The Lion Becomes King

After climbing down from the china wall, the travelers found themselves in a disagreeable country of bogs and marshes, and then entered a forest where the trees were bigger and older than any they had ever seen. The Lion declared the forest perfectly delightful, saying he had never seen a more beautiful place and would like to live there all his life. As they walked through the forest until it became too dark to go farther, Dorothy, Toto, and the Lion lay down to sleep while the Woodman and the Scarecrow kept watch as usual.

The Assembly of the Beasts

When morning came, they started again and soon heard a low rumble of growling from many wild animals. Toto whimpered a little, but none of the others was frightened. They kept along the well-trodden path until they came to an opening in the wood where hundreds of beasts of every variety were gathered—tigers, elephants, bears, wolves, foxes, and all the others in the natural history. For a moment Dorothy was afraid, but the Lion explained that the animals were holding a meeting, and he judged by their snarling and growling that they were in great trouble. As he spoke, several of the beasts caught sight of him, and at once the great assemblage hushed as if by magic. The biggest of the tigers came up to the Lion and bowed, saying, "Welcome, O King of Beasts! You have come in good time to fight our enemy and bring peace to all the animals of the forest once more."

The Threat of the Spider Monster

The tiger explained that they were all threatened by a fierce enemy which had lately come into the forest—a most tremendous monster, like a great spider, with a body as big as an elephant and legs as long as a tree trunk. It had eight of these long legs, and as the monster crawled through the forest it seized an animal with a leg and dragged it to its mouth, where it ate it as a spider does a fly. Not one of them was safe while this fierce creature was alive, and they had called a meeting to decide how to take care of themselves. The Lion thought for a moment and asked if there were any other lions in the forest. The tiger replied that there had been some, but the monster had eaten them all, and none were nearly so large and brave as the Cowardly Lion. The Lion then proposed a bargain: if he put an end to their enemy, would they bow down to him and obey him as King of the Forest? The tiger answered gladly that they would, and all the other beasts roared with a mighty roar: "We will!" The tiger pointed to where the great spider lay among the oak trees, and the Lion bade his comrades good-bye and marched proudly away to do battle with the enemy.

The Battle and the Killing

The great spider was lying asleep when the Lion found him, and it looked so ugly that its foe turned up his nose in disgust. Its legs were quite as long as the tiger had said, and its body was covered with coarse black hair. It had a great mouth with a row of sharp teeth a foot long, but its head was joined to the pudgy body by a neck as slender as a wasp's waist. This gave the Lion a hint of the best way to attack the creature, and as he knew it was easier to fight it asleep than awake, he gave a great spring and landed directly upon the monster's back. Then, with one blow of his heavy paw, all armed with sharp claws, he knocked the spider's head from its body. Jumping down, he watched it until the long legs stopped wiggling, when he knew it was quite dead.

The Lion Becomes King

The Lion went back to the opening where the beasts of the forest were waiting for him and said proudly, "You need fear your enemy no longer." Then the beasts bowed down to the Lion as their King, and he promised to come back and rule over them as soon as Dorothy was safely on her way to Kansas. This event marked the culmination of the Lion's personal quest: he had sought courage from the Wizard Oz, but it was through his own decisive action—killing a monster that had devoured all other lions—that he proved his bravery and earned the kingship he had always been expected to hold. The transformation was complete: the creature who had once trembled at the sound of his own roar now stood as the acknowledged sovereign of the forest.