Which Latin case is missing from Alice's mouse declension?

The ablative is the Latin case missing from Alice's mouse declension.

In Chapter 2, Alice tries to address the Mouse by recalling a declension from her brother's grammar: “A mouse,” “of a mouse,” “to a mouse,” “a mouse,” and “O mouse.” These correspond to the nominative, genitive, dative, accusative, and vocative cases. The ablative, the usual sixth case in a standard Latin paradigm, is not included.

The joke works because Alice remembers the sequence incompletely while trying to speak politely to the Mouse. In Latin, the ablative can express meanings such as separation, means, accompaniment, or circumstances, depending on the construction. The English paraphrases in her memory are therefore only rough labels, not literal English declension forms.

Nominative, genitive, and dative are all present in her list, so they cannot be the missing answer. Vocative is represented by “O mouse,” even though it is not among the listed options. Carroll's language jokes often turn schoolroom grammar into comic confusion.