Алиса в стране чудес / Alice in Wonderland

But here, to Alice’s great surprise, the Duchess’s arm began to tremble. Alice looked up, and there stood the Queen in front of them.

“A fine day, your Majesty!” the Duchess began in a low, weak voice.

“Now, I warn you,” shouted the Queen; “either you or your head must be off! Take your choice[73 - Take your choice! – Выбирай!]!”

The Duchess took her choice, and went away in a moment.

“Let’s continue our game,” the Queen said to Alice; and Alice followed to the croquet-ground.

The other guests were resting in the shade: however, the moment they saw her, they hurried back to the game. The Queen merely remarked: “A moment’s delay costs you your lives.”

All the time they were playing the Queen was quarrelling with the other players, and shouting “Off with his head!” or “Off with her head!” All the players, except the King, the Queen, and Alice, were in custody and under sentence of execution.

Then the Queen stopped the game, and said to Alice, “Did you see the Mock Turtle?”

“No,” said Alice. “I don’t even know what a Mock Turtle is. I never saw one, or heard of one.”

“Come on, then,” said the Queen, “and it shall tell you its history.”

As they walked off together, the King said in a low voice, to the guests, “You are all pardoned.”

“Oh, that’s a good thing!” Alice said to herself.

Very soon they met a Gryphon[74 - Gryphon – Грифон], it was sleeping in the sun.

“Get up, you idler!” said the Queen, “and take this young lady to the Mock Turtle. I must go back”; and she walked off.

The Queen left Alice alone with the Gryphon. Alice did not like the look of the creature, but it seemed as safe to stay with it as to go after that savage Queen; so she waited.

The Gryphon sat up and rubbed its eyes, then it chuckled.

“What fun!” said the Gryphon, half to itself, half to Alice.

“What is the fun?” said Alice.

“She,” said the Gryphon. “It’s a fake, you know, they never execute anybody. Come on!”

“Everybody says “come on!” here,” thought Alice, as she went slowly after the Gryphon.

Soon they saw the Mock Turtle. It was sitting sad and lonely on a little ledge of rock, and sighing.

“What is his sorrow?” Alice asked the Gryphon, and the Gryphon answered, “It’s a fake, you know, it has no sorrow. Come on!”

So they went up to the Mock Turtle. It looked at them with large eyes full of tears, but said nothing.

“This is a young lady,” said the Gryphon, “she wants to know your history.”

“I’ll tell it her,” said the Mock Turtle in a deep, hollow tone: “sit down, both of you, and don’t speak a word. I’ll tell a story.”

So they sat down, and nobody spoke for some minutes. Alice waited patiently.

“Once,” said the Mock Turtle at last, with a deep sigh, “I was a real Turtle.”

Next was a very long silence. The Mock Turtle was only sobbing. Alice was going to get up and say, “Thank you for your interesting story,” but she sat still and said nothing.

“When we were little,” the Mock Turtle went on at last, more calmly, “we went to school in the sea. The master was an old Turtle—we called him Tortoise—”

“Why did you call him Tortoise, if he wasn’t one?” Alice asked.

“We called him Tortoise because he taught us,” said the Mock Turtle angrily, “and really you are very silly!”

“Yes, don’t ask such simple questions,” added the Gryphon; and then they both sat silent and looked at poor Alice. At last the Gryphon said to the Mock Turtle, “Go on, old fellow!”

And the Mock Turtle went on in these words:

“Yes, we went to school in the sea, though you don’t believe it—”

“Why? I didn’t say that!” interrupted Alice.

“You did,” said the Mock Turtle.

“Hold your tongue[75 - Hold your tongue! – Придержи язык!]!” added the Gryphon.

The Mock Turtle went on.

“We had the best educations— in fact, we went to school every day—”

“So what?” asked Alice; “I go to school everyday, too. Why are you so proud?”

“With extras[76 - With extras? – С дополнительными уроками?]?” asked the Mock Turtle a little anxiously.

“Yes,” said Alice, “we learned French and music.”

“And washing?” said the Mock Turtle.

“Certainly not!” said Alice indignantly.

“Ah! then your school isn’t a really good school,” said the Mock Turtle in a tone of great relief. We had washing—extra.”

“What for?” asked Alice; “You were living at the bottom of the sea.”

“Yes, I was,” said the Mock Turtle with a sigh. “I only took the regular course[77 - regular course – основной курс, обязательные предметы].”

“What was that?” inquired Alice.

“Reeling and Writhing[78 - Reeling and Writhing – Верчение и Корчение (названия предметов построены на ассоциации с Reading and Writing – чтение и письмо)]. Different branches of Arithmetic,” the Mock Turtle replied; “Ambition, Distraction, Uglification, and Derision[79 - Названия четырёх арифметических действий построены на ассоциациях: Ambition (~Addition, сложение), Distraction (~Substraction, вычитание), Uglification (~Multiplication, умножение), Derision (~Division, деление).].”

“I never heard of ‘Uglification,’” Alice said. “What is it?”