Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll
Chapter 6 - Humpty Dumpty
However, the egg only got larger and larger, and more and more
human: when she had come within a few yards of it, she saw that
it had eyes and a nose and mouth; and when she had come close to
it, she saw clearly that it was HUMPTY DUMPTY himself. `It can't
be anybody else!' she said to herself. `I'm as certain of it, as
if his name were written all over his face.'
It might have been written a hundred times, easily, on that enormous face. Humpty Dumpty was sitting with his legs crossed, like a Turk, on the top of a high wall -- such a narrow one that Alice quite wondered how he could keep his balance -- and, as his eyes were steadily fixed in the opposite direction, and he didn't take the least notice of her, she thought he must be a stuffed figure after all.
`And how exactly like an egg he is!' she said aloud, standing with her hands ready to catch him, for she was every moment expecting him to fall.
`It's very provoking,' Humpty Dumpty said after a long silence, looking away from Alice as he spoke, `to be called an egg -- very!'
`I said you looked like an egg, Sir,' Alice gently explained. `And some eggs are very pretty, you know, she added, hoping to turn her remark into a sort of a compliment.
`Some people,' said Humpty Dumpty, looking away from her as usual, `have no more sense than a baby!'
Alice didn't know what to say to this: it wasn't at all like conversation, she thought, as he never said anything to her; in fact, his last remark was evidently addressed to a tree -- so she stood and softly repeated to herself: --
It might have been written a hundred times, easily, on that enormous face. Humpty Dumpty was sitting with his legs crossed, like a Turk, on the top of a high wall -- such a narrow one that Alice quite wondered how he could keep his balance -- and, as his eyes were steadily fixed in the opposite direction, and he didn't take the least notice of her, she thought he must be a stuffed figure after all.
`And how exactly like an egg he is!' she said aloud, standing with her hands ready to catch him, for she was every moment expecting him to fall.
`It's very provoking,' Humpty Dumpty said after a long silence, looking away from Alice as he spoke, `to be called an egg -- very!'
`I said you looked like an egg, Sir,' Alice gently explained. `And some eggs are very pretty, you know, she added, hoping to turn her remark into a sort of a compliment.
`Some people,' said Humpty Dumpty, looking away from her as usual, `have no more sense than a baby!'
Alice didn't know what to say to this: it wasn't at all like conversation, she thought, as he never said anything to her; in fact, his last remark was evidently addressed to a tree -- so she stood and softly repeated to herself: --
`Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall:`That last line is much too long for the poetry,' she added, almost out loud, forgetting that Humpty Dumpty would hear her.
Humpty Dumpty had a great fall.
All the King's horses and all the King's men
Couldn't put Humpty Dumpty in his place again.'