“As well as you can,” said the Tiger-lily, “and a great deal louder.”
“It isn’t manners for us to begin, you know,” said the Rose, “and I really was wondering when you’d speak! Said I to myself, ‘Her face has got some sense in it though it’s not a clever one!’ Still you’ve the right color and that goes a long way.”
“I don’t care about the color,” the Tiger-lily remarked. “If only her petals curled up a little more, she’d be all right.”
Alice didn’t like being criticised, so she began asking questions:
“Aren’t you sometimes frightened at being planted out here with nobody to take care of you?”
“There’s the tree in the middle,” said the Rose. “What else is it good for?”
“But what could it do if any danger came?” Alice asked.
“It could bark,” said the Rose.
“It says ‘bough-wough’,” cried a Daisy. “That’s why its branches are called boughs.”
“Didn’t you know that?” cried another Daisy. And here they all began shouting together.