Alices Adventures Under Ground | Page 9

and she trembled till she shook
the house, quite forgetting that she was now about a thousand times as
large as the rabbit, and had no reason to be afraid of it. Presently the
rabbit came to the door, and tried to open it, but as it opened inwards,
and Alice's elbow was against it, the attempt proved a failure. Alice
heard it say to itself "then I'll go round and get in at the window."
"That you wo'n't!" thought Alice, and, after waiting till she fancied she
heard the rabbit, just under the window, she suddenly spread out her
hand, and made a snatch in the air. She did not get hold of anything, but
she heard a little shriek and a fall and a crash of breaking glass, from
which she concluded that it was just possible it had fallen into a
cucumber-frame, or something of the sort.
[Illustration]
Next came an angry voice--the rabbit's--"Pat, Pat! where are you?" And
then a voice she had never heard before, "shure then I'm here! digging
for apples, anyway, yer honour!"
"Digging for apples indeed!" said the rabbit angrily, "here, come and
help me out of this!"--Sound of more breaking glass.
"Now, tell me, Pat, what is that coming out of the window?"
"Shure it's an arm, yer honour!" (He pronounced it "arrum".)
"An arm, you goose! Who ever saw an arm that size? Why, it fills the
whole window, don't you see?"
"Shure, it does, yer honour, but it's an arm for all that."

"Well, it's no business there: go and take it away!"
There was a long silence after this, and Alice could only hear whispers
now and then, such as "shure I don't like it, yer honour, at all at all!"
"do as I tell you, you coward!" and at last she spread out her hand again
and made another snatch in the air. This time there were two little
shrieks, and more breaking glass--"what a number of cucumber-frames
there must be!" thought Alice, "I wonder what they'll do next! As for
pulling me out of the window, I only wish they could! I'm sure I don't
want to stop in here any longer!"
She waited for some time without hearing anything more: at last came a
rumbling of little cart-wheels, and the sound of a good many voices all
talking together: she made out the words "where's the other
ladder?--why, I hadn't to bring but one, Bill's got the other--here, put
'em up at this corner--no, tie 'em together first--they don't reach high
enough yet--oh, they'll do well enough, don't be particular--here, Bill!
catch hold of this rope--will the roof bear?--mind that loose slate--oh,
it's coming down! heads below!--" (a loud crash) "now, who did
that?--it was Bill, I fancy--who's to go down the chimney?--nay, I
sha'n't! you do it!--that I won't then--Bill's got to go down--here, Bill!
the master says you've to go down the chimney!"
"Oh, so Bill's got to come down the chimney, has he?" said Alice to
herself, "why, they seem to put everything upon Bill! I wouldn't be in
Bill's place for a good deal: the fireplace is a pretty tight one, but I
think I can kick a little!"
She drew her foot as far down the chimney as she could, and waited till
she heard a little animal (she couldn't guess what sort it was) scratching
and scrambling in the chimney close above her: then, saying to herself
"this is Bill," she gave one sharp kick, and waited again to see what
would happen next.
[Illustration]
The first thing was a general chorus of "there goes Bill!" then the
rabbit's voice alone "catch him, you by the hedge!" then silence, and

then another confusion of voices, "how was it, old fellow? what
happened to you? tell us all about it."
Last came a little feeble squeaking voice, ("that's Bill" thought Alice,)
which said "well, I hardly know--I'm all of a fluster myself--something
comes at me like a Jack-in-the-box, and the next minute up I goes like a
rocket!" "And so you did, old fellow!" said the other voices.
"We must burn the house down!" said the voice of the rabbit, and Alice
called out as loud as she could "if you do, I'll set Dinah at you!" This
caused silence again, and while Alice was thinking "but how can I get
Dinah here?" she found to her great delight that she was getting smaller:
very soon she was able to get up out of the uncomfortable position in
which she had been lying, and in two or three minutes more she was
once more three inches high.
She ran out of the house as quick as she could, and found quite a crowd
of little animals waiting outside--guinea-pigs, white mice, squirrels,
and