The King and Queen of Hearts were seated on their throne when they arrived, with a great crowd assembled around them — all sorts of little birds and beasts, as well as the whole pack of cards; and near the King was the Knave of Hearts and the White Rabbit (who seemed to have been let go of his modeling crimes), with a trumpet in one hand, and a scroll of parchment in the other. In the very middle of the court was a blackboard with the following written on it with blue chalk: 

Who stole the tarts?

Alice, who had imagined a nice large dish of tarts on reading this, felt quite hungry, and to divert her attention, she began looking at everything around her.

Alice had never been in a court before, so she started calling out the names of nearly everyone present there. “That’s the judge,” she said to herself, “because of his great wig.”

The judge, by the way, was the King; and as he wore his crown over the wig, he did not look at all comfortable, and it was certainly not becoming.

“And that’s the jury box,” thought Alice, “and those twelve creatures,” (she was obliged to say “creatures,” you see, because some of them were animals, and some were birds,) “I suppose they are the jurors.”

The twelve jurors were all writing very busily on slates. “What are they doing?” Alice whispered to the Gryphon. “They can’t have anything to put down yet, before the trial’s begun.”

“They’re putting down their names,” the Gryphon whispered in reply, “for fear they should forget them before the end of the trial.”

“Stupid things!” Alice began in a loud, indignant voice, but she stopped hastily, for the White Rabbit cried out, “Silence in the inference house!” and the King put on his spectacles and looked anxiously round, to make out who was talking.

The Duchess walked towards Alice from the left and seemed very happy to meet her again. Alice asked her, “Duchess, why did the White Rabbit call this court an inference house?”.

“Why, dear,”, she replied, “because this is an inference house, not a court. You see, every day, God gives us a prompt through the King of Hearts, and we have to answer it. It could be a question, an image, a video, or some other kind of data, and we have to give the best answer based on what we know. This is the task of the jurors. A number of witnesses might be consulted in the process. Today’s question prompt is ‘Who stole the tarts?’” 

Alice could see, as well as if she were looking over their shoulders, that all the jurors were writing down “stupid things!” on their slates, and she could even make out that one of them didn’t know how to spell “stupid,” and that he had to ask his neighbor to tell him. “A nice muddle their slates’ll be in before the trial’s over!” thought Alice.

One of the jurors had a pencil that squeaked. This, of course, Alice could not stand, and she went round the court and got behind him, and very soon found an opportunity of taking it away. She did it so quickly that the poor little juror (it was Bill, the Lizard) could not make out at all what had become of it; so, after hunting all about for it, he was obliged to write with one finger for the rest of the day; and this was of very little use, as it left no mark on the slate.

“Herald, what do you know about tarts!” said the King.

On this the White Rabbit blew three blasts on the trumpet, and then unrolled the parchment scroll, and read as follows:—

“The Queen of Hearts, she made some tarts,

    All on a summer day:

The Knave of Hearts, he stole those tarts,

    And took them quite away!”

“Consider your verdict,” the King said to the jury.

“Not yet, not yet!” the Rabbit hastily interrupted. “There’s a great deal to come before that!”

“Call the first witness,” said the King; and the White Rabbit blew three blasts on the trumpet, and called out, “First witness!”

The first witness was the Hatter. He came in with a teacup in one hand and a piece of bread-and-butter in the other. “I beg pardon, your Majesty,” he began, “for bringing these in: but I hadn’t quite finished my tea when I was sent for.”

“You ought to have finished,” said the King. “When did you begin?”

The Hatter looked at the March Hare, who had followed him into the court, arm-in-arm with the Dormouse. “Fourteenth of March, I think it was,” he said.

“Fifteenth,” said the March Hare.

“Sixteenth,” added the Dormouse.

“Write that down,” the King said to the jury, and the jury eagerly wrote down all three dates on their slates, then added them up, and reduced the answer to shillings and pence.

“Take off your hat,” the King said to the Hatter.

“It isn’t mine,” said the Hatter.

“Stolen!” the King exclaimed, turning to the jury, who instantly made a memorandum of the fact.

“I keep them to sell,” the Hatter added as an explanation; “I’ve none of my own. I’m a hatter.”

Here the Queen put on her spectacles and began staring at the Hatter, who turned pale and fidgeted.

“Give your evidence,” said the King; “and don’t be nervous, or I’ll have you executed on the spot.”

This did not seem to encourage the witness at all: he kept shifting from one foot to the other, looking uneasily at the Queen, and in his confusion, he bit a large piece out of his teacup instead of the bread-and-butter.

Just at this moment, Alice realized that the verdict of this hearing is what will be given out by the model. “And this”, she said to herself “is precisely what I’ve been looking for — a way for me to leave the wonderland.”

All this time the Queen had never left off staring at the Hatter, and, just as the Dormouse crossed the court, she said to one of the officers of the court, “Bring me the list of the singers in the last concert!” on which the wretched Hatter trembled so, that he shook both his shoes off.

“Give your evidence,” the King repeated angrily, “or I’ll have you executed, whether you’re nervous or not.”

“I’m a poor man, your Majesty,” the Hatter began, in a trembling voice, “—and I hadn’t begun my tea—not above a week or so—and what with the bread-and-butter getting so thin—and the twinkling of the tea—”

“The twinkling of the what?” said the King.

“It began with the tea,” the Hatter replied.

“Of course, twinkling begins with a T!” said the King sharply. “Do you take me for a dunce? Go on!”

“I’m a poor man,” the Hatter went on, “and most things twinkled after that—only the March Hare said—”

“I didn’t!” the March Hare interrupted in a great hurry.

“You did!” said the Hatter.

“I deny it!” said the March Hare.

“He denies it,” said the King: “leave out that part.”

“Well, at any rate, the Dormouse said—” the Hatter went on, looking anxiously round to see if he would deny it too: but the Dormouse denied nothing, being fast asleep.

“After that,” continued the Hatter, “I cut some more bread-and-butter—”

“But what did the Dormouse say?” one of the juries asked.

“That I can’t remember,” said the Hatter.

“You must remember,” remarked the King, “or I’ll have you executed.”

The miserable Hatter dropped his teacup and bread-and-butter and went down on one knee. “I’m a poor man, your Majesty,” he began.

“You’re a very poor speaker,” said the King. “If that’s all you know about it, you may stand down.”

“I can’t go no lower,” said the Hatter: “I’m on the floor, as it is.”

“Then you may sit down,” the King replied.

“I’d rather finish my tea,” said the Hatter, with an anxious look at the Queen, who was reading the list of singers.

“You may go,” said the King, and the Hatter hurriedly left the court, without even waiting to put his shoes on.

“—and just take his head off outside,” the Queen added to one of the officers: but the Hatter was out of sight before the officer could get to the door.

“Call the next witness!” said the King.

The next witness was the Duchess’s cook. She carried the pepper-box in her hand, and Alice guessed who it was, even before she got into the court, by the way, the people near the door began sneezing all at once.

“Give your evidence,” said the King.

“Shan’t,” said the cook.

The King looked anxiously at the White Rabbit, who said in a low voice, “Your Majesty must cross-examine this witness.”

“Well, if I must, I must,” the King said, with a melancholy air, and, after folding his arms and frowning at the cook till his eyes were nearly out of sight, he said in a deep voice, “What are tarts made of?”

“Pepper, mostly,” said the cook.

“Treacle,” said a sleepy voice behind her.

“Collar that Dormouse,” the Queen shrieked out. “Behead that Dormouse! Turn that Dormouse out of court! Suppress him! Pinch him! Off with his whiskers!”

For some minutes the whole court was in confusion, getting the Dormouse turned out, and, by the time they had settled down again, the cook had disappeared.

“Never mind!” said the King, with an air of great relief. “Jurors, give your verdict.” 

The jurors, after one last consultation with each other, all stood up and said, “Here is our verdict: This question is nonsense. It is needed to know who had the tarts before they were stolen.”

So far, Alice had been following with great wonder, but now she had to do something really fast, or else they would go ahead and return this stupid reply. Muster courage that she did not know she had, she yelled, at the top of her voice, “Wait. There’s one more witness.”

The King of Hearts asked, “Who is it?”

“Me.”, answered Alice.