ring some of it to Tiktok, who declined because, as he said,
he was merely a machine. Afterward she offered to share with Billina,
but the hen murmured something about "dead things" and said she
preferred her bugs and ants.

"Do the lunch-box trees and the dinner-pail trees belong to the
Wheelers?" the child asked Tiktok, while engaged in eating her meal.

"Of course not," he answered. "They be-long to the roy-al fam-il-y of
Ev, on-ly of course there is no roy-al fam-il-y just now be-cause King
Ev-ol-do jumped in-to the sea and his wife and ten chil-dren have been
trans-formed by the Nome King. So there is no one to rule the Land of
Ev, that I can think of. Per-haps it is for this rea-son that the
Wheel-ers claim the trees for their own, and pick the lunch-eons and
din-ners to eat them-selves. But they be-long to the King, and you will
find the roy-al "E" stamped up-on the bot-tom of ev-er-y din-ner pail."

Dorothy turned the pail over, and at once discovered the royal mark upon
it, as Tiktok had said.

"Are the Wheelers the only folks living in the Land of Ev?" enquired the
girl.

[Illustration: DOROTHY OPENED HER TIN DINNER-PAIL]

"No; they on-ly in-hab-it a small por-tion of it just back of the
woods," replied the machine. "But they have al-ways been mis-chiev-ous
and im-per-ti-nent, and my old mas-ter, King Ev-ol-do, used to car-ry a
whip with him, when he walked out, to keep the crea-tures in or-der.
When I was first made the Wheel-ers tried to run o-ver me, and butt me
with their heads; but they soon found I was built of too sol-id a
ma-ter-i-al for them to in-jure."

"You seem very durable," said Dorothy. "Who made you?"

"The firm of Smith & Tin-ker, in the town of Ev-na, where the roy-al
pal-ace stands," answered Tiktok.

"Did they make many of you?" asked the child.

"No; I am the on-ly au-to-mat-ic me-chan-i-cal man they ev-er
com-plet-ed," he replied. "They were ver-y won-der-ful in-ven-tors, were
my mak-ers, and quite ar-tis-tic in all they did."

"I am sure of that," said Dorothy. "Do they live in the town of Evna
now?"

"They are both gone," replied the machine. "Mr. Smith was an art-ist, as
well as an in-vent-or, and he paint-ed a pic-ture of a riv-er which was
so nat-ur-al that, as he was reach-ing a-cross it to paint some flow-ers
on the op-po-site bank, he fell in-to the wa-ter and was drowned."

"Oh, I'm sorry for that!" exclaimed the little girl.

"Mis-ter Tin-ker," continued Tiktok