{
 "id": "robert-louis-stevenson/a-song-of-the-road",
 "title": "A Song of the Road",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "Robert Louis Stevenson",
 "poet_slug": "robert-louis-stevenson",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Underwoods",
 "book_slug": "underwoods",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 2,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1887,
  "venue": "Underwoods (1887)",
  "note": "First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/underwoods00stevrich"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/robert-louis-stevenson_poetry",
  "file": "poetry.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
   "https://archive.org/details/worksofrobertlvol28stev",
   "https://archive.org/details/worksofrobertlou14stev",
   "https://archive.org/details/newpoemsandvaria00stevuoft",
   "https://archive.org/details/poemshithertounp00stevrich",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/31291",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/30659",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/441",
   "https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Poems,_by_Robert_Louis_Stevenson,_hitherto_unpublished"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-20"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 28,
  "n_stanzas": 7,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 38,
  "max_indent": 0
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "The gauger walked with willing foot,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And aye the gauger played the flute;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And what should Master Gauger play",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But Over the Hills and Far Away?",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Whene’er I buckle on my pack",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And foot it gaily in the track,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "O pleasant gauger, long since dead,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I hear you fluting on ahead.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "You go with me the selfsame way⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The selfsame air for me you play;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For I do think and so do you",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "It is the tune to travel to.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "For who would gravely set his face",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To go to this or t’other place?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "There’s nothing under heav’n so blue",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That’s fairly worth the travelling to.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "On every hand the roads begin,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And people walk with zeal therein;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But wheresoe’er the highways tend,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Be sure there’s nothing at the end.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Then follow you, wherever hie",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The travelling mountains of the sky.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Or let the streams in civil mode",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Direct your choice upon a road;",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "For one and all, or high or low,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Will lead you where you wish to go;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And one and all go night and day",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Over the Hills and Far Away!",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}