nch. Then,
accompanied by the yellow hen, she walked out of the shadow of the trees
toward the sea-shore.

They were part way across the sands when Billina suddenly cried, in a
voice of terror:

"What's that?"

[Illustration]

Dorothy turned quickly around, and saw coming out of a path that led
from between the trees the most peculiar person her eyes had ever
beheld.

It had the form of a man, except that it walked, or rather rolled, upon
all fours, and its legs were the same length as its arms, giving them
the appearance of the four legs of a beast. Yet it was no beast that
Dorothy had discovered, for the person was clothed most gorgeously in
embroidered garments of many colors, and wore a straw hat perched
jauntily upon the side of its head. But it differed from human beings in
this respect, that instead of hands and feet there grew at the end of
its arms and legs round wheels, and by means of these wheels it rolled
very swiftly over the level ground. Afterward Dorothy found that these
odd wheels were of the same hard substance that our finger-nails and
toe-nails are composed of, and she also learned that creatures of this
strange race were born in this queer fashion. But when our little girl
first caught sight of the first individual of a race that was destined
to cause her a lot of trouble, she had an idea that the
brilliantly-clothed personage was on roller-skates, which were attached
to his hands as well as to his feet.

"Run!" screamed the yellow hen, fluttering away in great fright. "It's a
Wheeler!"

[Illustration: "IT'S A WHEELER!"]

"A Wheeler?" exclaimed Dorothy. "What can that be?"

"Don't you remember the warning in the sand: 'Beware the Wheelers'? Run,
I tell you--run!"

So Dorothy ran, and the Wheeler gave a sharp, wild cry and came after
her in full chase.

Looking over her shoulder as she ran, the girl now saw a great
procession of Wheelers emerging from the forest--dozens and dozens of
them--all clad in splendid, tight-fitting garments and all rolling
swiftly toward her and uttering their wild, strange cries.

"They're sure to catch us!" panted the girl, who was still carrying the
heavy dinner-pail she had picked. "I can't run much farther, Billina."

"Climb up this hill,--quick!" said the hen; and Dorothy found she was
very near to the heap of loose and jagged rocks they had passed on their
way to the forest. The yellow hen was even now fluttering among the
rocks, and Dorothy follo