Part 12 (1/2)
”Oh, Tiger-lily!” said Alice, addressing herself to one that was waving gracefully about in the wind, ”I _wish_ you could talk!”
”We can talk,” said the Tiger-lily, ”when there's anybody worth talking to” ... At length, as the Tiger-lily went on waving about, she spoke again in a timid voice, almost in a whisper:
”And can _all_ the flowers talk?”
”As well as _you_ can,” said the Tiger-lily, ”and a great deal louder.”
”It isn't manners for us to begin, you know,” said the Rose, ”and I really was wondering when you'd speak! Said I to myself, 'Her face has got _some_ sense in it though it's not a clever one!' Still you've the right color and that goes a long way.”
”I don't care about the color,” the Tiger-lily remarked. ”If only her petals curled up a little more, she'd be all right.”
Alice didn't like being criticised, so she began asking questions:
”Aren't you sometimes frightened at being planted out here with n.o.body to take care of you?”
”There's the tree in the middle,” said the Rose. ”What else is it good for?”
”But what could it do if any danger came?” Alice asked.
”It could bark,” said the Rose.
”It says 'bough-wough',” cried a Daisy. ”That's why its branches are called boughs.”
”Didn't you know that?” cried another Daisy. And here they all began shouting together.
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--”