`How the
creatures order one about, and make one repeat lessons!' thought Alice; `I
might as well be at school at once.' However, she got up, and began to repeat
it, but her head was so full of the Lobster Quadrille, that she hardly knew
what she was saying, and the words came very queer indeed:--
`'Tis the voice of the Lobster; I heard him declare, "You have baked me too brown, I must sugar my hair." As a duck with its eyelids, so he with his nose Trims his belt and his buttons, and turns out his toes.' When the sands are all dry, he is gay as a lark, And will talk in contemptuous tones of the Shark, But, when the tide rises and sharks are around, His voice has a timid and tremulous sound.
`That's
different from what I used to say when I was a child,' said the Gryphon.
`Well, I
never heard it before,' said the Mock Turtle; `but it sounds uncommon
nonsense.'
Alice said
nothing; she had sat down with her face in her hands, wondering if anything
would EVER happen in a natural way again.
`I should
like to have it explained,' said the Mock Turtle.
`She can't
explain it,' said the Gryphon hastily. `Go on with the next verse.'
`But about
his toes?' the Mock Turtle persisted. `How COULD he turn them out with his
nose, you know?'
`It's the
first position in dancing.' Alice said; but was dreadfully puzzled by the whole
thing, and longed to change the subject.
`Go on
with the next verse,' the Gryphon repeated impatiently: `it begins "I
passed by his garden."'
Alice did
not dare to disobey, though she felt sure it would all come wrong, and she went
on in a trembling voice:--
`I passed by his garden, and marked, with one eye, How the Owl and the Panther were sharing a pie--' The Panther took pie-crust, and gravy, and meat, While the Owl had the dish as its share of the treat. When the pie was all finished, the Owl, as a boon, Was kindly permitted to pocket the spoon: While the Panther received knife and fork with a growl, And concluded the banquet--
`What IS
the use of repeating all that stuff,' the Mock Turtle interrupted, `if you
don't explain it as you go on? It's by far the most confusing thing I ever
heard!'
`Yes, I
think you'd better leave off,' said the Gryphon: and Alice was only too glad to
do so.
`Shall we
try another figure of the Lobster Quadrille?' the Gryphon went on. `Or would
you like the Mock Turtle to sing you a song?'
`Oh, a
song, please, if the Mock Turtle would be so kind,' Alice replied, so eagerly
that the Gryphon said, in a rather offended tone, `Hm! No accounting for
tastes! Sing her "Turtle Soup," will you, old fellow?'
The Mock
Turtle sighed deeply, and began, in a voice sometimes choked with sobs, to sing
this:--
`Beautiful Soup, so rich and green, Waiting in a hot tureen! Who for such dainties would not stoop? Soup of the evening, beautiful Soup! Soup of the evening, beautiful Soup! Beau--ootiful Soo--oop! Beau--ootiful Soo--oop! Soo--oop of the e--e--evening, Beautiful, beautiful Soup! `Beautiful Soup! Who cares for fish, Game, or any other dish? Who would not give all else for two p ennyworth only of beautiful Soup? Pennyworth only of beautiful Soup? Beau--ootiful Soo--oop! Beau--ootiful Soo--oop! Soo--oop of the e--e--evening, Beautiful, beauti--FUL SOUP!'
`Chorus
again!' cried the Gryphon, and the Mock Turtle had just begun to repeat it,
when a cry of `The trial's beginning!' was heard in the distance.
`Come on!'
cried the Gryphon, and, taking Alice by the hand, it hurried off, without
waiting for the end of the song.
`What
trial is it?' Alice panted as she ran; but the Gryphon only answered `Come on!'
and ran the faster, while more and more faintly came, carried on the breeze
that followed them, the melancholy words:--
`Soo--oop of the e--e--evening, Beautiful, beautiful Soup!'
