A blanket low and leaden, Though rent across the west, Whose darkness seems to deaden The brightest and the best; A sunset white and staring On cloud-wrecks far away,...
Lo! the Boar's tail is salted, and the Kangaroo's exalted, And his right eye is extinguished by a man-o'-warsman's cap; He is flying round the fences where the Southern Sea commences,...
I mind the days when ladies fair Helped on my overcoat, And tucked the silken handkerchief About my precious throat; They used to see the poet's soul In every song I wrote. ...
With pannikins all rusty, And billy burnt and black, And clothes all torn and dusty, That scarcely hide his back; With sun-cracked saddle-leather, And knotted greenhide rein,...
Oh, do you hear the argument, far up above the skies? The voice of old Saint Peter, in expostulation rise? Growing shrill, and ever shriller, at the thing that's being done;...
Sing the strong, proud song of Labour, Toss the ringing music high; Liberty's a nearer neighbour Than she was in days gone by. Workmen's weary wives and daughters Sing the songs of liberty;...
Man, is the Sea your master? Sea, and is man your slave?, This is the song of brave men who never know they are brave: Ceaselessly watching to save you, stranger from foreign lands,...
Sons of the South, awake! arise! Sons of the South, and do. Banish from under your bonny skies Those old-world errors and wrongs and lies. Making a hell in a Paradise That belongs to your sons and you....
He was bare we don't want to be rude (His condition was owing to drink) They say his condition was nood, Which amounts to the same thing, we think (We mean his condition, we think,...
We must suffer, husband and father, we must suffer, daughter and son, For the wrong we have taken part in and the wrong that we have seen done. Let the bride of frivolous fashion, and of ease, be ashamed and dumb,...
Ben Boyd's Tower is watching, Watching o'er the sea; Ben Boyd's Tower is waiting For her and me. We do not know the day, We do not know the hour, But we know that we shall meet...
Long Bill, the captain of the push, was tired of his estate, And wished to change his life and win the love of something 'straight'; 'Twas rumour'd that the Gory B.'s had heard Long Bill declare...
Grown tired of mourning for my sins, And brooding over merits, The other night with aching heart I went amongst the spirits; And I met one that I knew well: 'O Scotty's Ghost! is that you?...
It surely cannot be too soon, and never is too late, It tones with all Australia's tune to praise one's native State, And so I bring an old refrain from days of posts and rails,...
They were 'ratty' they were hooted by the meanest and the least, When they woke the Drum of Glory long ago in London East. They were often mobbed by hoodlums, they were few, but unafraid,...
At a point where the old road crosses The river, and turns to the right, I'd camped with the team; and the hosses Was all fixed up for the night. I'd been to the town to carry A load to the Cudgegong;...
But what's the use of writing 'bush', Though editors demand it, For city folk, and farming folk, Can never understand it. They're blind to what the bushman sees The best with eyes shut tightest,...
By hut, homestead and shearing shed, By railroad, coach and track, By lonely graves where rest the dead, Up-Country and Out-Back: To where beneath the clustered stars The dreamy plains expand. ...
The diggings were just in their glory when Alister Cameron came, With recommendations, he told me, from friends and a parson `at hame'; He read me his recommendations, he called them a part of his plant,...