# Dikes and Ditches

Dikes and Ditches by Oliver Optic has 86,205 words.

## At a glance

- **Author:** [Oliver Optic](https://musael.com/books/authors/oliver-optic.md) (1822–1897)
- **Genre:** adventure
- **Readers:** middle grade

## How long it takes to read

- **Words:** 86,205
- **Reading time:** 5 h 45 min (at 250 words a minute)
- **Listening time:** 9 h 16 min (audiobook pace, 155 words a minute)

| Reading speed | Whole book | At 30 minutes a day |
| --- | --- | --- |
| 200 wpm | 7 h 11 min | 15 days |
| 250 wpm | 5 h 45 min | 12 days |
| 300 wpm | 4 h 47 min | 10 days |

## Read or listen

Dikes and Ditches is in the public domain: these editions are free to download, read and share.

- Project Gutenberg: https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/25485

## Counted from the text

Automated estimates from the selected Project Gutenberg text; it may include a preface or notes.

- Words in the text: 86,205
- Chapters: 20
- Dialogue: 45% of the words are inside quotation marks
- Average sentence: 14.7 words

## Where the numbers come from

The word count comes from the sources below.

- https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/25485 (word count)
- https://openlibrary.org/works/OL1501515W
- https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/25485

Checked on 2026-10-27. Page counts change from edition to edition.

Source: https://musael.com/books/dikes-and-ditches