[Illustration]

THROUGH THE LOOKING-GLASS

And What Alice Found There

By Lewis Carroll

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The Characters (Like Chess Pieces)

This story is like a game of chess. Here are the players, listed as White pieces and Red pieces, with their pawns:

White Pieces: Tweedledee, Unicorn, Sheep, White Queen, White King, Aged Man, White Knight, Tweedledum

White Pawns: Daisy, Haigha, Oyster, "Lily," Fawn, Oyster, Hatta, Daisy

Red Pawns: Daisy, Messenger, Oyster, Tiger-lily, Rose, Oyster, Frog, Daisy

Red Pieces: Humpty Dumpty, Carpenter, Walrus, Red Queen, Red King, Crow, Red Knight, Lion

[Illustration: a chessboard]

In this game, a White Pawn (that's Alice!) gets to move first. She will win after eleven moves. Here is a short list of what happens in the game, move by move. (Don't worry if it's tricky — the story will explain it all!)

1. Alice meets the Red Queen.
2. Alice rides a train to the fourth square, where she meets Tweedledum and Tweedledee.
3. Alice meets the White Queen, who is carrying a shawl.
4. Alice goes through a shop, over a river, and back to a shop.
5. Alice meets Humpty Dumpty.
6. Alice walks through a forest.
7. The White Knight beats the Red Knight in a fight.
8. Alice reaches the eighth square and gets crowned.
9. Alice becomes a Queen.
10. There is a feast.
11. Alice wins the game!

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A Poem for the Reader

(This poem is written by the author for a young girl he loves. Here is what it means, in simple words:)

Dear child, with your bright, wondering eyes —
even though time passes and pulls us apart,
I know you will smile at this gift:
a fairy tale, made just for you.

I have never seen your happy face
or heard you laugh.
You may not think of me later.
But right now, you will listen to my story.

This tale began long ago,
on a warm summer day,
when we rowed a boat together,
and a little rhyme kept time with the oars.
I still remember it,
even though years try to make us forget.

So listen now, before bedtime comes
and calls you away, sleepy and sad.
We are all just grown-up children,
who wish bedtime would wait a little longer.

Outside, it is cold and snowy and windy.
Inside, the fire glows warm,
and children feel safe and happy.
These magic words will keep you cozy.
You won't even hear the storm.

Even if a little sadness creeps into the story,
missing summer days gone by,
it won't spoil our fairy tale.

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Contents

1. Looking-Glass House
2. The Garden of Live Flowers
3. Looking-Glass Insects
4. Tweedledum and Tweedledee
5. Wool and Water
6. Humpty Dumpty
7. The Lion and the Unicorn
8. "It's My Own Invention"
9. Queen Alice
10. Shaking
11. Waking
12. Which Dreamed It?

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CHAPTER I: Looking-Glass House

One thing was for sure: the white kitten had done nothing wrong. It was all the black kitten's fault. The white kitten had been sitting still for a whole fifteen minutes while the mother cat, Dinah, washed its face. It had been very patient. So the white kitten couldn't have caused any trouble.

Here is how Dinah washed her kittens' faces: First, she held the kitten down by one ear with her paw. Then, with her other paw, she rubbed its face — the wrong way, starting at the nose! Right now, she was washing the white kitten. It lay very still, trying to purr, as if it knew this was good for it.

But Dinah had finished washing the black kitten earlier that afternoon. So while Alice sat curled up in a big armchair — half talking to herself, half asleep — the black kitten had been playing with a ball of yarn. Alice had been trying to wind the yarn into a ball. But the kitten rolled it around and around until it all came undone! Now the yarn was spread all over the rug, tangled and knotted, with the kitten chasing its own tail in the middle of the mess.

"Oh, you naughty little thing!" cried Alice. She picked up the kitten and gave it a little kiss — but also to let it know it was in trouble. "Really, Dinah should teach you better manners! You should, Dinah, you know you should!" She looked crossly at the mother cat and tried to sound stern. Then she climbed back into the armchair with the kitten and the yarn, and started winding the ball again.

But she didn't wind very fast, because she kept talking — sometimes to the kitten, sometimes to herself. Kitty sat quietly on her lap, watching the yarn, and now and then reaching out one paw to touch the ball, as if she wanted to help.

"Do you know what tomorrow is, Kitty?" Alice began. "You would have guessed if you'd been at the window with me — but Dinah was cleaning you, so you missed it. I watched the boys gathering sticks for a bonfire. They need lots of sticks! But it got so cold and snowy, they had to stop. Never mind, Kitty — we'll see the bonfire tomorrow."

Alice wound a few loops of yarn around the kitten's neck, just to see how it looked. This caused a tumble, and the ball rolled onto the floor, unwinding again.

"You know, I was very angry with you, Kitty," Alice went on, once they had settled back down. "When I saw the mess you made, I almost put you outside in the snow! And you would have deserved it, you naughty little darling. What do you have to say for yourself? Don't interrupt me!" She held up one finger. "I'm going to tell you all the bad things you did.

"Number one: you squeaked twice while Dinah washed your face this morning. Don't say you didn't — I heard you! What's that? Her paw poked your eye? Well, that's your own fault for keeping your eyes open. If you'd shut them tight, it wouldn't have happened. No more excuses! Listen to number two: you pulled Snowdrop away by the tail, right when I put down her milk! What, you say you were thirsty? How do you know she wasn't thirsty too?

"And number three: you unwound all the yarn when I wasn't looking!

"That's three bad things, Kitty, and you haven't been punished yet. I'm saving up all your punishments for next Wednesday. Just think — what if someone saved up all my punishments like that?" she said, more to herself now. "What would happen at the end of a year? I suppose I'd be sent to jail! Or maybe — let's say each punishment meant skipping one dinner. Then, on punishment day, I'd have to skip fifty dinners all at once! Well, I wouldn't mind that much. I'd rather skip dinners than eat them!

"Do you hear the snow tapping on the window, Kitty? Doesn't it sound soft and nice? Like someone gently kissing the glass. I wonder if the snow loves the trees and fields, since it kisses them so softly. Maybe it covers them up warm, like a white blanket, and says, 'Go to sleep, little ones, until summer comes again.' And when they wake up in summer, Kitty, they put on green leaves and dance whenever the wind blows! Oh, that would be so pretty!" Alice clapped her hands, dropping the yarn. "I really wish that were true! The woods do look sleepy in autumn, when the leaves turn brown.

"Kitty, can you play chess? Don't laugh — I'm asking seriously! When we played earlier, you watched like you understood it. And when I said 'Check!' you purred! It really was a good check, Kitty. I might have won, if that pesky Knight hadn't wiggled in among my pieces.

"Kitty, dear, let's pretend—"

Here, I wish I could tell you all the things Alice liked to say, starting with her favorite words: "Let's pretend." Just yesterday, she'd had a whole argument with her sister about it. Alice had said, "Let's pretend we are kings and queens." But her sister, who liked things to be exact, argued that they couldn't — because there were only two of them. So Alice said, "Fine — you can be one of them, and I'll be all the rest!" Once, she had even scared her old nurse by shouting, "Nurse! Let's pretend I'm a hungry hyena, and you're a bone!"

But back to Alice and the kitten. "Let's pretend you're the Red Queen, Kitty! If you sat up and folded your arms, you'd look just like her. Try it, please!" Alice picked up a small toy Red Queen from the table and held it up so the kitten could copy it. But it didn't work — mostly because the kitten wouldn't fold its arms properly. So, to tease it, Alice held the kitten up to the mirror, so it could see how grumpy it looked.

"If you're not good right now," she added, "I'll put you through into Looking-glass House! How would you like that?

"Now listen carefully, Kitty, and don't talk so much. I'll tell you my ideas about Looking-glass House. First, there's the room you can see through the mirror — it looks just like our living room, only everything is backwards. I can see all of it if I stand on a chair — except the part behind the fireplace. Oh, I really wish I could see that part! I want to know if they have a fire in winter. You can never tell, unless our fire smokes — then smoke shows up in that room too. But maybe that's just pretend, to make it look like they have a fire.

"The books in there are almost like our books, except the words go the wrong way. I know this because I held one of our books up to the mirror, and they held one up too, in the other room.

"How would you like to live in Looking-glass House, Kitty? I wonder if they'd give you milk there. Maybe Looking-glass milk isn't good to drink! But oh, Kitty — here's the best part. If you leave our living-room door open, you can see a little peek of the hallway in Looking-glass House. It looks like our hallway, as far as you can see — but who knows what it's like further along?

"Oh, Kitty, wouldn't it be wonderful if we could go through into Looking-glass House? I bet it's full of beautiful things! Let's pretend there's a way to get in, somehow. Let's pretend the mirror has turned soft, like thin cloth, so we could step right through it. Why — it really is turning misty now! It'll be easy to get through—"

She said this while standing on the fireplace mantel, though she hardly remembered climbing up there. And truly, the mirror was starting to melt away, just like a bright, silvery mist.

In another moment, Alice had stepped through the glass and hopped lightly down into the Looking-glass room. The very first thing she did was check the fireplace — and she was happy to see a real fire burning there, just as bright as the one she had left behind.

"So I'll be just as warm here as I was in—"