Battered Bob Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABCBDEDE FGFGHIH JKJJFLFL JMJMDNDN FEFEOPOP QRQRHJH FSFSHTHT FUFUV WX OYOYFZFZ FZFZFJFJHe was working on a station in the Western when I knew him | A |
And he came from Conongamo up the old surveyors' track | B |
And the fellows all admitted that no man in Vic could 'do him ' | C |
Since he'd smothered Stonewall Menzie also Anderson the black | B |
Bob was modelled for a fighter but he'd run to beef a trifle | D |
For his science every rouseabout was satisfied to vouch | E |
And Red Fogarty advised us he delivered like a rifle | D |
And his stopping well beside him Harry Sallars was a slouch | E |
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Not a man of us had met him till he settled on the station | F |
This was early in the Sixties what we call the good old days | G |
And it's cheerfully admitted Robert owed his reputation | F |
To a crippled jaw a broken nose and eyes that looked both ways | G |
We were certain on the face of it our guess was not an error | H |
Every feature of his phiz was marked his chin was pulled askew | I |
And The Critic passed the office 'Bet your buttons he's a terror | H |
That's the man who hammered Kelly on The Creek in Fifty two ' | - |
- | |
Bob was not a shrinking blossom and he held the first impressions | J |
By his subsequent admissions to the ringers and the mugs | K |
And he let himself be tickled into casual confessions | J |
Of his battles with the bruisers and the scientific pugs | J |
How he'd mangled Matty Hardy was his earliest narration | F |
He'd completely flummoxed Kitchen and had made the climate hot | L |
For Maloney Fee and Curran It was quite a consolation | F |
When he graciously informed us that he hadn't licked the lot | L |
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The arrival of the Wonder gave a spurt to local science | J |
And we had an exhibition every evening in the week | M |
For the lightest joke was answered in the lingo of defiance | J |
And our blood was cast like water on the grasses by the creek | M |
Every fellow but the stranger had his scrap or rough and tumble | D |
No one thought of looking ugly at the slugger Battered Bob | N |
And whene'er the boys addressed him 'twas in language choice and humble | D |
Though they ached to see him beaten none was anxious for the job | N |
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How we honoured Bob and yielded to his later information | F |
Let him lead in all the arguments and gently run the ranche | E |
And a very small potato was the owner of the station | F |
By the man who slaughtered Melody and fought a draw with Blanche | E |
Battered Bob became our champion our boss and by degrees he | O |
Sent his fame down to the Wannon and right up to Spooner's Gap | P |
And he scooped the honours smiling and he held them just as easy | O |
For we'd never seen him shape yet and he hadn't fought a tap | P |
- | |
We'd a cook whose name was Han Cat he was short and fat and yellow | Q |
Just a common ugly Chinky with a never ending smile | R |
Bob was careful to avoid the corns of any other fellow | Q |
But he filled Han Cat with sorrow and he whaled him all the while | R |
Han Cat groaned and bore it meekly and we didn't care to figure | H |
In the antics of the Champion or his little private rows | J |
Robert said 'I like a native and I'll liquor with a nigger | H |
But I hate the skin and colour of these sanguinary Chows ' | - |
- | |
On a certain Sunday morning Robert slyly cut a section | F |
Off the pig tail of the pagan 'twas Han's glory and his pride | S |
But the trouble that came after is his saddest recollection | F |
And the boys were so disgusted that they very nearly died | S |
Han Cat wept a while and then he turned and scowled as black as thunder | H |
And he cursed the grinning spoiler till he had to stop for breath | T |
When he shaped up like a Christian and he waltzed into the Wonder | H |
We arranged a ring and waited for the heathen's sudden death | T |
- | |
Oh the sorrow of that Sunday Oh the shame and degradation | F |
The chaps were simply paralyzed and everyone was dumb | U |
For the heathen pushed the battle in the fashion of our nation | F |
And he countered in a way that made the Wonder fairly hum | U |
'Bob is fooling Han ' we murmured 'he'll surprise him in a minute | V |
Soon he'll rise to this occasion and display his proper form ' | - |
But alas we'd nursed a viper for our pug was never in it | W |
And he couldn't battle well enough to keep the Pagan warm | X |
- | |
Han Cat beat our battered champion beat the conqueror of Menzie | O |
And he towed him round the paddock like a dummy stuffed with hair | Y |
And we never stirred to interfere and stop the Chinky's frenzy | O |
When he jumped upon the Wonder in a manner most unfair | Y |
You must fancy all our sorrow and our shame and indignation | F |
For pen can never never tell how horrified we felt | Z |
In the morning Little Finney for the credit of the station | F |
Hammered Han in stylish fashion with one fist tucked in his belt | Z |
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As for Robert we discussed him in a serious convention | F |
And resolved that we were victims of a duffer's awful skite | Z |
And we put it up to tar him but he dropped to our intention | F |
And he skipped without a character for Hamilton that night | Z |
There's a moral boys Don't think a mangled boko is a token | F |
That a fellow is a fighter as a simple thing of course | J |
Like Battered Bob he may have had his features bent and broken | F |
Through his carelessness when drunk in being walked on by a horse | J |
Edward Dyson
(1)
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