have no way to earn a living. He was a good man, and worked in the
field as hard as he could; and Aunt Em did all the housework, with
Dorothy's help. Yet they did not seem to get along.

This little girl, Dorothy, was like dozens of little girls you know.
She was loving and usually sweet-tempered, and had a round rosy face
and earnest eyes. Life was a serious thing to Dorothy, and a
wonderful thing, too, for she had encountered more strange adventures
in her short life than many other girls of her age.

Aunt Em once said she thought the fairies must have marked Dorothy at
her birth, because she had wandered into strange places and had always
been protected by some unseen power. As for Uncle Henry, he thought
his little niece merely a dreamer, as her dead mother had been, for he
could not quite believe all the curious stories Dorothy told them of
the Land of Oz, which she had several times visited. He did not think
that she tried to deceive her uncle and aunt, but he imagined that she
had dreamed all of those astonishing adventures, and that the dreams
had been so real to her that she had come to believe them true.

Whatever the explanation might be, it was certain that Dorothy had
been absent from her Kansas home for several long periods, always
disappearing unexpectedly, yet always coming back safe and sound, with
amazing tales of where she had been and the unusual people she had
met. Her uncle and aunt listened to her stories eagerly and in spite
of their doubts began to feel that the little girl had gained a lot of
experience and wisdom that were unaccountable in this age, when
fairies are supposed no longer to exist.

Most of Dorothy's stories were about the Land of Oz, with its