Alice in Wonderland Chapter 7

Books at bedtime, Alice in Wonderland, Chapter 7, a mad tea party.

There was a table set out under a tree in front of the house, and the march air and the hatter were having teared it. A door-mouse was sitting between them, vast asleep, and the other two were using it as a cushion, resting their elbows on it, and talking over its head. Very uncomfortable for the door-mouse, or Alice. Only as it's asleep, I suppose it doesn't mind.

The table was a large one, but there three were all corrided around it at one corner. No room, no room, they cried out when they saw Alice coming. This plenty of room said Alice indignantly, and she sat down in a large armchair at one end of the table. Perhaps some wine the march air said in an encouraging tone.

Alice looked all around the table, but there was nothing on it, but tea. "I don't see any wine," she remarked. "There isn't any," said the march air. "Then it wasn't a very civil view to offer it," said Alice angrily.

It wasn't very civil view to sit down without being invited, said the march air. I didn't know it was your table," said Alice. It's laid for a great many more than three. Your hair once cutting, said the hatter.

He had been looking at Alice for some time with great curiosity, and this was his first speech. You should learn not to make personal remarks, Alice said, with some severity. It's very rude. The hatter opened his eyes, very, very wide on hearing this, but all he said was, "Why is a raven like a riding desk?"

"Come, we shall have some fun, now, thought Alice. I'm glad they've begun asking riddles. I believe I can guess that," she added aloud. "Do you mean that you think you can find out the answer to it," said the march air?

"Exactly so," said Alice. "Then you should say what you mean," the march air went on. I do, Alice, said, replying hesitantly. At least, at least, I mean what I say.

That's the same thing, you know. The same thing, a bit, said the hatter. You might just as well say, "I see what I eat is the same thing as I eat what I see." You might just as well say, "I did the march air, that I like what I get is the same thing as I get what I like."

You might just as well say, "I did the dorm house, who seemed to be talking in his sleep, that I'd breathe when I sleep is the same thing as I sleep when I breathe." It is the same thing for you, said the hatter, and here the conversation dropped, and the party sat silent for a minute, while Alice thought over all that she could remember about Ravens and writing desks. The hatter was the first to break the silence. "They have the month," said he, said, turning to Alice.

He had taken his watch out of his pocket and was looking at it uneasily, shaking it every now and then, and holding it to his ear. Alice considered it a little, and then said, "The fourth, two days wrong, siddha hatter. I told you Butter wouldn't suit the works he added, looking angrily at the march air. It was the best Butter," the march air neatly replied.

"Yes, but some crumbs must have got in as well," the hatter grumble. "You shouldn't have put it in with the bread knife." The march air took the watch and looked all at it gloomly. Then he dipped it in his cup of tea and looked at it again.

But he could think of nothing better to say than his first remark. It was the best Butter, you know. Alice had been looking over his shoulder with some curiosity. What a funny watch she remarked.

It tells the day of the month and doesn't tell what o'clock it is. "Why should it?" Butter hatter said. "Does your watch tell you what year it is?"

"Of course not," Alice replied readily. But that's because it stays the same year for such a long time together. Which is just the case with mine," said the hatter. Alice felt dreadfully puzzled.

The hatter's remarks seem to have no sort of meaning in it, and yet it was certainly English. "I don't quite understand," she said, as politely as she could. The door mail sizzles again, said the hatter, and he pulled a little hot tea upon its nose. The door mail shook its head impatiently and said without opening its eye.

Of course, of course, just what I was going to remark myself. "Have you guessed the riddle yet?" The hatter said, turning to Alice again. "No, I give up," Alice whispered.

"What's the answer?" "I haven't the slightest idea," said the hatter. "Nor I," said the march air. "Alice sighed wearily.

I think you might do something better with the time," she said, then wasted asking riddles that have no answers. "If you knew time as well as I do," said the hatter. "You wouldn't talk about wasting it. It's him."

"I don't know what you mean," said Alice. "Of course you don't," the hatter said, tossing his head contemptuously. "I dare say you never even spoke to time." "Perhaps not," Alice cautiously replied, "but I know I have to beat time when I learn music."

"Ah, that accounts for it," said the hatter. He won't stand beating. Now, if you only kept on good terms with him, he'd do almost anything you liked with the clock. For instance, suppose it were nine o'clock in the morning, just time to begin lessons.

You'd only have to whisper a hint to time, and round goes the clock in a twinkling. Half past one, time for dinner. I only wish it was the march air whispered to himself. That would be grand, certainly, said Alice thoughtfully.

But then, I wouldn't be hungry for it, you know. Not at first perhaps at the hatter, but you could keep it in at half past one as long as you liked. "Is that the way you marriage?" Alice asked.

The hatter shook his head mournfully, "not high," he replied. We quarreled last March, just before he went mad, you know, pointing with his teaspoon at the march air. It was at the great concert given by the queen of hearts, and I had to sing, "Twinkle, twinkle, little bad. How I wonder what you're at."

You know the song perhaps? "I've heard something like it," said Alice. "It goes on, you know." The hatter continued in this way.

Up above the world you fly, like a tea tray in the sky. "Twinkle, twinkle, here the door mouse shook itself and began singing in its sleep. Twinkle, twinkle, twinkle, twinkle, twinkle." And went on so long that they had to pinch it to make it stop.

"Well, I'd hardly finished the first verse," said the hatter, when the queen jumped up and bawled out. He's murdering the time, off with his head. "How dreadfully savage," exclaimed Alice. And ever since that, the hatter went on in a more form-tone.

He won't do a thing I ask. It's always six o'clock now. A bright idea came into Alice's head. Is that the reason so many teeth things are put out here, she asked?

"Yes, that's it," said the hatter with a sigh. "That's always tea time, and we have no time to wash the things between the wiles." Then you keep moving around, I suppose, said Alice. "Exactly so," said the hatter, as the things get used up.

But what happens when you come back to the beginning again, Alice benched to art? Suppose we change the subject of March Air interrupted yourening. I'm getting tired of this, I vote the young lady tells us a story. I'm afraid I don't know one, said Alice, rather ashamed at the proposal.

Then the door-mouthed shell, they both cried, "Wake up, door-mouthed," and they pinched it on both sides at once. The door-mouthed slowly opened his eyes. "I wasn't asleep," he said in a horse, "people-voiced." "I heard every word you fellows were saying."

"Tell us a story," said the March Air. "Yes, please do," pleaded Alice. And be quick about it, added the hatter, or you'll be asleep again before it's done. Once upon a time, there were three little sisters.

The door-mouse began in a great hurry, and their names were Elsie, Lacey and Tilly, and they lived at the bottom of a well. What did they live on, said Alice, who always took a great interest in questions of eating and drinking? They lived on treacle, said the door-mouthed, after thinking a minute or two. They couldn't have done that, you know, Alice gently remarked, "They'll have been ill."

So they were, said the door-mouse. Very ill. Alice tried to fancy to herself, that such an extraordinarily way of living would be like, but it puzzled her too much, so she went on. But why did they live at the bottom of a well?

Take some more tea, the March Air said to Alice, very honestly. "I've had nothing yet," Alice replied in an off-handed tone, "so I can't take more." "You mean you can't take less," said the hatter. "It's very easy to take more than nothing."

Nobody asked your opinion, said Alice, who's making personal remarks now, that had to ask triumphantly. Alice did not quite know what to say to this, so she helped herself to some tea and bread and butter, and then turned to the door-mouse and repeated her question. Why did they live at the bottom of a well? The door-mouse again took a minute or two to think about it, and then said, "It was a trickle well.

There is no such thing, Alice, was beginning very angrily, but the hatter in the March Air went, "ch-ch-ch," and the door-mouse, so clearly remarked, "If you can't be civil, you'd better finish the story yourself." No. "Please go on," Alice said, very humbly. I won't interrupt again.

I daresay, there may be one. One indeed said the door-mouse indignantly. However, he consented to go on, and so these three sisters, they were learning to draw, you know. "What did they draw?" said Alice, quite forgetting her promise.

"True call," said the door-mouse, without considering it all this time. I want to clean up, interrupt to the hatter. Let's all move one place on. He moved on as he spoke, and the door-mouse followed him.

The March Air moved into the door-mouse's space, and Alice, rather unwillingly, took the place to the March Air. The hatter was the only one who got any advantage from the change, and Alice was a good deal worse off than before, as the March Air had just upset the milk jug into his plate. Alice did not wish to offend the door-mouse again, so she began very cautiously. "But I don't understand, where did they draw the treacle from?"

"Well, you can draw water out of a water well," said the hatter, "so I should think that you could draw treacle out of a treacle well." "Err, stupid?" "But they were in the well," Alice said to the door-mouse, not choosing to notice the hatter's last remark. "Of course they were," said the door-mouse, "well, in." This answer so confused, poor Alice, that she let the door-mouse go on for some time without interrupting it.

"They were learning to draw," the door-mouse went on, yawning and rubbing his eyes, for he was getting very sleepy, and they drew all matter of things, everything that begins with an M." "Why with an M?" said Alice. "Why not?" said the March Air. Alice was silent.

The door-mouse had closed its eyes by this time, and was going off into a dose. But on being pinched by the hatter, it woke up again with a little shriek, and went on. That begins with an M, such as mouse traps, and the moon, and memory, and muchness. You know you say things as much of a muchness.

Did you ever see such a thing as a drawing of a muchness? "Really?" "Now you ask me," said Alice, "very much confused. I don't think then you shouldn't talk," said the hatter.

This piece of rudeness was more than Alice could bear. She got up in great disgust and walked off. The door-mouse fell asleep instantly, and neither of the others took the least notice of her going, though she looked back once or twice, half-hoping that they would call after her. But the last time she saw them, they were trying to put the door-mouse into the teapot.

At any rate, I'll never go there again," said Alice, as she picked her way through the will. It's the stupidest teapot I was ever at in all my life. As she said this, she noticed that one of the trees had a door leading right into it. "That's very curious," she thought.

But everything is curious today. I think I may as well go in at once, and in she went. Once more, she found herself in a long home, and close to the little glass table. "Now, I'll manage better this time," she said to herself, and again began by taking a little golden key, and unlocking the door that led into the garden.

Then she set to work nibbling at the mushroom. She had kept a piece in her pocket until she was about a foot high. Then she walked down the little passage, and then she found herself at last in the beautiful garden, among the bright flower beds and the cool fountains.