Through the Looking-Glass
altering most of the pins. “But really you should have a lady’s maid!”
“I’m sure I’ll take you with pleasure!” the Queen said. “Twopence a
week, and jam every other day.”
Alice couldn’t help laughing, as she said, “I don’t want you to hire
_me_—and I don’t care for jam.”
“It’s very good jam,” said the Queen.
“Well, I don’t want any _to-day_, at any rate.”
“You couldn’t have it if you _did_ want it,” the Queen said. “The rule
is, jam to-morrow and jam yesterday—but never jam to-day.”
“It _must_ come sometimes to ‘jam to-day,’” Alice objected.
“No, it can’t,” said the Queen. “It’s jam every _other_ day: to-day
isn’t any _other_ day, you know.”
“I don’t understand you,” said Alice. “It’s dreadfully confusing!”
“That’s the effect of living backwards,” the Queen said kindly: “it
always makes one a little giddy at first—”
“Living backwards!” Alice repeated in great astonishment. “I never
heard of such a thing!”
“—but there’s one great advantage in it, that one’s memory works both
ways.”
“I’m sure _mine_ only works one way,” Alice remarked. “I can’t remember
things before they happen.”
“It’s a poor sort of memory that only works backwards,” the Queen
remarked.
“What sort of things do _you_ remember best?” Alice ventured to ask.
“Oh, things that happened the week after next,” the Queen replied in a
careless tone. “For instance, now,” she went on, sticking a large piece
of plaster on her finger as she spoke, “there’s the King’s Messenger.
He’s in prison now, being punished: and the trial doesn’t even begin
till next Wednesday: and of course the crime comes last of all.”
“Suppose he never commits the crime?” said Alice.
“That would be all the better, wouldn’t it?” the Queen said, as she
bound the plaster round her finger with a bit of ribbon.
Alice felt there was no denying _that_. “Of course it would be all the
better,” she said: “but it wouldn’t be all the better his being
punished.”
“You’re wrong _there_, at any rate,” said the Queen: “were _you_ ever
punished?”
“Only for faults,” said Alice.
“And you were all the better for it, I know!” the Queen said
triumphantly.
“Yes, but then I _had_ done the things I was punished for,” said Alice:
“that makes all the difference.”
“But if you _hadn’t_ done them,” the Queen said, “that would have been
better still; better, and better, and better!” Her voice went higher
with each “better,” till it got quite to a squeak at last.
Alice was just beginning to say “There’s a mistake somewhere—,” when
the Queen began screaming so loud that she had to leave the sentence
unfinished. “Oh, oh, oh!” shouted the Queen, shaking her hand about as
if she wanted to shake it off. “My finger’s bleeding! Oh, oh, oh, oh!”
Her screams were so exactly like the whistle of a steam-engine, that
Alice had to hold both her hands over her ears.
“What _is_ the matter?” she said, as soon as there was a chance of
making herself heard. “Have you pricked your finger?”
“I haven’t pricked it _yet_,” the Queen said, “but I soon shall—oh, oh,
oh!”
“When do you expect to do it?” Alice asked, feeling very much inclined
to laugh.
“When I fasten my shawl again,” the poor Queen groaned out: “the brooch
will come undone directly. Oh, oh!” As she said the words the brooch
flew open, and the Queen clutched wildly at it, and tried to clasp it
again.
“Take care!” cried Alice. “You’re holding it all crooked!” And she
caught at the brooch; but it was too late: the pin had slipped, and the
Queen had pricked her finger.
“That accounts for the bleeding, you see,” she said to Alice with a
smile. “Now you understand the way things happen here.”
“But why don’t you scream now?” Alice asked, holding her hands ready to
put over her ears again.
“Why, I’ve done all the screaming already,” said the Queen. “What would
be the good of having it all over again?”
By this time it was getting light. “The crow must have flown away, I
think,” said Alice: “I’m so glad it’s gone. I thought it was the night
coming on.”
“I wish _I_ could manage to be glad!” the Queen said. “Only I never can
remember the rule. You must be very happy, living in this wood, and
being glad whenever you like!”
“Only it is so _very_ lonely here!” Alice said in a melancholy voice;
and at the thought of her loneliness two large tears came rolling down
her cheeks.
“Oh, don’t go on like that!” cried the poor Queen, wringing her hands
in despair. “Consider what a great girl you are. Consider what a long
way you’ve come to-day. Consider what o’clock it is. Consider anything,
only don’t cry!”
Alice could not help laughing at this, even in the midst of her tears.
“Can _you_ keep from crying by considering things?” she asked.
“That’s the way it’s done,” the Queen said with great decision: “nobody
can do two things at once, you know. Let’s consider your age to begin
with—how old are you?”
“I’m seven and a half exactly.”
“You needn’t say ‘exactually,’” the Queen remarked: “I can believe it
without that. Now I’ll give _you_ something to believe. I’m just one
hundred and one, five months and a day.”
“I can’t believe _that_!” said Alice.
“Can’t you?” the Queen said in a pitying tone. “Try again: draw a long
breath, and shut your eyes.”
Alice laughed. “There’s no use trying,” she said: “one _can’t_ believe
impossible things.”
“I daresay you haven’t had much practice,” said the Queen. “When I was
your age, I always did it for half-an-hour a day. Why, sometimes I’ve
believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast. There goes
the shawl again!”
The brooch had come undone as she spoke, and a sudden gust of wind blew
the Queen’s shawl across a little brook. The Queen spread out her arms
again, and went flying after it, and this time she succeeded in
catching it for herself. “I’ve got it!” she cried in a triumphant tone.
“Now you shall see me pin it on again, all by myself!”
“Then I hope your finger is better now?” Alice said very politely, as
she crossed the little brook after the Queen.
* * * * * * *
* * * * * *
* * * * * * *
“Oh, much better!” cried the Queen, her voice rising to a squeak as she
went on. “Much be-etter! Be-etter! Be-e-e-etter! Be-e-ehh!” The last
word ended in a long bleat, so like a sheep that Alice quite started.
She looked at the Queen, who seemed to have suddenly wrapped herself up
in wool. Alice rubbed her eyes, and looked again. She couldn’t make out
what had happened at all. Was she in a shop? And was that really—was it
really a _sheep_ that was sitting on the other side of the counter? Rub
as she could, she could make nothing more of it: she was in a little
dark shop, leaning with her elbows on the counter, and opposite to her
was an old Sheep, sitting in an arm-chair knitting, and every now and
then leaving off to look at her through a great pair of spectacles.
“What is it you want to buy?” the Sheep said at last, looking up for a
moment from her knitting.
“I don’t _quite_ know yet,” Alice said, very gently. “I should like to
look all round me first, if I might.”
“You may look in front of you, and on both sides, if you like,” said
the Sheep: “but you can’t look _all_ round you—unless you’ve got eyes
at the back of your head.”
But these, as it happened, Alice had _not_ got: so she contented
herself with turning round, looking at the shelves as she came to them.
The shop seemed to be full of all manner of curious things—but the
oddest part of it all was, that whenever she looked hard at any shelf,
to make out exactly what it had on it, that particular shelf was always
quite empty: though the others round it were crowded as full as they
could hold.
“Things flow about so here!” she said at last in a plaintive tone,
after she had spent a minute or so in vainly pursuing a large bright
thing, that looked sometimes like a doll and sometimes like a work-box,
and was always in the shelf next above the one she was looking at. “And
this one is the most provoking of all—but I’ll tell you what—” she
added, as a sudden thought struck her, “I’ll follow it up to the very
top shelf of all. It’ll puzzle it to go through the ceiling, I expect!”
But even this plan failed: the “thing” went through the ceiling as
quietly as possible, as if it were quite used to it.
“Are you a child or a teetotum?” the Sheep said, as she took up another
pair of needles. “You’ll make me giddy soon, if you go on turning round
like that.” She was now working with fourteen pairs at once, and Alice
couldn’t help looking at her in great astonishment.
“How _can_ she knit with so many?” the puzzled child thought to
herself. “She gets more and more like a porcupine every minute!”
“Can you row?” the Sheep asked, handing her a pair of knitting-needles
as she spoke.
“Yes, a little—but not on land—and not with needles—” Alice was
beginning to say, when suddenly the needles turned into oars in her
hands, and she found they were in a little boat, gliding along between
banks: so there was nothing for it but to do her best.
“Feather!” cried the Sheep, as she took up another pair of needles.
This didn’t sound like a remark that needed any answer, so Alice said
nothing, but pulled away. There was something very queer about the
water, she thought, as every now and then the oars got fast in it, and
would hardly come out again.
“Feather! Feather!” the Sheep cried again, taking more needles. “You’ll
be catching a crab directly.”
“A dear little crab!” thought Alice. “I should like that.”
“Didn’t you hear me say ‘Feather’?” the Sheep cried angrily, taking up
quite a bunch of needles.
“Indeed I did,” said Alice: “you’ve said it very often—and very loud.
Please, where _are_ the crabs?”
“In the water, of course!” said the Sheep, sticking some of the needles
into her hair, as her hands were full. “Feather, I say!”
“_Why_ do you say ‘feather’ so often?” Alice asked at last, rather
vexed. “I’m not a bird!”
“You are,” said the Sheep: “you’re a little goose.”
This offended Alice a little, so there was no more conversation for a
minute or two, while the boat glided gently on, sometimes among beds of
weeds (which made the oars stick fast in the water, worse then ever),
and sometimes under trees, but always with the same tall river-banks
frowning over their heads.
“Oh, please! There are some scented rushes!” Alice cried in a sudden
transport of delight. “There really are—and _such_ beauties!”
“You needn’t say ‘please’ to _me_ about ’em,” the Sheep said, without
looking up from her knitting: “I didn’t put ’em there, and I’m not
going to take ’em away.”
“No, but I meant—please, may we wait and pick some?” Alice pleaded. “If
you don’t mind stopping the boat for a minute.”
“How am _I_ to stop it?” said the Sheep. “If you leave off rowing,
it’ll stop of itself.”
So the boat was left to drift down the stream as it would, till it
glided gently in among the waving rushes. And then the little sleeves
were carefully rolled up, and the little arms were plunged in
elbow-deep to get the rushes a good long way down before breaking them
off—and for a while Alice forgot all about the Sheep and the knitting,
as she bent over the side of the boat, with just the ends of her
tangled hair dipping into the water—while with bright eager eyes she
caught at one bunch after another of the darling scented rushes.
“I only hope the boat won’t tipple over!” she said to herself. “Oh,
_what_ a lovely one! Only I couldn’t quite reach it.” And it certainly
_did_ seem a little provoking (“almost as if it happened on purpose,”
she thought) that, though she managed to pick plenty of beautiful
rushes as the boat glided by, there was always a more lovely one that
she couldn’t reach.