Oz Giving Brain, Heart, and Courage

After the travelers return to the Emerald City having destroyed the Wicked Witch of the West, they demand that Oz keep his promises. The Wizard, exposed as a common man from Omaha who arrived by balloon, admits he is a humbug but agrees to do what he can. The next morning, he summons each companion separately to the Throne Room and bestows upon them the gifts they sought, using makeshift materials and theatrical gestures that nonetheless produce genuine transformations in how each character perceives himself.

The Bestowal of Brains upon the Scarecrow

The Scarecrow enters the Throne Room to find the little man sitting by the window, deep in thought. Oz asks him to sit down and explains that he must take off the Scarecrow's head to put the brains in their proper place. The Scarecrow agrees readily, saying he is welcome to take his head off as long as it will be a better one when it is put back on. The Wizard unfastens the head and empties out all the straw. He then goes into the back room and takes up a measure of bran, which he mixes with a great many pins and needles. After shaking them together thoroughly, he fills the top of the Scarecrow's head with this mixture and stuffs the rest of the space with straw to hold it in place. When he fastens the head back on the body, he declares, "Hereafter you will be a great man, for I have given you a lot of bran-new brains." The Scarecrow returns to his friends with his head bulging out at the top, feeling wise indeed and confident that when he gets used to his brains he will know everything. The Tin Woodman notices pins and needles sticking out of his head, and the Lion remarks that this is proof he is sharp.

The Bestowal of a Heart upon the Tin Woodman

The Tin Woodman walks to the Throne Room and knocks. Oz tells him he will have to cut a hole in his breast to put the heart in the right place, and the Woodman replies that he will not feel it at all. Oz brings a pair of tinsmith's shears and cuts a small, square hole in the left side of the Tin Woodman's breast. Then, going to a chest of drawers, he takes out a pretty heart made entirely of silk and stuffed with sawdust. He asks, "Isn't it a beauty?" and the Woodman, greatly pleased, inquires if it is a kind heart. Oz assures him it is very kind, places the heart in the Woodman's breast, and replaces the square of tin, soldering it neatly together where it had been cut. He apologizes for having to put a patch on the breast, but the happy Woodman says he does not mind the patch and is very grateful. When he returns to his friends, he feels his heart rattling around in his breast and tells Dorothy he has discovered it to be a kinder and more tender heart than the one he had owned when he was made of flesh.

The Bestowal of Courage upon the Cowardly Lion

The Lion enters the Throne Room and announces he has come for his courage. Oz goes to a cupboard, reaches up to a high shelf, and takes down a square green bottle, the contents of which he pours into a beautifully carved green-gold dish. Placing this before the Cowardly Lion, who sniffs at it as if he does not like it, the Wizard says, "Drink." When the Lion asks what it is, Oz explains that if it were inside of him, it would be courage, and that courage is always inside one, so it cannot be called courage until it is swallowed. The Lion hesitates no longer but drinks until the dish is empty. When Oz asks how he feels, the Lion replies, "Full of courage," and goes joyfully back to his friends to tell them of his good fortune. The Lion later declares he is afraid of nothing on earth and would gladly face an army or a dozen of the fierce Kalidahs.

The Significance of the Humbug's Gifts

Left alone, Oz smiles to think of his success in giving the Scarecrow, the Tin Woodman, and the Lion exactly what they thought they wanted. He reflects, "How can I help being a humbug, when all these people make me do things that everybody knows can't be done? It was easy to make the Scarecrow and the Lion and the Woodman happy, because they imagined I could do anything." The gifts are material fakes—bran and pins for brains, a silk-and-sawdust heart, a green liquid for courage—yet each character immediately experiences the psychological reality of what he received. The Scarecrow feels wise, the Woodman feels kind-hearted, and the Lion feels brave. The episode underscores the novel's central theme that the qualities the companions sought were already within them, and that the Wizard's role was not to create but to catalyze their own self-discovery through belief and confidence.