Chapter IX

The Mock Turtle’s Story

“You can’t think how glad I am to see you again, my dear!” said the Duchess to Alice, and they walked together.

Alice was very glad to find her in such a pleasant temper, and thought to herself that perhaps it was only the pepper that made her so angry.

“When I am a Duchess,” she said to herself, “I won’t have any pepper in my kitchen at all. Maybe it’s always pepper that makes people hot-tempered,” she went on, “and vinegar that makes them sour—and camomile that makes them bitter—and—and barley-sugar that makes children sweet-tempered—”

“You’re thinking about something, my dear,”—said the Duchess, “and you forget to talk. I can’t tell you now what the moral of that is.”

“Perhaps there is no moral at all,” Alice remarked.

“What?” said the Duchess. “Everything has got a moral, if only you can find it.”

And she went closer to Alice’s side as she spoke.

Alice did not like it very much, because the Duchess was very ugly; and because she had a very sharp chin. However, Alice did not like to be rude.

“The game’s going on,” she said to keep up the conversation a little.

“Exactly,” said the Duchess: “and the moral of that is ‘Oh, it’s love, it’s love, that makes the world go round!’”

“Somebody says,” Alice whispered, “that it’s necessary to mind his own business!”

“Ah, well! It means the same thing,” said the Duchess, “and the moral of that is ‘Take care of the sense!’”

“Oh, she likes to find morals in everything!” Alice thought to herself.

“I’m not sure about the temper of your flamingo. Does it bite?”

“It may bite,” Alice cautiously replied.

“Very true,” said the Duchess: “flamingoes and mustard both bite. And the moral of that is “Birds of a feather flock together.”’

“Only mustard isn’t a bird,” Alice remarked.

“Right, as usual,” said the Duchess, “what a clear mind!”

“It’s a mineral, I think,” said Alice.

“Of course it is,” said the Duchess, who was ready to agree to everything that Alice said.

“Oh, I know!” exclaimed Alice, “it’s a vegetable. It doesn’t look like one, but it is.”

“I quite agree with you,” said the Duchess; “and the moral of that is ‘Never imagine yourself not to be otherwise than you are otherwise.’”

“I think I must understand that better,” Alice said very politely, “if I write that down.”

“Thinking again?” the Duchess asked, with the dig of her sharp little chin.

“I’ve a right to think,” said Alice sharply.

“You know, my dear,” said the Duchess, “the moral of this is—”

But here, to Alice’s great surprise, the Duchess’s arm began to tremble. Alice looked up, and there stood the Queen in front of them.

“A fine day, your Majesty!” the Duchess began in a low, weak voice.

“Now, I warn you,” shouted the Queen; “either you or your head must be off! Take your choice!”

The Duchess took her choice, and went away in a moment.

“Let’s continue our game,” the Queen said to Alice; and Alice followed to the croquet-ground.

The other guests were resting in the shade: however, the moment they saw her, they hurried back to the game. The Queen merely remarked: “A moment’s delay costs you your lives.”

All the time they were playing the Queen was quarrelling with the other players, and shouting “Off with his head!” or “Off with her head!” All the players, except the King, the Queen, and Alice, were in custody and under sentence of execution.

Then the Queen stopped the game, and said to Alice, “Did you see the Mock Turtle?”

“No,” said Alice. “I don’t even know what a Mock Turtle is. I never saw one, or heard of one.”

“Come on, then,” said the Queen, “and it shall tell you its history.”

As they walked off together, the King said in a low voice, to the guests, “You are all pardoned.”

“Oh, that’s a good thing!” Alice said to herself.

Very soon they met a Gryphon, it was sleeping in the sun.

“Get up, you idler!” said the Queen, “and take this young lady to the Mock Turtle. I must go back”; and she walked off.

The Queen left Alice alone with the Gryphon. Alice did not like the look of the creature, but it seemed as safe to stay with it as to go after that savage Queen; so she waited.

The Gryphon sat up and rubbed its eyes, then it chuckled.

“What fun!” said the Gryphon, half to itself, half to Alice.

“What is the fun?” said Alice.

“She,” said the Gryphon. “It’s a fake, you know, they never execute anybody. Come on!”

“Everybody says “come on!” here,” thought Alice, as she went slowly after the Gryphon.

Soon they saw the Mock Turtle. It was sitting sad and lonely on a little ledge of rock, and sighing.

“What is his sorrow?” Alice asked the Gryphon, and the Gryphon answered, “It’s a fake, you know, it has no sorrow. Come on!”

So they went up to the Mock Turtle. It looked at them with large eyes full of tears, but said nothing.

“This is a young lady,” said the Gryphon, “she wants to know your history.”

“I’ll tell it her,” said the Mock Turtle in a deep, hollow tone: “sit down, both of you, and don’t speak a word. I’ll tell a story.”

So they sat down, and nobody spoke for some minutes. Alice waited patiently.

“Once,” said the Mock Turtle at last, with a deep sigh, “I was a real Turtle.”

Next was a very long silence. The Mock Turtle was only sobbing. Alice was going to get up and say, “Thank you for your interesting story,” but she sat still and said nothing.

“When we were little,” the Mock Turtle went on at last, more calmly, “we went to school in the sea. The master was an old Turtle—we called him Tortoise—”

“Why did you call him Tortoise, if he wasn’t one?” Alice asked.

“We called him Tortoise because he taught us,” said the Mock Turtle angrily, “and really you are very silly!”

“Yes, don’t ask such simple questions,” added the Gryphon; and then they both sat silent and looked at poor Alice. At last the Gryphon said to the Mock Turtle, “Go on, old fellow!”

And the Mock Turtle went on in these words:

“Yes, we went to school in the sea, though you don’t believe it—”

“Why? I didn’t say that!” interrupted Alice.

“You did,” said the Mock Turtle.

“Hold your tongue!” added the Gryphon.

The Mock Turtle went on.

“We had the best educations— in fact, we went to school every day—”

“So what?” asked Alice; “I go to school everyday, too. Why are you so proud?”

“With extras?” asked the Mock Turtle a little anxiously.

“Yes,” said Alice, “we learned French and music.”

“And washing?” said the Mock Turtle.

“Certainly not!” said Alice indignantly.

“Ah! then your school isn’t a really good school,” said the Mock Turtle in a tone of great relief. We had washing—extra.”

“What for?” asked Alice; “You were living at the bottom of the sea.”

“Yes, I was,” said the Mock Turtle with a sigh. “I only took the regular course.”

“What was that?” inquired Alice.

“Reeling and Writhing. Different branches of Arithmetic,” the Mock Turtle replied; “Ambition, Distraction, Uglification, and Derision.”

“I never heard of ‘Uglification,’” Alice said. “What is it?”

The Gryphon was surprised.

“What! Never heard of that!” it exclaimed. “You know what ‘to beautify’ is, I suppose?”

“Yes,” said Alice doubtfully: “it means ‘to make something prettier.’”

“Well, then,” the Gryphon went on, “if you don’t know what to uglify is, you are just foolish.”

Alice turned to the Mock Turtle, and said “What else did you learn?”

“Well, there was Mystery,” the Mock Turtle replied, “Mystery, ancient and modern, with Seaography: then Drawling, Stretching, and Fainting in Coils.”

“What was that like?” said Alice.

“Well, I can’t show it you myself,” the Mock Turtle said: “I’m too old for that. And the Gryphon never learnt it.”

“I had no time,” said the Gryphon: “I went to the Classics master, though. He was an old crab, he was.”

“I never went to him,” the Mock Turtle said with a sigh, “he taught Laughing and Grief.”

“So he did, so he did,” said the Gryphon; and both creatures hid their faces in their paws.

“And how many hours a day did you do lessons?” said Alice.

“Ten hours the first day,” said the Mock Turtle: “nine the next, and so on.”

“What a curious plan!” exclaimed Alice.

“That’s the reason they’re called lessons,” the Gryphon remarked, “because they lessen from day to day.”

This was quite a new idea to Alice, and she made her next remark.

“Then the eleventh day was a holiday?’

“Of course it was,” said the Mock Turtle.

“And what about the twelfth day?” Alice asked eagerly.

“Enough about lessons,” the Gryphon interrupted in a very decided tone: “tell her something about the games now.”