FullReads

“This is it,” said the Duchess. “There is your bedroom, here is your parlour, and that is the bath-room. The apartment has running soda-water, hot and cold; you will find a refrigerator stocked with peanut brittle, molasses candy, and sugared fruits in the pantry. Your reading will consist of Lucy the Lace Vendor, or How the Laundress Became a Lady; the works of Marie Corelli; Factory Fanny, the Forger’s Daughter, and any other unwholesome book you may want from the House of Correction Library. Playtime will begin at seven every morning and you will be compelled to dress and undress dolls until one, when your caramel will be given to you, after which you will skip the rope and read fairy stories until six. You must drink five glasses of soda-water every day and will not be allowed to go to bed before eleven o’clock at night. Hurry now, and get your hair mussed and your hands dirty for dinner. The first course of whipped cream and roasted chestnuts will be served promptly at six-thirty.”

“But,” cried Alice, “I don’t want to stay here–I want to go home.”

“You are home,” said the Duchess. “This is the Municipal Home of the Children of Blunderland.”

“But I want my father and mother,” whimpered Alice.

“The City is your father, my child, and I am officially your mother,” said the Duchess.

“You are not!” cried Alice. “You are trying to kidnap me!–I’ll–I’ll call the police.”

“The police can’t arrest a city, my dear child, and as for me, as the Commissioner of Maternity I am immune from arrest,” laughed the Duchess.

“Well, I just won’t stay, that’s all,” cried Alice, stamping her foot angrily. “I don’t want a city for a father, and I shan’t have an official mother in place of a real one.”

The child ran toward the door, but the Duchess was too quick for her, seizing her by the arm.

“Let me go!” shrieked Alice.

“Never,” snapped the Duchess.

And then the little girl thought of the piece of paper the White Knight had given her.

“I guess that will make you change your mind,” she said, handing the injunction to her captor.

The Duchess read it carefully; her face paled, and she too stamped her foot.

“I’ll see about this, she roared angrily, and in a moment she had gone, slamming the door so hard behind her that the building fairly shook. A moment later Alice followed, and in a short time was bounding down the stairway as fast as her little legs would carry her toward freedom, when all of a sudden she tripped and began to fall–down, down, down–O, would she never stop! And then, bump! Her fall was over, and strange to relate the little maid found herself sitting on the floor back in her own nursery in her own real home, with her mother bending over her.

“Dear me, Alice,” said her mother. “I hope you haven’t hurt yourself.”

“No,” said Alice. “Why–have I–I really fallen?”

“You most certainly have–off the sofa,” laughed her mother. “Where have you been?” she added. “In Wonderland again?”

“No,” said Alice. “In Blunderland–this time.”

Which struck her father, when he heard the story of her adventures later, as a very apt and descriptive title for the M. O. Country.