The Saga of Foxy

The Saga of Foxy

He was a lively and happy little chap,
This puppy I once knew;
When I was just a growing lad,
He was my best friend, too.

He first belonged to a city boy,
Who used to come and stay
With his grandma, in the country,
Every school holiday.

But this kid was hard and cruel,
A ring of fire he lit,
And threw the pup into the middle,
To make him run through it.

There was a wide, strong river
That ran beside the town,
He once threw the puppy in,
To see if it would drown.

And when he saw the dog could swim,
He stoned him to make sure
The little pup stayed in the middle
And could not reach the shore.

It happened that I was passing by,
When I heard an excited shout;
That little dog was nearly drowned,
So I stopped and pulled him out.

After than, when I came home
From school, I'd see him wait,
Just sitting quiet and patiently
Outside of our front gate.

I hasten to say that, day by day,
The visits became much longer;
The stays became more pleasurable
As our friendship became stronger.

I noticed one day, whilst patting him,
That he was getting thin,
So I gave him a feed to fatten him up,
And he decided to move in.

The original owner's grandmother
Several times took him back;
But he would break her heavy chain
And for our home make track.

From then on we were inseparable,
He followed where I went;
He even came when we went camping,
And slept each night in our tent.

He was a typical suburban terrier,
Of indiscriminate breed;
But he was loyal and trusty and true,
For faithfulness was his creed.

One night, he stayed away from home,
We didn't know where he'd gone;
And he hadn't come back next morning,
So a full-scale search was on.

The next time that I saw him,
It nearly broke my heart,
For his body was being wheeled along,
In a friend's home-made billy cart.

Apparently he'd gone wandering off
With other dogs, in a pack,
And they had raided a chook* yard
But he hadn't made it back.

The farmer had been raided before,
And was in a worried state,
So he laced some meat with strychnine,
And left it inside his gate.

This was the first time the dog had stayed out,
What a terrible way to end,
A life that was truly and fully devoted,
To me, his master and friend.

* Aussie slang for chicken