Lewis Carroll: Through the Looking Glass

CHAPTER 8: `It's my own Invention' (continued)

`What did you mean it to be made of?' Alice asked, hoping to cheer him up, for the poor Knight seemed quite low-spirited about it.

`It began with blotting paper,' the Knight answered with a groan.

`That wouldn't be very nice, I'm afraid--'

`Not very nice ALONE,' he interrupted, quite eagerly: `but you've no idea what a difference it makes mixing it with other things--such as gunpowder and sealing-wax. And here I must leave you.' They had just come to the end of the wood.

Alice could only look puzzled: she was thinking of the pudding.

`You are sad,' the Knight said in an anxious tone: `let me sing you a song to comfort you.'

`Is it very long?' Alice asked, for she had heard a good deal of poetry that day.

`It's long,' said the Knight, `but very, VERY beautiful. Everybody that hears me sing it--either it brings the TEARS into their eyes, or else--'

`Or else what?' said Alice, for the Knight had made a sudden pause.

`Or else it doesn't, you know. The name of the song is called "HADDOCKS' EYES."'

`Oh, that's the name of the song, is it?' Alice said, trying to feel interested.

`No, you don't understand,' the Knight said, looking a little vexed. `That's what the name is CALLED. The name really IS "THE AGED AGED MAN."'

`Then I ought to have said "That's what the SONG is called"?' Alice corrected herself.

`No, you oughtn't: that's quite another thing! The SONG is called "WAYS AND MEANS": but that's only what it's CALLED, you know!'