Ruth Plumly Thompson

The Cowardly Lion of Oz Ruth Plumly Thompson Illustrated First edition

A nice edition of this Oz classic with more than 100 original illustrations by John R. Neill.

The Cowardly Lion of Oz (1923) is the seventeenth in the series of Oz books created by L. Frank Baum and his successors, and the third written by Ruth Plumly Thompson. It was illustrated by John R. Neill.

The story opens with Mustafa of Mudge, a turbaned desert monarch with blue whiskers, who collects lions. Mustafa demands one more lion-he already has nine thousand nine hundred and ninety nine and a half lions, but there are no more lions in Mudge, and Mudgers are forbidden by Ozma, on penalty of death, to travel beyond the desert borders of Mudge.