【英文读物】The Westminster Alice

【英文读物】The Westminster AliceALICE IN DOWNING STREET“Have you ever seen an Ineptitude?0 asked the Cheshire Cat suddenly; the Cat was nothing ifnot abrupt.“CAN YOU TELL ME WHAT YOU ARE DOING HERE?” ALICE INQUIRED POLITELY.“ Not in real life, said Alice. uHave you any about here?4A few,” answered the Cat comprehensively. Over there, for instance,n it added, contractingits pupils to the requisite focus, “ is the most perfect specimen we have.Alice followed the direction of its glance and noticed for the first time a figure sitting in a veryuncomfortable attitude on nothing in particular. Alice had no time to wonder how it managed todo it, she was busy taking in the appearance of the creature, which was something like abadly-written note of interrogation and something like a guillemot, and seemed to have beentrying to preen its rather untidy plumage with whitewash. What a dreadful mess it* s in! sheremarked, after gazing at it for a few moments in silence. What is it, and why is it here?“Ithasn t any meaning/1 said the Cat, “it simply is.“ Can it talk? asked Alice eagerly.“It has never done anything else,* chuckled the Cat.“Can you tell me what you are doing here? Alice inquired politely. The Ineptitude shook itshead with a deprecatory motion and commenced to drawl, I haven t an idea.5”It never has, you know,* interrupted the Cheshire Cat rudely, but in its leisure moments(Alice thought it must have a good many of them) when it isn t playing with a gutta-percha ballit unravels the groundwork of what people believeor don t believe, I forget which.THE QUEEN.with apologies to Sir John TennielIt really doesn t matter which, said the Ineptitude, with languid interest.6uOf course it doesn* t,” the Cat went on cheerfully, 4 because the unravelling got so tangledthat no one could follow it. Its theory is, he continued, seeing that Alice was waiting for more,“ that you mustn t interfere with the Inevitable. Slide and let slide, you know.“But,” objected Alice, “supposing the war was to assume that your reasoning faculty waswanting, and went on all the same?”“The child is talking nonsense, said the Red Queen; “she doesn t know anything of ChristianScience. Let s try Political Economy. Supposing you were pledged to introduce a scheme forOld-Age Pensions, what would be your next step? ”Alice considered. a should think“ Of course you d think, ” said the White Queen, “ever so much. You d go on thinking off andon for years. I can t tell you how much I ve thought about it myself; I still think about it a little,just for practiceprincipally on Tuesdays.“I should think, continued Alice, without noticing(32 the interruption, “that the first thingwould be to find the money. ”“ Dear; no, said the Red Queen pityingly, thatwouldn t be Political Economy. The first thingwould be to find an excuse for dropping the question.M(With apologies to Sir John Tenniel.)“ What a dreadful lot of unnecessary business we re talking! * said the White Queen fretfully.“It makes me quite miserablecarries me back to the days when I was in Opposition. Can t shesing us something?What shall I sing you? asked Alice.(3314 Oh, anything soothing; the 4 Intercessional/ if you like.Alice began, but the words didn t come a bit right, and she wasn t at all sure how the Queenswould take it:u Voice of the People, lately polled,Awed by our broad-cast battle scheme,By virtue of whose vote we holdOur licence still to doze and dream,Still, fait ring Voice, complaisant shout,Lest we go out, lest we go out.Alice looked anxiously at the Queens when she had finished, but they were both fast asleep.It will take a deal of shouting to rouse them, she thought.ALICE IN DIFFICULTIES“ How are you getting on? ” asked the Cheshire Cat.“I m not,v said Alice.Which was certainly the truth.It was the most provoking and bewildering game of croquet she had ever played in. The otherside did not seem to know what they were expected to do, and, for the most part, they weren tdoing anything, so Alice thought she might have a good chance of winningthough she was everso many hoops behind. But the ground she had to play over was all lumps and furrows, and someof the hoops were three-cornered in shape, which made them difficult to get through, while asfor the balls (which were live hedgehogs and very opinionated), it was all she could do to keepthem in position for a minute at a time. Then the flamingo which she was using as a mallet keptstiffening itself into uncompromising attitudes, and had to be coaxed back into a goodtemper.(36T think I can manage him now, ” she said, since I let him have a latchkey and allowed him totake up the position he wanted he has been quite amiable. The other flamingo I was playing with,she added regretfully, u strayed off into a furrow. The last I saw of it, it was trying to bore atunnel.”“ HOW ARE YOU GETTING ON? ASKED THE CHESHIRE CAT.“ A tunnel?” said the Cat.“Yes; under the sea, you know.I see; to avoid the cross-current, of course.37”Alice waited till the Cat had stopped grinning at its own joke, and then went onTHE OTHER FLAMINGO.As for the hedgehogs, there s no doing anything with them; they ve got such prickly tempers.And they re so short-sighted; if they don t happen to be looking the same way they invariablyrun against each other. I should have won that last hoop if both(38 hedgehogs hadn, t tried toget through at the same time.“Both?”44 Yes, the one I was playing with and the one I wasn t. And every one began shouting out allsorts of different directions till I scarcely knew which I was playing with. Really, she continuedplaintively, it s the most discouraging croquet-party I was ever at; if we go on like this theresoon won , t be any party at all.M“It s no use swearing and humping your back,” said the Cat sympathetically. (Alice hadn tdone either.) “ Keep your temper and your flamingo.vTs that all?”“No,” said the Cat; ukeep on playing with the right ball.Which is the right ball? asked Alice.But the Cat had discreetly vanished.ALICE AT ST. STEPHEN SIt s very provoking,n said Alice to herself; she had been trying for the previous quarter of anhour to attract the attention of a large and very solemn caterpillar that was perched on the top ofa big mushroom with a Gothic fringe. I ve heard that the only chance of speaking to it is tocatch its eye, ” she continued, but she found out that however perseveringly she thrust herselfinto the Caterpillar s range of vision its eye persistently looked beyond her, or beneath her, oraround hernever at her. Alice had read somewhere that little girls should be seen and notheard; “but,” she thought, T m not even seen here, and if I * m not to be heard, what amI here at all for? In any case she determined to make an attempt at conversation.If you please she began.“I don t, said the Caterpillar shortly, without seeming to take any further notice of her.(40)After an uncomfortable pause she commenced again.“I should likeYou shouldn t, said the Caterpillar; with decision.Alice felt discouraged, but it was no use to be shut41 up in this way, so she started again asamiably as she could.You can t think, Mr. Caterpillar“I can, and I often do,” he remarked stiffly; adding, “You mustn t make such wild statements.They re not relevant to the discussion/*But I only said that in order“Youdidn t, said the Caterpillar angrily. 441 tell you it was not in order.You are so dreadfully short, exclaimed Alice; the Caterpillar drew itself up.“In manner; I mean; noin memory, she added hastily, for it was thoroughly angry by thistime.T m sure I didn, t mean anything/* she continued humbly, for she felt that it was absurd toquarrel with a caterpillar.The Caterpillar snorted.What s the good of talking if you don t mean anything? If you ve talked all this time withoutmeaning anything you re not worth listening to. ”But you put a wrong construction Alice began.“You can* t discuss Construction now, you know; that comes on the Estimates. Shrivel! ”I don t understand/* said Alice.42Shrivel. Dry up, explained the Caterpillar and proceeded to look in another direction, as if ithad forgotten her existence.Good-bye,v said Alice, after waiting a moment; she half hoped that the Caterpillar might say,See you later, ” but it took not the slightest notice of her remark, so she got up reluctantly andwalked away.u Well, of all the gubernatorial said Alice to herself when she got outside. She did notquite know what it meant, but it was an immense relief to be able to come out with a word of sixsyllables.ALICE LUNCHES AT WESTMINSTER(With apologies to Everybody.)“I think I would rather not hear it just now, ” said Alice politely.It is expressly intended for publication,，, said Humpty Dumpty; I don t suppose(44 there*II be a paper to-morrow that won t be talking about it. ”“In that case I suppose I may as well hear it, said Alice, with resignation.The scene, said Humpty Dumpty, is Before Ladysmith, and the time一well, the time is AfterColenso:I sent a message to the WhiteTo tell him一if you must, you might.But then, I said, you p raps might not(The weather was extremely hot).This query, too, I spatchcock-slid,How would you do it, if you did?I did not know, I rather thoughtAnd then I wondered if I ought.It s dreadfully hard to understand,M said Alice.It gets easier as it goes on, said Humpty Dumpty, and resumedThey tried a most malignant scheme,They put dead horses in the stream;(With One at home I saw it boreOn preference for a horseless war).45)But though I held the war might cease,At least I never held my peace.I held the key; it was a boreI could not hit upon the door.Then One suggested, in my ear,It would be well to persevere.The papers followed in that strain,They said it very loud and plain.I simply answered with a grin,Why, what a hurry they are in! ”I went and played a waiting game;Observe, I got there just the same.And if you have a better man,Well, show him to me, if you can.Thank you very much, ” said Alice; it s very interesting, but I m afraid it won * t help to coolthe atmosphere much/,“I could tell you lots more like that,” Humpty Dumpty began, but Alice hastily interrupted him.I hear a lot of fighting going on in the wood; don t you think I had better hear the rest someother time?4746 ”ALICE IN A FOGThe Duke and Duchess! said the White Rabbit nervously, as it went scurrying past; “theymay be here at any moment, and I haven t got it yet.Hasn t got what?* wondered Alice.“A rhyme for Cornwall/ said the Rabbit, as if in answer to her thought; borne well, yawn welland he pattered away into the distance, dropping in his hurry a folded paper that he had beencarrying.What have you got there? v asked the Cheshire Cat as Alice picked up the paper and opened it.u It seems to be a kind of poetry,v said Alice doubtfully; “ at least, she added, usome of thewords rhyme and none of them appear to have any particular meaning.nWhat is it about? asked the Cat.“Well, some one seems to be coming somewhere from everywhere else, and to get a mixedreception:. Your Father smiles,Your Mother weeps. ”48“I ve heard something like that before, said the Cat; “it went on, if I remember, Your aunthas the pen of the gardener/ THE WHITE RABBIT.There s nothing about that here, * said Alice; *supposing she didn* t weep when the timecame?”She would if she had to read all that stuff/ said the Cat.(49“And then it goes onYou went as came the swallow.That doesn t help us unless we know how the swallow came, ” observed the Cat. If he wentas the swallow usually travels he would have won the Deutsch Prize.homeward drawNow it hath winged its way to winters green/There seems to have been some urgent reason for avoiding the swallow,M continued Alice.Then all sorts of things happened to the Almanac:Twice a hundred dawns, a hundred noons, a hundred eves.“You see there were two dawns to every noon and eveningit must have been dreadfullyconfusing.M“It would be at first, of course, agreed the Cat.“I think it must have been that extra dawn thatNever swallow or wandering sea-bird sawor else it was the Flag.“What flag?Well, the flag that some one found,Scouring the field or furrowing the sea.Would you mind explaining, said the Cat, which was doing the scouring and furrowing?”The flag/ said Alice, or the some one. It is50n t exactly clear, and it doesn t make senseeither way. Anyhow, wherever the flag was it floated o er the Free.WOULD YOU MIND EXPLAINING?，r SAID THE CAT.51Come, that tells us something. Whoever it was must have avoided Dartmoor and St. Helena.vYou, wandering, saw,Young Commonwealths you found.There s a great deal of wandering in the poem, observed the Cat.“You sailed from us to them, from them to us, ” continued Alice.That isn t new, either. It should go on: You all returned from him to them, though they weremine before.Tt doesn t go on quite like that, said Alice; 4 it ends up with a lot of words that I supposewere left over and couldn t be fitted in anywhere else:Therefore rejoicing mightier hath been madeImperial Power.That,” said the Cat, is the cleverest thing in the whole poem. People see that at the end, andthen they read it through to see what on earth it s about.T d give sixpence to any one who can explain it,M said Alice.ALICE HAS TEA AT THE HOTEL CECILThe March Hare and the Dormouse and the Hatter were seated at a very neglected-lookingtea-table; they were evidently in agonised consideration of something一even the Dormouse,which was asleep, had a note of interrogation in its tail.“ No room! ” they shouted, as soon as they caught sight of Alice.“There s lots of room for improvement,v said Alice, as she sat down.You ve got no business to be here, said the March Hare.And if you had any business you wouldn t be here, you know, said the Hatter; ul hope youdon* t suppose this is a business gathering. What will you have to eat? he continued.Alice looked at a long list of dishes with promising names, but nearly all of them seemed to becrossed off.(54That list was made nearly seven years ago, you know, said the March Hare, in explanation.But you can always have patience/* said the Hatter. You begin with patience and we do therest. And he leaned back and seemed prepared to do a lot of rest.TEA AT THE HOTEL CECIL.(With apologies to Everybody Concerned.)Your manners want mending, said the March Hare suddenly to Alice.“They don t, ” she replied indignantly.(55)It s very rude to contradict, said the Hatter; 4you would like to hear me sing something.Alice felt that it would be unwise to contradict again, so she said nothing, and the Hatter began:Dwindle, dwindle, little war,How I wonder more and more,As about the veldt you hopWhen you really mean to stop.“Talking about stopping, ” interrupted the March Hare anxiously, I wonder how my timepieceis behaving.He took out of his pocket a large chronometer of complicated workmanship, and mournfullyregarded it.It s dreadfully behind the times/* he said, giving it an experimental shake. I would take it topieces at once if I was at all sure of getting the bits back in their right places.What is the matter with it? asked Alice.The wheels seem to get stuck, said the March Hare. There is too much Irish butter in theworks.nRuins the thing from a dramatic point of view,” said the Hatter; “too many scenes, too fewacts.”“ The result is we never have time to get through(56 the day s work. It s never even time for afree breakfast-table; we do what we can for education at odd moments, but we shall all die of oldage before we have a moment to spare for social duties.You might lose a lot if you run your business in that way, said Alice.uDWINDLE, DWINDLE, LITTLE WAR.”“Not in this country, said the March Hare. You see, we have a Commission on everythingthat we don t do.“The Dormouse must tell us a story, ” said the Hatter; giving it a sharp pinch.The Dormouse awoke with a start, and began as(57 though it had been awake all the time:uThere was an old woman who lived in a shoeI know said Alice, 4she had so many children that she didn* t know what to do.TRYING TO MAKE HIM LOOK LIKE A LION.“ Nothing of the sort, ” said the Dormouse, “you lack the gift of imagination. She put most ofthem into Treasuries and Foreign Offices and Boards of(58 Trade, and all sorts of unlikely placeswhere they could learn things.What did they learn? asked Alice.*Painting in glowing colours, and attrition, and terminology (that* s the science of knowingwhen things are over), and iteration (that s the same thing over again), and drawingWhat did they draw?*,uSalaries. And then there were classes for foreign languages. And such language!v (Here theMarch Hare and the Hatter shut their eyes and took a big gulp from their tea-cups.) However, Idon t think anybody attended to them.The Dormouse broke off into a chuckle which ended in a snore, and as no one seemed inclined towake it up again Alice thought she might as well be going.When she looked back the Hatter and the March Hare were trying to stiffen the Dormouse outinto the attitude of a lion guardant. But it will never pass for anything but a Dormouse if it willsnore so, ” she remarked to herself.ALICE GOES TO CHESTERFIELDAlice noticed a good deal of excitement going on among the Looking-Glass creatures: some ofthem were hurrying off expectantly in one direction, as fast as their legs would carry them, whileothers were trying to look as if nothing in particular was about to happen.Those mimsy-looking birds, she said, catching sight of a group that did not look in the best ofspirits, u those must be Borogoves. T ve read about them somewhere; in some parts of thecountry they have to be protected. And, I declare, there is the White King coming through theWood.Alice went to meet the King, who was struggling with a very unwieldy pencil to write somethingin a notebook. Alice remembered having seen the Red King, in rose-coloured armour that had got a little rusty,sleeping uneasily in the thickest part of the wood.“The fact is, the White King went on, * some of them think we * re only a part of his dream,and that we shall all go piff when he wakes up. That is what makes them so jumpy just now.Oh, he cried, giving a little jump himself, uthere go some more!But what do you keep it here for? ” asked Alice.“ Oh, somehow you can t help it; it s so perfectly harmless and amiable and says the nastiestthings in the nicest manner, and the King just couldn