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 a
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 Sheet: - 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.
- The prettiest are always further! - she said at last, with a sigh
at the obstinacy of the rushes in growing so far off, as, with flushed
cheeks and dripping hair and hands, she scrambled back into her place, and
began to arrange her new-found treasures.
What mattered it to her just than that the rushes had begun to fade,
and to lose all their scent and beauty, from the very moment that she
picked them? Even real scented rushes, you know, last only a very little
while - and these, being dream-rushes, melted away almost like snow, as
they lay in heaps at her feet -but Alice hardly noticed this, there were
so many other curious things to think about.
They hadn't gone much farther before the blade of one of the oars got
fast in the water and WOULDN'T come out again (so Alice explained it
afterwards), and the consequence was that the handle of it caught her
under the chin, and, in spite of a series of little shrieks of - Oh, oh,
oh! - from poor Alice, it swept her straight off the seat, and down among
the heap of rushes.
However, she wasn't hurt, and was soon up again: the Sheep went on
with her knitting all the while, just as if nothing had happened.
- That was a nice crab you caught! - she remarked, as Alice got back
into her place, very much relieved to find herself still in the boat.
- Was it? I didn't see it, - Said Alice, peeping cautiously over the
side of the boat into the dark water. - I wish it hadn't let go - I should
so like to see a little crab to take home with me! - But the Sheep only
laughed scornfully, and went on with her knitting.
- Are there many crabs here? - said Alice.
- Crabs, and all sorts of things, - said the Sheep: - plenty of
choice, only make up your mind. Now, what DO you want to buy?
- To buy! - Alice echoes in a tone that was half astonished and half
frightened - for the oars, and the boat, and the river, had vanished all
in a moment, and she was back again in the little dark shop.
- I should like to buy an egg, please, - she said timidly. - How do
you sell them?
- Fivepence farthing for one - Twopence for two, - the Sheep replied.
- Then two are cheaper than one? - Alice said in a surprised tone,
taking out her purse.
- Only you MUST eat them both, if you buy two, - said the Sheep.
- Then I'll have ONE, please, - said Alice, as she put the money down
on the counter. For she thought to herself, - They mightn't be at all
nice, you know.
The Sheep took the money, and put it away in a box: then she said - I
never put things into people's hands - that would never do - you must get
it for yourself. - And so saying, she went off to the other end of the
shop, and set the egg upright on a shelf.
- I wonder WHY it wouldn't do? - thought Alice, as she groped her way
among the tables and chairs, for the shop was very dark towards the end. -
The egg seems to get further away the more I walk towards it. Let me see,
is this a chair? Why, it's got branches, I declare! How very odd to find
trees growing here! And actually here's a little brook! Well, this is the
very queerest shop I ever saw!

* * * * * * *
* * * * * *
* * * * * * *


So she went on, wondering more and more at every step, as everything
turned into a tree the moment she came up to it, and she quite expected
the egg to do the same.



CHAPTER VI

Humpty Dumpty

However, the egg only got larger and larger, and more and more human:
when she had come within a few yards of it, she saw that it had eyes and a
nose and mouth; and when she had come close to it, she saw clearly that it
was HUMPTY DUMPTY himself. - It can't be anybody else! - she said to
herself. - I'm as certain of it, as if his name were written all over his
face.
It might have been written a hundred times, easily, on that enormous
face. Humpty Dumpty was sitting with his legs crossed, like a Turk, on the
top of a high wall - such a narrow one that Alice quite wondered how he
could keep his balance - and, as his eyes were steadily fixed in the
opposite direction, and he didn't take the least notice of her, she
thought he must be a stuffed figure after all.
- And how exactly like an egg he is! - she said aloud, standing with
her hands ready to catch him, for she was every moment expecting him to
fall.
- It's VERY provoking, - Humpty Dumpty said after a long silence,
looking away from Alice as he spoke, - to be called an egg -VERY!
- I said you LOOKED like an egg, Sir, - Alice gently explained. - And
some eggs are very pretty, you know, she added, hoping to turn her remark
into a sort of a compliment.
- Some people, - said Humpty Dumpty, looking away from her as usual,
- have no more sense than a baby!
Alice didn't know what to say to this: it wasn't at all like
conversation, she thought, as he never said anything to HER; in fact, his
last remark was evidently addressed to a tree - so she stood and softly
repeated to herself:

- Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall:
Humpty Dumpty had a great fall.
All the King's horses and all the King's men
Couldn't put Humpty Dumpty in his place again.

- That last line is much too long for the poetry, - she added, almost
out loud, forgetting that Humpty Dumpty would hear her.
- Don't stand there chattering to yourself like that, - Humpty Dumpty
said, looking at her for the first time, - but tell me your name and your
business.
- My NAME is Alice, but
- It's a stupid name enough! - Humpty Dumpty interrupted impatiently.
- What does it mean?
- MUST a name mean something? - Alice asked doubtfully.
- Of course it must, - Humpty Dumpty said with a sort laugh:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16