A PROEM (TO ARTHUR RACHMAN'S EDITION 'ALICE IN WONDERLAND') by HENRY AUSTIN DOBSON

'TIS two-score years since Carroll's art,
With topsy-turvy magic,
Sent Alice wandering through a part
Half-comic and half-tragic.

Enchanting Alice! Black-and-white
Has made your charm perennial;
And nought save 'Chaos and old Night'
Can part you now from Tenniel;

But still you are a Type, and based
In Truth, like Lear and Hamlet;
And Types may be re-draped to taste
In cloth of gold or camlet.

Here comes a fresh Costumier then;
That Taste may gain a wrinkle
From him who drew with such deft pen
The rags of Rip van Winkle.

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