Page 81 - Lavender-B-3

‘What was that?’ she asked timidly.

‘I cannot imagine,’ replied the

Scarecrow; ‘but we can go and see.’

They turned and walked through
the forest a few steps, when Dorothy

discovered something shining in a
ray of sunshine that fell between the

trees. She ran to the place and then
stopped short, with a little cry of
surprise.

One of the big trees had been partly
chopped through, and standing
beside it, with an uplifted axe in his

hands, was a man made entirely of tin.
His head and arms and legs were jointed upon his body, but he stood perfectly

motionless, as if he could not stir at all.

‘Did you groan?’ asked Dorothy.

‘Yes,’ answered the tin man, ‘I did. I’ve been groaning for more than a year, and

no one has ever heard me before or come to help me.’

‘What can I do for you?’ she inquired softly.

‘Get an oil-can and oil my joints,’ he answered. ‘They are rusted so badly that I

cannot move them at all; if I am well oiled I shall soon be all right again. You will
find an oil-can on a shelf in my cottage.’

Dorothy at once ran back to the cottage and found the oil-can, and then she

returned and asked anxiously, ‘Where are your joints?’

‘Oil my neck, first,’ replied the Tin Woodman. So she oiled it.

timidly: in a shy or nervous way ‘Now oil the joints in my arms,’ he said. And Dorothy
uplifted: raised oiled them and the Scarecrow bent them carefully until
inquired: asked for information
anxiously: in a worried or they were quite free from rust and as good as new.
nervous way
rust: a brownish layer that forms The Tin Woodman gave a sigh of satisfaction and
on iron objects
leaned: rested against lowered his axe, which he leaned against the tree.

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