‘And just as I’d taken the highest tree in the wood,’ continued the

Pigeon, raising its voice to a shriek, 🔊 ‘and just as I was thinking I

should be free of them at last, they must needs come wriggling down from

the sky! 🔊 Ugh, Serpent!’ 🔊

‘But I’m not a serpent, I tell you!’ said Alice. 🔊 ‘I’m a--I’m a--’

‘Well! What are you?’ said the Pigeon. 🔊 ‘I can see you’re trying to

invent something!’ 🔊

‘I--I’m a little girl,’ said Alice, rather doubtfully, as she remembered

the number of changes she had gone through that day. 🔊

‘A likely story indeed!’ said the Pigeon in a tone of the deepest

contempt. 🔊 ‘I’ve seen a good many little girls in my time, but never one

with such a neck as that! 🔊 No, no! You’re a serpent; and there’s no use

denying it. 🔊 I suppose you’ll be telling me next that you never tasted an

egg!’ 🔊

‘I have tasted eggs, certainly,’ said Alice, who was a very truthful

child; 🔊 ‘but little girls eat eggs quite as much as serpents do, you

know.’ 🔊

‘I don’t believe it,’ said the Pigeon; ‘but if they do, why then they’re

a kind of serpent, that’s all I can say.’ 🔊