Complete Works of Lewis Carroll
Page 163
Lewis Carroll loved this play upon words, and children, strange to say, loved it too, and were quick to see the point of his puns. The Red Queen, whom Alice met shortly after this, was a most dictatorial person.
“Where do you come from?” she asked, “and where are you going? Look up, speak nicely, and don’t twiddle your fingers all the time.”
Alice attended to all these directions, and explained as well as she could that she had lost her way.
“I don’t know what you mean by your way,” said the Queen. “All the ways about here belong to me, but why did you come out here at all?” she added in a kinder tone. “Curtsey while you’re thinking what to say. It saves time.”
Alice wondered a little at this, but she was too much in awe of the Queen to disbelieve it.
“I’ll try it when I go home,” she thought to herself, “the next time I’m a little late for dinner.”
Evidently some little girls were often late for dinner.
“It’s time for you to answer now,” the Queen said, looking at her watch; “open your mouth a little wider when you speak and always say ‘Your Majesty.’”
“I only wanted to see what your garden was like, your Majesty.”
“That’s right,” said the Queen, patting her on the head, which Alice didn’t like at all, “though when you say ‘garden,’ I’ve seen gardens compared with which this would be a wilderness.”
Alice didn’t dare to argue the point, but went on: “And I thought I’d try and find my way to the top of that hill—”
“When you say ‘hill,’” the Queen interrupted, “I could show you hills in comparison with which you’d call this a valley.”
“No, I shouldn’t,” said Alice, surprised into contradicting her at last. “A hill can’t be a valley you know. That would be nonsense—”
The Red Queen shook her head.
“You may call it ‘nonsense’ if you like,” she said, “but I’ve heard nonsense compared with which that would be as sensible as a dictionary!”
Which last remark seemed to settle the matter, for Alice had nothing further to say on the subject.
Nonsense, indeed; and what delightful nonsense it is! Is it any wonder that the little girls for whom Lewis Carroll labored so lovingly should reward him with their laughter?
Alice entered Checker-Board Land in the Red Queen’s company; she was apprenticed as a pawn, with the promise that when she entered the eighth square she would become a queen [she probably was confusing chess with checkers], and the Red Queen explained how she would travel.
“A pawn goes two squares in its first move, you know, so you’ll go very quickly through the third square, by railway, I should think, and you’ll find yourself in the fourth square in no time. Well, that square belongs to Tweedledum and Tweedledee, and the fifth is mostly water, the sixth belongs to Humpty Dumpty, ... the seventh square is all forest. However, one of the knights will show you the way, and in the eighth square we shall be queens together, and its all feasting and fun.”
The rest of her adventures occurred on those eight squares—sometimes in company with the Red Queen or the White Queen or both. Things went more rapidly than in Wonderland, the people were brisker and smarter. When the Red Queen left her on the border of Checker-Board Land, she gave her this parting advice:
“Speak in French when you can’t think of the English for a thing, turn out your toes as you walk, and remember who you are!”
How many little girls have had the same advice from their governesses or their mamma—“Turn out your toes when you walk, and remember who you are!”
This is what made Lewis Carroll so irresistibly funny—the way he had of bringing in the most common everyday expressions in the most uncommon, unexpected places. Only in Alice’s case it took her quite a long time to remember who she was, just because the Red Queen told her not to forget. Children are very queer about that—little girls in particular—at least those that Lewis Carroll knew, and he certainly was acquainted with a great many who did remarkably queer things.
Alice’s meeting with the two fat little men named Tweedledum and Tweedledee recalled to her memory the old rhyme:
Tweedledum and Tweedledee
Agreed to have a battle;
For Tweedledum said Tweedledee
Had spoiled his nice new rattle.
Just then flew down a monstrous crow,
As black as a tar barrel;
Which frightened both the heroes so,
They quite forgot their quarrel.
Fierce little men they were, one with Dum embroidered on his collar, the other showing Dee on his. They were not accustomed to good society nor fine grammar. They were exactly alike as they stood motionless before her, their arms about each other.
“I know what you’re thinking about,” said Tweedledum, “but it isn’t so—nohow.” [Behold the beautiful grammar.]
“Contrariwise,” continued Tweedledee, “if it was so, it might be; and if it were so, it would be; but as it isn’t, it ain’t. That’s logic.”
Now, Alice particularly wanted to know which road to take out of the woods, but somehow or other her polite question was never answered by either of the funny little brothers. They were very sociable and seemed most anxious to keep her with them, so for her entertainment Tweedledum repeated that beautiful and pathetic poem called:
THE WALRUS AND THE CARPENTER.
The sun was shining on the sea,
Shining with all his might;
He did his very best to make
The billows smooth and bright—
And this was odd, because it was
The middle of the night.
The moon was shining sulkily,
Because she thought the sun
Had got no business to be there
After the day was done—
“It’s very rude of him,” she said,
“To come and spoil the fun!”
The sea was wet as wet could be,
The sands were dry as dry,
You could not see a cloud, because
No cloud was in the sky;
No birds were flying overhead—
There were no birds to fly.
The Walrus and the Carpenter
Were walking close at hand;
They wept like anything to see
Such quantities of sand;
“If this were only cleared away,”
They said, “it would be grand!”
“If seven maids with seven mops
Swept it for half a year,
Do you suppose,” the Walrus said,
“That they would get it clear?”
“I doubt it,” said the Carpenter,
And shed a bitter tear.
Then comes the sad and sober part of the tale, when the Oysters were tempted to stroll along the beach, in company with these wily two, who lured them far away from their snug ocean beds.
The Walrus and the Carpenter
Walked on a mile or so,
And then they rested on a rock
Conveniently low;
And all the little Oysters stood
And waited in a row.
“The time has come,” the Walrus said,
“To talk of many things;
Of shoes, and ships, and sealing-wax—
Of cabbages and kings;
And why the sea is boiling hot,
And whether pigs have wings.”
“But wait a bit,” the Oysters cried,
“Before we have our chat;
For some of us are out of breath,
And all of us are fat!”
“No hurry!” said the Carpenter.
They thanked him much for that.
“A loaf of bread,” the Walrus said,
“Is what we chiefly need;
Pepper and vinegar besides
Are very good, indeed;
Now, if you’re ready, Oysters, dear,
We can begin to feed.”
Then the Oys
ters became terrified, as they saw all these grewsome preparations, and their fate loomed up before them. So the two old weeping hypocrites sat on the rocks and calmly devoured their late companions.
“It seems a shame,” the Walrus said,
“To play them such a trick,
After we’ve brought them out so far,
And made them trot so quick!”
The Carpenter said nothing but,
“The butter’s spread too thick!”
“I weep for you,” the Walrus said,
“I deeply sympathize.”
With sobs and tears he sorted out
Those of the largest size,
Holding his pocket-handkerchief
Before his streaming eyes.
“O Oysters,” said the Carpenter,
“You’ve had a pleasant run!
Shall we be trotting home again?”
But answer came there none.
And this was scarcely odd, because
They’d eaten every one.
The poor dear little Oysters! How any little girl, with a heart under her pinafore, could read these lines unmoved it is hard to say. Think of those innocent young dears, standing before these dreadful ogres.
All eager for the treat;
Their coats were brushed, their faces washed,
Their shoes were clean and neat;
And this was odd, because, you know,
They hadn’t any feet.
All the same, Tenniel has made most attractive pictures of them, feet and all. And think—oh, horror! of their supplying the treat! It was indeed an awful tragedy. Yet behind it all there lurks some fun, though Lewis Carroll was too clever to let us quite into his secret. All the young ones want is the story, but those who are old enough to love their Dickens and to look for his special characters outside of his books will certainly recognize in the Walrus the hypocritical Mr. Pecksniff, whose tears flowed on every occasion when he was not otherwise employed in robbing his victims, and other little pleasantries. And as for the Carpenter, there is something very scholarly in the set of his cap and the combing of his scant locks; possibly a caricature of some shining light of Oxford, for we know there were many in his books. Indeed, the whole poem may be something of an allegory, representing examination; the Oysters, the undergraduate victims before the college faculty (the Walrus and the Carpenter) who are just ready to “eat ’em alive”—poor innocent undergraduates!
But whatever the hidden meaning, Tweedledum and Tweedledee were not the sort of people to look deep into things, and Alice, being a little girl and very partial to oysters, thought the Walrus and the Carpenter were very unpleasant characters and had no sympathy with them at all.
Dreaming by a ruddy blaze in a big armchair keeps one much busier than if one fell asleep in a rocking boat or on the river bank on a golden summer day.
The scenes and all the company changed so often in Looking-Glass Land that Alice had all she could do to keep pace with her adventures. For you see all this time she was only a pawn, moving over an immense chess-board from square to square, until in the end she should be made queen. The White Queen whom Alice met shortly was a very lopsided person, quite unlike the Red Queen, who was neat enough no matter how sharp her tongue. Alice had to fix her hair, and straighten her shawl, and set her right and tidy.
“Really, you should have a lady’s maid,” she remarked.
“I’m sure I’ll take you with pleasure,” the Queen said. “Twopence a week, and jam every other day.”
Alice couldn’t help laughing as she said:
“I don’t want you to hire me, and I don’t care for jam.”
“It’s very good jam,” said the Queen.
“Well, I don’t want any to-day at any rate.”
“You couldn’t have it if you did want it,” the Queen said. “The rule is—jam to-morrow and jam yesterday, but never jam to-day.”
“It must come sometimes to ‘jam to-day,’” Alice objected.
“No, it can’t,” said the Queen. “It’s jam every other day; to-day isn’t any other day, you know.”
“I don’t understand you,” said Alice. “It’s dreadfully confusing!”
“That’s the effect of living backwards,” the Queen said, kindly. “It always makes one a little giddy at first—”
“Living backwards!” Alice remarked in great astonishment. “I never heard of such a thing!”
“But there’s one great advantage in it, that one’s memory works both ways.”
“I’m sure mine only works one way,” Alice remarked. “I can’t remember things before they happen.”
“It’s a poor memory that only works backwards,” the Queen remarked.
“What sort of things do you remember best?” Alice ventured to ask.
“Oh, the things that happened the week after next,” the Queen replied in a careless tone. “For instance, now,” she went on, sticking a large piece of plaster on her finger as she spoke, “there’s the king’s messenger. He’s in prison now, being punished, and the trial doesn’t begin till next Wednesday; and of course the crime comes last of all.” Then the Queen for further illustration began to scream—
“Oh, oh, oh!” shouted the Queen.... “My finger’s bleeding! Oh, oh, oh, oh!”
Her screams were so exactly like the whistle of a steam engine that Alice had to hold both her hands over her ears.
“What is the matter?” she said.... “Have you pricked your finger?”
“I haven’t pricked it yet,” the Queen said, “but I soon shall—oh, oh, oh!”
“When do you expect to do it?” Alice asked, feeling very much inclined to laugh.
“When I fasten my shawl again,” the poor Queen groaned out, “the brooch will come undone directly. Oh, oh!” As she said the words the brooch flew open, and the Queen clutched wildly at it and tried to clasp it again.
“Take care!” cried Alice, “you’re holding it all crooked!” and she caught at the brooch; but it was too late; the pin had slipped, and the Queen had pricked her finger.
“That accounts for the bleeding, you see,” she said to Alice, with a smile. “Now you understand the way things happen here.”
Alice’s meeting with Humpty-Dumpty in the sixth square has gone down in history. It has been played in nurseries and in private theatricals, and many ingenious Humpty-Dumptys have been fashioned by clever people.
Possibly the dear old rhyme which generations of childhood have handed about as a riddle is responsible for our great interest in Humpty-Dumpty.
Humpty-Dumpty sat on the wall,
Humpty-Dumpty had a great fall,
All the King’s horses and all the King’s men,
Couldn’t put Humpty-Dumpty in his place again.
This is an old version, but modern children have made a better ending, thus:
Couldn’t put Humpty-Dumpty up again.
Then there’s a mysterious pause, and some eager small boy or girl asks, “Now what is it?” and before one has time to answer, someone calls out—
“It’s an egg; it’s an egg!” and the riddle is a riddle no longer.
One clever mechanical Humpty was made of barrel hoops covered with stiff paper and muslin. The eyes, nose, and mouth were connected with various tapes, which the inventor had in charge behind the scenes, and so well did he work them that Humpty in his hands turned out a fine imitation of the Humpty-Dumpty Sir John Tenniel has made us remember; the same Humpty-Dumpty who asked Alice her name and her business, and who informed her proudly that if he did tumble off the wall, “The King has promised me with his very own mouth—to—to—”
“To send all his horses and all his men—” Alice interrupted rather unwisely.
“Now I declare that’s too bad!” Humpty-Dumpty cried, breaking into a sudden passion. “You’ve been listening at doors, and behind trees, and down chimneys, or you wouldn’t have known it.”
“I haven’t, indeed!” Alice said, very gently. “It’s in a book.”
“Yes, all his horses and all his men,” Humpty-Dumpty went on. “They’d pick me up in a minute, they would. However, this conversation is going on a little too fast; let’s go back to the last remark but one.”
Such a nice, common old chap is Humpty-Dumpty, so “stuck-up” because he has spoken to a King; and argue! Well, Alice never heard anything like it before, and found difficulty in keeping up a conversation that was disputed every step of the way. She found him worse than the Cheshire Cat or even the Duchess for that matter, and not half so well-bred.
He too favored Alice with the following poem, which he assured her was written entirely for her amusement, and here it is, with enough of Lewis Carroll’s “nonsense” in it to let us know where it came from:
In winter, when the fields are white,
I sing this song for your delight:—
In spring, when woods are getting green,
I’ll try and tell you what I mean:
In summer, when the days are long,
Perhaps you’ll understand the song:
In autumn, when the leaves are brown,
Take pen and ink, and write it down.
I sent a message to the fish:
I told them: “This is what I wish.”
The little fishes of the sea,
They sent an answer back to me.
The little fishes’ answer was:
“We cannot do it, Sir, because——”
I sent to them again to say:
“It will be better to obey.”
The fishes answered, with a grin:
“Why, what a temper you are in!”
I told them once, I told them twice:
They would not listen to advice.
I took a kettle large and new,
Fit for the deed I had to do.