‘Where does she wear the thorns?’ Alice asked with some curiosity.

‘Why all round her head, of course,’ the Rose replied. ‘I was wondering you hadn’t got some too. I thought it was the regular rule.’

‘She’s coming!’ cried the Larkspur. ‘I hear her footstep, thump, thump, thump, along the gravel-walk!’

Alice looked round eagerly, and found that it was the Red Queen. ‘She’s grown a good deal!’ was her first remark. She had indeed: when Alice first found her in the ashes, she had been only three inches high — and here she was, half a head taller than Alice herself!

‘It’s the fresh air that does it,’ said the Rose: