T
he
rabbit-h.
le went straight on like a tunnel for some way, and then dipped suddenly down, so suddenly that
Alice
had not a moment to think about stopping herself before she found herself falling down a very deep
well.
Either the well was very deep, or she fell very slowly, for she had plenty of time as she went down to look about her and to wonder what was going to happen next.
First, she tried to look down and make out what she was coming to, but it was too dark to see anything;
then she looked at the sides of the well, and noticed that they were filled with cupboards and book-shelves;
here and there she saw maps and pictures hung upon pegs. She took down a jar from one of the shelves as she passed;
it was labelled 'ORANGE MARMALADE', but to her great
disappointment it was empty: she did not like to drop the jar for fear
of killing somebody, so managed to put it into one of the cupboards as
she fell past it. 'Well!' thought (Alice to herself, 'after such a fall as this, I shall
think nothing of tumbling down stairs! How brave they'll all think me at
home! Why, I wouldn't say anything about it, even if I fell off the top
of the house!' (Which was very likely true.) Down, down, down. Would the fall
NEVER come
to an end!
Alice was not a bit hurt, and she jumped up on to her feet in a moment: she looked up, but it was all dark overhead;
There were doors all round the hall, but they were all locked; and when
Alice had been all the way down one side and up the other, trying every
door, she walked sadly down the middle, wondering how she was ever to
get out
again.x
Presently she began again. 'I wonder if I shall fall right THROUGH the earth! How funny it'll seem to come out among the people that walk with their heads downward! The Antipathies, I think-' (she was rather glad there WAS no one listening, this time, as it didn't sound at all the right word) '-but I shall have to ask them what the name of the country is, you know. Please, Ma'am, is this New Zealand or Australia?' (and she tried to curtsey as she spoke-fancy CURTSEYING as you're falling through the air! Do you think you could manage it?) 'And what an ignorant little girl she'll think me for asking!
No, it'll never do to ask: perhaps I shall see it written up somewhere.'
Suddenly she came upon a little three-legged table, all made of solid
glass; there was nothing
on it except a tiny golden key, and Alice's
first thought
was that it might belong
to one of the doors of
the hall;
but, alas! either
the locks were too large,
or the key was too small,
but at any rate it would
not open any of them.
However, on the
second
time round,
she came upon a
low curtain
she had not noticed
before, and
behind
it was a little
door about fifteen
inches high:
she tried the
little golden
key in
the lock,
and to
her great
delight
it
f
i
t
t
e
d
!
Down,
down,
down.
There was nothing else to do, so Alice soon began
talking again. 'Dinah'll miss me very much to-night, I should think!'
(Dinah was the cat.) 'I hope they'll remember her saucer of milk at
tea-time. Dinah my dear! I wish you were down here with me! There are no
mice in the air, I'm afraid, but you might catch a bat, and that's very
like a mouse, you know. But do cats eat bats, I wonder?' And here Alice
began to get rather sleepy, and went on saying to herself, in a dreamy
sort of way,
'Do cats eat bats?
Do
cats
eat
bats?'
and sometimes, '
Do
bats eat cats?' for, you see, as she couldn't answer either question,
it didn't much matter which way she put it. She felt that she was dozing
off, and had just begun to dream that
she was walking
hand
in hand
with
Dinah,
and
saying
to
her
very
earnestly
, 'Now,
Dinah,
tell
me
the
truth:
did
you
ever
eat
a
b
a
t
?'
when
suddenly,
thump!
thump!
d
o
w
n
she
came
upon
a
heap
of
sticks
and
dry
leaves,
and
the
fall
was
over.
Alice
opened the door and found that it led into a small passage, not
much larger than a rat-hole: she knelt down and looked along the passage
into the loveliest garden you ever saw. How she longed to get out of
that dark hall, and wander about among those beds of bright flowers and
those cool fountains, but she could not even get her head through the
doorway; 'and even if my head would go through,' thought poor Alice, 'it
would be of very little use without my shoulders. Oh, how I wish I could
shut up like a telescope! I think I could, if I only know how to begin.'
For,
you see,
so many
out-of-the-way things had happened lately,
that Alice had begun to think that very few things indeed
were
really
i
m
p
o
s
s
i
b
l
e
.
'I wonder how many miles I've fallen by this time?' she said aloud. 'I must be getting somewhere near the centre of the earth. Let me see: that would be four thousand miles down, I think-' (for, you see, Alice had learnt several things
of this sort in her lessons in the schoolroom, and though this was not a VERY good opportunity for showing off her knowledge, as there was no one to listen to her, still it was good practice to say it over)
'-yes, that's about the right distance-but then I wonder what Latitude or Longitude I've got to?' (Alice had no idea what Latitude was, or Longitude either, but thought they were nice grand words to say.)
before her was another
long passage, and the white rabbit was still in sight, hurrying down it.
There was not a moment to be lost: away
went (Alice like the wind, and
was
just in time to hear it say, as
it turned a corner, 'Oh
my ears
and
whiskers,
how late it's
getting!'
She
was close
behind it when
she
turned the
corner,
but
the
rabbit
was no
longer:
to be seen she
found
herself
in a
long, low
hall, which
was lit up
by a
row of
lamps
h
a
n
g
i
n
g
f
r
o
m
t
h
e
r
o
o
f.