"It may be a French Mouse," thought Al-ice, so she said: "Ou est ma
chatte?" (Where is my cat?) which was all the French she could think of
just then. The Mouse gave a quick leap out of the wa-ter, and seemed in
a great fright, "Oh, I beg your par-don," cried Al-ice. "I quite for-got
you didn't like cats."
"Not like cats!" cried the Mouse in a shrill, harsh voice. "Would you
like cats if you were me?"
"Well, I guess not," said Al-ice, "but please don't get mad. And yet I
wish I could show you our cat, Di-nah. I'm sure you'd like cats if you
could see her. She is such a dear thing," Al-ice went on half to
her-self as she swam round in the pool, "and she sits and purrs by the
fire and licks her paws and wash-es her face--and she is such a nice
soft thing to nurse--and she's a fine one to catch mice--Oh, dear!"
cried Al-ice, for this time the Mouse was in a great fright and each
hair stood on end. "We won't talk of her if you don't like it."
"We talk!" cried the Mouse, who shook down to the end of his tail. "As
if _I_ would talk of such low, mean things as cats! All rats hate them.
Don't let me hear the name a-gain!"
"I won't," said Al-ice, in great haste to change the theme. "Are you
fond--of--of dogs?" The mouse did not speak, so Al-ice went on: "There
is such a nice dog near our house, I should like to show you! A ti-ny
bright-eyed dog, you know, with oh! such long cur-ly brown hair! And
it'll fetch things when you throw them, and it'll sit up and beg for its
meat and do all sorts of things--I can't tell you half of them.
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