This long passage from "Alice Through the Looking Glass" has some special and mysterious significance to me. I identify with the gentle but heavily ineffectual White Knight, I guess. On YouTube, there is a professional-actress recital of this passage. And you can search for the tune "I Give Thee All, I can No More", also well-sung in a "professional" performance.
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'You are sad,' the Knight said in an anxious tone: 'let me sing you a song to comfort you.'
'Is it very long?' Alice asked, for she had heard a good deal of poetry that day.
'It's long,' said the Knight, 'but it's very, very beautiful. Everybody that hears me sing it -- either it brings the tears into their eyes, or else --'
'Or else what?' said Alice, for the Knight had made a sudden pause.
'Or else it doesn't, you know. The name of the song is called "Haddocks' Eyes".'
'Oh, that's the name of the song, is it?' Alice said, trying to feel interested.
'No, you don't understand,' the Knight said, looking a little vexed. 'That's what the name is called. The name really is "The Aged Aged Man".'
'Then I ought to have said "That's what the song is called"?' Alice corrected herself.
'No, you oughtn't: that's quite another thing! The song is called "Ways and Means": but that's only what it's called, you know!'
'Well, what is the song, then?' said Alice, who was by this time completely bewildered.
'I was coming to that,' the Knight said. 'The song really is "A-sitting On a Gate": and the tune's my own invention.'
So saying, he stopped his horse and let the reins fall on its neck: then, slowly beating time with one hand, and with a faint smile lighting up his gentle foolish face, as if he enjoyed the music of his song, he began.
Of all the strange things that Alice saw in her journey Through The Looking-Glass, this was the one that she always remembered most clearly. Years afterwards she could bring the whole scene back again, as if it had been only yesterday -- the mild blue eyes and kindly smile of the Knight -- the setting sun gleaming through his hair, and shining on his armour in a blaze of light that quite dazzled her -- the horse quietly moving about, with the reins hanging loose on his neck, cropping the grass at her feet -- and the black shadows of the forest behind -- all this she took in like a picture, as, with one hand shading her eyes, she leant against a tree, watching the strange pair, and listening, in a half-dream, to the melancholy music of the song.
'But the tune isn't his own invention,' she said to herself: 'it's "I give thee all, I can no more".' She stood and listened very attentively, but no tears came into her eyes.
'I'll tell thee everything I can: There's little to relate. I saw an aged aged man, A-sitting on a gate. "Who are you, aged man?" I said, "And how is it you live?" And his answer trickled through my head, Like water through a sieve.
He said "I look for butterflies That sleep among the wheat: I make them into mutton-pies, And sell them in the street.
I sell them unto men," he said, "Who sail on stormy seas; And that's the way I get my bread -- A trifle, if you please."
But I was thinking of a plan To dye one's whiskers green, And always use so large a fan That they could not be seen. So, having no reply to give To what the old man said, I cried "Come, tell me how you live!" And thumped him on the head.
His accents mild took up the tale: He said "I go my ways, And when I find a mountain-rill, I set it in a blaze; And thence they make a stuff they call Rowlands' Macassar-Oil -- Yet twopence-halfpenny is all They give me for my toil."
But I was thinking of a way To feed oneself on batter, And so go on from day to day Getting a little fatter. I shook him well from side to side, Until his face was blue: "Come, tell me how you live," I cried, "And what it is you do!"
He said "I hunt for haddocks' eyes Among the heather bright, And work them into waistcoat-buttons In the silent night. And these I do not sell for gold Or coin of silvery shine, But for a copper halfpenny, And that will purchase nine.
"I sometimes dig for buttered rolls, Or set limed twigs for crabs: I sometimes search the grassy knolls For wheels of Hansom-cabs. And that's the way" (he gave a wink) "By which I get my wealth-- And very gladly will I drink Your Honour's noble health."
I heard him then, for I had just Completed my design To keep the Menai bridge from rust By boiling it in wine. I thanked him much for telling me The way he got his wealth, But chiefly for his wish that he Might drink my noble health.
And now, if e'er by chance I put My fingers into glue, Or madly squeeze a right-hand foot Into a left-hand shoe,
Or if I drop upon my toe A very heavy weight, I weep, for it reminds me so Of that old man I used to know-- Whose look was mild, whose speech was slow Whose hair was whiter than the snow, Whose face was very like a crow, With eyes, like cinders, all aglow, Who seemed distracted with his woe, Who rocked his body to and fro, And muttered mumblingly and low, As if his mouth were full of dough,
Who snorted like a buffalo-- That summer evening long ago, A-sitting on a gate.'
As the Knight sang the last words of the ballad, he gathered up the reins, and turned his horse's head along the road by which they had come. 'You've only a few yards to go,' he said, 'down the hill and over that little brook, and then you'll be a Queen--But you'll stay and see me off first?' he added as Alice turned with an eager look in the direction to which he pointed. 'I shan't be long. You'll wait and wave your handkerchief when I get to that turn in the road! I think it'll encourage me, you see.'
'Of course I'll wait,' said Alice: 'and thank you very much for coming so far--and for the song--I liked it very much.'
'I hope so,' the Knight said doubtfully: 'but you didn't cry so much as I thought you would.'
So they shook hands, and then the Knight rode slowly away into the forest. 'It won't take long to see him off, I expect,' Alice said to herself, as she stood watching him. 'There he goes! Right on his head as usual! However, he gets on again pretty easily--that comes of having so many things hung round the horse--' So she went on talking to herself, as she watched the horse walking leisurely along the road, and the Knight tumbling off, first on one side and then on the other. After the fourth or fifth tumble he reached the turn, and then she waved her handkerchief to him, and waited till he was out of sight.