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“What a pity our Dinah is not here!” Alice said aloud. “She would soon bring it here!”

“And who is Dinah?” asked the Lory.

Alice was always ready to talk about her pet: “Dinah”s our cat. And she’s so good at catching mice! And oh, the same about birds! Well, she’ll eat a little bird as soon as it looks at it!”

After Alice’s speech all the party hurried away on different pretexts and Alice was soon alone.

“I wish I hadn’t spoken about Dinah! “She said to herself sadly. “It seems nobody likes her here, and I’m sure she’s the best cat in the world! Oh, my dear Dinah! I wonder if I shall ever see you again!” And here poor Alice began to cry again because she felt very lonely and low-spirited. However a little later she again heard footsteps in the distance. She looked up hoping that the Mouse had changed its mind and was coming back to finish its story.

Chapter 4. The Rabbit Sends in a Little Bill

It was the White Rabbit coming slowly back and looking around as if it had lost something. Alice heard it saying to itself: “The Duchess! The Duchess! Oh my dear paws! Oh my fur and whiskers! I’ll be executed, I’m sure! Where COULD I drop them, I wonder?” Alice understood that it was looking for the fan and the pair of white kid gloves, and she began looking for them too, but they were nowhere to be seen.

Very soon the Rabbit noticed Alice and asked her in an angry tone, “Why, Mary Ann, what ARE you doing here? Run home this moment, and fetch me a pair of gloves and a fan! Quick, now!” And Alice was so frightened that she ran immediately in the direction it pointed to.

“He took me for his housemaid,” she said to herself as she ran. “How surprised he’ll be when he finds out who I am! But I’d better bring him his fan and gloves – of course, if I can find them.” As she said this, she came to a neat little house, on the door of which was a bright brass plate with the name “W. RABBIT” engraved upon it. She went in without knocking, and hurried upstairs.

Soon she was in a tidy little room with a table in the window and on it were a fan and two or three pairs of tiny gloves. Alice took the fan and one pair and was going to leave the room when she saw a little bottle. This time there was no label on it with the words “DRINK ME” but she still put it to her lips. “I know SOMETHING interesting will happen,” she said to herself “I hope I’ll grow large again, because I’m quite tired of being such a tiny little thing!”

It happened so quickly that in the next moment her head was pressing against the ceiling. “Now I can’t get out of the door – Why did I drink so much?”

Alas! It was too late! She continued growing, and growing, and very soon had to kneel down on the floor. Still she went on growing, and at last she put one arm out of the window, and one foot up the chimney, and said to herself “What WILL become of me?”

Fortunately Alice stopped growing but she felt very unhappy. “It was much pleasanter at home,” thought poor Alice, “when nobody grew larger and smaller. When I read fairy-tales, I thought that such things never happened, and now here I am in one of them!”