o wink
with one of its little eyes, but it said nothing.

[Illustration]

"Perhaps it doesn't understand English," thought Alice; "I
daresay it's a French mouse, come over with William the
Conqueror!" (for, with all her knowledge of history, Alice had
no very clear notion how long ago anything had happened,) so she
began again: "ou est ma chatte?" which was the first sentence out
of her French lesson-book. The mouse gave a sudden jump in the
pool, and seemed to quiver with fright: "oh, I beg your pardon!"
cried Alice hastily, afraid that she had hurt the poor animal's
feelings, "I quite forgot you didn't like cats!"

"Not like cats!" cried the mouse, in a shrill, passionate voice,
"would you like cats if you were me?"

"Well, perhaps not," said Alice in a soothing tone, "don't be
angry about it. And yet I wish I could show you our cat Dinah: I
think you'd take a fancy to cats if you could only see her. She
is such a dear quiet thing," said Alice, half to herself, as she
swam lazily about in the pool, "she sits purring so nicely by the
fire, licking her paws and washing her face: and she is such a
nice soft thing to nurse, and she's such a capital one for
catching mice--oh! I beg your pardon!" cried poor Alice again,
for this time the mouse was bristling all over, and she felt
certain that it was really offended, "have I offended you?"

"Offended indeed!" cried the mouse, who seemed to be positively
trembling with rage, "our family always hated cats! Nasty, low,
vulgar things! Don't talk to me about them any more!"

"I won't indeed!" said Alice, in a great hurry to change the
conversation, "are you--are you--fond of--dogs?" The mouse did
not answer, so Alice went on eagerly: "there is such a nice
little dog near our house I should like to show you! A little
bright-eyed terrier, you know, with oh! such long curly brown
hair! And it'll fetch things when you throw them, and it'll sit
up and beg for its dinner, and all sorts of things--I ca'n't
remember half of them--and it belongs to a farmer, and he says it
kills all the rats and--oh dear!" said Alice sadly, "I'm afraid
I've offended it again!" for the mouse was swimming away from her
as hard as it could go, and making quite a commotion in the pool
as it went.

So she called softly after it: "mouse dear! Do come back again,
and we won't talk about cats and dogs any more, if you don't like
them!" When the mouse heard this, it turned and swam slowly back
to her: