Chapter Twelve
THE WIZARD CHANGES HIS FRIENDS
FORMS AGAIN
Dorothy, who was a little Lamb, cried
out with joy when she saw her friend the Wizard in his real form. The Fat
Woman and the Munchkin Boy stood around him and looked at him in great
surprise.
"How wonderful!" they cried. "How did
it happen? Who changed you back into your real form?"
"First, I shall change you all into
your real forms and then I shall tell you all about it," answered the Wizard.
He said the magic word and changed his friends, one by one, back into their
real forms. Then he told his happy friends of his adventures and showed them
the two nuts.
"Now," he said, "we must not be afraid
of those two wicked beasts. They are only nuts now. Nuts can't speak, so they
can't change their forms and can't harm us."
"But listen," cried Dorothy. "What
about the soldiers? 1 Where are they now?"
"I forgot all about them,"
2 said the Wizard. "But I think they must be in the forest.
Let's go there at once!"
The Wizard was right. The soldiers
were in the forest. They were as big and as tall that they could not make a
step in the thick forest. Hundreds and hundreds of monkeys sat in the trees.
They looked at the soldiers and talked to one another. 3 They
made a great noise. The Wizard and his friends could not hear each other.
The Wizard had no magic tools, you
remember, but now he knew the magic word Pyrzqxgl and he quickly changed the
six soldiers into monkeys.
"The Wizard is a very good man," cried
the monkeys on the trees. "We like him, we want to thank him."
"I must tell you," said the Wizard,
"that I want to take twelve monkeys with me to the Emerald City. Who wants to
come with me?"
At once twelve monkeys cried: "We are
ready to go with you. Take us with you, Wizard."
Then the Wizard said: "You see, I want
only twelve little monkeys. I shall make you very, very small. What will you
say to this?"
The monkeys cried: "All right, make us
small!"
The Wizard put a small basket on the
ground and said:
"My monkeys must become very small:
Pyrzqxgl!" And suddenly all saw in the basket twelve very, very small monkeys.
"And now we shall say good-bye to
you," said the Wizard of Oz. "I promise to bring back your brothers and
sisters soon. They will be happy in the Emerald City. But this is their home.
And you know that 'East or West home is best'!"
Dorothy and the Wizard said good-bye
to all their friends.
"Good-bye, friends," said Gugu the
Leopard. "I like you. I know that you are the true friends of animals. We
shall always be glad to see you in our forest. Good-bye!"
The Wizard and Dorothy went away on
the back of the Cowardly Lion. The basket with the little monkeys in it was in
the Wizard's hand.
For a long time the monkeys in the
trees cried "Goodbye" to their new friends.
1 What about the
soldiers? — А как обстоят дела с солдатами?
2 I forgot all about
them — Я совершенно забыл о них
3 talked to one
another — говорили друг с другом