Alice's Adventures in Wonderland

								

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, 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

        the 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.'"
"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?"
"You insult me by talking such nonsense!" said the Mouse, getting up and
walking away.
"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.
"I wish I had Dinah, our cat, here!" said Alice. This caused a
remarkable sensation among the party. Some of the birds hurried off at
once, 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! Nobody seems to like her down here and
I'm sure she's the best cat in the world!" 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.
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; Alice 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 good-naturedly began hunting about for them, but they were
nowhere to be seen--everything seemed to have changed since her swim in