Suddenly she came upon a little three-legged
table, all made of solid glass; there was nothing
on it except a tiny golden key, and Alice's first
thought was that it might belong to one of the
doors of the hall; but, alas! either the locks were
too large, or the key was too small, but at any
rate it would not open any of them. However, on
the second time round, she came upon a low
curtain she had not noticed before, and behind it
was a little door about fifteen inches high: she
tried the little golden key in the lock, and to her
great delight it fitted!
Alice opened the door and found that it led into a
small passage, not much larger than a rat-hole:
she knelt down and looked along the passage
into the loveliest garden you ever saw. How she
longed to get out of that dark hall, and wander
about among those beds of bright flowers and
those cool fountains, but she could not even get her head though the doorway; ànd even if my head would go through,' thought poor Alice, ìt would be of very little use without my shoulders. Oh, how I wish I could shut up like a telescope! I think I could, if I only know how to begin.' For, you see, so many out-of-the-way things had happened lately, that Alice had begun to think that very few things indeed were really impossible.
5
There seemed to be no use in waiting by the little door, so she went back to the table, half hoping she might find
another key on it, or at any rate a book of rules for shutting people up like telescopes: this time she found a little bottle on it, (`which certainly was not here before,' said Alice,) and round the neck of the bottle was a paper label, with the words `DRINK ME' beautifully printed on it in large
letters.
It was all very well to say `Drink me,' but the wise little Alice was not going to do THAT in a hurry. `No, I'll look first,' she said, ànd see whether it's marked "poison" or not'; for she had read several nice little histories about children who had got burnt, and eaten up by wild beasts
and other unpleasant things, all because they WOULD not
remember the simple rules their friends had taught them: such as, that a red-hot poker will burn you if you hold it too long; and that if you cut your finger VERY deeply with a knife, it usually bleeds; and she had never forgotten that, if you drink much from a bottle marked `poison,' it is