The Hunting of The Snark: an agony in eight fits

by Lewis Carroll

For instance, take the two words "fuming" and "furious." Make up your mind that you will say both words, but leave it unsettled which you will first. Now open your mouth and speak. If your thoughts incline ever so little towards "fuming," you will say "fuming-furious;" if they turn, by even a hair's breadth, towards "furious," you will say "furious-fuming;" but if you have the rarest of gifts, a perfectly balanced mind, you will say "frumious."

What I tell you three times is true."

And had often (the Bellman said) saved them from wreck, Though none of the sailors knew how.

He had forty-two boxes, all carefully packed, With his name painted clearly on each: But, since he omitted to mention the fact, They were all left behind on the beach.

the Bellman, perplexed and distressed, Said he had hoped, at least, when the wind blew due East, That the ship would not travel due West!

the taste, Which is meagre and hollow, but crisp: Like a coat that is rather too tight in the waist,

"Its habit of getting up late you'll agree That it carries too far, when I say That it frequently breakfasts at five-o'clock tea, And dines on the following day.

And it always looks grave at a pun.

("That's exactly the method," the Bellman bold In a hasty parenthesis cried, "That's exactly the way I have always been told That the capture of Snarks should be tried!")

And my heart is like nothing so much as a bowl Brimming over with quivering curds!

"If only you'd spoken before! It's excessively awkward to mention it now, With the Snark, so to speak, at the door!

"I said it in Hebrew—I said it in Dutch— I said it in German and Greek: But I wholly forgot (and it vexes me much) That English is what you speak!"

Do all that you know, and try all that you don't: Not a chance must be wasted to-day!

And even the Butcher felt queer. He thought of his childhood, left far far behind— That blissful and innocent state— The sound so exactly recalled to his mind A pencil that squeaks on a slate!

If I had but the time and you had but the brain—

in charity-meetings it stands at the door, And collects—though it does not subscribe.

It had learned in ten minutes far more than all books Would have taught it in seventy years.

The indictment had never been clearly expressed, And it seemed that the Snark had begun, And had spoken three hours, before any one guessed What the pig was supposed to have done.

The Jury had each formed a different view (Long before the indictment was read), And they all spoke at once, so that none of them knew One word that the others had said.

the Judge said he never had summed up before; So the Snark undertook it instead, And summed it so well that it came to far more Than the Witnesses ever had said!

He was black in the face, and they scarcely could trace The least likeness to what he had been: While so great was his fright that his waistcoat turned white— A wonderful thing to be seen!

(As if stung by a spasm) plunge into a chasm,