Vintage Illustration Vintage illustration black and white fairy tales and nursery rhymes image of Alice with the Mock Turtle and Gryphon by John Tenniel in Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, 1865.

Alice is portrayed as a quaintly logical girl, sometimes even pedantic. She is seven years old but acts much older.

The Mock Turtle is a pun incorporating the creatures of Mock Turtle Soup, with the body of a turtle, and the head, hooves, and tail of a calf. The Mock Turtle is a very melancholy character, it is thought because he used to be a real turtle. He tells Alice his history of going to school in the sea, but cannot understand the school system that Alice describes to him- least of all the poetry she recites. Ironically, she cannot understand it either. This is a pun on the two meanings of "school", referring in the turtle's usage to a school of fish or marine animals, and by Alice to an institute of learning (see school). He says teacher was an old Sea Turtle called Tortoise and when Alice asks him why he was called Tortoise if he was a Turtle the Mock Turtle answers "We called him tortoise because he taught us!".

The Gryphon appears to be somewhat overbearing and dismissive of the obsessions and dismays of other characters, such as the Mock Turtle's sorrow and the Queen of Hearts' executions, neither of which (according to the Gryphon) have any basis in fact. The Gryphon was ordered by the Queen to take Alice to meet the Mock Turtle; this he did, and stayed with them for a long time, demanding that the Mock Turtle tell its history, as well as several poems. The two creatures go on to explain certain features of their world which are apparently nonsense to Alice, before Alice and the Gryphon are summoned to a criminal trial, leaving the Mock Turtle behind.