Works

We throw us down on the dusty plain
When the gold has gone from the west,
But we rise and tramp on the track again,
For we're tired, too tired to rest.
Darker and denser the shadows fall...

Behold! the biased foes of Right
Are conscious of their danger,
They're startled by the dawning light,
So very long a stranger.
And fearing for their rotting laws,
Whose reign is nearly ended,...

From over the leagues of ice and snow, and the miles of scorching sand;
From back of the days of long ago, and the lonely sea and land,
To the end of the world and our Gipsy race, to the death of our dark-eyed line,...

When first I came to town, resolved
To fight my way alone,
No prouder foot than mine e'er trod
Upon the pavement stone;
But I am one in thousands,
And why should I repine?...

It has a 'point' of neither sex
But comes in guise of both,
And, doubly dangerous complex,
It is a thing to loathe,
A lady with her sweet, sad smile,
A gentleman on oath.
...

Last salvo in "The Bush Controversy".

The later poem "A Voice From the Town" (Banjo Patterson) continues the theme.


The world has had enough of bards who wish that they were dead,...

Our hull is seldom painted,
Our decks are seldom stoned;
Our sails are patched and cobbled
And chains by rust marooned.
Our rigging is untidy,
And all things in accord:,
We always sail on Friday...

Down here where the ships loom large in
The gloom when the sea-storms veer,
Down here on the south-west margin
Of the western hemisphere,
Where the might of a world-wide ocean...

It knows it all, it knows it all,
The world of groans and laughter,
It sneers of pride before a fall,
But the bitter pride comes after:
So leave me and I'll seek you not,
So seek me and you'll find me,...

Oh, the strength of the toil of those twenty years, with father, and master, and men!
And the clearer brain of the business man, who has held his own for ten:...

When you've knocked about the country, been away from home for years;
When the past, by distance softened, nearly fills your eyes with tears,
You are haunted oft, wherever or however you may roam,...

He'd been for years in Sydney "a-acting of the goat",
His name was Joseph Swallow, "the Great Australian Pote",
In spite of all the stories and sketches that he wrote.
...

The night too quickly passes
And we are growing old,
So let us fill our glasses
And toast the Days of Gold;
When finds of wondrous treasure
Set all the South ablaze,...

We love the land when the world goes round,
And deep, deep down in her thorny ground,
Where nobody comes, and nobody knows,
We love the Rose. Oh! we love the Rose.
...

Did you hear the children singing, O my brothers?
Did you hear the children singing as our troops went marching past?
In the sunshine and the rain,
As they'll never sing again,...

Some born of homely parents
For ages settled down,
The steady generations
Of village, farm, and town:
And some of dusky fathers
Who wandered since the flood,
The fairest skin or darkest...

You're off away to London now,
Where no one dare ignore you,
With Southern laurels on your brow,
And all the world before you.
But if you should return again,
Forgotten and unknowing,...

Of home, name and wealth and ambition bereft,
We are children of fortune and luck:
They deny there's a shred of our characters left,
But they cannot deny us the pluck!...

Black Scots and red Scots,
Red Scots and black;
I hae dealt wi' the red Scot,
An' dealt wi' the black.

The Red Scot is angry.
Among the sons o' men,
He'll pay you a bawbee,...

They towed the Seabolt down the stream,
And through the harbour's mouth;
She spread her wings and sailed away
To seek the sunny South.

But, ah! she met with storm on storm...