asked it aloud; and in another moment it was out of sight.
Alice remained looking thoughtfully at the mushroom for a
minute, trying to make out which were the two sides of it; and, as
it was perfectly round, she found this a very difficult question.
However, at last she stretched her arms round it as far as they
would go, and broke off a bit of the edge with each hand.
“And now which is which?” she said to herself, and nibbled a
little of the right-hand bit to try the effect. The next moment she
felt a violent blow underneath her chin: it had struck her
foot!
She was a good deal frightened by this very sudden change, but
she felt that there was no time to be lost, as she was shrinking
rapidly: so she set to work at once to eat some of the other bit.
Her chin was pressed so closely against her foot, that there was
hardly room to open her mouth; but she did it at last, and managed
to swallow a morsel of the left-hand bit.
* * * * * * *
* * * * * *
* * * * * * *
“Come, my head’s free at last!” said Alice in a tone of delight,
which changed into alarm in another moment, when she found that her
shoulders were nowhere to be found: all she could see, when she
looked down, was an immense length of neck, which seemed to rise
like a stalk out of a sea of green leaves that lay far below
her.
“What can all that green stuff be?” said Alice. “And where have
my shoulders got to? And oh, my poor hands, how is it I ca’n’t see
you?” She was moving them about as she spoke, but no result seemed
to follow, except a little shaking among the distant green
leaves.
As there seemed to be no chance of getting her hands up to her
head, she tried to get her head down to them, and was delighted to
find that her neck would bend about easily in any direction, like a
serpent. She had just succeeded in curving it down into a graceful
zigzag, and was going to dive in among the leaves, which she found
to be nothing but the tops of the trees under which she had been
wandering, when a sharp hiss made her draw back in a hurry: a largewandering, when a sharp hiss made her draw back in a hurry: a large
pigeon had flown into her face, and was beating her violently with
its wings.
“Serpent!” screamed the Pigeon.
“I’m not a serpent!” said Alice indignantly. “Let me alone!”
“Serpent, I say again!” repeated the Pigeon, but in a more
subdued tone, and added with a kind of sob, “I’ve tried every way,
and nothing seems to suit them!”
“I haven’t the least idea what you're talking about,” said
Alice.
“I’ve tried the roots of trees, and I’ve tried banks, and I’ve
tried hedges,” the Pigeon went on, without attending to her; “but
those serpents! There’s no pleasing them!”
Alice was more and more puzzled, but she thought there was no
use in saying anything more till the Pigeon had finished.
“As if it wasn’t trouble enough hatching the eggs,” said the
Pigeon; “but I must be on the look-out for serpents, night and day!
Why, I haven’t had a wink of sleep these three weeks!”
“I’m very sorry you've been annoyed,” said Alice, who was
beginning to see its meaning.
“And just as I’d taken the highest tree in the wood,” continued
the Pigeon, raising its voice to a shriek, “and just as I was
thinking I should be free of them at last, they must needs come
wriggling down from the sky! Ugh, Serpent!”
“But I’m not a serpent, I tell you!” said Alice. “I’m a——I’m
a——”
“Well! What are you?” said the Pigeon. “I can see you’re trying
to invent something!”
“I—I’m a little girl,” said Alice, rather doubtfully, as she
remembered the number of changes she had gone through, that
day.
“A likely story indeed!” said the Pigeon, in a tone of the
deepest contempt. “I've seen a good many little girls in my time,
but never one with such a neck as that! No, no! You're a serpent;
and there's no use denying it. I suppose you'll be telling me next
that you never tasted an egg!”
“I have tasted eggs, certainly,” said Alice, who was a very
truthful child; “but little girls eat eggs quite as much as
serpents do, you know.”
“I don’t believe it,” said the Pigeon; “but if they do, why thenserpents do, you know.”
“I don’t believe it,” said the Pigeon; “but if they do, why then
they’re a kind of serpent: that’s all I can say.”
This was such a new idea to Alice, that she was quite silent for
a minute or two, which gave the Pigeon the opportunity of adding
“You’re looking for eggs, I know that well enough; and what does it
matter to me whether you're a little girl or a serpent?”
“It matters a good deal to me,” said Alice hastily; “but I’m not
looking for eggs, as it happens; and, if I was, I shouldn’t want
yours: I don’t like them raw.”
“Well, be off, then!” said the Pigeon in a sulky tone, as it
settled down again into its nest. Alice crouched down among the
trees as well as she could, for her neck kept getting entangled
among the branches, and every now and then she had to stop and
untwist it. After a while she remembered that she still held the
pieces of mushroom in her hands, and she set to work very
carefully, nibbling first at one and then at the other, and growing
sometimes taller, and sometimes shorter, until she had succeeded in
bringing herself down to her usual height.
It was so long since she had been anything near the right size,
that it felt quite strange at first; but she got used to it in a
few minutes, and began talking to herself, as usual, “Come, there’s
half my plan done now! How puzzling all these changes are! I’m
never sure what I’m going to be, from one minute to another!
However, I’ve got back to my right size: the next thing is, to get
into that beautiful garden—how is that to be done, I wonder?” As
she said this, she came suddenly upon an open place, with a little
house in it about four feet high. “Whoever lives there,” thought
Alice, “it’ll never do to come upon them this size: why, I should
frighten them out of their wits!” So she began nibbling at the
right-hand bit again, and did not venture to go near the house till
she had brought herself down to nine inches high.