p 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 quickly 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," declared
Dorothy.

Scraps danced around them two or three times without reply. Then she
said, "Don't look at me, you stupid folks. Look at those blankets."

The Wizard's face brightened at once.

"Why didn't we think of those blankets before?"

"Because you haven't magic brains," laughed Scraps. "Such brains as
you have are of the common sort that grow in your heads, like weeds in
a garden. I'm sorry for you people who have to be born in order to be
alive."

But the Wizard was not listening to her. He quickly removed the
blankets from the back of the Sawhorse and spread one of them upon the
thistles, just next the grass. The thick cloth rendered the prickers
harmless, so the Wizard walked over this first blanket and spread the
second one farther on,