Works

I've had all sorts of luck, sometimes bad, sometimes better,
But now I have somebody's luck and my own,
For I stooped in the street and I picked up a letter,
Which some one had written to send away home.
...

They came of bold and roving stock that would not fixed abide;
They were the sons of field and flock since e'er they learnt to ride,
We may not hope to see such men in these degenerate years...

Air: "Widow McGrath"


To Policeman G. the Inspector said:
"When you pass the 'shops' you must turn your head;
If you took a wager, that would be a sin;...

I have gathered these stories afar
In the wind and the rain,
In the land where the cattle-camps are,
On the edge of the Plain.
On the overland routes of the west,
When the watches were long,...

So, the bank has bust it's boiler! And in six or seven year
It will pay me all my money back, of course!
But the horse will perish waiting while the grass is germinating,...

There's some that ride the Robbo style, and bump at every stride;
While others sit a long way back, to get a longer ride.
There's some that ride as sailors do, with legs, and arms, and teeth;...

"Where 'ave you been this week or more,
'Aven't seen you about the war'?
Thought perhaps you was at the rear
Guarding the waggons." "What, us? No fear!
Where have we been? Why, bless my heart,...

Now this was what Macpherson told
While waiting in the stand;
A reckless rider, over-bold,
The only man with hands to hold
The rushing Rio Grande.

He said, "This day I bid good-bye...

(Air: 'Belle Mahone.')


At River Bend, in New South Wales,
All alone among the whales,
Busting up some post and rails,
Sweet Belle Mahone.
In the blazing sun we stand,...

Now is the law of the Overland that all in the West obey,
A man must cover with traveling sheep a six-mile stage a day;
But this is the law which the drovers make, right easily understood,...

Beyond the land where Leichhardt went,
Beyond Sturt's Western track,
The rolling tide of change has sent
Some strange J.P.'s out back.

And Saltbush Bill, grown old and grey,...

Come all you little rouseabouts and climb upon my knee;
Today, you see, is Christmas Day, and so it's up to me
To give you some instruction like, a kind of Christmas tale,...

'Twas Saltbush Bill, with his traveling sheep, was making his way to town;
He crossed them over the Hard Times Run, and he came to the Take 'Em Down;...

The news came down on the Castlereagh, and went to the world at large,
That twenty thousand traveling sheep, with Saltbush Bill in charge,
Were drifting down from a dried-out run to ravage the Castlereagh;...

(Air: 'Ben Bolt.')


Oh! don't you remember Black Alice, Sam Holt'
Black Alice, so dusky and dark,
The Warrego gin, with the straw through her nose,
And teeth like a Moreton Bay shark.
...

"Halt! Who goes there?" the sentry's call
Rose on the midnight air
Above the noises of the camp,
The roll of wheels, the horses' tramp.
The challenge echoed over all,
"Halt! Who goes there?"
...

It chanced out back at the Christmas time,
When the wheat was ripe and tall,
A stranger rode to the farmer's gate,
A sturdy man and a small.

"Rin doon, rin doon, my little son Jack,...

An Unpublished Drama
A Winter's Turf Tale

...

The bell is set a-ringing, and the engine gives a toot,
There's five-and-thirty shearers here a-shearing for the loot,
So stir yourselves, you penners-up, and shove the sheep along,...

The track that led to Carmody's is choked and overgrown,
The suckers of the stringybark have made the place their own;
The mountain rains have cut the track that once we used to know...