The Reverend Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, writing under the pseudonym of Lewis Carroll, bequeathed to the world a singular treasure with Alice and her adventures in Wonderland. He has left us a record of how Alice came to be written: "I distinctly remember, now as I write, how in a desperate attempt to strike out some new line of fairy-lore, I had sent my heroine down a rabbit hole, without the least idea of what was to happen afterwards...Full many a year has slipped away, since that 'golden afternoon' that gave thee birth, but I can call it up as if it were yesterday - the cloudless blue above, the watery mirror below, the boat drifting idly on its way, the tinkle of the drops that fell from the oars, as they waved so sleepily to and fro, and (the one bright gleam of light in all the slumbrous scene) the three eager faces hungry for news of fairy-land and who would not be said 'Nay' to; from whose lips 'Tell us a story, please,' had all the stern immutability of fate."