The Dog Guard: An Australian Story Poem Rhyme Scheme

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There are lonesome places upon the earth	A
That have never re echoed a sound of mirth	A
Where the spirits abide that feast and quaff	B
On the shuddering soul of a murdered laugh	B
And take grim delight in the fearful start	C
As their unseen fingers clutch the heart	C
And the blood flies out from the griping pain	D
To carry the chill through every vein	D
And the staring eyes and the whitened faces	E
Are a joy to these ghosts of the lonesome places	E
	-
But of all the spots on this earthly sphere	F
Where these dismal spirits are strong and near	F
There is one more dreary than all the rest	G
'Tis the barren island of Rottenest	G
On Australia's western coast you may	H
On a seaman's chart of Fremantle Bay	H
Find a tiny speck some ten miles from shore	I
If the chart be good there is something more	I
For a shoal runs in on the landward side	G
With five fathoms marked for the highest tide	G
You have nought but my word for all the rest	G
But that speck is the island of Rottenest	G
	-
'Tis a white sand heap about two miles long	J
And say half as wide but the deeds of wrong	J
Between man and his brother that there took place	K
Are sufficient to sully a continent's face	K
Ah cruel tales were they told as a whole	L
They would scare your polished humanity's soul	L
They would blanch the cheeks in your carpeted room	M
With a terrible thought of the merited doom	M
For the crimes committed still unredrest	G
On that white sand heap called Rottenest	G
	-
Of late years the island is not so bare	N
As it was when I saw it first for there	N
On the outer headland some buildings stand	G
And a flag red crossed says the patch of sand	G
Is a recognized part of the wide domain	D
That is blessed with the peace of Victoria's reign	D
But behind the lighthouse the land's the same	O
And it bears grim proof of the white man's shame	O
For the miniature vales that the island owns	P
Have a horrible harvest of human bones	P
	-
And how did they come there that's the word	G
And I'll answer it now with a tale I heard	G
From the lips of a man who was there and saw	Q
The bad end of man's greed and of colony law	Q
Many years ago when the white man first	G
Set his foot on the coast and was hated and cursed	G
By the native who had not yet learned to fear	F
The dark wrath of the stranger but drove his spear	F
With a freeman's force and a bushman's yell	R
At the white invader it then befell	R
That so many were killed and cooked and eaten	S
There was risk of the whites in the end being beaten	S
So a plan was proposed 'twas deemed safest and best	G
To imprison the natives in Rottenest	G
	-
And so every time there was white blood spilled	G
There were black men captured and those not killed	G
In the rage of vengeance were sent away	H
To this bleak sand isle in Fremantle Bay	H
And it soon came round that a thousand men	T
Were together there like wild beasts in a pen	T
There was not a shrub or grass blade in the sand	G
Nor a piece of timber as large as your hand	G
But a government boat went out each day	H
To fling meat ashore and then sailed away	H
	-
For a year or so was this course pursued	G
Till 'twas noticed that fewer came down for food	G
When the boat appeared then a guard lay round	G
The island one night and the white men found	G
That the savages swam at the lowest tide	G
To the shoal that lay on the landward side	G
'Twas a mile from the beach and then waded ashore	I
So the settlers met in grave council once more	I
	-
That a guard was needed was plain to all	U
But nobody answered the Governor's call	U
For a volunteer watch They were only a few	B
And their wild young farms gave plenty to do	B
And the council of settlers was breaking up	V
With a dread of the sorrow they'd have to sup	V
When the savage unawed and for vengeance wild	G
Lay await in the wood for the mother and child	G
	-
And with doleful countenance each to his neighbor	W
Told a dreary tale of the world of labor	W
He had and said ' Let him watch who can	X
I can't ' when there stepped to the front a man	X
With a hard brown face and a burglar's brow	Y
Who had learned the secret he uttered now	Y
When he served in the chain gang in New South Wales	Z
And he said to them ' Friends as all else fails	Z
These 'ere natives are safe as if locked and barred	G
If you'll line that shoal with a mastiff guard '	-
	-
And the settlers looked at each other awhile	A2
Till the wonder toned to a well pleased smile	A2
When the brown ex burglar said he knew	B
And would show the whole of 'em what to do	B
	-
Some three weeks after the guard was set	G
And a native who swam to the shoal was met	G
By two half starved dogs when a mile from shore	I
And somehow that native was never seen more	I
All the settlers were pleased with the capital plan	X
And they voted their thanks to the hard faced man	X
	-
For a year each day did the government boat	G
Take the meat to the isle and its guard afloat	G
In a line on the face of the shoal the dogs	B2
Had a dry house each on some anchored logs	C2
And the neck chain from each stretched just half way	H
To the next dog's house right across the Bay	H
Ran a line that was hideous with horrid sounds	D2
From the hungry throats of two hundred hounds	D2
	-
So one more year passed and the brutes on the logs	C2
Had grown more like devils than common dogs	B2
There was such a hell chorus by day and night	G
That the settlers ashore were chilled with fright	G
When they thought if that legion should break away	H
And come in with the tide some fatal day	H
	-
But they ' scapod that chance for a man came in	E2
From the Bush one day with a 'possum's skin	E2
To the throat filled up with large pearls he'd found	G
To the north on the shore of the Shark's Bay Sound	G
And the settlement blazed with a wild commotion	S
At sight of the gems from the wealthy ocean	S
	-
Then the settlers all began to pack	F2
Their tools and tents and to ask the track	F2
That the bushman followed to strike the spot	G
While the dogs and natives were all forgot	G
In two days from that camp on the River Swan	G2
To the Shark's Bay Sound had the settlers gone	H2
And no merciful feeling did one retard	G
For the helpless men and their terrible guard	G
	-
It were vain to try in my quiet room	M
To write down the truth of the awful doom	M
That befell those savages prisoned there	N
When the pangs of hunger and wild despair	N
Had nigh made them mad as the fiends outside	G
'Tis enough that one night through the low ebb tide	G
Swam nine hundred savages armed with stones	P
And with weapons made from their dead friends' bones	P
Without ripple or sound when the moon was gone	H2
Through the inky water they glided on	G2
Swimming deep and scarce daring to draw a breath	I2
While the guards if they saw were as dumb as death	I2
'Twas a terrible picture O God that the night	G
Were so black as to cover the horrid sight	G
From the eyes of the Angel that notes man's ways	J2
In the book that will ope on the Day of Days	J2
	-
There were screams when they met shrill screams of pain	D
For each animal swam at the length of his chain	D
And with parching throat and in furious mood	G
Lay awaiting not men but his coming food	G
There were short sharp cries and a line of fleck	K2
As the long fangs sank in the swimmer's neck	K2
There were gurgling growls mixed with human groans	P
For the savages drave the sharpened bones	P
Through their enemies' ribs and the bodies sank	L2
Each dog holding fast with a bone through his flank	L2
	-
Then those of the natives who 'scaped swam back	F2
But too late for scores of the savage pack	F2
Driven mad by the yells and the sounds of fight	G
Had broke loose and followed On that dread night	G
Let the curtain fall when the red sun rose	M2
From the placid ocean the joys and woes	M2
Of a thousand men he had last eve seen	N2
Were as things or thoughts that had never been	E2
	-
When the settlers returned in a month or two	B
They bethought of the dogs and the prisoned crew	B
And a boat went out on a tardy quest	G
Of whatever was living on Rottenest	G
They searched all the isle and sailed back again	T
With some specimen bones of the dogs and men	T

John Boyle O'reilly

The Dog Guard: An Australian Story Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis

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