Where the real charm lies in “Alice in Wonderland” would be very difficult to say. If a thousand children were asked to pick out their favorite parts, it is probable that not ten of them would think alike. A great many would say “I like any part,” and really with such a fascinating book how can one choose? The very opening is enough to cure any little girl of drowsiness on a summer day, and the picture of the pompous little White Rabbit with his bulging waistcoat and his imposing watch chain, for all the world like an everyday Englishman, is a type no doubt that the lively little girls and the grave young “don” knew pretty well.
Every page gives one something to think about. To begin with, the fact that Alice is dreaming, is plain from the beginning, and that very odd sensation of falling through space often comes during the first few moments of sleep. A busy dreamer can accomplish a great deal in a very short time, as we all know, and the most remarkable things happen in the simplest way. There is a story, for instance, of one little girl, who, after a nice warm bath, was carried to bed and tucked in up to her rosy chin. Her heavy eyes shut immediately and lo! in half a minute she was back in the big porcelain tub, splashing about like a little mermaid; then nurse pulled the stopper out, and through the waste-pipe went water, small girl, and all. When she opened her eyes with a start, she found she had been dreaming not quite two minutes. So suppose the real Alice had been dreaming a half an hour; it was quite long enough to skip through “Wonderland,” and to have delightful and curious things constantly happening.
It was the White Rabbit talking to himself that first attracted her, but a short stay in “Wonderland” got her quite used to all sorts of animals and their funny talk, and the way she had of growing larger or smaller on the shortest notice was very puzzling and amusing. How like real people was this dream-child; how many everyday folks find themselves too small for great places, and too great for the small ones, and how many experiments they try to make themselves larger or smaller! You see Lewis Carroll thought of all this, though he did not spoil his story by stopping to explain. It is, indeed, poor nonsense that has to be explained every step of the way.
The dream “Alice” just at first was apt to cry if anything unusual or unpleasant happened; a bad habit with some children, the real Alice was given to understand. At any rate, when she drank out of the bottle that tasted of “cherry tart, custard, pineapple, roast turkey, toffy, and hot buttered toast,” and found herself growing smaller and smaller, she cried, because she was only ten inches high and could not possibly reach the Golden Key on the glass table. Then she took herself to task very sharply, saying: “Come, there’s no use in crying like that! I advise you to leave off this minute!”
“She generally gave herself very good advice (though she seldom followed it), and sometimes she scolded herself so severely as to bring tears into her eyes, and once she remembered trying to box her own ears for having cheated herself in a game of croquet she was playing against herself, for this curious child was very fond of pretending to be two people. ‘But it’s no use now,’ thought poor Alice, ‘to pretend to be two people, when there’s hardly enough left of me to make one respectable person.’”
Then when she found the little glass box with a cake in it marked “Eat Me” in currants, she decided that if she ate it something different might happen, for otherwise she would go out like a candle if she grew any smaller. Of course, as soon as she swallowed the whole cake, she took a start and soon stood nine feet high in her slippers.
“‘Curiouser and curiouser!’ cried Alice (she was so surprised that for the moment she quite forgot to speak good English), ‘now I’m opening out like the largest telescope that ever was. Good-bye, feet!’ (for when she looked down at her feet they seemed to be almost out of sight, they were getting so far off.) ‘Oh, my poor little feet! I wonder who will put on your shoes and stockings for you now, dears? I’m sure I shan’t be able! I shall be a great deal too far off to trouble myself about you; you must manage the best way you can; but I must be kind to them,’ thought Alice, ‘or perhaps they won’t walk the way I want to go! Let me see: I’ll give them a new pair of boots every Christmas.’”
“And she went on planning to herself how she would manage it. ‘They must go by the carrier,’ she thought; ‘and how funny it’ll seem, sending presents to one’s own feet, and how odd the directions will look!
Alice’s Right Foot, Esq.,
Hearthrug,
near the Fender,
(with Alice’s love).
Oh, dear, what nonsense I’m talking.’”