From a Railway Carriage

Robert Louis Stevenson · 1885

Catalog grade guidance: K–5 — Short children’s lyric; good for early memorization and reading aloud.

18 content lines · 124 words · Est. recitation about 1 min 11 sec (approx.)

Public-domain text for reading and recitation practice. Source: Project Gutenberg #136.Estimated time uses ~120 words/minute plus short pauses—not a contest rule.

From a Railway Carriage

  Faster than fairies, faster than witches,
  Bridges and houses, hedges and ditches;
  And charging along like troops in a battle
  All through the meadows the horses and cattle:
  All of the sights of the hill and the plain
  Fly as thick as driving rain;
  And ever again, in the wink of an eye,
  Painted stations whistle by.

  Here is a child who clambers and scrambles,
  All by himself and gathering brambles;
  Here is a tramp who stands and gazes;
  And here is the green for stringing the daisies!
  Here is a cart run away in the road
  Lumping along with man and load;
  And here is a mill, and there is a river:
  Each a glimpse and gone forever!

                                          XXXVIII