Mock Turtle he was a Turtle the Mock Turtle answers, "We called him tortoise because he taught us!" ('tortoise' and 'taught us' both being pronounced <tɔːtʊs> in Carroll's dialect). To say that the Mock Turtle's name is a pun on the name of the soup is incomplete. The Tenniel illustration of the Mock Turtle specifically depicts it as a collection of creatures that make up the ingredients of mock turtle soup; they are not random. The pun is not only of the name, but of the nature of the soup itself. Traditionally, mock turtle soup takes the parts of a calf that
'Tis the Voice of the Lobster meaning; in this case that of ‘Mock Turtle Soup’, it being either not real turtle soup or real soup made from real mock-turtles! Alice's recitation is suddenly interrupted by the Mock Turtle, who finds the poem "the most confusing thing I ever heard." The poem ends with a mind rhyme; it is generally assumed that the last words of the poem could be supplied as "— eating the Owl". This poem is not to be conflated with a "Lobster Quadrille" that the Mock Turtle sings to Alice as he dances with the Gryphon. After the dance, Alice intends to recite