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Through
the Looking-Glass
and what Alice
found there
Kapitel 7:
The lion and the unicorn, Lewis Carroll, Seite 1 ( von 5 )
The next moment soldiers came running through the wood, at first in twos and
threes, then ten or twenty together, and at last in such crowds that they
seemed to fill the whole forest. Alice got behind a tree, for fear of being run
over, and watched them go by.
She thought that in all her life she had never seen soldiers so uncertain on
their feet: they were always tripping over something or other, and whenever one
went down, several more always fell over him, so that the ground was soon
covered with little heaps of men.
Then came the horses. Having four feet, these managed rather better than the
foot-soldiers: but even
they stumbled
now and then; and it seemed to be a regular rule that, whenever a horse
stumbled, the rider fell off instantly. The confusion got worse every moment,
and Alice was very glad to get out of the wood into an open place, where she
found the White King seated on the ground, busily writing in his
memorandum-book.
"I've sent them all!" the King cried in a tone of delight, on seeing
Alice. "Did you happen to meet any soldiers, my dear, as you came through
the wood?"
"Yes, I did," said Alice: "several thousand, I should
think."
"Four thousand two hundred and seven, that's the exact number," the
King said, referring to his book. "I couldn't send all the horses, you
know, because two of them are wanted in the game. And I haven't sent the two
Messengers, either. They're both gone to the town. Just look along the road,
and tell me if you can see either of them."
"I see nobody on the road," said Alice.
"I only wish I had such
eyes," the King remarked in a fretful tone. "To be able to see
Nobody! And at that distance too! Why, it's as much as
I can do to see
real people, by this light!"
All this was lost on Alice, who was still looking intently along the road,
shading her eyes with one hand. "I see somebody now!" she exclaimed
at last. "But he's coming very slowly - and what curious attitudes he goes
into!" (For the Messenger kept skipping up and down, and wriggling like an
eel, as he came along, with his great hands spread out like fans on each side.)
"Not at all," said the King. "He's an Anglo-Saxon Messenger -
and those are Anglo-Saxon attitudes. He only does them when he's happy. His
name is Haigha." (He pronounced it so as to rhyme with 'mayor.')
" I love my love with an H," Alice couldn't help beginning,
"because he is Happy. I hate him with an H, because he is Hideous. I fed
him with - with - with Ham-sandwiches and Hay, His name is Haigha, and he lives
-"
"He lives on the Hill," the King remarked simply, without the least
idea that he was joining in the game, while Alice was still hesitating for the
name of a town beginning with H. "The other Messenger's called Hatta. I
must have two,
you know - to come and go. One to come, and one to go."
"I beg your pardon?" said Alice.
"It isn't respectable to beg," said the King.
"I only meant that I didn't understand," said Alice. "Why one to
come and one to go?"
"Don't I tell you?" the King repeated impatiently. "I must have
two - to fetch
and carry. One to fetch, and one to carry."
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