Looking for Alice

Front matter

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Contents

CHAPTER PAGE

I. The Frog in the Well 9

II. On the Royal Road to Learning . 25

Chapter I The Frog In The Well

Of course, Harriet knew all about the Adventures of Alice in Wonderland, as what little girl does not ? She knew, of course, that the Adventures were only a part of a story and did not really and truly happen. But she had been told that Alice herself was a real, live little girl, and Harriet often thought how nice it would be if only Alice could come and play with her.

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She used to fancy what they would say and do together, and how Alice would relate the sayings and doings of the White Rabbit and the Duchess and the Queen of Hearts. There really was a Queen of Hearts, for Harriet had seen her once, and the King and the Knave, too, in a pack of cards, when she had played “ Old Maid ” ; and she had decided, for herself, that the Duchess must have been the “ Old Maid.”

“ And that was why she had to look out for the pig-baby,” Harriet thought, for it seemed to her that looking out for other people’s babies was the special mission of old maids.

It was not so pleasant to fancy such things for herself as to hear them read about. But, oftentimes, when Harriet was ready to listen, there was no one to read to her; and when she opened the little green and gold book to look at the pictures, which were just exactly what Harriet knew Alice and her friends were like, she found that the letters of the alphabet were quite as much mixed up as

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they \Vere when she tried to repeat them at lesson time and not a bit more interesting.

If only she could find the hole that the White Rabbit hurried into on that eventful afternoon, Harriet felt quite sure that she would be able to find Alice also, and then, hand in hand, they would wander about “ the beautiful gardens, among the bright flower-beds and the cool fountains.”

But, alas ! the old well in the orchard behind the house was the only hole that Harriet could find, and that did not look like a rabbit hole at all, for it had a high, wooden curb around it and a great well-sweep above it, with a stone at the end to balance the bucket of clear, cool water when it came up, shining and dripping, from the depths below.

But then, who can tell just what there is at the bottom of a well after all? And so, one day, Harriet was lifted up and allowed to take a long look down into the shadows below. '

“ You see it is nothing but a well, Miss,” said Margaret.

“ Oh, but, Margaret, I can see a little girl down there at the bottom and she is looking up at me,” Harriet exclaimed, in great excitement.

“ That is only your reflection,” said Margaret.

“ Now run away and play, like a good girl.”

So Harriet ran away and played, like a good girl, but, for all that, she was quite sure that Margaret was mistaken, and that the little girl whom she had seen at the bottom of the well was really Alice herself ; for had she not bow'ed when Harriet had bowed, and smiled when she smiled ?

Oh, what fun they would have together, if only the little girl in the well could get into the bucket sometime and come up and play with her in the shade of the apple trees in the old orchard ! Oh, if only the little girl could come !

Now, one day, when Harriet had been playing by herself in the orchard for a long, long time, she lay down to rest for a minute. The green leaves rustled softly overhead and the sunbeams danced like tiny sparks of fire, here and there, and the little white clouds in the blue sky looked down at her between the branches, and, as Harriet lay there, she closed her eyes, “ to take a little look inside,” and, of course, her thoughts turned once more to the little girl in the well and she wondered if Alice was still there, looking up and waiting for her.

The old, gray bucket lay upon the ground beside the well-curb, and Harriet wondered if it would make a comfortable seat, for she had been in an elevator once and so knew exactly what would be most comfortable ; and she kept thinking of this, until presently she got up and seated herself very carefully in the bucket. “ Just to see what it would feel like,” as she said afterwards.

The bucket proved to be very comfortable indeed ; and if it had been in its usual place on the edge of

the well-curb, Harriet could have looked down into the well again.

“ But then, if it had been there I could not have got into it,” she reflected, when, to her surprise, the bucket began to rise from the ground so gently that she was not at all alarmed, even when, having lifted her over the well-curb, it began to descend very steadily into the well.

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She had just time to catch a glimpse of the little girl at the bottom looking up at her, and then, as the bucket^ dipped lower and lower, it became so dark that she could not see anything, because her eyes were not accustomed to the shadows.

“If it is dark like this, I don’t think I shall get out at all,” she said to herself. “ And I’m sure if I was Alice, I should have come up long ago. But I suppose the bucket is full of water when it comes up, and so it wouldn’t be so pleasant to ride in.”

You see, she was a very brave little girl, so she was not at all afraid, but held on tightly with both hands until the bucket stopped when it reached the bottom, and Harriet stepped sdfely out.

She was standing on the bank of a little pool, and the sun was shining brightly, and all about the fields lay, broad and inviting, like those at home. But there was no little girl to be seen, much to Harriet’s disappointment, although a big, green frog was sitting by the side of the pool, who blinked at her out of his great, dull eyes.

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‘*Well?” the Frog croaked, in his hoarse voice. His voice was so hoarse and queer that Harriet stepped back — you see, his voice wasn’t nearly so queer as the fact that he had one at all — but as soon as she touched the rim of the bucket it floated out on the water, and then shot up out of sight very rapidly. There was no one else beside the Frog who could have spoken, and he looked as though he was fast asleep, with his great, round eyes wide open.

“Well?” the Frog asked once more, in his hoarse croak. “ Poor thing, he must have caught cold sitting in the wet all the time,” Harriet thought.

“ How do you do, sir? ” she said aloud.

“ Well,” said the Frog, for the third time.

“ That is nice,” said Harriet, politely. “ Will you please tell me where I am ? ”

“Well,” said the Frog, for the fourth time, and without another word, he leaped into the pool with a great splash.

“I suppose that ‘Well’ is all he can say,” the little girl thought. “ And really that is a good deal

ON THE ROAD TO LEARNING .

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for a frog. I wish I had asked him if he had seen Alice.”

But the Green Frog had vanished.

There was a narrow footpath leading from the pool across the fields, and at the side of the path stood a finger post, and on it was printed :

ROYAL ROAD TO LEARNING

“ I’m sure I don’t want to go to learning,” Harriet said to herself, as she walked around the bank of the pool, for it was vacation and she thought she had had quite lessons enough at home. But wherever she stopped, there was the signpost before her and the narrow road to Learning, reaching to her feet, just as the rays of the sun make a path to your feet over the waters, go where you will.

“ Oh, dear ! ” sighed Harriet. “ I don’t see the use of having a finger post at all.”

As she spoke, to her astonishment, the finger post beckoned to her and then pointed out the road once more, and there, in the distance, she saw the red roof of a cottage nestling among the tree tops.

“ There is no use in my staying here,” she decided at length, “ and perhaps they will know at the Red House where Alice lives, and perhaps Mary Ann or the Duchess will come to the door.”

“ Please, ma’am,” she went on, dropping a courtesy, “ can you tell me where Alice lives ? I wish I knew where. How strange it all is ! I feel as if I were in a dream or under a magic spell.”

She had scarcely finished when she saw the Frog looking at her once more ; that is, she could not see the Frog, but his dull, round eyes looked at her out of space, like large, round buttons on a black coat.

“ If you want anything, spell it,” said the Frog, in his hoarse voice.

“Spell what?” asked Harriet.

“ I-T,” said the Frog, and his eyes shut up with a snap.

“ Frog, come back ! ” she called, but no frog appeared. “ What did he mean by ‘ Spell it ’ ? Oh, Frog, come back ! ” she called again. “ F-R-O-G ! ”

As soon as she had spelled his name, to her great delight, she saw the Frog. He was sitting on the bank of the pool again, and was busily engaged in putting on a pair of rubber boots.

“ Well,” he croaked, and his voice was hoarser than ever. “ Do you know what you want this time?”

“ I want to find the little girl in the well,” said Harriet.

“You won’t find her in the well, if you don’t learn to spell well,” he croaked.

“ But I don’t want to find her in the well at all,” Harriet explained.

“You can’t spell all that, you know,” said the Frog. “ Not unless you spell water first.”

“No water, no well ;

No water, dry spell.”

“ That sounds like poetry,” said Harriet.

“ It happens to be common sense,” said the Frog. “ Make it a rule not to believe what you hear.”

This was not a very good beginning, Harriet thought, and so after a moment she said :

“ Why do all the roads go from here to Learning ? ”

“ Did you ever hear that the truth is at the bottom of a well ? ” asked the Frog. “ This is the well of truth, and all the roads of learning lead from it.”

“ Then they must lead to it, too, don’t they ? ” asked Harriet, and, indeed, she was quite surprised at herself.

“ Some do, and some don’t,” said the Frog, “ and you have to go to Learning to find that out.”

Harriet wanted to ask the Frog some more questions about the well, but his legs were so long and his feet were so large that he was having a great deal of trouble in putting on his rubber boots. Finally, however, he succeeded in drawing them both on, and then he fished another pair out of the pool and tried to put them on his hands, like a pair of mittens.

“ I wish you’d hold this for me,” he said, giving Harriet one of his boots. “ My fingers are all feet this morning.”

“ I don’t see the good of putting on rubber boots after your feet are wet,” Harriet couldn’t help remarking, as she helped him.

“ It all depends upon what you put them on for,” said the Frog. “You put on rubbers to keep your feet dry, and I put them on to keep my feet wet. The world is upside down here, you know.”

“ Is it ? ” said Harriet, in surprise. “ It doesn’t look so.”

“ That is because everything is upside down here,” said the Frog. “ You’re upside down, I’m upside down, the water in the well is upside down.”

“ How can it be ? ” asked Harriet, as the Frog paused.

“ It wouldn’t come out of the top of the well if it wasn’t,” said the Frog.

“ Oh, but that is only when we draw it,” Harriet answered, quickly.

“ Drawing it so, don’t make it so,” said the Frog, shaking his head. “ I drew some water once. I had water on the brain, I remember, and I drew on my imagination with a faucet, and, after I had drawn it, I painted it ; not with oil paints, though, because the oil wouldn’t mix with the water.”

“ How could you paint water, when it hasn’t any color?” asked Harriet, who was dreadfully puzzled by this time.

“ Oh, that was easy enough,” said the Frog. “ I used water-color paints, and it made a beautiful picture, I can tell you. But the trouble was that when the water dried up, only the pitcher remained.”

The Frog paused again, and after a moment Harriet asked :

“ Did you say picture or pitcher ? ”

“ Something to draw the water in, you know,” said the Frog.

“ But you said the water dried up,” said Harriet.

“ So it did,” said the Frog, “ and the drawing remained. It remained to be seen.”

“ I don’t think I quite understand,” Harriet began, but the Frog interrupted her with :

“ Of course you don’t, if you don’t think. Make

2 3 it a rule to think twice before you understand once.”

As he said this, the Frog closed his eyes and shut his mouth, and all that Harriet could see was a little heap of rubber boots lying by the side of the pool. It was very unsatisfactory, and she was on the point of walking away, when the Frog called after her :

“ Come back ! ”

Harriet did as he bade her, although it really seemed ridiculous to come back to somebody she couldn’t see.

“ If you want to find Alice,” the Frog croaked, “you must take the Royal Road to Learning.”

“ In which direction ? ” asked Harriet.

“ Oh, in any,” said the Frog. “ You can’t miss it.”

“ I might start in the wrong direction,” said Harriet.

“ That,” said the Frog, “ depends on who gives the directions. First go to the Red House and learn to read, then turn to the right and learn to write.”

“ What nonsense ! ” thought Harriet, as she walked away. But long after she had left the pool, she could hear him shouting all sorts of directions, and a confused medley of words, such as “ subtraction . . . and forests . . . and pies . . . and giants,” were wafted to her ears.

Chapter II On The Royal Road To Learning

“The first thing for me to do is to find the Red House,’ 1 Harriet said to herself, as the voice of the Green Frog died away in the distance, “ and the second thing is to be sure not to lose my way ” ; for Harriet had heard stories of little girls who had gone out walking by themselves without leave and had not come back until long after supper-time, and she thought it bad enough for them to lose their way, but much worse to lose their suppers.

“ I don’t suppose I could lose my way, though,” she reflected, “ because, somehow, I feel as if I had been here before, unless I have dreamed about it sometime, or else I really have been here before and am dreaming about it now. I wonder which it is. Let me see: if I were awake, of course, I should know I was not asleep. But if I were asleep and dreamed I was awake, why, then, I couldn’t wake up to know I was asleep until I stopped dreaming that I was awake ! Oh, dear ! perhaps I am walking and talking in my sleep now, and I know they wouldn’t like that at home.”

“ Come, Harriet,” she said, severely, “ if you will walk about in your sleep like this, I shall have to pinch you ! But I don’t remember,” she added, rather mournfully, “ whether you pinch yourself when you are asleep to find out if you are awake, or when you are awake to find out if you are asleep ! ” And, indeed, it was most perplexing.

Yet, despite these doubts, it was very pleasant to walk along the Royal Road to Learning. Great trees, on either hand, arched themselves overhead with interlacing branches and formed a leafy canopy, through which the sunbeams darted in shafts of quivering light. Birds of bright plumage sang and twittered, as they hopped from bough to bough, and, here and there, between the tree trunks were glimpses of blossoming hedgerows and green fields stretching far away into the distance, while, near r at hand, the little childish figure walked, with the golden hair pushed back from above the eager, questioning eyes, and the little feet tripping daintily over the dust which will collect in spots, even in the Royal Road to Learning; for, withal that it is such a pleasant road, there are stretches along it that are always dusty because they are so dry.

How lovely it all was ! — -and what a pity there was no one there to share her pleasure with her! — for, though there were a great many footprints in the dust — “ and there can’t be footprints without feet, nor feet without people ” — there was no one in sight ; and when she looked back, she found that not only had the Green Frog and the pool disappeared, but that the road itself and the trees and fields also were vanishing behind her, step by step, “as if she was walking on the very edge of the world!”

It really was quite alarming, but then, how much more alarming it would have been if the road had taken to vanishing in front of her, instead of behind her! — for she felt quite sure that if the road had once gotten ahead of her, she could never, never, have caught up with it again, and where would she have been then?

“ I wonder if I am a given point,” the little girl thought, for she had heard of the time it takes a procession to pass a “ given point,” and had wondered what the “ given point ” was, and who gave it. “ Only I am the procession, and they are standing still,” she concluded, “ which would take the same amount of time, after all.”

“ I’m glad I’m not at home now,” she went on.

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“Just fancy going out for a walk and not being able to go back, or even to stop if you wanted to.”

But after stopping, just for a moment, to see what would happen, she found that the Royal Road to Learning was very obliging and stopped whenever she did, and for as long a time as she did, which gave her such a comfortable feeling that she began to look about her with much interest as she walked along.

It seemed natural enough for the ends of the nearest branches of the trees to go first as she passed by them, but it did seem strange for the branches on the farther side to be waving gently in the wind long after the trunks of the trees had disappeared.

They were just the sort of trees that the Cheshire Cat would have felt at home in, Harriet thought. It would have been so much easier for the Cat to vanish with the branch she was sitting on than to vanish from it, and so the little girl scanned the trees closely in the hope of seeing the familiar face, or at least the familiar grin, appear somewhere

3 ° amongst the leaves. “ Purr or fur,” either of them would have been such a comfort.

But there was no sign of the Cheshire Cat, and, after all, the trees were so different from ordinary trees that perhaps it would have been extraordinary if the Cheshire Cat had appeared in them, and, if it had, it certainly would not have grinned.

The trunks of the trees were all covered with russet leather and studded with brass nails, like Great-grandmama’s leather trunk at home, or else they were nicely bound in tree calf, with their titles done neatly in trefoil on them, just as if they were books instead of trees, and for the matter of that, the leaves, too, were like the leaves of books, being printed all over on both sides and making a pleasant rustling noise, like a new edition, on the various branches of learning from which they hung.

It seemed impossible that any one ever could find time to read so many books; for Harriet did not know that many people are contented with merely looking at the backs of them, as they hurry by, and

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that there are some who do not even do this. Indeed, she did not know then (for she had a great many things to learn) that, although the Royal Road to Learning is open to all alike, there are no two who travel it in the same way; and this, perhaps, was the reason why she thought she was alone upon it.

“ I don’t see why all the trees have circles of tar painted about their trunks,” she thought, “ especially as there is no one here to climb up them.”

For Harriet had supposed, always, that the bands of tar on the apple trees at home were put there to keep little people from sitting in the branches, and she was on the point of reaching up to touch one of the black rings, just to see if it was sticky, when a little voice close by said, softly:

“ That is not tar, that is printer’s ink, and it keeps the bookworms from eating the leaves.”

It was such a gentle little voice that Harriet was not at all startled by it, although she could see no one and the voice sounded as though it was quite near her. It was followed by a deep sigh.

“ It must be the Looking-glass Gnat,” she thought, “ and that is why I can’t see it ; only it was the size of a chicken — Alice said it was, though I don’t see how it could be so big as that — but then, that was afterwards, and I dare say that it grew upon acquaintance.” And she was so pleased with this idea that she was on the point of thinking it all over again, when the little voice continued.

“ I am so lonely here,” it whispered, “ that when you stopped, I ventured to speak, because I was quite sure that you didn’t see me.”

“ Indeed, I didn’t,” said Harriet, with much earnestness, for she didn’t want any one to think her rude. “ And I can’t see you now, either,” she added, truthfully, for it is rather puzzling to carry on a conversation with some one you can’t see, unless you are talking through the telephone, and sometimes it is puzzling even then. “ I wish you would tell me where you are — that is, if you don’t mind.”

“ I am on the end of this branch,” the little voice answered, “ and you can’t see me because the end of the branch has disappeared.”

“ I shouldn’t think it would be very comfortable to sit on the end of something that has disappeared,” said Harriet.

“It isn’t very comfortable,” the little voice explained, with still another sigh, “ but I have no choice. I am the letter H, and ‘ branch ’ ends with H, you know; and so when the end of the branch disappeared, I disappeared with it.”

“ Then how can you expect people to see you, if you have disappeared ? ” asked Harriet, to whom this seemed rather unreasonable. But the voice only sighed deeply in answer. Presently, however, it began again.

“ There are a great many people who know me well enough by sight, who drop me altogether when it comes to a speaking acquaintance,” it said. “ Now you might be ’Arriet instead of Harriet, if you dropped your H’s, you know.”

“ I should think you would have an easier time than some of the other letters,” said Harriet.

“ So I would, if people didn’t insist on dragging me into the conversation where I don’t belong,” said the little voice, sadly. “ The vowels don’t like it when I am crowded in ahead of them. I wish you could hear how they talk behind my back.” And once more the little voice sighed deeply.

It was very unhappy, evidently, and Harriet “ would have said something pitying to comfort it, if it only would sigh like other people,” she thought.

“ I wish you wouldn’t sigh so much,” was what she really did say. “ I don’t believe sighing makes you feel a bit better.”

“ Those are not sighs, they are aspirations,” said the little voice. “ I am H aspirate. If I was H silent, I should be seen and not heard ; but I am just the opposite, and so I am heard and not seen.”

Here the little voice was lost in such a succession of long-drawn aspirations that they raised quite a commotion in the air, and Harriet felt that she was being slowly lifted from the ground and wafted over the hedge, at the side of the Royal Road to Learning, into the Land of Letters.

Fortunately, she managed to catch hold of a little twig, as she floated by, and soon found herself sitting on the very branch at the end of which the letter H was hidden.

“ Where are you, H ? ” she called, softly, as she parted the leaves and looked in vain for the letter which -she was sure she should recognize.

But the little voice made no answer, although the leaves rustled in a little breeze that sounded almost like a tiny whisper, and so Harriet cautiously worked her way out towards the end of the branch as far as she dared.

“ For I really couldn’t feel easy if I had to sit on nothing at all,” she thought ; and so, when the branch, which spread far out over the green turf below, began to bend down a little with her weight, she sat upright again, and holding on tightly with both hands, looked down over the Land of Letters with much interest.

Chapter III The Land Of Letters

The Land of Letters was like a park, or garden, and was laid out in huge flower-beds, in the shapes of all the letters of the alphabet, and between the flower-beds were broad walks of white gravel, bordered by neat rows of letter-boxes painted a nice, bright green.

There were a number of little people in the garden, busily engaged in weeding the beds and raking the walks, and directly under the branch Harriet was sitting on, a gardener and a gardeness (somehow this last word didn’t sound quite right to Harriet, although she had a governess at home), a gardener and a gardeness were down on their knees, looking intently for something in the grass.

“ It’s very provoking after so much trouble,” said the Gardener. His back was so bent that he looked, for all the world, like the letter R. “ But, of course, when she went I lost the handle off my hoe, and the Queen will be furious when she hears of it.”

“Why didn’t you try to catch her again, R?” asked the Gardeness.

“ I did try,” said R, sullenly, “ and all I could catch was her expression.

And, much to Harriet’s amusement, R took a small looking-glass out of his pocket and handed it to his companion, who examined it with

much care. Harriet, also, leaned down as far as she could from the branch, and, to her surprise, she saw the reflection of her own face on the polished surface.

“ I do believe he has caught my likeness,” she exclaimed aloud, and at that the Gardener and the Gardeness dropped the glass and looked up.

“ There she is ! ” cried R, in great excitement, and in an instant all the letters came running from all parts of the garden and stood beneath her in a little crowd, all staring and looking up and talking at once.

“ Bring a box . . . and a chair . . . or a ladder . . . and a piece of string ! ” they called ; each one shouting and giving directions, and no one apparently doing anything at all.