Page:The Royal Book of Oz.djvu/127

 were too lovely for words. Poppies, roses, lotus and other lilies perfumed the air and at night a thousand silver lanterns turned them to a veritable fairy land. The grass and trees were green, as in other lands, but the sky was always full of tiny silver clouds, the waters surrounding the island were of a lovely liquid silver and as all the houses and towers were of this gleaming metal the effect was bewildering and beautiful.

But the Silver Islanders themselves were too stupid to appreciate this beauty. "And what use is it all when I have no one to enjoy it with me," sighed the Scarecrow. "And no time to play!"

In Oz no one thought it queer if Ozma, the little Queen, jumped rope with Dorothy or Betsy Bobbin, or had a quiet game of croquet with the palace cook. But here, alas, everything was different. If the Scarecrow so much as ventured a game of ball with the gardener's boy the whole court was thrown into an uproar. At first the Scarecrow tried to please everybody, but, finding that nothing pleased the people in the palace, he decided to please himself.

"I don't care a kinkajou if I am the Emperor, I'm going to talk to whom I please!" he exclaimed on the second night, and, shaking his glove at a bronze