L. Frank Baum

“ Why would he wish to steal her?" questioned Dorothy.
"Don't ask me, my dear. Ugu doesn't tell me why he does things, I assure you."
Then we must go and ask him ourselves," declared the little girl.
"I wouldn't do that if I were you," advised the Czarover, looking first at the three girls and then at the boy and the little Wizard and finally at the stuffed Patchwork Girl. "If Ugu has really stolen your Ozma, he will probably keep her a prisoner, in spite of all your threats or entreaties. And with all his magical knowledge he would be a dangerous person to attack. ”

“ Would you like to eat some?"
"No thank you," replied the girl. "I—I don't want to get so thin."
"Well, of course one can't have strength and flesh at the same time," said the Czarover. "Zosozo is pure energy, and it's the only compound of its sort in existence. I never allow our giants to have it, you know, or they would soon become our masters, since they are bigger that we; so I keep all the stuff locked up in my private laboratory. Once a year I feed a teaspoonful of it to each of my people—men, women and children—so every one of them is nearly as strong as I am. ”

“ Through the legs of the giants as they walked, Dorothy could see rows of houses on each side of the street and throngs of people standing on the sidewalks, but the people were of ordinary size and the only remarkable thing about them was the fact that they were dreadfully lean and thin. ”

“ There's a wall around it, too, but it has gates and plenty of pathways."
"Did you get in?" asked Trot.
"No, for the gates were locked and the wall was a real wall. So we came back here again. It isn't far to the city. We can reach it in two hours after you've had your breakfasts." ”