The Wizard hesitated.
"If you'll take care not to leave the raft or step foot on the
island, you'll be quite safe," he decided. So the Wizard told the
Hungry Tiger and the Cowardly Lion to guard the cage of monkeys until
he returned, and then he and Dorothy got upon the raft. The paddle
which Cap'n Bill had made was still there, so the little Wizard paddled
the clumsy raft across the water and ran it upon the beach of the
Magic Isle as close to the place where Cap'n Bill and Trot were
rooted as he could.
Dorothy was shocked to see how small the prisoners had become, and
Trot said to her friends: "If you can't save us soon, there'll be
nothing left of us."
"Be patient, my dear," counseled the Wizard, and took the little axe
from his black bag.
"What are you going to do with that?" asked Cap'n Bill.
"It's a magic axe," replied the Wizard, "and when I tell it to chop,
it will chop those roots from your feet and you can run to the raft
before they grow again."
"Don't!" shouted the sailor in alarm. "Don't do it! Those roots
are all flesh roots, and our bodies are feeding 'em while they're
growing into the ground.
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