Previous - Next

mouse--a mouse--O mouse!') The Mouse looked at her rather
inquisitively, and seemed to her to wink with one of its little
eyes, but it said nothing.

`Perhaps it doesn't understand English,' thought Alice; `I
daresay it's a French mouse, come over with William the
Conqueror.' (For, with all her knowledge of history, Alice had
no very clear notion how long ago anything had happened.) So she
began again: `Ou est ma chatte?' which was the first sentence in
her French lesson-book. The Mouse gave a sudden leap out of the
water, and seemed to quiver all over with fright. `Oh, I beg
your pardon!' cried Alice hastily, afraid that she had hurt the
poor animal's feelings. `I quite forgot you didn't like cats.'

`Not like cats!' cried the Mouse, in a shrill, passionate
voice. `Would YOU like cats if you were me?'

`Well, perhaps not,' said Alice in a soothing tone: `don't be
angry about it. And yet I wish I could show you our cat Dinah:
I think you'd take a fancy to cats if you could only see her.
She is such a dear quiet thing,' Alice went on, half to herself,
as she swam lazily about in the pool, `and she sits purring so
nicely by the fire, licking her paws and washing her face--and
she is such a nice soft thing to nurse--and she's such a capital
one for catching mice--oh, I beg your pardon!' cried Alice again,
for this time the Mouse was bristling all over, and she felt
certain it must be really offended. `We won't talk about her any
more if you'd rather not.'

`We indeed!' cried the Mouse, who was trembling down to the end
of his tail. `As if I would talk on such a subject! Our family
always HATED cats: nasty, low, vulgar things! Don't let me hear
the name again!'

`I won't indeed!' said Alice, in a great hurry to change the
subject of conversation. `Are you--are you fond--of--of dogs?'
The Mouse did not answer, so Alice went on eagerly: `There is
such a nice little dog near our house I should like to show you!
A little bright-eyed terrier, you know, with oh, such long curly
brown hair! And it'll fetch things when you throw them, and
it'll sit up and beg for its dinner, and all sorts of things--I
can't remember half of them--and it belongs to a farmer, you
know, and he says it's so useful, it's worth a hundred pounds!
He says it kills all the rats and--oh dear!' cried Alice in a
sorrowful tone, `I'm afraid I've offended it again!' For the
Mouse was swimming away from her as hard as it could go, and
making quite a commotion in the pool as it went.

So she called softly after it, `Mouse dear! Do come back
again, and we won't talk about cats or dogs either, if you don't
like them!' When the Mouse heard this, it turned round and swam
slowly back to her: its face was quite pale (with passion, Alice
thought), and it said in a low trembling voice, `Let us get to

Previous - Next