Alice's Adventures in Cambridge/III

by Richard Conover Evarts

CHAPTER III

The Mad Meeting

AFTER running a little way through the woods, Alice stopped in surprise before a table which was set out under a tree. The table was laid for at least thirty people, but only three were sitting at it. Alice imme­diately recognized the Hatter and the March Hare, and the third she was quite sure must be the Dormouse, as it was fast asleep. The Hatter wore a very high hat covered with eight or ten hatbands of various colors. As soon as he saw Alice he cried out, "Radcliffe not admitted!"

"But my name isn't Radcliffe," said Alice, as she took a seat.

"Nobody said it was," the Hatter replied.

"But you looked at me," said Alice.

"That was unavoidable," said the March Hare. "Nobody looks at Radcliffe students for pleasure."

"I don't think much of Nobody's taste then," said the Dormouse, waking up.

"Come, come," cried the Hatter, bringing

a huge mallet down on the table with a crash. "The meeting is called to order."

"This is a meeting of the Student Council," the March Hare explained to Alice, "and we are the Student Council. At least," he said, pointing to the Dormouse, "he is the Stu­dent, and we are the Council."

"Phibetakappa, Phibetakappa, Phibeta­kappa," murmured the Dormouse sleepily,

and was immediately silenced by the Hatter hitting him over the head with the mallet.

"That's his way of apologizing for being here," said the March Hare. "You see he's neither athletic nor prominent."

"I suppose you are both," said Alice politely.

"No, I'm only athletic," replied the March Hare. "He's really prominent though," he went on, pointing to the Hatter. "See all his hatbands."

"Yes," said the Hatter proudly. "You see, this style of hat allows me to wear them all at once."

"But I don't see the object," said Alice.

"The object is plain enough," the March Hare said; "it is right underneath the hat."

"Order!" shouted the Hatter. "There is a motion before the house. All those in favor say aye. The ayes have it. The motion is carried."

"What was the motion?" asked Alice.

"I haven't the slightest idea," said the Hatter.

"Then I don't see how you can carry it, if you don't know what it is," said Alice rather impatiently.

"I didn't carry it. I passed it," the Hatter replied.

"But that's the same thing," said Alice.

"Not the same thing at all," said the March Hare. "You might as well say that a forward pass is the same thing as a touch­down."

"You might as well say," the Dormouse drowsily murmured, "that to pass with an A is the same thing as to fail with an E."

"You might as well say that the Crime is the same thing as the penalty," said the Hatter.

"It is the same thing, if you read it," said the March Hare.

Alice was silent. She felt somehow that they were all talking nonsense.

"Now," said the Hatter, after a pause, "we will turn to the very important ques­tion whether straw hats should be worn by the Student Body before the first of April."

"Is that as important as to decide who should be manager of the Chess Team?" asked the March Hare.

"Well," said the Hatter judicially, "it certainly ought to come before the question of Freshman nominations."

"Phibetakappa, Phibetakappa, Phibeta­kappa," the Dormouse began, and would have gone on indefinitely had not the March Hare shoved under its nose a large volume on Political Economy which so absorbed the

little animal that he subsided, and was soon asleep again.

"I don't see why you call this the Student Council," said Alice. "The Student part of it doesn't have any say at all."

"He can say only one thing, and it gets

tiresome after a while," the Hatter answered. "Would you like to hear a song?"

"I should love to," said Alice, only too glad to keep out of an argument.

Thereupon the Hatter stood up, and began to sing, in a tune which was a mixture of "Fair Harvard" and "Yankee Doodle,"—

"We are the Student Council.
We were fathered by a Crime.
Our word is law,
Our law is words,
Believe me, every time.
We draw up constitutions,
We submit resolutions,
We cogitate,
We mediate,
We elevate,
We meditate,
And are known for doing nothing
In every land and clime."

"That's very pretty," said Alice. "I don't think I ever heard anything like it before."

"I hear you are on probation," said the March Hare looking severely at Alice. "Hereafter you can take part in no College Activities—By-law 68, Article 507, Sec­tion 1654 of the Revised Constitution."

This was so rude that it was beyond endurance. Alice got up and left without an­other word. As she walked away, she heard the Hatter and March Hare discussing vio­lently whether the Student Body could wear a straw hat at all unless it had a head.