ChapterIII
“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, 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 anxiously
among the trees round her, 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 reach her: “poor thing!” said Alice in a coaxing tone,
and she tried hard to whistle
to it, but she was terribly alarmed all the while at the thought that
it might be hungry, in which case
it would probably devour her 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, and with a yelp of delight 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 at the other side, the puppy made another dart at the stick,
and tumlbed head over heels
in its hurry to get hold: then Alice, thinking it was very like having
a game of play with a
cart-horse, 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: she set
off at once, and ran till
the puppy’s bark sounded quite faint in the distance, and till she
was quite tired and out of breath.
“And yet what a dear little puppy it was!” said Alice, as she leant
against a buttercup to rest
herself, and fanned herself with her hat, “I should have liked teaching
it tricks, if---if I’d only been
the right size to do it! Oh! 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 could not see anything that looked like the right thing
to eat under the circumstances.
There was a large mushroom 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
to 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 eyes immediately met those of a large blue
caterpillar, which was sitting with its arms folded, quietly smoking a
long hookah, and taking not the least notice of her or of anything
else.
For some time they looked at each other in silence: at last the
caterpillar took the hookah out of its mouth, and languidly addressed
her.
“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 that.”
“What do you mean by that?” said the caterpillar, “explain yourself!”
“I ca’n’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 ca’n’t put it more clearly,” Alice replied very politely,
“for I ca’n’t understand it
myself, and really to be so many different sizes in one 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 know, and then after that into a butterfly, I should
think it’ll feel a little queer, don’t
you think so?”
“Not a bit,” said the caterpillar.
“All I know is,” said Alice, “it would feel 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 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 had no reason ready,
and the caterpillar seemed
to be in a very bad temper, she turned round and walked away.
“Come back!” the caterpillar called after her, “I’ve something important to say!”
This sounded promising: Alice turned and came back.
“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 the
caterpillar might tell her something worth hearing. For some minutes
it puffed away at its hookah
without speaking, but at last it unfolded its arms, took the hookah
out of its mouth again, and
saidk “so you think you’re changed, do you?”
“Yes, sir,” said Alice, “I ca’n’t remember the things I used to know--I’ve
tried to say “How doth
the little busy bee” and it came all different!”
“Try and repeat “You are old, father William”,” said the caterpillar.
Alice folded her hands, and began:
1.
“You are old, father William,” the young man
said,
“And your hair is
exceedingly white:
And yet you incessantly stand on your
head--
Do you think,
at your age, it is right?”
2.
“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.”
3.
“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?”
4.
“In my youth,” said the sage, as he shook
his gray locks,
“I kept all
my limbs very supple.
By the use of this ointment, five shillings
the box--
Allow
me to sell you a couple.”
5.
“You are old,” said the youth,” and your jaws
are too weak
“For anything
tougher than suet:
Yet you eat all the goose, with the
bones and the beak--
Pray,
how did you manage to do it?”
6.
“In my youth,” said the old man, “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.”
7.
“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?”
8.
“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!”
“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.”
“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 loudly and angrily,
rearing itself straight up as
it spoke (it was exactly three inches high).
“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 quietly until it chose to speak again: in a few
minutes the caterpillar took the
hookah out of its mouth, and got down off the mushroom, and crawled
away into the grass,
merely remarking as it went: “the top will make you grow taller, and
the stalk will make you grow
shorter.”
“The top of what? the stalk of what?” thought Alice.
“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, and
then picked it and carefully broke it in two, taking the stalk in one
hand and the top in the other.
“Which does the stalk do?” she said, and nibbled a little bit of it to
try:
the next moment she felt a violent blow on her chin: it had struck her
foot!
She was a good deal frightened by this very
sudden change, but as she did not shrink any further, and had not dropped
the
top of the mushroom, she did not give up hope yet. There was hardly
room to
open her mouth, with her chin pressing against her foot, but she did
it at last,
and managed to bite off a little bit of the top of the mushroom.
“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 seen: she looked down upon 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 ca’n’t see you?” She was
moving
them about as she spoke, but no result seemed to follow, except a little
rustling among the leaves. Then she tried to bring her head down to
her hands,
and was delighted to find that her neck would bend about easily in
every
direction, like a serpent. She had just succeeded in bending it down
in a
beautiful zig-zag, and was going to dive in among the leaves, which
she found
to be the tops of the trees of the wood she had been wandering in,
when a
sharp hiss made her draw back: a large pigeon had flown into her face,
and
was violently beating her with its wings.
“Serpent!” screamed the pigeon.
“I’m not a serpent!” said Alice indignantly, “let me alone!”
“I’ve tried every way!” the pigeon said desperately, with a kind of
sob: “nothing seems to suit ‘em!”
“I haven’t the least idea what you mean,” said Alice.
“I’ve tried the roots of trees, and I’ve tried banks, and I’m tried
hedges,” the pigeon went on
without attending to her, “but them serpents! There’s no pleasing ‘em!”
Alice was more and more puzzled, but she thought there was no use in
saying anything till the
pigeon had finished.
“As if it wasn’t trouble enough hatching the eggs!” said the pigeon,
“without being on the look out
for serpents, day and night! Why, I haven’t had a wink of sleep these
three weeks!”
“I’m very sorry you’ve been annoyed,” said Alice, beginning to see its meaning.
“And just as I’d taken the highest tree in the wood,” said the pigeon
raising its voice to a shriek,
“and was just thinking I was free of ‘em at least, they must beeds
come down from the sky! Ugh!
Serpent!”
“But I’m not a serpent,” said Alice, “I’m a-- I’m a---”
“Well! What are you?” said the pigeon, “I 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.
“A likely story indeed!” said the pigeon, “I’ve seen a good many of
them in my time, but never
one with such a neck as yours! No, you’re a serpent, I know that well
enough! I suppose you’ll
tell me next that you never tasted an egg!”
“I have tasted eggs, certainly,” said Alice, who was a very truthful
child, “but indeed I do’n’t want
any of yours. I do’n’t like them raw.”
“Well, be off, then!” said the pigeon, and settled down into its nest
again. Alice crouched down
among the trees, as well as she could, as her neck kept getting entangled
among the branches, and
several times she had to stop and untwist it. Soon she remebered the
pieces of mushroom which
she still held in her hands, and 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 size.
It was so long since she had been of the right size that it felt quite
strange at first, but she got quite
used to it in a minute or two, and began talking to herself as usual:
“well! 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 to my right size again: the next thing
is, to get into that beautiful
garden--how is that to be done, I wonder?”
Just as she said this, she noticed that one of the trees had a doorway leading right into it. “That’s very curious!” she thought, “but everything’s curious today: I may as well go in.”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 set to work eating
the pieces of mushroom till she was about fifteen inches 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.