"Of course not," said Al-ice, "but there's no need that it should, since it stays the same year such a long time." "Which is just the case with mine," said the Hat-ter; which seemed to Al-ice to have no sense in it at all. "I don't quite know what you mean," she said. "The Dor-mouse has gone to sleep, once more," said the Hat-ter, and he poured some hot tea on the tip of its nose. The Dor-mouse shook its head, and said with its eyes still closed, "Of course, of course; just what I want-ed to say my-self." "Have you guessed the rid-dle yet?" the Hat-ter asked, turn-ing to Al-ice. "No, I give it up," she said. "What's the an-swer?" "I do not know at all," said the Hat-ter. "Nor I," said the March Hare. Al-ice sighed. "I think you might do bet-ter with the time than to waste it, by ask-ing rid-dles that have no an-swers." "If you knew Time as well as I do, you wouldn't say 'waste _it_.' It's _him_." "I don't know what you mean," Al-ice said. "Of course you don't!" said the Hat-ter with a toss of his head. "I dare say you nev-er e-ven spoke to Time." "May-be not," she said, "but I know I have to beat time when I learn to sing." "Oh! that's it," said the Hat-ter. "He won't stand beat-ing. Now if you kept on good terms with him, he would do an-y-thing you liked with the clock. Say it was nine o'clock, just time to go to school; you'd have but to give a hint to Time, and round goes the clock! Half-past one, time for lunch." "I wish it was," the March Hare said to it-self. [Illustration] "That would be grand, I'm sure," said Al-ice: "but then--I shouldn't be hun-gry for it, you know." "Not at first, per-haps, but you could keep it to half-past one as long as you liked," said the Hat-ter. "Is that the way you do?" asked Al-ice. The Hat-ter shook his head and sighed. "Not I," he said. "Time and I fell out last March. It was at the great con-cert giv-en by the Queen of Hearts and I had to sing: 'Twin-kle, twin-kle, lit-tle bat! How I wonder what you're at!' You know the song, per-haps?" "I've heard some-thing like it," said Alice. "It goes on, you know," the Hat-ter said, "in this way: 'Up a-bove the world you fly, Like a tea-tray in the sky, Twin-kle, twin-kle----'" Here the Dor-mouse shook it-self and sang in its sleep, "twin-kle, twin-kle, twin-kle, twin-kle----" and went on so long that they had to pinch it to make it stop. "Well, while I sang the first verse," the Hat-ter went on, "the Queen bawled out 'See how he mur-ders the time! Off with his head!' And ev-er since that, he won't do a thing I ask! It's al-ways six o'clock now." A bright thought came in-to Al-ice's head. "Is that why so man-y tea things are put out here?" she asked. "Yes, that's it," said the Hat-ter with a sigh: "it's al-ways tea-time, and we've no time to wash the things." "Then you keep mov-ing round, I guess," said Al-ice. "Just so," said the Hat-ter; "as the things get used up."