Back to back, they faced each other

[xenith]

While I was looking through my joke collection, I found one that was a collection of absurdities and it included the verse:

One bright day in the middle of the night
Two dead boys got up to fight.
Back to back, they faced each other
Drew their swords and shot each other.

Which I remembered saying as a kid, except the last bit in our version didn't scan properly (or "sounded like it didn't fit" in kid terms) so I always assumed it was a recent addition. Coming across it now, I thought I might be able to find the original version and where it came from.

Not that easy.

It was interesting to see that, like any good folk poetry, the version I knew is a mixture of other variations with a updated twist. That is:

One bright day in the middle of the night
Two dead men got up to fight.
Back to back they faced each other.
Drew their swords and shoot each other.
The blind man saw it.
The deaf man heard it.
The dumb man rang up the fire brigade.
The fire brigade came screeching round the corner at ten kilometres an hour
Ran over dead dog, and half killed it!

Anyone else have a version?

Comments

[sue-bursztynski.livejournal.com]

I ave heard this, though only the first four lines. There are others. Like " I went to the pictures tomorrow, I gt a front seat at the back, I said to the lady behind me,"I cannot see over your hat." She gave me some whole broken biscuits, I ate them and gave her them back, I fell from the floor to the ceiling, And broke my front bone at the back." my fave, though, is,"Yesterday upon the stair, I met a man who wasn't there. He wasn't there again today, I wish that man would go away!"

[monissaw.livejournal.com]

That last one is part of a song?

[sue-bursztynski.livejournal.com]

No, it's a poem. I believe by William Hughes Mearns (?)

[kaelajael.livejournal.com]

One bright day in the middle of the night
Two dead men got up to fight.
Back to back they faced each other.
Drew their swords and shoot each other.
The blind man saw it.
The deaf man heard it.

The version I know is the same up to here.

The dumb man rang up the fire brigade.
The fire brigade came screeching round the corner at ten kilometres an hour

I can't remember exactly how it went, but the version I knew was something like this:

The man with no legs ran for the fire brigade.

The next line was something like The fire brigade came around the corner something, something, something (But the line in the original doesn't sound familiar.)

Ran over dead dog, and half killed it!
And this line is the same

[capnoblivious.livejournal.com]

My version ends with "The dumb man told me all about it", but the dead dog line is ringing bells.

[monissaw.livejournal.com]

Heard from elsewhere? Interesting how these things change and travel though.

[monissaw.livejournal.com]

I had a thought there about similar time & regional area, but I can't quite the right words. So make up your own :)