The Land of Counterpane

When I was sick and lay a-bed, I had two pillows at my head, And all my toys beside me lay To keep me happy all the day.

And sometimes for an hour or so I watched my leaden soldiers go, With different uniforms and drills, Among the bed-clothes, through the hills;

And sometimes sent my ships in fleets All up and down among the sheets; Or brought my trees and houses out, And planted cities all about.

I was the giant great and still That sits upon the pillow-hill, And sees before him, dale and plain, The pleasant land of counterpane.

From The Land of Counterpane by Robert Louis Stevenson (1885). Public domain.

Check your understanding

1. What is the speaker doing in the poem?

Playing outside in the hillsPlaying with toys in bed while sickSleeping all day longReading a book about giants

2. What does the speaker pretend the bed-clothes are?

A giant's castleA stormy oceanHills and plainsA dark forest

3. How does the speaker feel about being sick in bed, and what words from the poem show this?

4. Why does the speaker call himself the giant great and still?

5. A counterpane is a bedspread. How does the child turn an ordinary bedspread into a whole land?