if you were inside, you might knock, and I could let you out, you

know.” He was looking up into the sky all the time he was speaking, and

this Alice thought decidedly uncivil. “But perhaps he can’t help

it,” she said to herself; “his eyes are so very nearly at

the top of his head. But at any rate he might answer questions.—How am I

to get in?” she repeated, aloud.


“I shall sit here,” the Footman remarked, “till

tomorrow—”


At this moment the door of the house opened, and a large plate came skimming

out, straight at the Footman’s head: it just grazed his nose, and broke

to pieces against one of the trees behind him.


“—or next day, maybe,” the Footman continued in the same

tone, exactly as if nothing had happened.


“How am I to get in?” asked Alice again, in a louder tone.


“Are you to get in at all?” said the Footman.

“That’s the first question, you know.”


It was, no doubt: only Alice did not like to be told so. “It’s

really dreadful,” she muttered to herself, “the way all the

creatures argue. It’s enough to drive one crazy!”


The Footman seemed to think this a good opportunity for repeating his remark,

with variations. “I shall sit here,” he said, “on and off,

for days and days.”


“But what am I to do?” said Alice.


“Anything you like,” said the Footman, and began whistling.


“Oh, there’s no use in talking to him,” said Alice

desperately: “he’s perfectly idiotic!” And she opened the

door and went in.


The door led right into a large kitchen, which was full of smoke from one end

to the other: the Duchess was sitting on a three-legged stool in the middle,

nursing a baby; the cook was leaning over the fire, stirring a large cauldron

which seemed to be full of soup.


“There’s certainly too much pepper in that soup!” Alice said

to herself, as well as she could for sneezing.


There was certainly too much of it in the air. Even the Duchess sneezed