Lewis Carroll: Through the Looking Glass

CHAPTER 6: Humpty Dumpty (continued)

`Ah, you should see 'em come round me of a Saturday night,' Humpty Dumpty went on, wagging his head gravely from side to side: `for to get their wages, you know.'

(Alice didn't venture to ask what he paid them with; and so you see I can't tell YOU.)

`You seem very clever at explaining words, Sir,' said Alice. `Would you kindly tell me the meaning of the poem called "Jabberwocky"?'

`Let's hear it,' said Humpty Dumpty. `I can explain all the poems that were ever invented--and a good many that haven't been invented just yet.'

This sounded very hopeful, so Alice repeated the first verse:

            'Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
               Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;
             All mimsy were the borogoves,
               And the mome raths outgrabe.

`That's enough to begin with,' Humpty Dumpty interrupted: `there are plenty of hard words there. "BRILLIG" means four o'clock in the afternoon--the time when you begin BROILING things for dinner.'

`That'll do very well,' said Alice: and "SLITHY"?'

`Well, "SLITHY" means "lithe and slimy." "Lithe" is the same as "active." You see it's like a portmanteau--there are two meanings packed up into one word.'

`I see it now,' Alice remarked thoughtfully: `and what are "TOVES"?'

`Well, "TOVES" are something like badgers--they're something like lizards--and they're something like corkscrews.'

`They must be very curious looking creatures.'

`They are that,' said Humpty Dumpty: `also they make their nests under sun-dials--also they live on cheese.'

`Andy what's the "GYRE" and to "GIMBLE"?'

`To "GYRE" is to go round and round like a gyroscope. To "GIMBLE" is to make holes like a gimlet.'