Alice's Adventures in Wonderland: HTML Edition

								

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 except a tiny golden key,
and Alice's first thought was that it might belong to one of the
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 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 know
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 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 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 histories 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,' 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, toffee, 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