Works

Not for the love of women toil we, we of the craft,
Not for the people's praise;
Only because our goddess made us her own and laughed,
Claiming us all our days,
...

Scene: On Monaro.
Dramatis Personae
Shock-headed blackfellow,
Boy (on a pony).

Snowflakes are falling
Gentle and slow,
Youngster says, "Frying Pan
What makes it snow?"
...

Far from the trouble and toil of town,
Where the reed beds sweep and shiver,
Look at a fragment of velvet brown,
Old Man Platypus drifting down,
Drifting along the river.
...

You never heard tell of the story?
Well, now, I can hardly believe!
Never heard of the honour and glory
Of Pardon, the son of Reprieve?
But maybe you're only a Johnnie
And don't know a horse from a hoe?...

Och! my name's Pat Malone, and I'm from Tipperary.
Sure, I don't know it now I'm so bothered, Ohone!
And the gals that I danced with, light-hearted and airy,
It's scarcely they'd notice poor Paddy Malone....

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,...

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,...

The shades of night had fallen at last,
When through the house a shadow passed,
That once had been the Genial Dan,
But now become a desperate man,
At question time he waited near,...

It was the lunatic poet escaped from the local asylum,
Loudly he twanged on his banjo and sang with his voice like a saw-mill,
While as with fervour he sang there was borne o'er the shuddering wildwood,...

(Air: 'The Little Old Log Cabin in the Lane.')


I'm a broken-down old squatter, my cash it is all gone,
Of troubles and bad seasons I complain;
My cattle are all mortgaged, of horses I have none,...

It was somewhere up the country, in a land of rock and scrub,
That they formed an institution called the Geebung Polo Club.
There were long and wiry natives from the rugged mountain side,...

With never a sound of trumpet,
With never a flag displayed,
The last of the old campaigners
Lined up for the last parade.

Weary they were and battered,
Shoeless, and knocked about;...

In distant New Zealand, whose tresses of gold
The billows are ceaselessly combing,
Away in a village all tranquil and old
I came on a market where porkers were sold,
A market for pigs in the gloaming.
...

There's nothing here sublime,
But just a roving rhyme,
Run off to pass the time,
With nought titanic in.
The theme that it supports,
And, though it treats of quarts,
It's bare of golden thoughts,...

"I'll introduce a friend!" he said,
"And if you've got a vacant pen
You'd better take him in the shed
And start him shearing straight ahead;
He's one of these here quiet men.
...

Kanzo Makame, the diver, sturdy and small Japanee,
Seeker of pearls and of pearl-shell down in the depths of the sea,
Trudged o'er the bed of the ocean, searching industriously.
...