be quite as safe to stay with it as to go after that savage

Queen: so she waited.

The Gryphon sat up and rubbed its eyes: then it watched the

Queen till she was out of sight: then it chuckled. `What fun!'

said the Gryphon, half to itself, half to Alice.

`What IS the fun?' said Alice.

`Why, SHE,' said the Gryphon. `It's all her fancy, that: they

never executes nobody, you know. Come on!'

`Everybody says "come on!" here,' thought Alice, as she went

slowly after it: `I never was so ordered about in all my life,

never!'

They had not gone far before they saw the Mock Turtle in the

distance, sitting sad and lonely on a little ledge of rock, and,

as they came nearer, Alice could hear him sighing as if his heart

would break. She pitied him deeply. `What is his sorrow?' she

asked the Gryphon, and the Gryphon answered, very nearly in the

same words as before, `It's all his fancy, that: he hasn't got

no sorrow, you know. Come on!'

So they went up to the Mock Turtle, who looked at them with

large eyes full of tears, but said nothing.

`This here young lady,' said the Gryphon, `she wants for to

know your history, she do.'

`I'll tell it her,' said the Mock Turtle in a deep, hollow

tone: `sit down, both of you, and don't speak a word till I've

finished.'

So they sat down, and nobody spoke for some minutes. Alice

thought to herself, `I don't see how he can EVEN finish, if he

doesn't begin.' But she waited patiently.

`Once,' said the Mock Turtle at last, with a deep sigh, `I was

a real Turtle.'

These words were followed by a very long silence, broken only

by an occasional exclamation of `Hjckrrh!' from the Gryphon, and

the constant heavy sobbing of the Mock Turtle. Alice was very