Analysis of Pasha Bailey Ben
William Schwenck Gilbert 1836 – 1911
A proud Pasha was BAILEY BEN,
His wives were three, his tails were ten;
His form was dignified, but stout,
Men called him "Little Roundabout."
Pale Pilgrims came from o'er the sea
To wait on PASHA BAILEY B.,
All bearing presents in a crowd,
For B. was poor as well as proud.
They brought him onions strung on ropes,
And cold boiled beef, and telescopes,
And balls of string, and shrimps, and guns,
And chops, and tacks, and hats, and buns.
MORE OF THEM
They brought him white kid gloves, and pails,
And candlesticks, and potted quails,
And capstan-bars, and scales and weights,
And ornaments for empty grates.
WHY I MENTION THESE
My tale is not of these - oh no!
I only mention them to show
The divers gifts that divers men
Brought o'er the sea to BAILEY BEN.
A confidant had BAILEY B.,
A gay Mongolian dog was he;
I am not good at Turkish names,
And so I call him SIMPLE JAMES.
HIS CONFIDANT'S COUNTENANCE
A dreadful legend you might trace
In SIMPLE JAMES'S honest face,
For there you read, in Nature's print,
"A Scoundrel of the Deepest Tint."
A deed of blood, or fire, or flames,
Was meat and drink to SIMPLE JAMES:
To hide his guilt he did not plan,
But owned himself a bad young man.
THE AUTHOR TO HIS READER
And why on earth good BAILEY BEN
(The wisest, noblest, best of men)
Made SIMPLE JAMES his right-hand man
Is quite beyond my mental span.
THE SAME, CONTINUED
But there - enough of gruesome deeds!
My heart, in thinking of them, bleeds;
And so let SIMPLE JAMES take wing, -
'Tis not of him I'm going to sing.
THE PASHA'S CLERK
Good PASHA BAILEY kept a clerk
(For BAILEY only made his mark),
His name was MATTHEW WYCOMBE COO,
A man of nearly forty-two.
No person that I ever knew
Could "yodel" half as well as COO,
And Highlanders exclaimed, "Eh, weel!"
When COO began to dance a reel.
HIS KINDNESS TO THE PASHA'S WIVES
He used to dance and sing and play
In such an unaffected way,
He cheered the unexciting lives
Of PASHA BAILEY'S lovely wives.
THE AUTHOR TO HIS READER
But why should I encumber you
With histories of MATTHEW COO?
Let MATTHEW COO at once take wing, -
'Tis not of COO I'm going to sing.
THE AUTHOR'S MUSE
Let me recall my wandering Muse;
She SHALL be steady if I choose -
She roves, instead of helping me
To tell the deeds of BAILEY B.
THE PASHA'S VISITOR
One morning knocked, at half-past eight,
A tall Red Indian at his gate.
In Turkey, as you're p'raps aware,
Red Indians are extremely rare.
THE VISITOR'S OUTFIT
Mocassins decked his graceful legs,
His eyes were black, and round as eggs,
And on his neck, instead of beads,
Hung several Catawampous seeds.
WHAT THE VISITOR SAID
"Ho, ho!" he said, "thou pale-faced one,
Poor offspring of an Eastern sun,
You've NEVER seen the Red Man skip
Upon the banks of Mississip!"
THE AUTHOR'S MODERATION
To say that BAILEY oped his eyes
Would feebly paint his great surprise -
To say it almost made him die
Would be to paint it much too high.
THE AUTHOR TO HIS READER
But why should I ransack my head
To tell you all that Indian said;
We'll let the Indian man take wing, -
'Tis not of him I'm going to sing.
THE READER TO THE AUTHOR
Come, come, I say, that's quite enough
Of this absurd disjointed stuff;
Now let's get on to that affair
About LIEUTENANT-COLONEL FLARE.
Scheme | aabb ccdd eeff x gghh x iiaa ccjj x kkll jjmm N aamm x oopP q qxrr rrss t sxxt N rrpp u uucc n vvww x xxoo y zz1 1 z 2 2 3 3 n yypp n 4 4 ww |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 01011101 11011101 1111011 1111010 110111001 11101101 11010001 11111111 11110111 0111010 01110101 01010101 111 11111101 0100101 01010101 01001101 11101 11111111 11010111 01011101 110011101 0101101 010100111 11111101 01111101 11100 01010111 01010101 11110101 01010101 011111011 11011101 11111111 11010111 0101110 01111101 01010111 11011111 11011101 01010 11011101 11010111 01110111 111111011 011 10110101 11010111 1111011 01110101 11011101 11011111 0100111 11011101 1101011 11110101 0110101 11000101 10110101 0101110 11110101 11001101 11011111 111111011 0101 11111001 11110111 11011101 11011101 01100 11011111 011100111 010111101 110010101 01001 111101 11010111 01110111 11011 101001 11111111 1111101 11010111 010111 010010 11110111 11011101 1111111 11111111 0101110 1111111 111111001 110100111 111111011 0101010 11111101 11010101 11111101 01010101 |
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 3,217 |
Words | 621 |
Sentences | 31 |
Stanzas | 36 |
Stanza Lengths | 4, 4, 4, 1, 4, 1, 4, 4, 1, 4, 4, 1, 4, 1, 4, 1, 4, 4, 1, 4, 1, 4, 1, 4, 1, 4, 1, 4, 1, 4, 1, 4, 1, 4, 1, 4 |
Lines Amount | 99 |
Letters per line (avg) | 25 |
Words per line (avg) | 6 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 69 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 17 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 3:11 min read
- 73 Views
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"Pasha Bailey Ben" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 27 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/41255/pasha-bailey-ben>.
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