Calamity In London Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: AABB CCDD EFAA GGHH IIBB JJKL MMNN OOPQ RRSS TTUV GGTT TTTT GGPQ| 'Twas in the year of and on the night of Christmas day | A |
| That ten persons' lives were taken sway | A |
| By a destructive fire in London at No Dixie Street | B |
| Alas so great was the fire the victims couldn't retreat | B |
| - | |
| In Dixie Street No if was occupied by two families | C |
| Who were all quite happy and sitting at their ease | C |
| One of these was a labourer David Barber and his wife | D |
| And a dear little child he loved as his life | D |
| - | |
| Barber's mother and three sisters were living on the ground floor | E |
| And in the upper two rooms lived a family who were very poor | F |
| And all had retired to rest on the night of Christmas day | A |
| Never dreaming that by e their lives would be taken away | A |
| - | |
| Barber got up on Sunday morning to prepare breakfast for his family | G |
| And a most appalling sight he then did see | G |
| For he found the room was full of smoke | H |
| So dense indeed that it nearly did him choke | H |
| - | |
| Then fearlessly to the room door he did creep | I |
| And tried to aronse the inmates who were asleep | I |
| And succeeded in getting his own family out into the street | B |
| And to him the thought thereof was surely very sweet | B |
| - | |
| And by this time the heroic Barber's strength was failing | J |
| And his efforts to warn the family upstairs were unavailing | J |
| And before the alarm was given the house was in flames | K |
| Which prevented anything being done after all his pains | L |
| - | |
| Oh it was a horrible and heart rending sight | M |
| To see the house in a blaze of lurid light | M |
| And the roof fallen in and the windows burnt out | N |
| Alas 'tis pitiful to relate without any doubt | N |
| - | |
| Oh Heaven 'tis a dreadful calamity to narrate | O |
| Because the victims have met with a cruel fate | O |
| Little did they think they were going to lose their lives by fire | P |
| On that night when to their beds they did retire | Q |
| - | |
| It was sometime before the gutted house could be entered in | R |
| Then to search for the bodies the officers in charge did begin | R |
| And a horrifying spectacle met their gaze | S |
| Which made them stand aghast in a fit of amaze | S |
| - | |
| Sometime before the firemen arrived | T |
| Ten persons of their lives had been deprived | T |
| By the choking smoke and merciless flame | U |
| Which will long in the memory of their relatives remain | V |
| - | |
| Oh Heaven if was a frightful and pitiful sight to see | G |
| Seven bodies charred of the Jarvis' family | G |
| And Mrs Jarvis was found with her child and both carbonised | T |
| And as the searchers gazed thereon they were surprised | T |
| - | |
| And these were lying beside the fragments of the bed | T |
| And in a chair the tenth victim was sitting dead | T |
| Oh Horrible Oh Horrible what a sight to behold | T |
| The charred and burnt bodies of young and old | T |
| - | |
| Good people of high and low degree | G |
| Oh think of this sad catastrophe | G |
| And pray to God to protect ye from fire | P |
| Every night before to your beds ye retire | Q |
William Topaz Mcgonagall
(1)
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