not cut me. There was only one danger--that my joints would
rust; but I kept an oil-can in my cottage and took care to oil
myself whenever I needed it. However, there came a day when I
forgot to do this, and, being caught in a rainstorm, before I
thought of the danger my joints had rusted, and I was left to
stand in the woods until you came to help me. It was a terrible
thing to undergo, but during the year I stood there I had time to
think that the greatest loss I had known was the loss of my heart.
While I was in love I was the happiest man on earth; but no one
can love who has not a heart, and so I am resolved to ask Oz to
give me one. If he does, I will go back to the Munchkin maiden
and marry her."

Both Dorothy and the Scarecrow had been greatly interested
in the story of the Tin Woodman, and now they knew why he was so
anxious to get a new heart.

"All the same," said the Scarecrow, "I shall ask for brains
instead of a heart; for a fool would not know what to do with a
heart if he had one."

"I shall take the heart," returned the Tin Woodman; "for
brains do not make one happy, and happiness is the best thing
in the world."

Dorothy did not say anything, for she was puzzled to know
which of her two friends was right, and she decided if she could
only get back to Kansas and Aunt Em, it did not matter so much
whether the Woodman had no brains and the Scarecrow no heart,
or each got what he wanted.