midst of her pet
word, "mor-al," and Al-ice felt the arm that was linked in hers shake as
if with fright. Al-ice looked up and there stood the Queen in front of
them with her arms fold-ed, and a dark frown up-on her face.

"A fine day, your ma-jes-ty!" the Duch-ess be-gan in a weak voice.

"Now, I warn you in time," shout-ed the Queen, with a stamp on the
ground as she spoke; "ei-ther you or your head must be off, and that in
a-bout half no time! Take your choice!"

The Duch-ess took her choice and was gone in a mo-ment.

"Let's go on with the game," the Queen said to Al-ice; and Al-ice was in
too great a fright to speak, but went with her, back to the cro-quet
ground.

The guests had all sat down in the shade to rest while the Queen was
a-way, but as soon as they saw her they rushed back to the game; while
the Queen said if they were not in their pla-ces at once, it would cost
them their lives.

All the time the game went on the Queen kept shout-ing, "Off with his
head!" or "Off with her head!" so that by the end of half an hour there
was no one left on the grounds but the King, the Queen, and Al-ice.

Then the Queen left off, quite out of breath, and said to Al-ice, "Have
you seen the Mock Tur-tle yet?"

"No," said Al-ice, "I don't know what a Mock-tur-tle is."

"It is a thing Mock Tur-tle Soup is made from," the Queen said.

"I've nev-er seen or heard of one," Alice said.

"Come on then, and he shall tell you his sto-ry," said the Queen.

As they walked off, Al-ice heard the King say in a low tone to those
whom the Queen had doomed to death, "You may all go free!" "Come, that's
a good thing," thought Al-ice, for she felt ver-y sad that all those men
must have their heads cut off.

[Illustration]

They soon came to where a Gry-phon lay fast a-sleep in the sun. (If you
don't know what it is like, look at the pic-ture.) "Up, dull thing!"
said the Queen, "and take this young la-dy to see the Mock Tur-tle. I
must go back now;" and she walked a-way and left Al-ice with the
Gry-phon. Al-ice was by no means pleased with its looks, but she thought
she would be quite as safe with it as she would be with the Queen; so
she wait-ed.

The Gry-phon sat up and rubbed its eyes; then watched the Queen till she
was out of sight; then it laughed. "What fun!" it said, half to it-self,
half to Alice.

"What is the fun?" she asked.

"Why, _she_," it said. "It's all a whim of hers; they nev-er cut off
those heads, you