Chapter IV. The Rabbit Sends in a Little Bill · page 21 2101_” thought Alice; but she had not long to doubt, for the next moment a shower of little pebbles came rattling in at the window, and some of them hit her in the face.102“I’ll put a stop to this,” she said to herself, and shouted out, “You’d better not do that again!” which produced another dead silence.103Alice noticed with some surprise that the pebbles were all turning into little cakes as they lay on the floor, and a bright idea came into her head.104“If I eat one of these cakes,” she thought, “it’s sure to make _some_ change in my size; and as it can’t possibly make me larger, it must make me smaller, I suppose.”105So she swallowed one of the cakes, and was delighted to find that she began shrinking directly.106As soon as she was small enough to get through the door, she ran out of the house, and found quite a crowd of little animals and birds waiting outside.107The poor little Lizard, Bill, was in the middle, being held up by two guinea-pigs, who were giving it something out of a bottle.108They all made a rush at Alice the moment she appeared; but she ran off as hard as she could, and soon found herself safe in a thick wood.109“The first thing I’ve got to do,” said Alice to herself, as she wandered about in the wood, “is to grow to my right size again; and the second thing is to find my way into that lovely garden.110I think that will be the best plan.”111It sounded an excellent plan, no doubt, and very neatly and simply arranged; the only difficulty was, that she had not the smallest idea how to set about it; and while she was peering about anxiously among the trees, a little sharp bark just over her head made her look up in a great hurry.112An enormous puppy was looking down at her with large round eyes, and feebly stretching out one paw, trying to touch her.113“Poor little thing!” said Alice, in a coaxing tone, and she tried hard to whistle to it; but she was terribly frightened all the time at the thought that it might be hungry, in which case it would be very likely to eat her up in spite of all her coaxing.114Hardly knowing what she did, she picked up a little bit of stick, and held it out to the puppy; whereupon the puppy jumped into the air off all its feet at once, with a yelp of delight, and rushed at the stick, and made believe to worry it; then Alice dodged behind a great thistle, to keep herself from being run over; and the moment she appeared on the other side, the puppy made another rush at the stick, and tumbled head over heels in its hurry to get hold of it; then Alice, thinking it was very like having a game of play with a cart-horse, and expecting every moment to be trampled under its feet, ran round the thistle again; then the puppy began a series of short charges at the stick, running a very little way forwards each time and a long way back, and barking hoarsely all the while, till at last it sat down a good way off, panting, with its tongue hanging out of its mouth, and its great eyes half shut.115This seemed to Alice a good opportunity for making her escape; so she set off at once, and ran till she was quite tired and out of breath, and till the puppy’s bark sounded quite faint in the distance.116“And yet what a dear little puppy it was!” said Alice, as she leant against a buttercup to rest herself, and fanned herself with one of the leaves: “I should have liked teaching it tricks very much, if—if I’d only been the right size to do it!117Oh dear!118I’d nearly forgotten that I’ve got to grow up again!119Let me see—how _is_ it to be managed?120I suppose I ought to eat or drink something or other; but the great question is, what?”121The great question certainly was, what?122Alice looked all round her at the flowers and the blades of grass, but she did not see anything that looked like the right thing to eat or drink under the circumstances.123There was a large mushroom growing near her, about the same height as herself; and when she had looked under it, and on both sides of it, and behind it, it occurred to her that she might as well look and see what was on the top of it.124She stretched herself up on tiptoe, and peeped over the edge of the mushroom, and her eyes immediately met those of a large blue caterpillar, that was sitting on the top with its arms folded, quietly smoking a long hookah, and taking not the smallest notice of her or of anything else.1 2← previousChapter III. A Caucus-Race and a Long Talenext →Chapter V. Advice from a Caterpillar↑ back to Alice's Adventures in WonderlandThis page in Markdown → https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg11/5/page/2/