were not straight, and then tucked her head under her wing again and
went to sleep.

In the morning Dorothy and the Lion and Tiger were given their breakfast
in their rooms, and afterward joined the King in his throne room. The
Tiger complained bitterly that he was half starved, and begged to go
into the palace and become an ornament, so that he would no longer
suffer the pangs of hunger.

"Haven't you had your breakfast?" asked the Nome King.

"Oh, I had just a bite," replied the beast. "But what good is a bite, to
a hungry tiger?"

"He ate seventeen bowls of porridge, a platter full of fried sausages,
eleven loaves of bread and twenty-one mince pies," said the Steward.

"What more do you want?" demanded the King.

"A fat baby. I want a fat baby," said the Hungry Tiger. "A nice, plump,
juicy, tender, fat baby. But, of course, if I had one, my conscience
would not allow me to eat it. So I'll have to be an ornament and forget
my hunger."

"Impossible!" exclaimed the King. "I'll have no clumsy beasts enter my
palace, to overturn and break all my pretty nick-nacks. When the rest of
your friends are transformed you can return to the upper world, and go
about your business."

"As for that we have no business, when our friends are gone," said the
Lion. "So we do not care much what becomes of us."

Dorothy begged to be allowed to go first into the palace, but Tiktok
firmly maintained that the slave should face danger before the mistress.
The Scarecrow agreed with him in that, so the Nome King opened the door
for the machine man, who tramped into the palace to meet his fate. Then
his Majesty returned to his throne and puffed his pipe so contentedly
that a small cloud of smoke formed above his head.

Bye and bye he said:

"I'm sorry there are so few of you left. Very soon, now, my fun will be
over, and then for amusement I shall have nothing to do but admire my
new ornaments."

"It seems to me," said Dorothy, "that you are not so honest as you
pretend to be."

[Illustration: THE NOME KING PUFFED HIS PIPE]

"How's that?" asked the King.

"Why, you made us think it would be easy to guess what ornaments the
people of Ev were changed into."

"It _is_ easy," declared the monarch, "if one is a good guesser. But it
appears that the members of your party are all poor guessers."

"What is Tiktok doing now?" asked the girl, uneasily.

"Nothing," replied the King, with a frown. "He is standing perfectly
still, in th