Analysis of A Thousand Miles Away

Andrew Barton Paterson 1864 (Orange, New South Wales) – 1941 (Sydney, New South Wales)



Hurrah for the Roma railway! Hurrah for Cobb and Co.,
And oh! for a good fat horse or two to carry me Westward Ho
To carry me Westward Ho! my boys, that's where the cattle stray
On the far Barcoo, where they eat nardoo, a thousand miles away.
Chorus
Then give your horses rein across the open plain,
We'll ship our meat both sound and sweet, nor care what some folks say;
And frozen we'll send home the cattle that now roam
On the far Barcoo and the Flinders too, a thousand miles away.
Knee-deep in grass we've got to pass—for the truth I'm bound to tell
Where in three weeks the cattle get as fat as they can swell
As fat as they can swell, my boys; a thousand pounds they weigh,
On the far Barcoo, where they eat nardoo, a thousand miles away.

No Yankee hide e'er grew outside such beef as we can freeze;
No Yankee pastures make such steers as we send o'er the sea
As we send o'er the seas, my boys, a thousand pounds they weigh
From the far Barcoo, where they eat nardoo, a thousand miles away.


Scheme aabBxxbxbccbB xxbb
Poetic Form
Metre 0110101011101 0110111111101101 110110111110101 10111111010101 10 111101010101 111011101111111 010111010111 101100101010101 110111111011111 10110101111111 11111111010111 10111111010101 110110111111111 110101111111001 111100111010111 10111111010101
Closest metre Iambic heptameter
Characters 992
Words 196
Sentences 9
Stanzas 2
Stanza Lengths 13, 4
Lines Amount 17
Letters per line (avg) 45
Words per line (avg) 11
Letters per stanza (avg) 385
Words per stanza (avg) 97
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

1:01 min read
78

Andrew Barton Paterson

Andrew Barton "Banjo" Paterson, was an Australian bush poet, journalist and author. He wrote many ballads and poems about Australian life, focusing particularly on the rural and outback areas, including the district around Binalong, New South Wales, where he spent much of his childhood. Paterson's more notable poems include "Clancy of the Overflow" (1889), "The Man from Snowy River" (1890) and "Waltzing Matilda" (1895), regarded widely as Australia's unofficial national anthem. more…

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