owed Dorothy.

Our friends entered a large room at the front of the house, where the
High Coco-Lorum asked them to be seated. "I hope your mission here is
a peaceful one," he said, looking a little worried, "for the Thists are
not very good fighters and object to being conquered."

"Are your people called Thists?" asked Dorothy.

"Yes. I thought you knew that. And we call our city Thi."

"Oh!"

"We are Thists because we eat thistles, you know," continued the High
Coco-Lorum.

"Do you really eat those prickly things?" inquired Button-Bright
wonderingly.

"Why not?" replied the other. "The sharp points of the thistles cannot
hurt us, because all our insides are gold-lined."

"Gold-lined!"

"To be sure. Our throats and stomachs are lined with solid gold, and
we find the thistles nourishing and good to eat. As a matter of fact,
there is nothing else in our country that is fit for food. All around
the City of Thi grow countless thistles, and all we need do is to go
and gather them. If we wanted anything else to eat, we would have to
plant it, and grow it, and harvest it, and that would be a lot of
trouble and make us work, which is an occupation we detest."

"But tell me, please," said the Wizard, "how does it happen that your
city jumps around so, from one part of the country to another?"

"The city doesn't jump. It doesn't move at all," declared the High
Coco-Lorum. "However, I will admit that the land that surrounds it has
a trick of turning this way or that, and so if one is standing upon the
plain and facing north, he is likely to find himself suddenly facing
west or east or south. But once you reach the thistle fields, you are
on solid ground."

"Ah, I begin to understand," said the Wizard, nodding his head. "But I
have another question to ask: How does it happen that the Thists have
no King to rule over them?"

"Hush!" whispered the High Coco-Lorum, looking uneasily around to make
sure they were not overheard. "In reality, I am the King, but the
people don't know it. They think they rule themselves, but the fact is
I have everything my own way. No one else knows anything about our
laws, and so I make the laws to suit myself. If any oppose me or
question my acts, I tell them it's the law and that settles it. If I
called myself King, however, and wore a crown and lived in royal style,
the people would not like me and might do me harm. As the High
Coco-Lorum of Thi, I am considered a v