"You promised to tell me your history, you know," said Alice, "and why it is you hate — C and D," she added in a whisper, half afraid that it would be offended again.
"Mine is a long and a sad tale!" said the Mouse, turning to Alice, and sighing.
"It is a long tail, certainly," said Alice, looking down with wonder at the Mouse's tail; "but why do you call it sad?"
And she kept on puzzling about it while the Mouse was speaking, so that her idea of the tale was something like this.
Source: Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, Lewis Carroll, 1869
