Though to many Ben Hall is an oft-reproduced
daguerreotype of a handsome man,
taken in a Sydney studio
in the late eighteen-fifties,
one of those old, faded civil war types
of photographs which blanch the face,
highlight the black/white contrasts
and make its sitter seem
forlorn, romantic and doomed
—and photographs so often lie—
in Ben’s sad case,
his picture
pretty much did him justice.