"There are too many 'if's' in that suggestion," remarked the little
Wizard. "And you must remember that the other side is nothing but
spinning mountains, so we couldn't possibly fasten a rope to them--even
if we had one."

"That rope idea isn't half bad, though," said the Patchwork Girl, who
had been dancing dangerously near to the edge of the gulf.

"What do you mean?" asked Dorothy.

The Patchwork Girl suddenly stood still and cast her button eyes around
the group.

"Ha, I have it!" she exclaimed. "Unharness the Sawhorse, somebody; my
fingers are too clumsy."

"Shall we?" asked Button-Bright doubtfully, turning to the others.

"Well, Scraps has a lot of brains, even if she is stuffed with cotton,"
asserted the Wizard. "If her brains can help us out of this trouble we
ought to use them."

So he began unharnessing the Sawhorse, and Button-Bright and Dorothy
helped him. When they had removed the harness the Patchwork Girl told
them to take it all apart and buckle the straps together, end to end.
And, after they had done this, they found they had one very long strap
that was stronger than any rope.

"It would reach across the gulf, easily," said the Lion, who with the
other animals had sat on his haunches and watched this proceeding. "But
I don't see how it could be fastened to one of those dizzy mountains."

Scraps had no such notion as that in her baggy head. She told them to
fasten one end of the strap to a stout limb of the tree, pointing to one
which extended quite to the edge of the gulf. Button-Bright did that,
climbing the tree and then crawling out upon the limb until he was
nearly over the gulf. There he managed to fasten the strap, which
reached to the ground below, and then he slid down it and was caught
by the Wizard, who feared he might fall into the chasm.

[Illustration]

[Illustration]

Scraps was delighted. She seized the lower end of the strap and telling
them all to get out of her way she went back as far as the strap would
reach and then made a sudden run toward the gulf. Over the edge she
swung, clinging to the strap until it had gone as far as its length
permitted, when she let go and sailed gracefully through the air until
she alighted upon the mountain just in front of them.

Almost instantly, as the great cone continued to whirl, she was sent
flying against the next mountain in the rear, and that one had only
turned halfway around when Scraps was sent flying to the next mounta