Chapter 7A Mad Tea‐party

A Mad Tea-Party.

There was a table set out under a tree in front of the house, and the March Hare and the Hatter were having tea at it. A Dormouse was snoozing between them, fast asleep, and the other two were using it as a pillow, resting their elbows on it and talking over its head.

"Super awkward for the Dormouse," thought Alice; "but, like, it’s asleep, so I guess it doesn’t even notice."

The table was huge, but the three were all squished together at one corner: "No room! No room!" they yelled when they saw Alice coming. "There’s tons of room!" said Alice, annoyed, and she sat down in a big armchair at one end of the table.

"Have some wine," said the March Hare in a friendly way.

Alice looked all around the table, but there was nothing on it but tea.

"I don’t see any wine," she pointed out.

"There isn’t any," said the March Hare.

"Then it wasn’t very nice of you to offer it," said Alice, getting a little mad.

"It wasn’t very nice of you to sit down without being invited," said the March Hare.

"I didn’t know it was your table," said Alice; "it’s set for way more than three people."

"You need a haircut," said the Hatter.

He had been staring at Alice with tons of curiosity, and that was his first thing to say.

"You shouldn’t make personal comments," said Alice, a little sternly; "it’s really rude."

The Hatter opened his eyes super wide when he heard that, but all he said was, "Why is a raven like a writing-desk?"

"Come on, let’s have some fun now!" thought Alice.

"I’m glad they’re starting to ask riddles - I think I can guess that," she added out loud.

"Do you mean you think you can figure out the answer?" asked the March Hare.

"Exactly!" said Alice.

"Then you should just say what you mean," the March Hare went on.

"I do," Alice replied quickly; "at least - at least I mean what I say - that’s basically the same thing, right?"

"Not even close!" said the Hatter. "It’s like saying ‘I see what I eat’ is the same as ‘I eat what I see’!"

"It’s like saying," added the March Hare, "that ‘I like what I get’ is the same as ‘I get what I like’!"

"It’s like saying," added the Dormouse, who seemed to be talking in his sleep, "that ‘I breathe when I sleep’ is the same as ‘I sleep when I breathe’!"

"It’s the same thing with you," said the Hatter, and then the conversation just stopped, and the party sat in silence for a minute, while Alice tried to remember everything she could about ravens and writing-desks, which wasn’t much.

The Hatter was the first to break the silence.

"What day of the month is it?" he asked Alice, turning to her.

He had pulled out his watch and was looking at it nervously, shaking it every now and then, and holding it to his ear.

Alice thought for a moment, and then said, "The fourth."

"Two days wrong!" sighed the Hatter.

"I told you butter wouldn’t work with the gears!" he added, looking mad at the March Hare.

"It was the best butter," said the March Hare meekly.

"Yeah, but some crumbs must have gotten in too," grumbled the Hatter.

"You shouldn’t have put it in with the bread knife."

The March Hare grabbed the watch and looked at it sadly, then he dipped it into his cup of tea, and looked at it again. But he couldn’t think of anything better to say than his first remark, "It was the best butter, you know."

Alice had been looking over his shoulder with curiosity.

"What a weird watch!" she remarked. "It tells the day of the month, but it doesn’t tell what o’clock it is!"

"Why should it?" muttered the Hatter.

"Does your watch tell you what year it is?"

"Of course not," replied Alice very quickly. "But that’s because it stays the same year for such a long time!"

"Which is just the case with mine," said the Hatter.

Alice felt super confused. The Hatter’s comment didn't make any sense, but it was definitely English.

"I’m not really getting it," she said, as politely as she could.

"The Dormouse is snoozing again," said the Hatter, and he poured a little hot tea onto its nose.

The Dormouse shook its head, annoyed, without even opening its eyes.

"Of course, of course; that’s exactly what I was about to say."

"Have you figured out the riddle yet?" the Hatter asked, turning to Alice again.

"Nope, I give up," Alice replied. "What’s the answer?"

"I haven’t the slightest clue," said the Hatter.

"Me neither," said the March Hare.

Alice sighed wearily.

"I think you could be doing something better with your time," she said, "than wasting it on riddles that have no answers."

"If you knew Time like I do," said the Hatter, "you wouldn’t be talking about wasting it. He is time."

"I don’t know what you mean," said Alice.

"Seriously, you don’t!" the Hatter said, tossing his head dismissively. "I bet you’ve never even talked to Time!"

"Maybe not," Alice cautiously replied. "But I know I have to keep up with time when I’m learning music."

"Ah! That explains it," said the Hatter. "He doesn’t like being rushed. But if you’d just stay on good terms with him, he’d do almost anything you wanted with the clock."

"For example, if it were nine in the morning, time for lessons, you’d just whisper a hint to Time, and poof - the clock would spin right around! Half-past one, time for dinner!"

("I wish it was," the March Hare muttered to himself.)

"That would be awesome," said Alice thoughtfully. "But then - I wouldn’t be hungry!"

"Not at first, maybe," said the Hatter. "But you could keep it at half-past one as long as you wanted."

"Is that how you do it?" Alice asked.

The Hatter shook his head sadly.

"Not me!" he replied. "We had a fight last March - right before he went a little crazy, you know - " (pointing with his teaspoon at the March Hare,) " - it was at the big concert the Queen of Hearts threw, and I had to sing:"

‘Twinkle, twinkle, little bat! How I wonder what you’re at!’

"You know the song, right?"

"I’ve heard something like it," said Alice.

It goes on, you know, the Hatter continued, like this: -

"‘Up above the world you fly, Like a tea-tray in the sky. Twinkle, twinkle - ’"

Here the Dormouse shook itself and started singing in its sleep, "Twinkle, twinkle, twinkle, twinkle - " and went on so long that they had to pinch it to make it stop.

"Well, I’d barely finished the first verse," said the Hatter, "when the Queen jumped up and yelled, ‘He’s messing with time! Off with his head!’"

"How savage!" exclaimed Alice.

"And ever since then," the Hatter went on in a mournful tone, "he won’t do a thing I ask! It’s always six o’clock now."

A bright idea popped into Alice’s head.

"Is that why so many tea things are out here?" she asked.

"Yep, that’s it," said the Hatter with a sigh. "It’s always tea time, and we don’t have time to wash the dishes between servings."

"So, you just keep going around, I guess?" said Alice.

"Exactly!" said the Hatter. "As the things get used up."

"But what happens when you get to the beginning again?" Alice ventured to ask.

"Let’s change the subject," the March Hare interrupted, yawning.

"I’m getting bored. I vote the young lady tells us a story."

"I’m not sure I know one," said Alice, a little nervous about the suggestion.

"Then the Dormouse can!" they both cried. "Wake up, Dormouse!"

And they pinched it on both sides at once.

The Dormouse slowly opened his eyes.

"I wasn’t sleeping," he said in a raspy, weak voice. "I heard every word you guys were saying."

"Tell us a story!" said the March Hare.

"Yes, please do!" pleaded Alice.

"And hurry up about it," added the Hatter, "or you’ll be asleep again before you’re done."

"Once upon a time there were three little sisters," the Dormouse began, super rushed; "and their names were Elsie, Lacie, and Tillie; and they lived at the bottom of a well - "

"What did they eat?" said Alice, who always loved talking about food and drinks.

"They lived on treacle," said the Dormouse, after thinking for a bit.

"That’s not possible, you know," Alice gently pointed out; "they’d get sick."

"So they did," said the Dormouse; "they were really sick."

Alice tried to imagine what it would be like to live that way, but it was too weird, so she asked, "But why did they live at the bottom of a well?"

"Have some more tea," the March Hare said to Alice, really seriously.

"I haven’t had any yet," Alice replied, a little annoyed, "so I can’t have more."

"You mean you can’t have less," said the Hatter; "it’s super easy to have more than nothing."

"Nobody asked for your opinion," said Alice.

"Who’s being rude now?" the Hatter asked, sounding smug.

Alice wasn’t sure what to say, so she grabbed some tea and bread-and-butter, then turned to the Dormouse and asked again, "Why did they live at the bottom of a well? The Dormouse took a minute or two to think, and then said, "It was a treacle-well."

"There’s no such thing!"

Alice started to get really mad, but the Hatter and the March Hare said "Shhh!" and the Dormouse grumbled, "If you can’t be nice, you should finish the story yourself."

"No, please go on!" Alice said very politely; "I promise not to interrupt again. Maybe there is one."

"One, seriously?" said the Dormouse, sounding offended.

But he agreed to keep going.

"And so, these three little sisters - they were learning to draw, you know - "

"What did they draw?" said Alice, totally forgetting her promise.

"Treacle," said the Dormouse, without even thinking about it.

"I want a clean cup," interrupted the Hatter; "let’s all move one spot over."

He moved as he spoke, and the Dormouse followed him. The March Hare moved into the Dormouse’s spot, and Alice reluctantly took the March Hare’s place.

"The Hatter was the only one who benefited from the switch - and Alice was doing even worse than before, because the March Hare had just spilled the milk jug all over his plate. Alice didn’t want to upset the Dormouse again, so she started carefully, "But I don’t get it.

"Where did they draw the treacle from?"

"You can draw water from a water-well," said the Hatter; "so you should be able to draw treacle from a treacle-well - duh?"

"But they were in the well," Alice said to the Dormouse, choosing to ignore that last comment.

"Of course they were," said the Dormouse; " - well, in."

That answer totally confused poor Alice, so she let the Dormouse go on for a while without saying anything.

"They were learning to draw," the Dormouse went on, yawning and rubbing its eyes, because it was getting super sleepy; "and they drew all kinds of things - everything that starts with an M - "

"Why with an M ?" said Alice.

"Why not?" said the March Hare.

Alice was quiet.

The Dormouse had closed its eyes by this time, and was drifting off to sleep; but when the Hatter pinched it, it woke up with a little squeak, and went on: " - that starts with an M, like mouse-traps, and the moon, and memory, and muchness - you know, you say things are "much of a muchness" - have you ever seen a drawing of a muchness?"

"Seriously," said Alice, really confused, "I don’t think - "

"Then you shouldn’t talk," said the Hatter.

Seriously, this was the rudest thing ever! Alice couldn’t handle it, so she just stood up and walked away. The Dormouse instantly dozed off, and the others didn’t even notice she was gone. She glanced back a couple of times, kinda hoping they’d call her name.

The last time she saw them, they were trying to shove the Dormouse into the teapot!

"I am never going back there!" Alice mumbled to herself as she made her way through the woods.

"That was the most ridiculous tea party ever!"

Just then, she spotted a door built right into one of the trees.

"Whoa, that’s weird!" she thought.

"But everything’s weird today. I guess I’m just gonna go in."

And she did.

Suddenly, she was back in the long hallway, near that tiny glass table.

"Okay, I’m gonna do better this time," she said to herself.

She grabbed the little golden key and unlocked the door to the garden. Then, she started nibbling on the mushroom (she’d saved a piece in her pocket) until she was about a foot tall.

Next, she walked down the little path, and - finally - she was in the gorgeous garden, surrounded by bright flowerbeds and cool fountains.