, only to reappear at the right of them. They were constantly
getting nearer to it, however, so they kept their faces turned toward it
as it flitted here and there to all points of the compass. Presently the
Lion, who was leading the procession, halted abruptly and cried out:
"Ouch!"

"What's the matter?" asked Dorothy.

"Ouch--ouch!" repeated the Lion, and leaped backward so suddenly that
Dorothy nearly tumbled from his back. At the same time Hank the Mule
yelled "Ouch!" almost as loudly as the Lion had done, and he also
pranced backward a few paces.

"It's the thistles," said Betsy. "They prick their legs."

Hearing this, all looked down, and sure enough the ground was thick with
thistles, which covered the plain from the point where they stood way up
to the walls of the mysterious city. No pathways through them could be
seen at all; here the soft grass ended and the growth of thistles began.

"They're the prickliest thistles I ever felt," grumbled the Lion. "My
legs smart yet from their stings, though I jumped out of them as quick
as I could."

"Here is a new difficulty," remarked the Wizard in a grieved tone. "The
city has stopped hopping around, it is true; but how are we to get to
it, over this mass of prickers?"

"They can't hurt _me_," said the thick-skinned Woozy, advancing
fearlessly and trampling among the thistles.

"Nor me," said the Wooden Sawhorse.

"But the Lion and the Mule cannot stand the prickers," asserted Dorothy,
"and we can't leave them behind."

"Must we all go back?" asked Trot.

"Course not!" replied Button-Bright scornfully. "Always, when there's
trouble, there's a way out of it, if you can find it."

"I wish the Scarecrow was here," said Scraps, standing on her head on
the Woozy's square back. "His splendid brains would soon show us how to
conquer this field of thistles."

"What's the matter with _your_ brains?" asked the boy.

"Nothing," she said, making a flip-flop into the thistles and dancing
among them without feeling their sharp points. "I could tell you in
half a minute how to get over the thistles, if I wanted to."

"Tell us, Scraps!" begged Dorothy.

"I don't want to wear my brains out with overwork," replied the
Patchwork Girl.

"Don't you love Ozma? And don't you want to find her?" asked Betsy
reproachfully.

"Yes, indeed," said Scraps, walking on her hands as an acrobat does at
the circus.

"Well, we can't find Ozma unless we get past these thistles," dec