A Letter From Alice . . .

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume 78, 26 November 1943, Page 3

A Letter From Alice . . .

SLEEPING OUT Dear Boys and Girls, “I’ll never sleep. It was madness to come,” moaned White Rabbit. ‘‘lt’s all very well for you to lie in your sleeping: bag, but I seem to be all shapes and sizes and they won’t all fit into the ground.” He gave a big sigh. Alice said nothing. There was really nothin" she could say, except that when she had suggested walking over the Maungatapu to the Pelorus river, White Rabbit had jumped at the idea, and couldn’t leave fast enough. But nothing had gone right. First of all he had growled at the heat, and then at the rough track, and then when they came to the great friendly Pelorus river, and found the most wonderful camping place under some great black birches, a myriad of mosquitoes had zoomed down to attack poor White Rabbit so much that he had to eat his enormous supper while sitting in his sleeping bag. ‘‘Why, there’s honey on my bag,” said Alice in surprise. “At least I hope it’s honey for I’ve just licked it.” Then, from the other form under the trees: “Help, honey is dropping from the skies. I was yawning and a dab of honey fell in. Is someone having a joke?”

But no! Have you ever seen honey clinging to the bark of black birch trees, members? It hangs on a fine thread and the bubbles of nectar must have been so numerous and heavy that they were just falling off and making a carpet of honey on the ground. At last all was quiet, and White Rabbit was nearly snoring while Alice was dozing fast, when a terrific quacking and coughing began in the trees above. White Rabbit jumped as if he had been shot and quavered “Oh, Alice.”

“It’s a German owl, silly,” she said scornfully and “How dare you wake us up,” she called to the unseen quacker. which replied loudly and harshly. Each time Alice called something to it, it snapped back with the rudest of abuse, and when Alice began replying in the same vein, it flew off with a parting shout. The night wore oh, and what with a horse climbing all ove r White Rabbit and several more visits from the German owl, the mosquitoes and the honey dripping, no wonder White Rabbit said “How perfectly crazy we are!”

But those were the drawbacks and Alice felt the good things quite made up for everything. There were stars gleaming through the lacy silhouette of the trees above. There were the shooting stars, suddenly losing interest in life and jumping through space to their death. And then there were the glowworms over on the bank, showing an eerie greenish light for the fairies to hold their supper parties among the ferns. And most of all there was the heavy but alert stillness of the bush at night. If you listened carefully, there were insects calling, sleepy birds talking as something disturbed them, and a host of other strange night noises. There were White Rabbit’s snores, too. Alice was far too peacefully happy, enjoying the night, to sleep, but w - hen White Rabbit rose from the ground next morning and declared he had never slept a wink, do you wonder why a mosquito nipped him smartly behind the ear for telling such fibs? “Oh, well,” he admitted slowly. “Perhaps I did doze for a few minutes, but it certainly wasn’t for longer. Quick! Let’s get breakfast before I fall apart with stiffness and hunger.”

I wonder whether he can be persuaded to sleep out again, but I don’t think it will be hard, because White Rabbit, for all his moans, loves the outdoors just as much as your friend ALICE.