Page:Alice's adventures in Wonderland - (IA alicesadventures00carr 21).djvu/48

38 "I've seen girls in my time, but none with such a neck as that!" said the bird. "No! no! You're a snake; and there's no use to say you're not. I guess you'll say next that you don't eat eggs!"

"Of course I eat eggs," said Al-ice, "but girls eat eggs quite as much as snakes do, you know."

"I don't know," said the bird, "but if they do, why then they're a kind of snake, that's all I can say."

This was such a new thing to Al-ice that at first, she did not speak, which gave the bird a chance to add, "You want eggs now, I know that quite well."

"But I don't want eggs, and if I did I should-n't want yours. I don't like them raw."

"Well, be off, then!" said the bird as it sat down in its nest.

Al-ice crouched down through the trees as well as she could, for her neck would twist round the boughs, and now and then she had to stop to get it off. At last, she thought of the mush-room in her hands, and set to work with great care, to take a small bite first from the right hand, then from the left, till at length she brought her-self down to the right size.

It was so long since she had been this height, that it felt quite strange, at first, but she soon got used to it.

"Come, there's half my plan done now!" she said. "How strange all these things are! I'm not sure one hour, what I shall be the next! I'm glad I'm back to my right size: the next thing is, to get in-to that gar-den—how is