<SPAN name="startofbook"></SPAN>
<h2> Lay of the Motor-Car </h2>
<p>
We're away! and the wind whistles shrewd<br/>
In our whiskers and teeth;<br/>
And the granite-like grey of the road<br/>
Seems to slide underneath.<br/>
As an eagle might sweep through the sky,<br/>
So we sweep through the land;<br/>
And the pallid pedestrians fly<br/>
When they hear us at hand.<br/>
<br/>
We outpace, we outlast, we outstrip!<br/>
Not the fast-fleeing hare,<br/>
Nor the racehorses under the whip,<br/>
Nor the birds of the air<br/>
Can compete with our swiftness sublime,<br/>
Our ease and our grace.<br/>
We annihilate chickens and time<br/>
And policemen and space.<br/>
<br/>
Do you mind that fat grocer who crossed?<br/>
How he dropped down to pray<br/>
In the road when he saw he was lost;<br/>
How he melted away<br/>
Underneath, and there rang through the fog<br/>
His earsplitting squeal<br/>
As he went—— Is that he or a dog,<br/>
That stuff on the wheel?<br/></p>
<div style="break-after:column;"></div><br />