three little sisters—they were learning
to draw, you know——”
“What did they draw ?” said Alice, quite
forgetting her promise.
always took a great interest in questions of
eating and drinking.
“They lived on treacle,” said the Dormouse,
after thinking a minute or two.
“They couldn’t have done that, you know,”
Alice gently remarked ; “they ’d have been ill.”
“So they were,” said the Dormouse; “very ill.”
Alice tried a little to fancy to herself what
such an extraordinary way of living would be
like, but it puzzled her too much, so she went
on : “But why did they live at the bottom of
a well ?”
“Take some more tea,” the March Hare said
to Alice, very earnestly.
“I’ve had nothing yet,” Alice replied in an
offended tone, “so I can’t take more.”
“You mean, you can’t take less,” said the
Hatter: “it’s very easy to take more than nothing.”
“Nobody asked your opinion,” said Alice.
“Who’s making personal remarks now?” the
Hatter asked triumphantly.
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108 A MAD TEA-PARTY. A MAD TEA-PARTY. 109
“Of course they were,” said the Dormouse,—
“well in.”
This answer so confused poor Alice, that she
let the Dormouse go on for some time without
interrupting it.
“They were learning to draw,” the Dormouse
went on, yawning and rubbing its eyes, for it
was getting very sleepy ; “ and they drew all
manner of things—everything that begins with
an M——”
“Why with an M ?” said Alice.
“Why not?” said the March Hare.
Alice was silent.
The Dormouse had closed its eyes by this
time, and was going off into a doze, but, on
being pinched by the Hatter, it woke up again
with a little shriek, and went on : “——that
begins with an M, such as mousetraps, and the
moon, and memory, and muchness—you know
you say things are ‘much of a muchness ’—did
you ever see such a thing as a drawing of a
muchness?”
“Treacle,” said the Dormouse, without considering
at all this time.
“I want a clean cup,” interrupted the Hatter:
“let ’s all move one place on.”
He moved on as he spoke, and the Dormouse
followed him: the March Hare moved into the
Dormouse’s place, and Alice rather unwillingly
took the place of the March Hare. The Hatter
was the only one who got any advantage from
the change : and Alice was a good deal worse
off than before, as the March Hare had just upset
the milk-jug into his plate.
Alice did not wish to offend the Dormouse
again, so she began very cautiously : “ But I
don’t understand. Where did they draw the
treacle from?”
“You can draw water out of a water-well,”
said the Hatter; “so I should think you could
draw treacle out of a treacle-well—eh, stupid ?”
“But they were in the well,” Alice said to
the Dormouse, not choosing to notice this last
remark.
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110 A MAD TEA-PARTY. A MAD TEA-PARTY. 111
“Really, now you ask me,” said Alice, very
much confused, “I don’t think——”
“Then you shouldn’t talk,” said the Hatter.
This piece of rudeness was more than Alice
could bear : she got up in great disgust, and
walked off: the Dormouse fell asleep instantly,
and neither of the others took the least notice
of her going, though she looked back once or
twice, half hoping that they would call after
her : the last time she saw them, they were
trying to put the Dormouse into the teapot.
At any rate I ’ll never go there again !” said
Alice as she picked her way through the wood.
“It’s the stupidest tea-party I ever was at in
all my life !”
Just as she said this, she noticed that one
of the trees had a door leading right into it.
“That ’s very curious !” she thought. “ But
everything’s curious to-day. I think I may as
well go in at once.” And in she went.
Once more she found herself in the long hall,
and close to the little glass table. “Now, I ’ll
manage better this time,” she said to herself,
and began by taking the little golden key, and
unlocking the door that led into the garden.
Then she went to work nibbling at the mushroom
(she had kept a piece of it in her pocket) till
she was about a foot high : then she walked
down the little passage : and then—she found
herself at last in the beautiful garden, among
the bright flowerbeds and the cool fountains.
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THE QUEEN’S CROQUET-GROUND.
“You’d better not talk !” said Five. “ I
heard the Queen say only yesterday you deserved
to be beheaded !”
“What for ?”
said the one who
had spoken first.
“That ’s none
of your business,
Two!” said Seven.
“Yes, it is his
business !” said
Five, “ and I ’ll
tell him—it was
for bringing the
cook tulip-roots
instead of onions.”
Seven flung
down his brush, and had just begun, “Well, of
all the unjust things—” when his eye chanced
to fall upon Alice, as she stood watching them,
and he checked himself suddenly : the others
looked round also, and all of them bowed low.
CHAPTER VIII.
THE QUEEN’S CROQUET-GROUND.
A LARGE rose-tree stood near the entrance of
the garden: the roses growing on it were white,
but there were three gardeners at it, busily
painting them red. Alice thought this a very
curious thing, and she went nearer to watch
them, and just as she came up to them she
heard one of them say, “Look out now, Five !
Don’t go splashing paint over me like that !”
“ I couldn’t help it,” said Five in a sulky
tone; “Seven jogged my elbow.”
On which Seven looked up and said, “That’s
right, Five ! Always lay the blame on others !”
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114 THE QUEEN’S CROQUET-GROUND. 115
and two, as the soldiers did. After these came
the royal children ; there were ten of them,
and the little dears came jumping merrily along
hand in hand, in couples: they were all ornamented
with hearts. Next came the guests,
mostly Kings and Queens, and among them
Alice recognised the White Rabbit: it was talking
in a hurried nervous manner, smiling at
everything that was said, and went by without
noticing her. Then followed the Knave of
Hearts, carrying the King’s crown on a crimson
velvet cushion; and, last of all this grand procession,
came THE KING AND QUEEN OF
HEARTS.
Alice was rather doubtful whether she ought
not to lie down on her face like the three
gardeners, but she could not remember ever
having heard of such a rule at processions; “ and
besides, what would be the use of a procession,”
she thought, “if people had all to lie down on
their faces, so that they couldn’t see it?” So
she stood where she was, and waited.
“Would you tell me please,” said Alice,
a little timidly, “ why you are painting those
roses?”
Five and Seven said nothing, but looked at
Two. Two began in a low voice, “Why, the
fact is, you see, Miss, this here ought to have
been a red rose-tree, and we put a white one
in by mistake, and if the Queen was to find it
out, we should all have our heads cut off, you
know. So you see, Miss, we’re doing our best,
afore she comes, to—” At this moment Five,
who had been anxiously looking across the
garden, called out “The Queen ! The Queen !”
and the three gardeners instantly threw themselves
flat upon their faces. There was a sound
of many footsteps, and Alice looked round,
eager to see the Queen.
First came ten soldiers carrying clubs; these
were all shaped like the three gardeners, oblong
and flat, with their hands and feet at the corners:
next the ten courtiers ; these were ornamented
all over with diamonds, and walked two
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116 THE QUEEN’S CROQUET-GROUND. 117
When the procession came opposite to Alice,
they all stopped and looked at her, and the
Queen said severely, “Who is this ?” She said
it to the Knave of Hearts, who only bowed and
smiled in reply.
“ Idiot !” said the Queen, tossing her head
impatiently ; and, turning to Alice, she went
on, “What’s your name, child ?”
“My name is Alice, so please your Majesty,”
said Alice very politely ; but she added, to
herself, “Why, they ’re only a pack of cards,
after all. I needn ’t be afraid of them !”
“And who are these?” said the Queen, pointing
to the three gardeners who were lying
round the rose-tree; for you see, as they were
lying on their faces, and the pattern on their
backs was the same as the rest of the pack,
she could not tell whether they were gardeners,
or soldiers, or courtiers, or three of her own
children.
“How should I know ?” said Alice, surprised
at her own courage. “It’s no business of mine.”
The Queen turned crimson with fury, and,
after glaring at her for a moment like a wild
beast, began screaming, “ Off with her head !
Off—”
118 THE QUEEN’S CROQUET-GROUND. 119
their heads !” and the procession moved on,
three of the soldiers remaining behind to execute
the unfortunate gardeners, who ran to Alice for
protection.
“You shan’t be beheaded !” said Alice, and
she put them into a large flower-pot that stood
near. The three soldiers wandered about for
a minute or two, looking for them, and then
quietly marched off after the others.
“Are their heads off ?” shouted the Queen.
“Their heads are gone, if it please your
Majesty!” the soldiers shouted in reply.
“That ’s right !” shouted the Queen. “ Can
you play croquet?”
The soldiers were silent, and looked at Alice,
as the question was evidently meant for her.
“Yes!” shouted Alice.
“ Come on then !” roared the Queen, and
Alice joined the procession, wondering very
much what would happen next.
“ It ’s—it ’s a very fine day !” said a timid
voice at her side. She was walking by the White
“ Nonsense !” said Alice, very loudly and
decidedly, and the Queen was silent.
The King laid his hand upon her arm, and
timidly said, “Consider, my dear: she is only
a child !”
The Queen turned angrily away from him,
and said to the Knave, “Turn them over !”
The Knave did so, very carefully, with one
foot.
“Get up !” said the Queen in a shrill, loud
voice, and the three gardeners instantly jumped
up, and began bowing to the King, the Queen,
the royal children, and everybody else.
“Leave off that!” screamed the Queen. “You
make me giddy.” And then, turning to the
rose-tree, she went on, “What have you been
doing here?”
“May it please your Majesty,” said Two, in
a very humble tone, going down on one knee
as he spoke, “we were trying—”
“ I see !” said the Queen, who had meanwhile
been examining the roses. “ Off with
120 THE QUEEN’S CROQUET-GROUND. 121
Alice thought she had never seen such a
curious croquet-ground in her life : it was all
ridges and furrows ; the croquet-balls were live
hedgehogs, the mallets live flamingoes, and
the soldiers had to
double themselves up
and to stand on their
hands and feet, to
make the arches.
The chief difficulty
Alice found at
first was in managing
her flamingo : she
succeeded in getting
its body tucked away,
comfortably enough,
under her arm, with
its legs hanging down, but generally, just as she
had got its neck nicely straightened out, and
was going to give the hedgehog a blow with
its head, it would twist itself round and look
up into her face, with such a puzzled expresRabbit,
who was peeping anxiously into her face.
“Very,” said Alice :—“where’s the Duchess?”
“ Hush ! Hush !” said the Rabbit in a low,
hurried tone. He looked anxiously over his
shoulder as he spoke, and then raised himself
upon tiptoe, put his mouth close to her ear, and
whispered, “She’s under sentence of execution.”
“What for ?” said Alice.
“Did you say ‘What a pity!’ ?” the Rabbit
asked.
“No, I didn’t,” said Alice : “ I don’t think
it’s at all a pity. I said ‘What for ?’”
“She boxed the Queen’s ears—” the Rabbit
began. Alice gave a little scream of laughter.
“Oh, hush!” the Rabbit whispered in a frightened
tone. “The Queen will hear you! You see she
came rather late, and the Queen said—”
“Get to your places!” shouted the Queen in
a voice of thunder, and people began running
about in all directions, tumbling up against
each other: however, they got settled down in
a minute or two, and the game began.
122 THE QUEEN’S CROQUET-GROUND. 123
become of me ? They ’re dreadfully fond of
beheading people here : the great wonder is,
that there’s any one left alive !”
She was looking about for some way of
escape, and wondering whether she could get
away without being seen, when she noticed a
curious appearance in the air : it puzzled her
very much at first, but after watching it a
minute or two she made it out to be a grin,
and she said to herself, “ It’s the Cheshire Cat:
now I shall have somebody to talk to.”
“ How are you getting on ?” said the Cat,
as soon as there was mouth enough for it to
speak with.
Alice waited till the eyes appeared, and then
nodded. “ It ’s no use speaking to it,” she
thought, “ till its ears have come, or at least
one of them.” In another minute the whole
head appeared, and then Alice put down her
flamingo, and began an account of the game,
feeling very glad she had some one to listen to
her. The Cat seemed to think that there was
sion that she could not help bursting out laughing:
and when she had got its head down, and
was going to begin again, it was very provoking
to find that the hedgehog had unrolled itself,
and was in the act of crawling away: besides
all this, there was generally a ridge or furrow
in the way wherever she wanted to send the
hedgehog to, and, as the doubled-up soldiers were
always getting up and walking off to other parts
of the ground, Alice soon came to the conclusion
that it was a very difficult game indeed.
The players all played at once without waiting
for turns, quarrelling all the while, and
fighting for the hedgehogs; and in a very short
time the Queen was in a furious passion, and
went stamping about, and shouting, “Off with
his head!” or “Off with her head!” about once
in a minute.
Alice began to feel very uneasy : to be sure,
she had not as yet had any dispute with the
Queen, but she knew that it might happen any
minute, “and then,” thought she, “what would
124 THE QUEEN’S CROQUET-GROUND. 125
“Who are you talking to ?” said the King,
coming up to Alice, and looking at the Cat’s
head with great curiosity.
“It’s a friend of mine—a Cheshire Cat,” said
Alice: “ allow me to introduce it.”
“I don’t like the look of it at all,” said the
King : “ however, it may kiss my hand if it
likes.”
“I’d rather not,” the Cat remarked.
“Don ’t be impertinent,” said the King, “ and
don ’t look at me like that !” He got behind
Alice as he spoke.
“ A cat may look at a king,” said Alice.
“I’ve read that in some book, but I don’t remember
where.”
“Well, it must be removed,” said the King
very decidedly, and he called the Queen, who
was passing at the moment, “My dear ! I wish
you would have this cat removed !”
The Queen had only one way of settling all
difficulties, great or small. “Off with his head!”
she said without even looking round.
enough of it now in sight, and no more of it
appeared.
“I don’t think they play at all fairly,” Alice
began, in rather a complaining tone, “and they
all quarrel so dreadfully one can’t hear one’s-self
speak—and they don’t seem to have any rules
in particular ; at least, if there are, nobody
attends to them—and you’ve no idea how confusing
it is all the things being alive ; for instance,
there ’s the arch I ’ve got to go through
next walking about at the other end of the
ground—and I should have croqueted the
Queen’s hedgehog just now, only it ran away
when it saw mine coming ! ”
“How do you like the Queen?” said the Cat
in a low voice.
“ Not at all,” said Alice : “ she ’s so extremely—”
Just then she noticed that the
Queen was close behind her, listening: so she
went on “—likely to win, that it ’s hardly worth
while finishing the game.”
The Queen smiled and passed on.
126 THE QUEEN’S CROQUET-GROUND. 127
doesn’t matter much,” thought Alice, “ as all the
arches are gone from this side of the ground.”
So she tucked it away under her arm, that it
might not escape again, and went back to have
a little more conversation with her friend.
When she got back to the Cheshire Cat, she
was surprised to find quite a large crowd collected
round it: there was a dispute going on
between the executioner, the King, and the
Queen, who were all talking at once, while all
the rest were quite silent, and looked very
uncomfortable.
The moment Alice appeared, she was appealed
to by all three to settle the question,
and they repeated their arguments to her,
though, as they all spoke at once, she found it
very hard to make out exactly what they said.
The executioner’s argument was, that you
couldn’t cut off a head unless there was a body
to cut it off from: that he had never had to
do such a thing before, and he wasn ’t going to
begin at his time of life.
“I’ll fetch the executioner myself,” said the
King eagerly, and he hurried off.
Alice thought she might as well go back and
see how the game was going on, as she heard
the Queen’s voice in the distance, screaming
with passion. She had already heard her sentence
three of the players to be executed for
having missed their turns, and she did not like
the look of things at all, as the game was in
such confusion that she never knew whether it
was her turn or not. So she went off in search
of her hedgehog.
The hedgehog was engaged in a fight with
another hedgehog, which seemed to Alice an
excellent opportunity for croqueting one of them
with the other : the only difficulty was, that
her flamingo was gone across to the other side
of the garden, where Alice could see it trying
in a helpless sort of way to fly up into a tree.
By the time she had caught the flamingo
and brought it back, the fight was over, and
both the hedgehogs were out of sight: “but it
128 THE QUEEN’S CROQUET-GROUND. 129
was this last remark that had made the whole
party look so grave and anxious.)
Alice could think of nothing else to say but
“ It belongs to the Duchess : you ’d better ask
her about it.”
“ She ’s in prison,” the Queen said to the
executioner: “fetch her here.” And the executioner
went off like an arrow.
The Cat’s head began fading away the
moment he was gone, and, by the time he had
come back with the Duchess, it had entirely
disappeared: so the King and the executioner
ran wildly up and down looking for it, while
the rest of the party went back to the game.
The King’s argument was, that anything
that had a head could be beheaded, and that
you weren’t to talk nonsense.
The Queen’s argument was, that if something
wasn’t done about it in less than no time,
she’d have everybody executed, all round. (It
K
THE MOCK TURTLE’S STORY. 131
very well without—Maybe it ’s always pepper
that makes people hot-tempered,” she went on,
very much pleased at having found out a new
kind of rule, “ and vinegar that makes them
sour—and camomile that makes them bitter—
and—and barley-sugar and such things that
make children sweet-tempered. I only wish
people knew that : then they wouldn ’t be so
stingy about it, you know—”
She had quite forgotten the Duchess by this
time, and was a little startled when she heard
her voice close to her ear. “You ’re thinking
about something, my dear, and that makes you
forget to talk. I can’t tell you just now what
the moral of that is, but I shall remember it
in a bit.”
“Perhaps it hasn ’t one,” Alice ventured to
remark.
“Tut, tut, child !” said the Duchess. “Everything’s
got a moral, if only you can find it.”
And she squeezed herself up closer to Alice’s
side as she spoke.
CHAPTER IX.
THE MOCK TURTLE’S STORY.
“YOU can’t think how glad I am to see you
again, you dear old thing !” said the Duchess,
as she tucked her arm affectionately into Alice’s,
and they walked off together.
Alice was very glad to find her in such a
pleasant temper, and thought to herself that
perhaps it was only the pepper that had made
her so savage when they met in the kitchen.
“When I’m a Duchess,” she said to herself, (not
in a very hopeful tone though), “ I won ’t have
any pepper in my kitchen at all. Soup does
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132 THE MOCK TURTLE’S STORY. 133
done by everybody minding their own business!”
“Ah well! It means much the same thing,”
said the Duchess, digging her sharp little chin
into Alice’s shoulder as she added, “ and the
moral of that is—‘Take care of the sense, and
the sounds will take care of themselves.’ ”
“ How fond she is of finding morals in
things!” Alice thought to herself.
“ I daresay you ’re wondering why I don ’t
put my arm round your waist,” said the Duchess
after a pause: “the reason is, that I’m doubtful
about the temper of your flamingo. Shall
I try the experiment ?”
“ He might bite,” Alice cautiously replied,
not feeling at all anxious to have the experiment
tried.
“Very true,” said the Duchess : “flamingoes
and mustard both bite. And the moral of that
is—‘Birds of a feather flock together.’ ”
“Only mustard isn’t a bird,” Alice remarked.
“Right, as usual,” said the Duchess: “what
a clear way you have of putting things !”
Alice did not much like keeping so close
to her : first, because the Duchess was very
ugly, and secondly, because she was exactly the
right height to
rest her chin upon
Alice’s shoulder,
and it was an uncomfortably
sharp
chin. However,
she did not like
to be rude, so she
bore it as well as
she could.
“The game ’s
going on rather
better now,” she
said, by way of
keeping up the conversation a little.
“’ Tis so,” said the Duchess : “ and the moral
of that is—‘Oh, ’tis love, ’tis love, that makes
the world go round !’”
“Somebody said,” Alice whispered, “ that it’s
134 THE MOCK TURTLE’S STORY. 135
“Pray don’t trouble yourself to say it any
longer than that,” said Alice.
“ Oh, don’t talk about trouble !” said the
Duchess. “ I make you a present of everything
I’ve said as yet.”
“ A cheap sort of present !” thought Alice.
“ I ’m glad they don ’t give birthday presents
like that!” But she did not venture to say it
out loud.
“Thinking again?” the Duchess asked, with
another dig of her sharp little chin.
“I’ve a right to think,” said Alice sharply,
for she was beginning to feel a little worried.
“Just about as much right,” said the Duchess,
“as pigs have to fly: and the m—”
But here, to Alice’s great surprise, the
Duchess’ voice died away, even in the middle
of her favourite word ‘ moral,’ and the arm
that was linked into hers began to tremble.
Alice looked up, and there stood the Queen in
front of them, with her arms folded, frowning
like a thunderstorm.
“It’s a mineral, I think,” said Alice.
“ Of course it is,” said the Duchess, who
seemed ready to agree to everything that Alice
said; “there ’s a large mustard-mine near here.
And the moral of that is—‘The more there is
of mine, the less there is of yours.’ ”
“ Oh, I know !” exclaimed Alice, who had
not attended to this last remark, “it’s a vegetable.
It doesn ’t look like one, but it is.”
“I quite agree with you,” said the Duchess,
“and the moral of that is—‘Be what you would
seem to be’—or, if you ’d like it put more
simply—‘ Never imagine yourself not to be
otherwise than what it might appear to others
that what you were or might have been was
not otherwise than what you had been would
have appeared to them to be otherwise.’ ”
“ I think I should understand that better,”
Alice said very politely, “ if I had it written
down: but I can ’t quite follow it as you say it.”
“That ’s nothing to what I could say if I
chose,” the Duchess replied in a pleased tone.
136 THE MOCK TURTLE’S STORY. 137
were taken into custody by the soldiers, who
of course had to leave off being arches to do
this, so that by the end of half an hour or so
there were no arches left, and all the players,
except the King, the Queen, and Alice, were
in custody, and under sentence of execution.
Then the Queen left off, quite out of breath,
and said to Alice, “ Have you seen the Mock
Turtle yet?”
“No,” said Alice. “I don’t even know what
a Mock Turtle is.”
“ It ’s the thing Mock Turtle Soup is made
from,” said the Queen.
“I never saw one, or heard of one,” said Alice.
“Come on, then,” said the Queen, “ and he
shall tell you his history.”
As they walked off together, Alice heard the
King say in a low voice, to the company generally,
“You are all pardoned.” “Come, that’s a
good thing!” she said to herself, for she had
felt quite unhappy at the number of executions
the Queen had ordered.
“ A fine day, your Majesty !” the Duchess
began in a low, weak voice.
“Now, I give you fair warning,” shouted the
Queen, stamping on the ground as she spoke;
“either you or your head must be off, and that
in about half no time ! Take your choice !”
The Duchess took her choice, and was gone
in a moment.
“Let ’s go on with the game,” the Queen
said to Alice, and Alice was too much frightened
to say a word, but slowly followed her back to
the croquet-ground.
The other guests had taken advantage of
the Queen’s absence, and were resting in the
shade: however, the moment they saw her, they
hurried back to the game, the Queen merely
remarking that a moment’s delay would cost
them their lives.
All the time they were playing the Queen
never left off quarrelling with the other players,
and shouting “ Off with his head !” or “ Off
with her head !” Those whom she sentenced
138 THE MOCK TURTLE’S STORY. 139
safe to stay with it as to go after that savage
Queen: so she waited.
The Gryphon sat up and rubbed its eyes :
then it watched the Queen till she was out of
sight: then it chuckled. “What fun!” said the
Gryphon, half to itself, half to Alice.
“What is the fun ?” said Alice.
“Why, she,” said the Gryphon. “ It ’s all
her fancy, that : they never executes nobody,
you know. Come on !”
“Everybody says ‘come on!’ here,” thought
Alice, as she went slowly after it : “ I never was
so ordered about before in all my life, never !”
They had not gone far before they saw the
Mock Turtle in the distance, sitting sad and
lonely on a little ledge of rock, and, as they
came nearer, Alice could hear him sighing as
if his heart would break. She pitied him deeply.
“What is his sorrow?” she asked the Gryphon,
and the Gryphon answered, very nearly in the
same words as before, “It ’s all his fancy, that :
he hasn’t got no sorrow, you know. Come on !”
They very soon came upon a Gryphon, lying
fast asleep in the sun. (If you don’t know what
a Gryphon is, look at the picture.) “Up, lazy
thing!” said the Queen, “ and take this young
lady to see the Mock Turtle, and to hear his
history. I must go back and see after some
executions I have ordered ;” and she walked off,
leaving Alice alone with the Gryphon. Alice
did not quite like the look of the creature, but
on the whole she thought it would be quite as
140 THE MOCK TURTLE’S STORY. 141
So they went up to the Mock Turtle, who
looked at them with large eyes full of tears,
but said nothing.
“This here young lady,” said the Gryphon,
“she wants for to know your history, she do.”
“ I ’ll tell it her,” said the Mock Turtle in
a deep, hollow tone : “ sit down, both of you,
and don’t speak a word till I ’ve finished.”
So they sat down, and nobody spoke for some
minutes. Alice thought to herself, “I don ’t see
how he can ever finish, if he doesn ’t begin.”
But she waited patiently.
“Once,” said the Mock Turtle at last, with
a deep sigh, “I was a real Turtle.”
These words were followed by a very long
silence, broken only by an occasional exclamation
of “Hjckrrh!” from the Gryphon, and the
constant heavy sobbing of the Mock Turtle.
Alice was very nearly getting up and saying,
“Thank you, sir, for your interesting story,”
but she could not help thinking there must be
more to come, so she sat still and said nothing.
“When we were little,” the Mock Turtle
went on at last, more calmly, though still sobbing
a little now and then, “we went to school
in the sea. The master was an old Turtle—we
142 THE MOCK TURTLE’S STORY. 143
“I’ve been to a day-school too,” said Alice ;
“you needn ’t be so proud as all that.”
“With extras ?” asked the Mock Turtle a
little anxiously.
“Yes,” said Alice, “we learned French and
music.”
“And washing?” said the Mock Turtle.
“Certainly not !” said Alice indignantly.
“Ah! Then yours wasn’t a really good school,”
said the Mock Turtle in a tone of great relief,
“now at ours they had at the end of the bill,
‘French, music, and washing—extra.’ ”
“You couldn ’t have wanted it much,” said
Alice; “ living at the bottom of the sea.”
“I couldn ’t afford to learn it,” said the Mock
Turtle with a sigh. “ I only took the regular
course.”
“What was that ?” enquired Alice.
“Reeling and Writhing, of course, to begin
with,” the Mock Turtle replied : “and then the
different branches of Arithmetic—Ambition, Distraction,
Uglification, and Derision.”
used to call him Tortoise—”
“Why did you call him Tortoise, if he wasn’t
one?” Alice asked.
“We called him Tortoise because he taught
us,” said the Mock Turtle angrily; “ really you
are very dull !”
“You ought to be ashamed of yourself for
asking such a simple question,” added the Gryphon;
and then they both sat silent and looked
at poor Alice, who felt ready to sink into the
earth. At last the Gryphon said to the Mock
Turtle, “Drive on, old fellow ! Don’t be all day
about it!” and he went on in these words.
“Yes, we went to school in the sea, though
you mayn’t believe it—”
“I never said I didn ’t!” interrupted Alice.
“You did,” said the Mock Turtle.
“ Hold your tongue !” added the Gryphon,
before Alice could speak again. The Mock
Turtle went on.
“We had the best of educations—in fact, we
went to school every day—”
144 THE MOCK TURTLE’S STORY. 145
“Well, I can ’t show it you myself,” the
Mock Turtle said : “ I ’m too stiff. And the
Gryphon never learnt it.”
“Hadn’t time,” said the Gryphon : “ I went
to the Classical master, though. He was an
old crab, he was.”
“ I never went to him,” the Mock Turtle
said with a sigh : “ he taught Laughing and
Grief, they used to say.”
“So he did, so he did,” said the Gryphon,
sighing in his turn, and both creatures hid their
faces in their paws.
“ And how many hours a day did you do
lessons?” said Alice, in a hurry to change the
subject.
“Ten hours the first day,” said the Mock
Turtle: “nine the next, and so on.”
“What a curious plan !” exclaimed Alice.
“That ’s the reason they ’re called lessons,”
the Gryphon remarked : “ because they lessen
from day to day.”
This was quite a new idea to Alice, and she
“I never heard of ‘Uglification,’ ” Alice ventured
to say. “What is it ?”
The Gryphon lifted up both its paws in surprise.
“Never heard of uglifying !” it exclaimed.
“You know what to beautify is, I suppose ?”
“Yes,” said Alice, doubtfully : “ it means—
to—make—anything—prettier.”
“Well then,” the Gryphon went on, “if you
don ’t know what to uglify is, you are a
simpleton.”
Alice did not feel encouraged to ask any
more questions about it, so she turned to the
Mock Turtle, and said “What else had you to
learn?”
“Well, there was Mystery,” the Mock Turtle
replied, counting off the subjects on his flappers,—
“Mystery, ancient and modern, with Seaography:
then Drawling—the Drawling-master was an old
conger-eel, that used to come once a week: he
taught us Drawling, Stretching, and Fainting in
Coils.”
“What was that like?” said Alice.
L
146 THE MOCK TURTLE’S STORY.
CHAPTER X.
THE LOBSTER QUADRILLE.
THE Mock Turtle sighed deeply, and drew
the back of one flapper across his eyes. He
looked at Alice and tried to speak, but for a
minute or two sobs choked his voice. “Same
as if he had a bone in his throat,” said the
Gryphon, and it set to work shaking him
and punching him in the back. At last the
Mock Turtle recovered his voice, and, with tears
running down his cheeks, he went on again :—
“You may not have lived much under the
sea—” (“ I haven ’t,” said Alice)—“and perhaps
you were never even introduced to a lobster—”
thought it over a little before she made her next
remark. “Then the eleventh day must have
been a holiday ?”
“Of course it was,” said the Mock Turtle.
“And how did you manage on the twelfth ?”
Alice went on eagerly.
“That’s enough about lessons,” the Gryphon
interrupted in a very decided tone : “ tell her
something about the games now.”
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148 THE LOBSTER QUADRILLE. 149
“The lobsters !” shouted the Gryphon, with
a bound into the air.
“—as far out to sea as you can—”
“Swim after them !” screamed the Gryphon.
“Turn a somersault in the sea !” cried the
Mock Turtle, capering wildly about.
“Change lobsters again !” yelled the Gryphon
at the top of its voice.
“Back to land again, and—that’s all the first
figure,” said the Mock Turtle, suddenly dropping
his voice, and the two creatures, who had been
jumping about like mad things all this time,
sat down again very sadly and quietly, and
looked at Alice.
“It must be a very pretty dance,” said Alice
timidly.
“Would you like to see a little of it?” said
the Mock Turtle.
“Very much indeed,” said Alice.
“Come, let ’s try the first figure !” said the
Mock Turtle to the Gryphon. “We can do it
without lobsters, you know. Which shall sing?”
(Alice began to say “ I once tasted—” but
checked herself hastily, and said, “No, never”)—
“so you can have no idea what a delightful
thing a Lobster Quadrille is !”
“No, indeed,” said Alice. “What sort of a
dance is it?”
“Why,” said the Gryphon, “you first form
into a line along the seashore—”
“Two lines !” cried the Mock Turtle. “Seals,
turtles, salmon, and so on: then, when you’ve
cleared all the jelly-fish out of the way—”
“That generally takes some time,” interrupted
the Gryphon.
“—you advance twice—”
“Each with a lobster as a partner!” cried the
Gryphon.
“Of course,” the Mock Turtle said : “advance
twice, set to partners—”
“—change lobsters, and retire in same order,”
continued the Gryphon.
“Then, you know,” the Mock Turtle went
on, “you throw the—”
150 THE LOBSTER QUADRILLE. 151
“Will you walk a little faster ?” said a whiting to a snail,
“There’s a porpoise close behind us, and he’s treading on
my tail.
See how eagerly the lobsters and the turtles all advance !
They are waiting on the shingle—will you come and join
the dance?
Will you, won’t you, will you, won’t you, will you join
the dance?
Will you, won’t you, will you, won’t you, won’t you join
the dance?
“You can really have no notion how delightful it will be
When they take us up and throw us, with the lobsters, out
to sea!”
But the snail replied “Too far, too far!” and gave a look
askance—
Said he thanked the whiting kindly, but he would not join
the dance.
Would not, could not, would not, could not, would not
join the dance.
Would not, could not, would not, could not, could not
join the dance.
“ Oh, you sing,” said the Gryphon. “ I ’ve
forgotten the words.”
So they began solemnly dancing round and
round Alice, every now and then treading on
her toes when they passed too close, and waving
their fore-paws to mark the time, while the
Mock Turtle sang this, very slowly and sadly:—
152 THE LOBSTER QUADRILLE. 153
they’re all over crumbs.”
“You ’re wrong about the crumbs,” said the
Mock Turtle : “ crumbs would all wash off in
the sea. But they have their tails in their
mouths ; and the reason is—” here the Mock
Turtle yawned and shut his eyes.—“Tell her
about the reason and all that,” he said to the
Gryphon.
“The reason is,” said the Gryphon, “ that
they would go with the lobsters to the dance.
So they got thrown out to sea. So they had
to fall a long way. So they got their tails fast
in their mouths. So they couldn ’t get them
out again. That ’s all.”
“Thank you,” said Alice, “it’s very interesting.
I never knew so much about a whiting
before.”
“I can tell you more than that, if you like,”
said the Gryphon. “ Do you know why it ’s
called a whiting ?”
“ I never thought about it,” said Alice.
“Why?”
“What matters it how far we go?” his scaly friend replied,
“There is another shore, you know, upon the other side.
The further off from England the nearer is to France—
Then turn not pale, beloved snail, but come and join the dance.
Will you, won’t you, will you, won’t you, will you join
the dance?
Will you, won’t you, will you, won’t you, won’t you join
the dance?”
“Thank you, it ’s a very interesting dance to
watch,” said Alice, feeling very glad that it was
over at last ; “ and I do so like that curious
song about the whiting !”
“ Oh, as to the whiting,” said the Mock
Turtle, “ they—you’ve seen them, of course ?”
“Yes,” said Alice, “ I’ve often seen them at
dinn—” she checked herself hastily.
“ I don ’t know where Dinn may be,” said
the Mock Turtle, “but if you’ve seen them so
often, of course you know what they ’re like.”
“ I believe so,” Alice replied thoughtfully.
“They have their tails in their mouths ;—and
154 THE LOBSTER QUADRILLE. 155
we don’t want you with us!’ ”
“They were obliged to have him with them,”
the Mock Turtle said : “no wise fish would go
anywhere without a porpoise.”
“Wouldn ’t it really ?” said Alice in a tone
of great surprise.
“ Of course not,” said the Mock Turtle :
“why, if a fish came to me, and told me he
was going a journey, I should say ‘With what
porpoise?’”
“Don ’t you mean ‘purpose’ ?” said Alice.
“I mean what I say,” the Mock Turtle replied
in an offended tone. And the Gryphon added
“Come, let ’s hear some of your adventures.”
“I could tell you my adventures—beginning
from this morning,” said Alice a little timidly:
“ but it ’s no use going back to yesterday,
because I was a different person then.”
“Explain all that,” said the Mock Turtle.
“ No, no ! the adventures first,” said the
Gryphon in an impatient tone : “ explanations
take such a dreadful time.”
“ It does the boots and shoes,” the Gryphon
replied very solemnly.
Alice was thoroughly puzzled. “ Does the
boots and shoes !” she repeated in a wondering
tone.
“Why, what are your shoes done with ?”
said the Gryphon. “I mean, what makes them
so shiny?”
Alice looked down at them, and considered
a little before she gave her answer. “They’re
done with blacking, I believe.”
“Boots and shoes under the sea,” the Gryphon
went on in a deep voice, “ are done with
whiting. Now you know.”
“And what are they made of ?” Alice asked
in a tone of great curiosity.
“ Soles and eels, of course,” the Gryphon
replied rather impatiently : “ any shrimp could
have told you that.”
“If I ’d been the whiting,” said Alice, whose
thoughts were still running on the song, “ I ’d
have said to the porpoise, ‘Keep back, please:
156 THE LOBSTER QUADRILLE. 157
“How the creatures
order one about, and
make one repeat lessons!”
thought Alice,
“I might just as well
be at school at once.”
However, she got up,
and began to repeat
it, but her head was
so full of the Lobster-Quadrille,
that
she hardly knew what
she was saying, and
the words came very
queer indeed :—
“ ’Tis the voice of the lobster; I heard him declare,
‘You have baked me too brown, I must sugar my hair.’
As a duck with its eyelids, so he with his nose
Trims his belt and his buttons, and turns out his toes.”
“That ’s different from what I used to say
when I was a child,” said the Gryphon.
So Alice began telling them her adventures
from the time when she first saw the White
Rabbit: she was a little nervous about it just at
first, the two creatures got so close to her, one
on each side, and opened their eyes and mouths
so very wide, but she gained courage as she
went on. Her listeners were perfectly quiet
till she got to the part about her repeating
“You are old, Father William,” to the Caterpillar,
and the words all coming different, and
then the Mock Turtle drew a long breath, and
said, “That’s very curious.”
“It’s all about as curious as it can be,” said
the Gryphon.
“ It all came different !” the Mock Turtle
repeated thoughtfully. “ I should like to hear
her try and repeat something now. Tell her
to begin.” He looked at the Gryphon as if he
thought it had some kind of authority over
Alice.
“Stand up and repeat ‘’Tis the voice of the
sluggard,’” said the Gryphon.
158 THE LOBSTER QUADRILLE. 159
“ I passed by his garden, and marked, with one eye,
How the owl and the oyster were sharing a pie—”
“What is the use of repeating all that stuff,”
the Mock Turtle interrupted, “if you don’t explain
it as you go on? It ’s by far the most confusing
thing I ever heard !”
“Yes, I think you ’d better leave off,” said
the Gryphon, and Alice was only too glad to
do so.
“Shall we try another figure of the LobsterQuadrille?”
the Gryphon went on. “Or would
you like the Mock Turtle to sing you a song ?”
“ Oh, a song, please, if the Mock Turtle
would be so kind,” Alice replied, so eagerly
that the Gryphon said, in a rather offended
tone, “ Hm ! No accounting for tastes ! Sing
her ‘Turtle Soup,’ will you, old fellow ?”
The Mock Turtle sighed deeply, and began,
in a voice sometimes choked with sobs, to sing
this:—
“Well, I never heard it before,” said the Mock
Turtle; “but it sounds uncommon nonsense.”
Alice said nothing: she had sat down again
with her face in her hands, wondering if anything
would ever happen in a natural way
again.
“I should like to have it explained,” said the
Mock Turtle.
“ She can ’t explain it,” said the Gryphon
hastily. “Go on with the next verse.”
“ But about his toes ?” the Mock Turtle
persisted. “How could he turn them out with
his nose, you know ?”
“ It ’s the first position in dancing,” Alice
said ; but she was dreadfully puzzled by the
whole thing, and longed to change the subject.
“Go on with the next verse,” the Gryphon
repeated impatiently : “ it begins ‘ I passed by
his garden.’”
Alice did not dare to disobey, though she
felt sure it would all come wrong, and she went
on in a trembling voice :—
160 THE LOBSTER THE LOBSTER-QUADRILLE. 161
“Beautiful Soup, so rich and green,
Waiting in a hot tureen!
Who for such dainties would not stoop ?
Soup of the evening, beautiful Soup!
Soup of the evening, beautiful Soup!
Beau—ootiful Soo—oop !
Beau—ootiful Soo—oop !
Soo—oop of the e—e—evening,
Beautiful, beautiful Soup !
“Beautiful Soup! Who cares for fish,
Game, or any other dish?
Who would not give all else for two p
ennyworth only of beautiful Soup?
Pennyworth only of beautiful Soup ?
Beau—ootiful Soo—oop !
Beau—ootiful Soo—oop !
Soo—oop of the e—e—evening,
Beautiful, beauti—FUL SOUP !”
“Chorus again !” cried the Gryphon, and the
Mock Turtle had just begun to repeat it, when
a cry of “The trial’s beginning!” was heard in
the distance.
“Come on !” cried the Gryphon, and, taking
Alice by the hand, it hurried off, without waiting
for the end of the song.
“What trial is it ?” Alice panted as she ran,
but the Gryphon only answered “Come on !” and
ran the faster, while more and more faintly
came, carried on the breeze that followed them,
the melancholy words :—
“Soo—oop of the e—e—evening,
Beautiful, beautiful Soup!”
M
WHO STOLE THE TARTS ? 163
tarts upon it : they looked so good, that it
made Alice quite hungry to look at them—“I
wish they ’d get the trial done,” she thought,
“and hand round the refreshments !” But there
seemed to be no chance of this, so she began
looking at everything about her to pass away
the time.
Alice had never been in a court of justice
before, but she had read about them in books,
and she was quite pleased to find that she knew
the name of nearly everything there. “That ’s
the judge,” she said to herself, “because of his
great wig.”
The judge, by the way, was the King, and
as he wore his crown over the wig, (look at
the frontispiece if you want to see how he did
it,) he did not look at all comfortable, and it
was certainly not becoming.
“ And that ’s the jury-box,” thought Alice,
“and those twelve creatures,” (she was obliged
to say “ creatures,” you see, because some of
them were animals, and some were birds,) “ I
CHAPTER XI.
WHO STOLE THE TARTS ?
THE King and Queen of Hearts were seated
on their throne when they arrived, with a great
crowd assembled about them—all sorts of little
birds and beasts, as well as the whole pack of
cards : the Knave was standing before them,
in chains, with a soldier on each side to guard
him; and near the King was the White Rabbit,
with a trumpet in one hand, and a scroll of
parchment in the other. In the very middle
of the court was a table, with a large dish of
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164 WHO STOLE THE TARTS ? 165
writing down “ stupid things!” on their slates,
and she could even make out that one of them
didn’t know how to spell “stupid,” and that he
had to ask his neighbour to tell him. “A nice
muddle their slates ’ll be in before the trial’s
over!” thought Alice.
One of the jurors had a pencil that squeaked.
This of course, Alice could not stand, and she
went round the court and got behind him, and
very soon found an opportunity of taking it
away. She did it so quickly that the poor
little juror (it was Bill, the Lizard) could not
make out at all what had become of it ; so,
after hunting all about for it, he was obliged
to write with one finger for the rest of the
day; and this was of very little use, as it left
no mark on the slate.
“ Herald, read the accusation !” said the
King.
On this the White Rabbit blew three blasts
on the trumpet, and then unrolled the parchment
scroll, and read as follows :—
suppose they are the jurors.” She said this
last word two or three times over to herself
being rather proud of it: for she thought, and
rightly too, that very few little girls of her age
knew the meaning of it at all. However, “ jurymen”
would have done just as well.
The twelve jurors were all writing very
busily on slates. “What are they doing?” Alice
whispered to the Gryphon. “They can’t have
anything to put down yet, before the trial ’s
begun.”
“They ’re putting down their names,” the
Gryphon whispered in reply, “ for fear they
should forget them before the end of the trial.”
“ Stupid things !” Alice began in a loud
indignant voice, but she stopped herself hastily,
for the White Rabbit cried out, “Silence in the
court!” and the King put on his spectacles and
looked anxiously round, to make out who was
talking.
Alice could see, as well as if she were looking
over their shoulders, that all the jurors were
166 WHO STOLE THE TARTS ? 167
“Not yet, not yet !” the Rabbit hastily interrupted.
“There’s a great deal to come before
that!”
“Call the first witness,” said the King; and
the White Rabbit blew three blasts on the
trumpet, and called out, “First witness!”
The first witness was the Hatter. He came
in with a teacup in one hand, and a piece of
bread-and-butter in the other. “I beg pardon,
your Majesty,” he began, “ for bringing these
in : but I hadn’t quite finished my tea when
I was sent for.”
“You ought to have finished,” said the King.
“When did you begin ?”
The Hatter looked at the March Hare, who
had followed him into the court, arm-in-arm
with the Dormouse. “Fourteenth of March, I
think it was,” he said.
“Fifteenth,” said the March Hare.
“Sixteenth,” added the Dormouse.
“Write that down,” the King said to the
jury, and the jury eagerly wrote down all three
“The Queen of Hearts, she made some tarts,
All on a summer day:
The Knave of Hearts, he stole those tarts,
And took them quite away !”
“ Consider your verdict,” the King said to
the jury.
168 WHO STOLE THE TARTS ? 169
Just at this moment Alice felt a very curious
sensation, which puzzled her a good deal until
she made out what it was: she was beginning
to grow larger again, and she thought at first
she would get up and leave the court; but on
second thoughts she decided to remain where
she was as long as there was room for her.
“I wish you wouldn’t squeeze so,” said the
Dormouse, who was sitting next to her. “ I can
hardly breathe.”
“ I can’t help it,” said Alice very meekly :
“I’m growing.”
“ You ’ve no right to grow here,” said the
Dormouse.
“Don’t talk nonsense,” said Alice more
boldly: “you know you’re growing too.”
“Yes, but I grow at a reasonable pace,” said
the Dormouse: “not in that ridiculous fashion.”
And he got up very sulkily and crossed over
to the other side of the court.
All this time the Queen had never left off
staring at the Hatter, and, just as the Dormouse
dates on their slates, and then added them up,
and reduced the answer to shillings and pence.
“Take off your hat,” the King said to the
Hatter.
“It isn’t mine,” said the Hatter.
“ Stolen !” the King exclaimed, turning to
the jury, who instantly made a memorandum
of the fact.
“I keep them to sell,” the Hatter added as
an explanation : “ I ’ve none of my own. I ’m
a hatter.”
Here the Queen put on her spectacles, and
began staring at the Hatter, who turned
pale and fidgeted.
“Give your evidence,” said the King; “ and
don’t be nervous, or I’ll have you executed on
the spot.”
This did not seem to encourage the witness
at all : he kept shifting from one foot to the
other, looking uneasily at the Queen, and in
his confusion he bit a large piece out of his
teacup instead of the bread-and-butter.
170 WHO STOLE THE TARTS ? 171
“Of course twinkling begins with a T !” said
the King sharply. “Do you take me for a
dunce? Go on!”
“I’m a poor man,” the Hatter went on, “ and
most things twinkled after that—only the March
Hare said——”
“ I didn’t !” the March Hare interrupted in
a great hurry.
“You did !” said the Hatter.
“I deny it !” said the March Hare.
“ He denies it,” said the King : “ leave out
that part.”
“Well, at any rate, the Dormouse said—” the
Hatter went on, looking anxiously round to see
if he would deny it too : but the Dormouse
denied nothing, being fast asleep.
“After that,” continued the Hatter, “ I cut
some more bread-and-butter——”
“But what did the Dormouse say?” one of
the jury asked.
“That I can’t remember,” said the Hatter.
“You must remember,” remarked the King,
crossed the court, she said to one of the officers
of the court, “Bring me the list of the singers in
the last concert!” on which the wretched Hatter
trembled so, that he
shook both his shoes
off.
“Give your evidence,”
the King repeated
angrily, “or
I’ll have you executed,
whether you’re
nervous or not.”
“I’m a poor man,
your Majesty,” the
Hatter began in
a trembling voice,
“ and I hadn’t but just begun my tea—not
above a week or so—and what with the breadand-butter
getting so thin—and the twinkling
of the tea——”
“The twinkling of what?” said the King.
“It began with the tea,” the Hatter replied.
172 WHO STOLE THE TARTS ? 173
on the floor, as it is.”
“Then you may sit down,” the King replied.
Here the other guinea-pig cheered, and was
suppressed.
“Come, that finished the guinea-pigs!” thought
Alice. “Now we shall get on better.”
“I’d rather finish my tea,” said the Hatter,
with an anxious look at the Queen, who was
reading the list of singers.
“ You may go,” said the King, and the
Hatter hurriedly left the court, without even
waiting to put his shoes on.
“or I’ll have you executed.”
The miserable Hatter dropped his teacup and
bread-and-butter, and went down on one knee.
“I’m a poor man, your Majesty,” he began.
“ You ’re a very poor speaker,” said the
King.
Here one of the guinea-pigs cheered, and was
immediately suppressed by the officers of the
court. (As that is rather a hard word, I will
just explain to you how it was done. They had
a large canvass bag, which tied up at the mouth
with strings: into this they slipped the guineapig,
head first, and then sat upon it.)
“ I ’m glad I ’ve seen that done,” thought
Alice. “I’ve so often read in the newspapers,
at the end of trials, ‘There was some attempt
at applause, which was immediately suppressed
by the officers of the court,’ and I never understood
what it meant till now.”
“If that ’s all you know about it, you may
stand down,” continued the King.
“I can’t go no lower,” said the Hatter: “ I ’m
174 WHO STOLE THE TARTS ? 175
“Collar that Dormouse!” the Queen shrieked
out. “Behead that Dormouse! Turn that Dormouse
out of court! Suppress him! Pinch him!
Off with his whiskers !”
For some minutes the whole court was in
confusion, getting the Dormouse turned out, and,
by the time they had settled down again, the
cook had disappeared.
“Never mind !” said the King, with an air
of great relief. “Call the next witness.” And
he added in an undertone to the Queen,
“Really, my dear, you must cross-examine the
next witness. It quite makes my forehead ache!”
Alice watched the White Rabbit as he fumbled
over the list, feeling very curious to see what
the next witness would be like, “ —for they
haven’t got much evidence yet,” she said to
herself. Imagine her surprise, when the White
Rabbit read out, at the top of his shrill little
voice, the name “Alice!”
“——and just take his head off outside,” the
Queen added to one of the officers ; but the
Hatter was out of sight before the officer could
get to the door.
“Call the next witness !” said the King.
The next witness was the Duchess’ cook.
She carried the pepper-box in her hand, and
Alice guessed who it was, even before she got
into the court, by the way the people near the
door began sneezing all at once.
“Give your evidence,” said the King.
“Shan’t,” said the cook.
The King looked anxiously at the White
Rabbit, who said in a low voice, “Your Majesty
must cross-examine this witness.”
“Well, if I must, I must,” the King said
with a melancholy air, and, after folding his
arms and frowning at the cook till his eyes
were nearly out of sight, he said in a deep
voice, “What are tarts made of ?”
“Pepper, mostly,” said the cook.
“Treacle,” said a sleepy voice behind her.
ALICE’S EVIDENCE 177
dent of the gold-fish kept running in her head,
and she had a vague sort of idea that they
must be collected at once and put back into the
jury-box, or they would die.
CHAPTER XII.
ALICE’S EVIDENCE.
“HERE !” cried Alice, quite forgetting in the
flurry of the moment how large she had grown
in the last few minutes, and she jumped up in
such a hurry that she tipped over the jury-box
with the edge of her skirt, upsetting all the jurymen
on to the heads of the crowd below, and
there they lay sprawling about, reminding her
very much of a globe of gold-fish she had
accidentally upset the week before.
“Oh, I beg your pardon !” she exclaimed in
a tone of great dismay, and began picking them
up again as quickly as she could, for the acciN
178 ALICE’S EVIDENCE ALICE’S EVIDENCE 179
“What do you know about this business?”
the King said to Alice.
“Nothing,” said Alice.
“Nothing whatever ?” persisted the King.
“Nothing whatever,” said Alice.
“That’s very important,” the King said, turning
to the jury. They were just beginning to
write this down on their slates, when the White
Rabbit interrupted: “Unimportant, your Majesty
means, of course,” he said in a very respectful
tone, but frowning and making faces at him as
he spoke.
“Unimportant, of course, I meant,” the King
hastily said, and went on to himself in an undertone,
“ important—unimportant—unimportant—
important——” as if he were trying which word
sounded best.
Some of the jury wrote it down “important,”
and some “unimportant.” Alice could see this,
as she was near enough to look over their
slates; “but it doesn’t matter a bit,” she thought
to herself.
“The trial cannot proceed,” said the King in
a very grave voice, “until all the jurymen are
back in their proper places—all,” he repeated
with great emphasis, looking hard at Alice as
he said so.
Alice looked at the jury-box, and saw that,
in her haste, she had put the Lizard in head
downwards, and the poor little thing was
waving its tail about in a melancholy way,
being quite unable to move. She soon got it
out again, and put it right; “not that it signifies
much,” she said to herself ; “I should think it
would be quite as much use in the trial one
way up as the other.”
As soon as the jury had a little recovered
from the shock of being upset, and their slates
and pencils had been found and handed back
to them, they set to work very diligently to
write out a history of the accident, all except
the Lizard, who seemed too much overcome to
do anything but sit with its mouth open, gazing
up into the roof of the court.
N 2
180 ALICE’S EVIDENCE ALICE’S EVIDENCE 181
“What’s in it ?” said the Queen.
“ I haven’t opened it yet,” said the White
Rabbit, “but it seems to be a letter, written by
the prisoner to—to somebody.”
“ It must have been that,” said the King,
“unless it was written to nobody, which isn’t
usual, you know.”
“Who is it directed to ?” said one of the
jurymen.
“ It isn’t directed at all,” said the White
Rabbit; “ in fact, there’s nothing written on the
outside.” He unfolded the paper as he spoke,
and added, “ It isn’t a letter, after all : it’s a
set of verses.”
“ Are they in the prisoner’s handwriting ?”
asked another of the jurymen.
“No, they ’re not,” said the White Rabbit,
“and that’s the queerest thing about it.” (The
jury all looked puzzled.)
“ He must have imitated somebody else’s
hand,” said the King. (The jury all brightened
up again.)
At this moment the King, who had been for
some time busily writing in his note-book, called
out “ Silence !” and read out from his book,
“ Rule Forty-two. All persons more than a
mile high to leave the court.”
Everybody looked at Alice.
“I’m not a mile high,” said Alice.
“You are,” said the King.
“Nearly two miles high,” added the Queen.
“Well, I shan’t go, at any rate,” said Alice;
“besides, that ’s not a regular rule : you invented
it just now.”
“It’s the oldest rule in the book,” said the
King.
“Then it ought to be Number One,” said Alice.
The King turned pale, and shut his notebook
hastily. “Consider your verdict,” he said to
the jury, in a low trembling voice.
“There’s more evidence to come yet, please
your Majesty,” said the White Rabbit, jumping
up in a great hurry; “ this paper has just been
picked up.”
182 ALICE’S EVIDENCE ALICE’S EVIDENCE 183
“Please your Majesty,” said the Knave,
“I didn’t write it, and they can’t prove I did:
there’s no name signed at the end.”
“If you didn’t sign it,” said the King, “that
only makes the matter worse. You must have
meant some mischief, or else you’d have signed
your name like an honest man.”
There was a general clapping of hands at
this : it was the first really clever thing the
King had said that day.
“That proves his guilt,” said the Queen.
“ It proves nothing of the sort !” said
Alice. “Why, you don’t even know what they’re
about!”
“Read them,” said the King.
The White Rabbit put on his spectacles.
“Where shall I begin, please your Majesty ?”
he asked.
“ Begin at the beginning,” the King said,
gravely, “ and go on till you come to the end :
then stop.”
These were the verses the White Rabbit read:—
“They told me you had been to her,
And mentioned me to him:
She gave me a good character,
But said I could not swim.
He sent them word I had not gone
(We know it to be true):
If she should push the matter on,
What would become of you ?
I gave her one, they gave him two,
You gave us three or more;
They all returned from him to you,
Though they were mine before.
If I or she should chance to be
Involved in this affair,
He trusts to you to set them free,
Exactly as we were.
184 ALICE’S EVIDENCE ALICE’S EVIDENCE 185
in it,” but none of them attempted to explain
the paper.
“ If there ’s no meaning in it,” said the
King, “ that saves a world of trouble, you
know, as we needn’t try to find any. And
yet I don ’t know,” he went on, spreading
out the verses on his knee, and looking at them
with one eye; “ I seem to see some meaning in
them, after all. ‘ —said I could not swim—’
you can’t swim, can you?” he added, turning
to the Knave.
The Knave shook his head sadly. “ Do I
look like it ?” he said. (Which he certainly
did not, being made entirely of cardboard.)
“All right, so far,” said the King, and he
went on muttering over the verses to himself :
“ ‘We know it to be true—’ that’s the jury, of
course— ‘ I gave her one, they gave him two—’
why, that must be what he did with the tarts,
you know—”
“ But, it goes on ‘ they all returned from
him to you,’ ” said Alice.
My notion was that you had been
(Before she had this fit)
An obstacle that came between
Him, and ourselves, and it.
Don’t let him know she liked them best,
For this must ever be
A secret, kept from all the rest,
Between yourself and me.”
“That’s the most important piece of evidence
we ’ve heard yet,” said the King, rubbing his
hands; “ so now let the jury——”
“ If any one of them can explain it,” said
Alice, (she had grown so large in the last few
minutes that she wasn’t a bit afraid of interrupting
him,) “ I’ll give him sixpence. I don’t
believe there ’s an atom of meaning in it.”
The jury all wrote down on their slates,
“She doesn’t believe there’s an atom of meaning
186 ALICE’S EVIDENCE ALICE’S EVIDENCE 187
no mark; but he now hastily began again, using
the ink, that was trickling down his face, as
long as it lasted.)
“Then the words don ’t fit you,” said the
King, looking round the court with a smile.
There was a dead silence.
“It’s a pun!” the King added in an angry
tone, and everybody laughed. “Let the jury
consider their verdict,” the King said, for about
the twentieth time that day.
“No, no!” said the Queen. “Sentence first—
verdict afterwards.”
“Stuff and nonsense !” said Alice loudly. “The
idea of having the sentence first !”
“Hold your tongue!” said the Queen, turning
purple.
“I won’t !” said Alice.
“Off with her head !” the Queen shouted at
the top of her voice. Nobody moved.
“Who cares for you ?” said Alice, (she had
grown to her full size by this time.) “You’re
nothing but a pack of cards !”
ing an inkstand at the Lizard as she spoke.
(The unfortunate little Bill had left off writing
on his slate with one finger, as he found it made
“Why, there they
are !” said the King
triumphantly, pointing
to the tarts on the
table. “Nothing can be
clearer than that. Then
again—‘ before she had
this fit—’ you never
had fits, my dear, I
think ?” he said to the
Queen.
“ Never !” said the
Queen furiously, throw-
188 ALICE’S EVIDENCE ALICE’S EVIDENCE 189
little scream, half of fright and half of anger,
and tried to beat them off, and found herself
lying on the bank, with her head in the lap of
her sister, who was gently brushing away some
dead leaves that had fluttered down from the
trees upon her face.
“Wake up, Alice dear !” said her sister ;
“Why, what a long sleep you ’ve had !”
“Oh, I’ve had such a curious dream !” said
Alice, and she told her sister, as well as she
could remember them, all these strange Adventures
of hers that you have just been reading
about; and when she had finished, her sister
kissed her, and said, “ It was a curious
dream, dear, certainly: but now run in to your
tea ; it ’s getting late.” So Alice got up and
ran off, thinking while she ran, as well she
might, what a wonderful dream it had been.
At this the whole pack rose up into the air,
and came flying down upon her ; she gave a
190 191
The long grass rustled at her feet as the
White Rabbit hurried by—the frightened Mouse
splashed his way through the neighbouring pool
—she could hear the rattle of the teacups as
the March Hare and his friends shared their
never-ending meal, and the shrill voice of the
Queen ordering off her unfortunate guests to
execution—once more the pig-baby was sneezing
on the Duchess’ knee, while plates and dishes
crashed around it—once more the shriek of the
Gryphon, the squeaking of the Lizard’s slatepencil,
and the choking of the suppressed guineapigs,
filled the air, mixed up with the distant
sobs of the miseralbe Mock Turtle.
So she sat on, with closed eyes, and half
believed herself in Wonderland, though she
knew she had but to open them again and all
would change to dull reality—the grass would
be only rustling in the wind, and the pool rippling
to the waving of the reeds—the rattling
teacups would change to tinkling sheep-bells,
and the Queen’s shrill cries to the voice of the
But her sister sat still just as she left her,
leaning her head on her hand, watching the
setting sun, and thinking of little Alice and all
her wonderful Adventures, till she too began
dreaming after a fashion, and this was her
dream:—
First, she dreamed of little Alice herself :—
once again the tiny hands were clasped upon
her knee, and the bright eager eyes were looking
up into hers—she could hear the very tones
of her voice, and see that queer little toss of
her head, to keep back the wandering hair that
would always get into her eyes—and still as
she listened, or seemed to listen, the whole
place around her became alive with the strange
creatures of her little sister’s dream.
192
shepherd boy—and the sneeze of the baby, the
shriek of the Gryphon, and all the other queer
noises, would change (she knew) to the confused
clamour of the busy farm-yard—while the
lowing of the cattle in the distance would take
the place of the Mock Turtle’s heavy sobs.
Lastly, she pictured to herself how this same
little sister of hers would, in the after-time, be
herself a grown woman ; and how she would
keep, through all her riper years, the simple and
loving heart of her childhood : and how she
would gather about her other little children, and
make their eyes bright and eager with many a
strange tale, perhaps even with the dream of
Wonderland of long-ago : and how she would
feel with all their simple sorrows, and find a
pleasure in all their simple joys, remembering
her own child-life, and the happy summer days.
THE END.