Mouse (Alice's Adventures in Wonderland)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Mouse is a fictional character in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll. He appears in Chapter II "The Pool of Tears" [1] and Chapter III "A Caucus-Race and a Long Tale" [2].
Alice, the eponymous heroine in the book, first talks to the mouse when she is floating in a pool of her own tears, having shrunk in size:
`O Mouse, do you know the way out of this pool? I am very tired of swimming about here, O Mouse!' (Alice thought this must be the right way of speaking to a mouse: she had never done such a thing before, but she remembered having seen in her brother's Latin Grammar, `A mouse—of a mouse—to a mouse—a mouse—O mouse!' The Mouse looked at her rather inquisitively, and seemed to her to wink with one of its little eyes, but it said nothing.
With no response from the mouse, Alice fears that it may not speak English and attempts to speak French. Upon mentioning the French word for cat, chatte, the mouse panics. This leads to a discussion about cats and dogs, culminating in the mouse telling Alice his history.
[edit] The Mouse's Tale
When Alice hears the mouse's "long and sad tale", she is watching his tail. So, she imagines the tale in its shape.[1]
`Fury said to a
mouse, That he
met in the
house,
"Let us
both go to
law: I will
prosecute
YOU. --Come,
I'll take no
denial; We
must have a
trial: For
really this
morning I've
nothing
to do."
Said the
mouse to the
cur, "Such
a trial,
dear Sir,
With
no jury
or judge,
would be
wasting
our
breath."
"I'll be
judge, I'll
be jury,"
Said
cunning
old Fury:
"I'll
try the
whole
cause,
and
condemn
you
to
death."'
|
||||||||||||||||||||
