`` Now for the garden ! '' cried Alice , as she hurried back to the little door , but the little door was locked again , and the little gold key was lying on the glass table as before , and `` things are worse than ever ! '' thought the poor little girl , `` for I never was as small as this before , never ! And I declare it 's too bad , it is ! '' -LSB- Illustration -RSB- At this moment her foot slipped , and splash ! she was up to her chin in salt water . Her first idea was that she had fallen into the sea : then she remembered that she was under ground , and she soon made out that it was the pool of tears she had wept when she was nine feet high . `` I wish I had n't cried so much ! '' said Alice , as she swam about , trying to find her way out , `` I shall be punished for it now , I suppose , by being drowned in my own tears ! Well ! that 'll be a queer thing , to be sure ! However , every thing is queer today . '' Very soon she saw something splashing about in the pool near her : at first she thought it must be a walrus or a hippopotamus , but then she remembered how small she was herself , and soon made out that it was only a mouse , that had slipped in like herself . `` Would it be any use , now , '' thought Alice , `` to speak to this mouse ? The rabbit is something quite out-of-the-way , no doubt , and so have I been , ever since I came down here , but that is no reason why the mouse should not be able to talk . I think I may as well try . '' So she began : `` oh Mouse , do you know how to get out of this pool ? I am very tired of swimming about here , oh Mouse ! '' The mouse looked at her rather inquisitively , and seemed to her to wink with one of its little eyes , but it said nothing . -LSB- Illustration -RSB- `` Perhaps it does n't understand English , '' thought Alice ; `` I daresay it 's a French mouse , come over with William the Conqueror ! ''
-LRB- for , with all her knowledge of history , XXXXX had no very clear notion how long ago anything had happened , -RRB- so she began again : `` où est ma chatte ? ''
Alice English French William drowned first ground hippopotamus idea splash