Where "Pat Malone" Comes From
"Pat Malone" rhymes with "alone" and is used in the phrase "on your Pat Malone" — meaning by yourself, without company. The name appears to derive from a popular ballad, "Paddy Malone in Australia," noted from the 1870s and included in Banjo Paterson's 1906 collection — the story of an Irish immigrant who suffers a series of outback calamities and ends up returning home alone, sadder but wiser. The rhyming slang is first recorded in Australian English in 1907.
The connection to the ballad's hapless, solitary traveller gives the rhyming slang an appropriately lonely backstory. "On your Pat" is the shortened everyday form, still widely understood even by Australians unfamiliar with its origins.
Source:
"He was on his Pat Malone all night."
How Aussies Actually Use It
Almost always used in the phrase "on his/her Pat Malone," meaning entirely by oneself — "he was on his Pat Malone all night" simply means he was alone.
It's a slightly old-fashioned turn of phrase now, more likely to be heard from an older relative than a younger one.
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