HUMOROUS VERSES
I desire to thank the editor and proprietors of
the Sydney Bulletin for the privilege of reprinting
the verses in this volume.
H. L.
Sydney, March 17th, 1900.
HUMOROUS VERSES
BY
HENRY LAWSON
AUTHOR OK " WHBN THE WORLD WAS WIDE AND OTHER VERSES,
"WHILE THE BILLY BOILS," "ON THE TRACK AND OVER
THE SLIPRAILS," AND " POPULAR VERSES "
' Once 1 wrote a little poem which I thought was very fine,
Atid I showed the printer's copy to a critic friend of mine.'
SYDNEY
ANGUS AND ROBERTSON
LONDON : THE AUSTRALIAN BOOK COMPANY
38 WEST SMITHFIELD, E.G.
1900
fi
SYDNEY :
WEBSDALE, SHOOSMITH AND Co., PRINTERS,
117 CLARENCK STREET.
CONTENTS.
PAGE
MY LITERARY FRIEND
Once I wrote a little poem which I
thought was very fine, . . . 125
MARY CALLED HIM 'MISTER'
They'd parted but a year before — she
never thought he'd come, . . . 127
REJECTED
She says she's very sorry, as she sees you
to the gate; 130
O'HARA, J.P.
James Patrick O'Hara, the Justice of
Peace, 134
BILL AND JIM FALL OUT
Bill and Jim are mates no longer — they
would scorn the name of mate — . 138
THE PAROO
It was a week from Christmas-time, . 142
vi. CONTENTS
PAGE
THE GREEN-HAND ROUSEABOUT
Call this hot 1 I beg your pardon. Hot !
— you don't know what it means. . 146
THE MAN FROM WATERLOO
It was the Man from Waterloo, . . 151
SAINT PETER
Now, I think there is a likeness . , 155
THE STRANGER'S FRIEND
The strangest things, and the maddest
things, that a man can do or say, . 158
THE GOD-FORGOTTEN ELECTION
Pat M'Durmer brought the tidings to the
town of God-Forgotten : . . . 162
THE BOSS'S BOOTS
The shearers squint along the pens, they
squint along the * shoots ;' . . 168
THE CAPTAIN OF THE PUSH
As the night was falling slowly down on
city, town and bush, . . ' . 174
BILLY'S • SQUARE AFFAIR'
Long Bill, the captain of the push, was
tired of his estate, . . . . 181
CONTENTS vii.
PAGE
A DERRY ON A COVE
'Twas in the felon's dock he stood, his
eyes were black and blue ; . . 185
RISE YE! RISE YE!
Rise ye ! rise ye ! noble toilers ! claim
your rights with fire and steel ! . 187
THE BALLAD OF MABEL CLARE
Ye children of the Land of Gold, . 190
CONSTABLE MCCARTHY'S INVESTIGATIONS
Most unpleasantly adjacent to the haunts
of lower orders . . . . 196
AT THE TUG-OF-WAR
'Twas in a tug-of-war where I — the
guvnor's hope and pride — . . 205
HERE'S LUCK!
Old Time is tramping close to-day — you
hear his bluchers fall, . . . 208
THE MEN WHO COME BEHIND
There's a class of men (and women) who
are always on their guard — . . 211
viii. CONTENTS
PAGE
THE DAYS WHEN WE WENT SWIMMING
The breezes waved the silver grass, . 214
THE OLD BARK SCHOOL
It was built of bark and poles, and the
floor was full of holes . . . 216
TROUBLE ON THE SELECTION
You lazy boy, you're here at last, . 220
THE PROFESSIONAL WANDERER
When you've knocked about the country
— been away from home for years; , 222
A LITTLE MISTAKE
'Tis a yarn I heard of a new-chum c trap ' 225
A STUDY IN THE "NOOD"
He was bare — we don't want to be rude — 228
A WORD TO TEXAS JACK
Texas Jack, you are amusin'. By Lord
Harry, how I laughed . . . 231
THE GROG-AN'-GRUMBLE STEEPLECHASE
'Twixt the coastline and the border lay
the town of Grog-an'-Grumble . . 237
BUT WHAT'S THE USE
But what's the use of writing ' bush ' — 242
MY LITERARY FRIEND
ONCE I wrote a little poem which I thought was very
fine,
And I showed the printer's copy to a critic friend of
mine,
First he praised the thing a little, then he found a
little fault ;
* The ideas are good,' he muttered, ' but the rhythm
seems to halt.'
So I straighten'd up the rhythm where he marked it
with his pen,
And I copied it and showed it to my clever friend
again.
c You've improved the metre greatly, but the rhymes
are bad,' he said,
As he read it slowly, scratching surplus wisdom from
his head.
125
126 MY LITERARY FRIEND
So I worked as he suggested (I believe in taking
time),
And I burnt the « midnight taper ' while I
straightened up the rhyme.
' It is better now,' he muttered, * you go on and
you'll succeed,
1 It has got a ring about it — the ideas are what you
need.'
So I worked for hours upon it (I go on when I
commence),
And I kept in view the rhythm and the jingle and
the sense,
And I copied it and took it to my solemn friend once
more —
It reminded him of something he had somewhere
read before.
Now the people say I'd never put such horrors into
print
If I wasn't too conceited to accept a friendly hint,
And my dearest friends are certain that I'd profit in
the end
If I'd always show my copy to a literary friend.
MARY CALLED HIM < MISTER '
THEY'D parted but a year before — she never thought
he'd come,
She stammer'd, blushed, held out her hand, and called
him ' Mister Gum.'
How could he know that all the while she longed to
murmur * John.'
He called her « Miss le Brook,' and asked how she was
getting on.
They'd parted but a year before ; they'd loved each
other well,
But he'd been to the city, and he came back such a
swell.
They longed to meet in fond embrace, they hungered
for a kiss —
But Mary called him * Mister,' and the idiot called
her * Miss.'
127
128 MARY CALLED HIM < MISTER '
He stood and lean'd against the door — a stupid chap
was he —
And, when she asked if he'd come in and have a cup
of tea,
He looked to left, he looked to right, and then he
glanced behind,
And slowly doffed his cabbage-tree, and said he
* didn't mind.'
She made a shy apology because the meat was
tough,
And then she asked if he was sure his tea was sweet
enough ;
He stirred the tea and sipped it twice, and answer'd
' plenty, quite ; '
And cut the smallest piece of beef and^said that it
was c right.'
She glanced at him at times and cough 'd an awkward
little cough ;
He stared at anything but her and said, ' I must
be off.'
That evening he went riding north — a sad and lonely
ride —
She locked herself inside her room, and there sat
down and cried.
MARY CALLED HIM • MISTER ' 129
They'd parted but a year before, they loved each
other well-
But she was such a country girl and he was such a
swell ;
They longed to meet in fond embrace, they hungered
for a kiss —
But Mary called him ' Mister ' and the idiot called
her 'Miss.'
REJECTED
SHE says she's very sorry, as she sees you to the gate ;
You calmly say ' Good-bye ' to her while standing
off a yard,
Then you lift your hat and leave her, walking mighty
stiff and straight —
But you're hit, old man — hit hard.
In your brain the words are burning of the answer
that she gave,
As you turn the nearest corner and you stagger
just a bit ;
But you pull yourself together, for a man's strong
heart is brave
When it's hit, old man — hard hit.
130
REJECTED 131
You might try to drown the sorrow, but the drink
has no effect ;
You cannot stand the barmaid with her coarse and
vulgar wit ;
And so you seek the street again, and start for home
direct,
When you're hit, old man — hard hit.
You see the face of her you lost, the pity in her
smile —
Ah ! she is to the barmaid as is snow to chimney
grit;
You're a better man and nobler in your sorrow, for a
while,
When you're hit, old man — hard hit.
And, arriving at your lodgings, with a face of deepest
gloom,
You shun the other boarders and your manly brow
you knit ;
You take a light and go upstairs directly to your
room —
But the whole house knows you're hit.
132 REJECTED
You clutch the scarf and collar, and you tear them
from your throat,
You rip your waistcoat open like a fellow in a fit ;
And you fling them in a corner with the made-to-
order coat,
When you're hit, old man — hard hit.
You throw yourself, despairing, on your narrow little
bed,
Or pace the room till someone starts with ' Skit !
cat! -skit!'
And then lie blindly staring at the plaster overhead —
You are hit, old man — hard hit.
It's doubtful whether vanity or love has suffered
worst,
So neatly in our nature are those feelings interknit,
Your heart keeps swelling up so bad, you wish that
it would burst,
When you're hit, old man — hard hit.
You think and think, and think, and think, till you
go mad almost ;
Across your sight the spectres of the bygone seem
to flit ;
REJECTED 133
The very girl herself seems dead, and comes back as
a ghost,
When you're hit, like this — hard hit.
You know that it's all over— you're an older man by
years,
In the future not a twinkle, in your black sky not
a split.
Ah ! you'll think it well that women have the privilege
of tears,
When you're hit, old man — hard hit.
You long and hope for nothing but the rest that
sleep can bring,
And you find that in the morning things have
brightened up a bit ;
But you're dull for many evenings, with a cracked
heart in a sling,
When you're hit, old man — hard hit.
O'HARA, J.P.
JAMES PATRICK O'HARA, the Justice of Peace,
He bossed the P.M. and he bossed the police ;
A parent, a deacon, a landlord was he —
A townsman of weight was O'Hara, J.P.
He gave out the prizes, foundation-stones laid.
He shone when the Governor's visit was paid ;
And twice re-elected as Mayor was he —
The flies couldn't roost on O'Hara, J.P,
Now Sandy M'Fly, of the Axe-and-t he-Saw,
Was charged with a breach of the licensing law
He sold after hours whilst talking too free
On matters concerning O'Hara, J.P.
134
O'HARA, J.P. 135
And each contradicted the next witness flat,
Concerning back parlours, side-doors, and all that;
'Twas very conflicting, as all must agree —
' Ye'd betther take care !' said O'Hara, J.P.
But « Baby,' the barmaid, her evidence gave —
A poor, timid darling who tried to be brave —
' Now, don't be afraid — if it's frightened ye be —
' Speak out, my good girl,' said O'Hara, J.P.
Her hair was so golden, her eyes were so blue,
Her face was so fair and her words seemed so true —
So green in the ways of sweet wcmen was he
That she jolted the heart of O'Hara, J P.
He turned to the other grave Justice of Peace,
And whispered, * You can't always trust the police ;
' I'll visit the premises during the day,
* And see for myself,' said O'Hara, Jay Pay.
(Case postponed.)
'Twas early next morning, or late the same night —
' 'Twas early next morning' we think would be right —
And sounds that betokened a breach of the law
Escaped through the cracks of the Axe-and-the-Saw.
136 O'HARA, J.P.
And Constable Dogherty, out in the street,
Met Constable Clancy a bit off his beat ;
He took him with finger and thumb by the ear,
And led him around to a lane in the rear.
He pointed a blind where strange shadows were seen —
Wild pantomime hinting of revels within —
* We'll drop on M'Fly, if you'll listen to me,
1 And prove we are right to O'Hara, J.P.'
But Clancy was up to the lay of the land,
He cautiously shaded his mouth with his hand —
' Wisht, man ! Howld yer whisht ! or it's ruined
we'll be,
'It's the justice himself— it's O'Hara, J.P '
They hish'd and they whishted, and turned themselves
round,
And got themselves off like two cats on wet ground ;
Agreeing to be, on their honour as men,
A deaf-dumb-and-blind institution just then.
Inside on a sofa, two barmaids between,
With one on his knee was a gentleman seen ;
And any chance eye at the keyhole could see
In less than a wink 'twas O'Hara, J.P.
O'HARA, J.P. 137
The first in the chorus of songs that were sung,
The loudest that laughed at the jokes that were
sprung,
The guest of the evening, the soul of the spree —
The daddy of all was O'Hara, J.P.
And hard-cases chuckled, and hard-cases said
That Baby and Alice conveyed him to bed —
In subsequent storms it was painful to see
Those hard-cases side with the sinful J.P.
Next day, in the court, when the case came in sight,
O'Hara declared he was satisfied quite ;
The case was dismissed — it was destined to be
The final ukase of O'Hara, J.P.
The law and religion came down on him first —
The Christian was hard but his wife was the worst !
Half ruined and half driven crazy was he —
It made an old man of O'Hara, J.P.
Now, young men who come from the bush, do you
hear?
Who know not the power of barmaids and beer —
Don't see for yourself ! from temptation steer free,
Remember the fall of O'Hara, J.P.
BILL AND JIM FALL OUT
BILL and Jim are mates no longer — they would scorn
the name of mate —
Those two bushrnen hate each other with a soul-con-
suming hate ;
Yet erstwhile they were as brothers should be (tho'
they never will) :
Ne'er were mates to one another half so true as Jim
and Bill.
Bill was one of those who have to argue every day or
die —
Though, of course, he swore 'twas Jim who always
itched to argufy.
They would, on most abstract subjects, contradict
each other flat
And at times in lurid language — they were mates in
spite of that.
138
BILL AND JIM FALL OUT 139
Bill believed the Bible story re the origin of him —
He was sober, he was steady, he was orthodox ; while
Jim,
Who, we grieve to state, was always getting into
drunken scrapes,
Held that man degenerated from degenerated apes.
Bill was British to the backbone, he was loyal
through and through ;
Jim declared that Blucher's Prussians won the fight
at Waterloo,
And he hoped the coloured races would in time wipe
out the white —
And it rather strained their mateship, but it didn't
burst it quite.
They battled round in Maoriland — they saw it
through and through —
And argued on the rata, what it was and how it
grew ;
Bill believed the vine grew downward, Jim declared
that it grew up —
Yet they always shared their fortunes to the final
bite and sup.
140 BILL AND JIM FALL OUT
Night after night they argued how the kangaroo was
born,
And each one held the other's stupid theories in
scorn,
Bill believed it was ' born inside,' Jim declared it was
born out —
Each as to his own opinions never had the slightest
doubt.
They left the earth to argue and they went among the
stars,
Re conditions atmospheric, Bill believed ' the hair of
Mars
1 Was too thin for human bein's to exist in mortal
states.'
Jim declared it was too thick, if anything — yet they
were mates
Bill for Freetrade — Jim, Protection — argued as to
which was best
For the welfare of the workers — and their mateship
stood the test !
They argued over what they meant and didn't mean
at all,
And what they said and didn't — and were mates in
spite of all.
BILL AND JIM FALL OUT 141
Till one night the two together tried to light a fire in
camp,
When they had a leaky billy and the wood was scarce
and damp.
And . . . No matter : let the moral be distinctly
understood :
One alone should tend the fire, while the other brings
the wood.
THE PAROO
IT was a week from Christmas-time,
As near as I remember,
And half a year since in the rear
We'd left the Darling Timber.
The track was hot and more than drear
The long day seemed for ever ;
But now we knew that we were near
Our camp — the Paroo River.
With blighted eyes and blistered feet,
With stomachs out of order,
Half mad with flies and dust and heat
We'd crossed the Queensland Border.
I longed to hear a stream go by
And see the circles quiver ;
T longed to lay me down and die
That night on Paroo River.
142
THE PAROO 143
Tis said the land out West is grand —
I do not care who says it —
It isn't even decent scrub,
Nor yet an honest desert ;
It's plagued with flies, and broiling hot,
A curse is on it ever ;
I really think that God forgot
The country round that river.
My mate — a native of the land —
In fiery speech and vulgar,
Condemned the flies and cursed the sand,
And doubly damned the mulga.
He peered ahead, he peered about —
A bushman he, and clever —
1 Now mind you keep a sharp look-out ;
* We must be near the river.'
The « nose-bags ' heavy on each chest
(God bless one kindly squatter !)
With grateful weight our hearts they pressed — •
We only wanted water.
The sun was setting (in the west)
In colour like a liver —
We'd fondly hoped to camp and rest
That night on Paroo River.
144 THE PAROO
A cloud was on my mate's broad brow,
And once I heard him mutter :
* I'd like to see the Darling now,
' God bless the Grand Old Gutter ! '
And now and then he stopped and said
In tones that made me shiver —
4 It cannot well be on ahead,
4 1 think we've crossed the river?
But soon we saw a strip of ground
That crossed the track we followed —
No barer than the surface round,
But just a little hollowed.
His brows assumed a thoughtful frown —
This speech he did deliver :
* I wonder if we'd best go down
* Or up the blessed river 1 '
* But where,' said I, ' 's the blooming stream ?
And he replied, ' We're at it ! '
I stood awhile, as in a dream,
4 Great Scott ! ' I cried, 4 is that it ?
1 Why, that is some old bridle-track ! '
He chuckled, ' Well, I never !
1 It's nearly time you came out-back —
4 This is the Paroo River ! '
THE PAROO 145
No place to camp — no spot of damp —
No moisture to be seen there ;
If e'er there was, it left no sign
That it had ever been there.
But ere the morn, with heart and soul
We'd cause to thank the Giver —
We found a muddy water- hole
Some ten miles down the river.
THE GREEN-HAND ROUSEABOUT
CALL this hot 1 I beg your pardon. Hot ! — you
don't know what it means.
(What's that, waiter 1 lamb or mutton! Thank you —
mine is beef and greens.
Bread and butter while I'm waiting. Milk ? Oh,
yes — a bucketful.)
I'm just in from west the Darling, ' picking-up ' and
'rolling wool.'
Mutton stewed or chops for breakfast, dry and taste-
less, boiled in fat ;
Bread or brownie, tea or coffee — two hours' graft in
front of that ;
Legs of mutton boiled for dinner — mutton greasy-
warm for tea —
Mutton curried (gave my order, beef and plenty
greens for me.)
146
THE GREEN-HAND ROUSEABOUT 147
Breakfast, curried rice and mutton till your innards
sacrifice,
And you sicken at the colour and the smell of curried
rice.
All day long with living mutton — bits and belly- wool
and fleece ;
Blinded by the yoke of wool, and shirt and trousers
stiff with grease,
Till you long for sight of verdure, cabbage-plots and
water clear,
And you crave for beef and butter as a boozer craves
for beer.
Dusty patch in baking mulga — glaring iron hut and
shed —
Feel and smell of rain forgotten — water scarce and
feed-grass dead.
Hot and suffocating sunrise— all-pervading sheep-yard
smell —
Stiff and aching green-hand stretches — ' Slushy' rings
the bullock-bell —
Pint of tea and hunk of brownie — sinners string
towards the shed —
Great, black, greasy crows round carcass — screen
behind of dust-cloud red.
148 THE GREEN-HAND ROUSEABOUT
Engine whistles. « Go it, tigers ! ' and the agony
begins,
Picking up for seven devils out of Hades — for my
sins j
Picking up for seven devils, seven demons out of
Hell!
Sell their souls to get the bell-sheep — half a-dozen
Christs they'd sell !
Day grows hot as where they come from — too damned
hot for men or brutes ;
Roof of corrugated iron, six-foot-six above the shoots !
Whiz and rattle and vibration, like an endless chain
of trams ;
Blasphemy of five-and-forty — prickly heat — and
stink of rams !
' Barcoo ' leaves his pen-door open and the sheep
come bucking out ;
When the rouser goes to pen them, * Barcoo ' blasts
the rouseabout.
Injury with insult added — trial of our cursing
powers —
Cursed and cursing back enough to damn a dozen
worlds like ours.
THE GREEN-HAND ROUSEABOUT 149
' Take my combs down to the grinder, will yer 1 '
1 Seen my cattle-pup ? '
* There's a sheep fell down in my shoot— just jump
down and pick it up.'
* Give the office when the boss comes.' * Catch that
gory sheep, old man.'
1 Count the sheep in my pen, will yer ? ' ' Fetch my
combs back when yer can.'
1 When yer get a chance, old feller, will yer pop down
to the hut ?
' Fetch my pipe — the cook '11 show yer — and I'll let
yer have a cut.'
Shearer yells for tar and needle. Ringer's roaring like
a bull :
1 Wool away, you (son of angels). Where the hell's
the (foundling) WOOL ! ! '
Pound a week and station prices — mustn't kick
against the pricks —
Seven weeks of lurid mateship— ruined soul and four
pounds six.
150 THE GREEN-HAND ROQSEABOUT
What's that ? waiter 1 me ? stuffed mutton ! Look
here, waiter, to be brief,
I said beef ! you blood-stained villain! Beef — moo-
cow-Roast Bullock— BEEF !
THE MAN FROM WATERLOO
(With kind regards to " Banjo.")
IT was the Man from Waterloo,
When work in town was slack,
Who took the track as bushmen do,
And humped his swag out back.
He tramped for months without a bob,
For most the sheds were full,
Until at last he got a job
At picking up the wool.
He found the work was rather rough,
But swore to see it through,
For he was made of sterling stuff —
The Man from Waterloo.
The first remark was like a stab
That fell his ear upon,
'Twas — ' There's another something scab
' The boss has taken on ! '
151
152 THE MAN FROM WATERLOO
They couldn't let the towny be —
They sneered like anything ;
They'd mock him when he'd sound the * g
In words that end in ' ing.'
There came a man from Ironbark,
And at the shed he shore ;
He scoffed his victuals like a shark,
And like a fiend he swore.
He'd shorn his flowing beard that day —
He found it hard to reap —
Because 'twas hot and in the way
While he was shearing sheep.
His loaded fork in grimy holt
Was poised, his jaws moved fast,
Impatient till his throat could bolt
The mouthful taken last.
He couldn't stand a something toff,
Much less a jackaroo ;
And swore to take the trimmings off
The Man from Waterloo.
The towny saw he must be up
Or else be underneath,
And so one day, before them all,
He dared to clean his teeth.
THE MAN FROM WATERLOO 153
The men came running from the shed,
And shouted, ' Here's a lark ! '
1 It's gone to clean its tooties ! ' said
The man from Ironbark.
His feeble joke was much enjoyed ;
He sneered as bullies do,
And with a scrubbing-brush he guyed
The Man from Waterloo.
The Jackaroo made no remark
But peeled and waded in,
And soon the Man from Ironbark
Had three teeth less to grin !
And when they knew that he could fight
They swore to see him through,
Because they saw that he was right —
The Man from Waterloo.
Now in a shop in Sydney, near
The Bottle on the Shelf,
The tale is told — with trimmings — by
The Jackaroo himself.
* They made my life a hell,' he said ;
' They wouldn't let me be ;
{ They set the bully of the shed
* To take it out of me.
154 THE MAN FROM WATERLOO
* The dirt was on him like a sheath,
' He seldom washed his phiz ;
* He sneered because I cleaned my teeth
* I guess I dusted his !
* I treated them as they deserved—
' I signed on one or two !
. ' They won't forget me soon,' observed
The Man from Waterloo.
SAINT PETER
Now, I think there is a, likeness
'Twixt St. Peter's life and mine,
For he did a lot of trampin'
Long ago in Palestine.
He was ' union ' when the workers
First began to organise,
And — I'm glad that old St. Peter
Keeps the gate of Paradise.
When the ancient agitator
And his brothers carried swags,
I've no doubt he very often
Tramped with empty tucker-bags ;
And I'm glad he's Heaven's picket,
For I hate explainin' things,
And he'll think a union ticket
Just as good as Whitely King's.
155
156 SAINT PETER
He denied the Saviour's union,
Which was weak of him, no doubt ;
But perhaps his feet was blistered
And his boots had given out.
And the bitter storm was rushin'
On the bark and on the slabs,
And a cheerful fire was blazin',
And the hut was full of ' scabs.'
When I reach the great head-station —
Which is somewhere ' off the track '-
I won't want to talk with angels
Who have never been out back ;
They might bother me with offers
Of a banjo — meanin' well —
And a pair of wings to fly with,
When I only want a spell.
I'll just ask for old St. Peter,
And I think, when he appears,
I will only have to tell him
That I carried swag for years.
' I've been on the track,' I'll tell him,
' An' I done the best I could,'
And he'll understand me better
Than the other angels would.
SAINT PETER 157
He won't try to get a chorus
Out of lungs that's worn to rags,
Or to graft the wings on shoulders
That is stiff with humpin' swags.
But 111 rest about the station
Where the work-bell never rings,
Till they blow the final trumpet
And the Great Judge sees to things.
THE STRANGER'S FRIEND
THE strangest things, and the maddest things, that a
man can do or say,
To the chaps and fellers and coves Out Back are
matters of every day ;
Maybe on account of the lives they lead, or the life
that their hearts discard —
But never a fool can be too mad or a c hard case '
be too hard.
I met him in Bourke in the Union days — with which
we have nought to do
(Their creed was narrow, their methods crude, but
they stuck to ' the cause ' like glue)
He came into town from the Lost Soul Run for his
grim half-yearly ' bend,'
And because of a curious hobby he had, he was
known as * The Stranger's Friend.'
15S
THE STRANGER'S FRIEND 159
It is true to the region of adjectives when I say that
the spree was 'grim,'
For to go on the spree was a sacred rite, or a heathen
rite, to him,
To shout for the travellers passing through to the
land where the lost soul bakes —
Till they all seemed devils of different breeds, and his
pockets were filled with snakes.
In the joyful mood, in the solemn mood — in his
cynical stages too —
In the maudlin stage, in the fighting stage, in the
sta*ge when all was blue —
From the joyful hour when his spree commenced,
right through to the awful end,
He never lost grip of his * fixed idee ' that he was the
Stranger's Friend.
* The feller as knows, he can battle around for his
bloomin' self,' he'd say —
' I don't give a curse for the " blanks " I know -send
the hard-up bloke this way ;
'Send the stranger round, and I'll see him through,'
and, e'en as the bushman spoke,
The chaps and fellers would tip the wink to a casual,
' hard-up bloke.'
160 THE STRANGER'S FRIEND
And it wasn't only a bushinan's * bluff ' to the fame
of the Friend they scored,
For he'd shout the stranger a suit of clothes, and he'd
pay for the stranger's board —
The worst of it was that he'd skite all night on the
edge of the stranger's bunk,
And never got helplessly drunk himself till he'd got
the stranger drunk.
And the chaps and the fellers would speculate — by
way of a ghastly joke —
As to who'd be caught by the 'jim jams' first —the
Friend or the hard-up bloke 1
And the 'Joker' would say that there wasn't a doubt
as to who'd be damned in the end,
When the Devil got hold of a hard-up bloke in the
shape of the Stranger's Friend.
It mattered not to the Stranger's Friend what the
rest might say or think,
He always held that the hard-up state was due to the
curse of drink,
To the evils of cards, and of company : ' But a young
cove's built that way,
'And I was a bloomin' fool meself when I started out,'
he'd say.
THE STRANGER'S FRIEND 161
At the end of the spree, in clean white 'moles,' clean-
shaven, and cool as ice,
He'd give the stranger a ' bob ' or two, and some
straight Out Back advice ;
Then he'd tramp away for the Lost Soul Run, where
the hot dust rose like smoke,
Having done his duty to all mankind, for he'd ' stuck
to a hard -up bloke.'
They'll say 'tis a ' song of a sot,' perhaps, but the
Song of a Sot is true.
I have ' battled ' myself, and you know, you chaps,
what a man in the bush goes through ;
Let us hope when the last of his sprees is past, and
his cheques and his strength are done,
That, amongst the sober and thrifty mates, the
Stranger's Friend has one.
THE GOD-FORGOTTEN ELECTION
PAT M'DuRMEB brought the tidings to the town of
God-Forgotten :
'There are lively days before ye — commin Parly-
mint's dissolved ! '
And the boys were all excited, for the State, of
course, was ' rotten,'
And, in subsequent elections, God-Forgotten was
involved.
There was little there to live for save in drinking
beer and eating ;
But we rose on this occasion ere the news appeared
in print,
For the boys of God-Forgotten, at a wild, uproarious
meeting,
Nominated Billy Blazes for the cominin Parly-
mint.
162
THE GOD-FORGOTTEN ELECTION 163
Other towns had other favourites, but the day before
the battle
Bushmen flocked to God-Forgotten, and the distant
sheds were still ;
Sheep were left to go to glory, and neglected mobs of
cattle
Went a-straying down the river at their sweet
bucolic will.
William Spouter stood for Freetrade (and his votes
were split by Nottin),
He had influence behind him and he also had the
tin,
But across the lonely flatlands came the cry of God-
Forgotten,
' Vote for Blazes and Protection, and the land
you're living in ! '
Pat M'Durmer said, ' Ye schaymers, please to shut
yer ugly faces,
* Lend yer dirty ears a momint while I give ye all
a hint :
1 Keep ye sober till to-morrow and record yer vote for
Blazes
' If ye want to send a ringer to the commin Parly-
mint.
164 THE GOD-FORGOTTEN ELECTION
* As a young and growin' township God-Forgotten's
been neglected,
' And, if we'd be ripresinted, now's the moment to
begin—
* Have the local towns encouraged, local industries
purtected :
'Vote for Blazes, and Protection, and the land ye're
livin' in.
' I don't say that William Blazes is a perfect out-an'
outer,
' I don't say he have the larnin', for he never had
the luck ;
1 1 don't say he have the logic, or the gift of gab, like
Spouter,
'I don't say he have the practice— BUT I SAY HE
HAVE THE PLUCK !
' Now the country's gone to ruin, and the Govern-
ments are rotten,
* But he'll save the public credit and purtect the
public tin ;
1 To the iverlastin' glory of the name of God-Forgotten
1 Vote for Blazes and Protection, and the land ye're
livin' in ! '
THE GOD-FORGOTTEN ELECTION 165
Pat M'D. went on the war-path, and he worked like
salts and senna,
For he organised committees full of energy and
push ;
And those wild committees riding through the whisky-
fed Gehenna
Routed out astonished voters from their humpies
in the bush.
Everything on wheels was ' rinted,' and half -sobered
drunks were shot in ;
Said M'Durmer to the driver, ' If ye want to save
yer skin,
* Never stop to wet yer whistles — drive like hell to
God-Forgotten,
1 Make the villains plump for Blazes, and the land
they're livin' in.'
Half the local long-departed (for the purpose resur-
rected)
Plumped for Blazes and Protection, and the country
where they died ;
So he topped the poll by sixty, and when Blazes was
elected
There was victory and triumph on the God-For-
gotten side.
166 THE GOD-FORGOTTEN ELECTION
Then the boys got up a banquet, and our chairman,
Pat M'Durmer,
Was next day discovered sleeping in the local
baker's bin —
All the dough had risen round him, but we heard a
smothered murmur,
1 Vote for Blazes — and Protection — and the land
ye're livin' in.'
Now the great Sir William Blazes lives in London,
'cross the waters,
And they say his city mansion is the swellest in
West End,
But I very often wonder if his toney sons and
daughters
Ever heard of Billy Blazes who was once the
' people's friend.'
Does his biassed memory linger round that wild
electioneering
When the men of God-Forgotten stuck to him
through thick and thin ]
Does he ever, in his dreaming, hear the cry above the
cheering :
1 Vote for Blazes and Protection, and the land
you're livin' in ? '
THE GOD-FORGOTTEN ELECTION 167
Ah, the bush was grand in those days, and the
Western boys were daisies,
And their scheming and their dodging would outdo
the wildest print ;
Still my recollection lingers round the time when
Billy Blazes
Was returned by God-Forgotten to the ' Commin
Parlymint ' :
Still I keep a sign of canvas — 'twas a mate of mine
that made it —
And its paint is cracked and powdered, and its
threads are bare and thin,
Yet upon its grimy surface you can read in letters
faded :
'Vote for Blazes and Protection, and the Land
you're livin' in.'
THE BOSS'S BOOTS
THE shearers squint along the pens, they squint along
the c shoots ; '
The shearers squint along the board to catch the
Boss's boots ;
They have no time to straighten up, they have no
time to stare,
But when the Boss is looking on, they like to be
aware.
The f rouser ' has no soul to save. Condemn the rouse-
about !
And sling 'em in, and rip 'em through, and get the bell-
sheep out ;
And skim it by the tips at times, or take it with the
roots —
But 'pink ' 'em nice and pretty when you see the Boss's
boots.
168
THE BOSS'S BOOTS 169
The shearing super sprained his foot, as bosses some-
times do —
And wore, until the shed cut out, one ' side-spring '
and one shoe ;
And though he changed his pants at times — some
worn-out and some neat —
No ' tiger ' there could possibly mistake the Boss's
feet.
The Boss affected larger boots than many Western
men,
And Jim the Ringer swore the shoe was half as big
again ;
And tigers might have heard the boss ere any harm
was done —
For when he passed it was a sort of dot and carry one.
But now there comes a picker-up who sprained his
ankle, too,
And limping round the shed he found the Boss's
cast-off shoe.
He went to work, all legs and arms, as green-hand
rousers will,
And never dreamed of Boss's boots — much less of
Bogan Bill.
170 THE BOSS'S BOOTS
Ye sons of sin that tramp and shear in hot and dusty
scrubs,
Just keep away from ' headin' 'em,' and keep away from
pubs,
And keep away from handicaps — -for so your sugar
scoots —
And you may own a station yet and wear the Boss's
boots.
And Bogan by his mate was heard to mutter through
his hair :
' The Boss has got a rat to-day : he's buckin' every-
where—
1 He's trainin' for a bike, I think, the way he comes
an' scoots,
1 He's like a bloomin' cat on mud the way he shifts
his boots.'
Now Bogan Bill was shearing rough and chanced to
cut a teat ;
He stuck his leg in front at once, and slewed the ewe
a bit;
He hurried up to get her through, when, close beside
his shoot,
He saw a large and ancient shoe, in mateship with a
boot.
THE BOSS'S BOOTS 171
He thought that he'd be fined all right — he couldn't
turn the ' yoe ;'
The more he wished the boss away, the more he
wouldn't go ;
And Bogan swore amenfully — beneath his breath he
swore —
And he was never known to ' pink ' so prettily
before.
And Bogan through his bristling scalp in his mind's
eye could trace,
The cold, sarcastic smile that lurked about the Boss's
face ;
He cursed him with a silent curse in language known
to few,
He cursed him from his boot right up, and then down
to his shoe.
But while he shore so mighty clean, and while he
screened the teat,
He fancied there was something wrong about the
Boss's feet :
The boot grew unfamiliar, and the odd shoe seemed
awry,
And slowly up the trouser went the tail of Bogan's eye.
172 THE BOSS'S BOOTS
Then swiftly to the features from a plaited green-hide
belt-
You'd have to ring a shed or two to feel as Bogan
felt —
For 'twas his green-hand picker-up (who wore a
vacant look),
And Bogan saw the Boss outside consulting with his
cook.
And Bogan Bill was hurt and mad to see that rouse-
about ;
And Bogan laid his ' Wolseley ' down and knocked
that rouser out ;
He knocked him right across the board, he tumbled
through the shoot —
' I'll learn the fool/ said Bogan Bill, * to flash the
Boss's boot ! '
The rouser squints along the pens, he squints along
the shoots,
And gives his men the office when they miss the
Boss's boots.
They have no time to straighten up, they're too well-
bred to stare,
But when the Boss is looking on they like to be
aware.
THE BOSS'S BOOTS 173
The rouser has no soul to lose — it's blarst the rouseabout !
And rip 'em through and yell for ' tar ' and get the bell-
sheep outt
And take it with the scum at times or take it with the
roots, —
But * pink ' 'em nice and pretty when you see the Boss's
boots.
'Rouseabout' and 'picker-up* are interchangeable terms in above
rhymes, as also 'boss ' and ' super '; the shed-name for the latter is ' Boss-
over-the-board.' The shearer is paid by the hundred, the rouser by the
week. ' Pink 'em pretty ' : to shear clean to the skin. ' Bell-sheep ' :
shearers are not supposed to take another sheep out of pen when
' Smoke-ho,' breakfast or dinner bell goes, but some time themselves to
get so many sheep out, and one as the bell gofg, which makes more work
for the rouser and entrenches on his ' smoke-no,' as he must leave his
' board ' clean. Shearers are seldom or never fined now.
THE CAPTAIN OF THE PUSH
As the night was falling slowly down on city, town
and bush,
From a slum in Jones' Alley sloped the Captain of
the Push ;
And he scowled towards the North, and he scowled
towards the South,
As he hooked his little finger in the corners of his
mouth.
Then his whistle, loud and shrill, woke the echoes of
the ' Rocks,'
And a dozen ghouls came sloping round the corners
of the blocks.
There was nought to rouse their anger ; yet the oath
that each one swore
Seemed less fit for publication than the one that went
before.
174
THE CAPTAIN OF THE PUSH 175
For they spoke the gutter language with the easy flow
that comes
Only to the men whose childhood knew the brothels
and the slums.
Then they spat in turns, and halted ; and the one
that came behind,
Spitting fiercely on the pavement, called on Heaven
to strike him blind.
Let us first describe the captain, bottle-shouldered,
pale and thin,
For he was the beau-ideal of a Sydney larrikin ;
E'en his hat was most suggestive of the city where we
live,
With a gallows-tilt that no one, save a larrikin, can
give;
And the coat, a little shorter than the writer would
desire,
Showed a more or less uncertain portion of his strange
attire.
That which tailors know as ' trousers ' — known by
him as ' bloomin' bags ' —
Hanging loosely from his person, swept, with tattered
ends, the flags ;
176 THE CAPTAIN OF THE PUSH
And he had a pointed stern post to the boots that
peeped below
(Which he laced up from the centre of the nail of his
great toe),
And he wore his shirt uncollar'd, and the tie
correctly wrong ;
But I think his vest was shorter than should be in
one so long.
And the captain crooked his finger at a stranger on
the kerb,
Whom he qualified politely with an adjective and verb,
And he begged the Gory Bleeders that they wouldn t
interrupt
Till he gave an introduction — it was painfully
abrupt —
* Here's the bleedin' push, me covey — here's a
(something) from the bush !
1 Strike me dead, he wants to join us ! ' said the
captain of the push.
Said the stranger : * I am nothing but a bushy and
a dunce ;
'But I read about the Bleeders in the WEEKLY
GASBAG once :
THE CAPTAIN OF THE PUSH 177
' Sitting lonely in the humpy when the wind began to
" whoosh,"
4 How I longed to share the dangers and the pleasures
of the push !
1 Gosh ! I hate the swells and good 'uns — I could
burn 'em in their beds ;
' I am with you, if you'll have me, and I'll break
their blazing heads.'
' Now, look here,' exclaimed the captain to the
stranger from the bush,
1 Now, look here — suppose a feller was to split upon
the push,
* Would you lay for him and fetch him, even if the
traps were round 1
* Would you lay him out and kick him to a jelly on
the ground .1
' Would you jump upon the nameless — kill, or cripple
him, or both 1
1 Speak ? or else I'll— SPEAK !' The stranger answered,
4 My kerlonial oath ! '
1 Now, look here,' exclamed the captain to the stranger
from the bush,
1 Now, look here — suppose the Bleeders let you come
and join the push,
178 THE CAPTAIN OF THE PUSH
' Would you smash a bleedin' bobby if you got the
blank alone?
' Would you break a swell or Chinkie — split his garret
with a stone ?
' Would you have a " moll " to keep yer — like to
swear off work for good ? '
1 Yes, my oath ! ' replied the stranger. ' My kerlonial
oath ! I would ! '
1 Now, look here,' exclaimed the captain to that
stranger .from the bush,
'Now, look here — before the Bleeders let yer come
and join the push,
'You must prove that you're a blazer —you must
prove that you have grit
' Worthy of a Gory Bleeder — you must show your
form a bit —
1 Take a rock and smash that winder 1 ' and the
stranger, nothing loth,
Took the rock and— smash! They only muttered
1 My kerlonial oath ! '
So they swore him in, and found him sure of aim
and light of heel,
And his only fault, if any, lay in his excessive zeal ;
THE CAPTAIN OF THE PUSH 179
He was good at throwing metal, but we chronicle with
pain
That he jumped upon a victim, damaging the watch
and chain,
Ere the Bleeders had secured them ; yet the captain
of the push
Swore a dozen oaths in favour of the stranger from
the bush.
Late next morn the captain, rising, hoarse and thirsty
from his lair,
Called the newly-feather'd Bleeder, but the stranger
wasn't there !
Quickly going through the pockets of his * bloomin'
bags/ he learned
That the stranger had been through him for the stuff
his { moll ' had earned ;
And the language that he muttered I should
scarcely like to tell
(Stars ! and notes of exclamation ! ! blank and dash
will do as well).
In the night the captain's signal woke the echoes of
the ' Rocks,'
Brought the Gory Bleeders sloping thro' the shadows
of the blocks ;
180 THE CAPTAIN OF TBE PUSH
And they swore the stranger's action was a blood-
escaping shame,
While they waited for the nameless, but the name-
less never came.
And the Bleeders soon forgot him ; but the captain of
the push
Still is 'laying' round, in ballast, for the nameless
' from the bush.'
BILLY'S 'SQUARE AFFAIR'
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
That he would turn respectable and wed a ' square
affair.'
He craved the kiss of innocence ; his spirit longed to
rise;
The 'Crimson Streak,' his faithful 'piece,' grew
hateful in his eyes ;
(And though, in her entirety, the Crimson Streak
' was there,'
I grieve to state the Crimson Streak was not a
' square affair.')
181
182 BILLY'S 'SQUARE AFFAIR'
He wanted clothes, a masher suit, he wanted boots
and hat ;
His girl had earned a quid or two — he wouldn't part
with that ;
And so he went to Brickfield Hill, and from a draper
there
He 'shook' the proper kind of togs to fetch a 'square
affair.'
Long Bill went to the barber's shop and had a shave
and singe,
And from his narrow forehead combed his darling
Mabel fringe ;
Long Bill put on a c square cut ' and he brushed his
boots with care,
And roved about the Gardens till he mashed a 'square
affair.'
She was a tony servant-girl from somewhere on ' the
Shore ; '
She dressed in style that suited Bill — he could not
wish for more.
While in her guileless presence he had ceased to chew
or swear,
He knew the kind of barrack that can fetch a square
affair.
BILLY'S 'SQUARE AFFAIR' 183
To thus desert his donah old was risky and a sin,
And 'twould have served him right if she had caved
his garret in.
The Gory Bleeders thought it too, and warned him
to take care
In case the Crimson Streak got scent of Billy's square
affair.
He took her to the stalls ; 'twas dear, but Billy said
' Wot odds ! '
He couldn't take his square affair amongst the crimson
gods.
They wandered in the park at night, and hugged
each other there —
But, ah ! the Crimson Streak got wind of Billy's
square affair !
' The blank and space and stars ! ' she yelled ; ' the
nameless crimson dash !
' I'll smash the blank y crimson and his square affair,
I'll smash ' —
In short, she drank and raved and shrieked and tore
her crimson hair,
And swore to murder Billy and to pound his square
affair.
184 BILLY'S 'SQUARE AFFAIR'
And so one summer evening, as the day was growing
dim,
She watched her bloke go out. and foxed his square
affair and him.
That night the park was startled by the shrieks that
rent the air —
The 'Streak' had gone for Billy and for Billy's square
affair.
The ' gory ' push had foxed the Streak, they foxed
her to the park,
And they, of course, were close at hand to see the
bleedin' lark ;
A cop arrived in time to hear a 'gory B.' declare
' Gor blar-me ! here's the Red Streak foul of Billy's
square affair.'
Now Billy scowls about the Rocks, his manly beauty
marr'd,
And Billy's girl, upon her 'ed, is doin' six months
'ard;
Bill's swivel eye is in a sling, his heart is in despair,
And in the Sydney 'Orspital lies Billy's square affair.
A DERRY ON A COVE
'TWAS in the felon's dock he stood, his eyes were black
and blue \
His voice with grief was broken, and his nose was
broken, too ;
He muttered, as that broken nose he wiped upon his
cap—
'It's orful when the p'leece has got a derry on a
chap.
* I am a honest workin' cove, as any bloke can see,
' It's just because the p'leece has got a derry, sir, on
me ;
' Oh, yes, the legal gents can grin, I say it ain't no
joke —
; It's cruel when the p'leece has got a derry on a
bloke.'
185
186 A DERRY ON A COVE
* Why don't you go to work 1 ' he said (he muttered,
'Why don't you?').
1 Yer honer knows as well as me there ain't no work
to do.
1 And when I try to find a job I'm shaddered by a
trap —
' It's awful when the p'leece has got a derry on a
chap.'
I sigh'd and shed a tearlet for that noble nature
marred,
But, ah ! the Bench was rough on him, and gave him
six months' hard.
He only said, * Beyond the grave you'll cop it hot, by
Jove !
'There ain't no angel p'leece to get a derry on a
RISE YE! RISE YE!
RISE ye ! rise ye ! noble toilers ! claim your rights
with fire and steel !
Rise ye ! for the cursed tyrants crush ye with the
hiron 'eel !
They would treat ye worse than sl-a-a-ves ! they
would treat ye worse than brutes !
Rise and crush the selfish tyrants ! ku-r-rush them
with your hob-nailed boots !
Rise ye ! rise ye ! glorious toilers !
Rise ye ! rise ye ! noble toilers !
Erwake ! er-rise !
Rise ye ! rise ye ! noble toilers ! tyrants come across
the waves !
Will ye yield the Rights of Labour ? will ye ? will ye
still be sl-a-a-ves ? ! ! !
187
188 RISK YE ! RISE YE !
Rise ye ! rise ye ! mighty toilers ! and revoke the
rotten laws !
Lo ! your wives go out a-washing while ye battle for
the caws !
Rise ye ! rise ye ! glorious toilers !
Rise ye ! rise ye ! noble toilers !
Erwake ! er-rise !
Our gerlorious dawn is breaking ! Lo ! the tyrant
trembles now !
He will sta-a-rve us here no longer ! toilers will not
bend or bow !
Rise ye ! rise ye ! noble toilers ! rise ! behold, revenge
is near ;
See the leaders of the people ! come an' 'ave a pint o'
beer !
Rise ye ! rise ye ! noble toilers !
Rise ye ! rise ye ! glorious toilers !
Erwake ! er-rise !
Lo ! the poor are starved, my brothers ! lo ! our
wives and children weep !
Lo ! our women toil to keep us while the toilers are
asleep !
RISE YE I RISE YE ! 189
Rise ye ! rise ye ! noble toilers ! rise and break the
tyrant's chain !
March ye ! march ye ! mighty toilers ! even to the
battle plain !
Rise ye ! rise ye ! noble toilers !
Rise ye ! rise ye ! noble toilers !
Erwake ! er-r-rise !
THE BALLAD OF MABEL CLARE
YE children of the Land of Gold,
I sing a song to you,
And if the jokes are somewhat old,
The main idea 78 new.
So be it sung, by hut and tent,
Where tall the native grows ;
And understand, the song is meant
For singing through the nose.
There dwelt a hard old cockatoo
On western hills far out,
Where everything is green and blue,
Except, of course, in drought ;
A crimson Anarchist was he —
Held other men in scorn —
Yet preached that ev'ry man was free,
And also * ekal born.'
190
THE BALLAD OF MABEL CLARE 191
He lived in his ancestral hut —
His missus wasn't there —
And there was no one with him but
His daughter, Mabel Clare.
Her eyes and hair were like the sun ;
Her foot was like a mat ;
Her cheeks a trifle overdone ;
She was a democrat.
A manly independence, born
Among the trees, she had,
She treated womankind with scorn,
And often cursed her dad.
She hated swells and shining lights,
For she had seen a few,
And she believed in ' women's rights '
(She mostly got 'em, too).
A stranger at the neighb'ring run
Sojourned, the squatter's guest,
He was unknown to anyone,
But like a swell was dress'd ;
He had an eyeglass to his eye,
A collar to his ears,
His feet were made to tread the sky,
His mouth was formed for sneers.
THE BALLAD OF MABEL CLARE
He wore the latest toggery,
The loudest thing in ties —
'Twas generally reckoned he
Was something in disguise.
But who he was, or whence he came,
Was long unknown, except
Unto the squatter, who the name
And noble secret kept.
And strolling in the noontide heat,
Beneath the blinding glare,
This noble stranger chanced to meet
The radiant Mabel Clare.
She saw at once he was a swell —
According to her lights —
But, ah ! 'tis very sad to tell,
She met him oft of nights.
And, strolling through a moonlit gorge,
She chatted all the while
Of Ingersoll, and Henry George,
And Bradlaugh and Carlyle :
In short, he learned to love the girl,
And things went on like this,
Until he said he was an Earl,
And asked her to be his.
THE BALLAD OF MABEL CLARE 193
1 Oh, say no more, Lord Kawlinee,
' Oh, say no more ! ' she said ;
* Oh, say no more, Lord Kawlinee,
* I wish that I was dead :
1 My head is in a hawf ul whirl,
' The truth I dare not tell—
4 1 am a democratic girl,
' And cannot wed a swell ! '
' Oh love ! ' he cried, * but you forget
' That you are most unjust ;
* 'Twas not my fault that I was set
' Within the upper crust.
* Heed not the yarns the poets tell —
' Oh, darling, do not doubt
c A simple lord can love as well
' As any rouseabout !
' For you I'll give my fortune up —
' I'd go to work for you !
* I'll put the money in the cup
* And drop the title, too.
' Oh, fly with me ! Oh, fly with me
' Across the mountains blue !
4 Hoh, fly with me ! Hoh, fly with me ! '
That very night she flew.
194 THE BALLAD OF MABEL CLARE
They took the train and journeyed down-
Across the range they sped —
Until they came to Sydney town,
Where shortly they were wed.
And still upon the western wild
Admiring teamsters tell
How Mabel's father cursed his child
For clearing with a swell.
* What ails my bird this bridal night,'
Exclaimed Lord Kawlinee ;
I What ails my own this bridal night —
* O love, confide in me !'
c Oh now,' she said, 'that I am yaws
1 You'll let me weep — I must —
I 1 did desert the people's cause
'To join the upper crust.'
0 proudly smiled his lordship then —
His chimney-pot he floor'd —
* Look up, my love, and smile again,
* For I am not a lord ! '
His eye-glass from his eye he tore,
The dickey from his breast,
And turned and stood his bride before
A rouseabout — confess'd !
THE BALLAD OF MABEL CLARE 195
' Unknown I've loved you long,' he said,
1 And I have loved you true —
' A-shearing in your guv'ner's shed
' I learned to worship you.
1 1 do not care for place or pelf,
' For now, my love, I'm sure
That you will love me for myself
* And not because I'm poor.
' To prove your love I spent my cheque
' To buy this swell rig-out ;
1 So fling your arms about my neck
'For I'm a rouseabout !'
At first she gave a startled cry,
Then, safe from care's alarms,
She sigh'd a soul-subduing sigh
And sank into his arms.
He pawned the togs, and home he took
His bride in all her charms ;
The proud old cockatoo received
The pair with open arms.
And long they lived, the faithful bride,
The noble rouseabout —
And if she wasn't satisfied
She never let it out.
CONSTABLE M'CARTY'S INVESTIGATIONS
MOST unpleasantly adjacent to the haunts of lower
orders
Stood a ' terrace ' in the city when the current year
began,
And a notice indicated there were vacancies for
boarders
In the middle house, and lodgings for a single
gentleman.
Now, a singular observer could have seen but few
attractions
Whether in the house, or ' missus, or the notice,
or the street,
But at last there came a lodger whose appearances
and actions
Puzzled Constable M'Carty, the policeman on the
beat.
196
CONSTABLE M'CARTY'S INVESTIGATIONS 197
He (the single gent) was wasted almost to emaciation,
And his features were the palest that M'Carty ever
saw,
And these indications, pointing to a past of dissipa-
tion,
Greatly strengthened the suspicions of the agent of
the law.
He (the lodger— hang the pronoun !) seemed to like
the stormy weather,
When the elements in battle kept it up a little
late;
Yet he'd wander in the moonlight when the stars
were close together,
Taking ghostly consolation in a visionary state.
He would walk the streets at midnight, when the
storm-king raised his banner,
Walk without his old umbrella, — wave his arms
above his head :
Or he'd fold them tight, and mutter, in a wild,
disjointed manner,
While the town was wrapped in slumber and he
should have been in bed.
198 CONSTABLE M'CARTY'S INVESTIGATIONS
Said the consfcable-on-duty : 'Shure, Oi wonther phwat
his trade is 1 '
And the constable would watch him from the
shadow of a wall,
But he never picked a pocket, and he ne'er accosted
ladies,
And the constable was puzzled what to make of
him at all.
Now, M'Carty had arrested more than one notorious
dodger,
He had heard of men afflicted with the strangest
kind of fads,
But he couldn't fix the station or the business of the
lodger,
Who at times would chum with cadgers, and at
other times with cads.
And the constable would often stand and wonder how
the gory
Sheol the stranger got his living, for he loafed the
time away
he often sought a hillock when the sun went
down in glory,
Just as if he was a mourner at the burial of the
day.
CONSTABLE M'CARTY'S INVESTIGATIONS 199
Mac. had noticed that the lodger did a mighty lot of
smoking,
And could ' stow away a long 'un,' never winking,
so he could ;
And M'Oarty once, at midnight, came upon the lodger
poking
Round about suspicious alleys where the common
houses stood.
Yet the constable had seen him in a class above
suspicion —
Seen him welcomed with effusion by a dozen
* toney gents ' —
Seen him driving in the buggy of a rising politician
Thro' the gateway of the member's toney private
residence.
And the constable, off duty, had observed the lodger
slipping
Down a lane to where the river opened on the
ocean wide,
Where he'd stand for hours gazing at the distant
anchor'd shipping,
But he never took his coat off, so it wasn't
suicide.
200 CONSTABLE M'CARTY'S INVESTIGATIONS
For the constable had noticed that a man who's filled
with loathing
For his selfish fellow -creatures and the evil things
that be,
Will, for some mysterious reason, shed a portion of
his clothing,
Ere he takes his first and final plunge into eternity.
And M'Carty, once at midnight— be it said to his
abasement —
Left his beat and climbed a railing of considerable
height,
Just to watch the lodger's shadow on the curtain of
his casement
While the little room was lighted in the listening
hours of night.
Now, at first the shadow hinted that the substance
sat inditing ;
Now it indicated toothache, or the headache ;
and again,
'T would exaggerate the gestures of a dipsomaniac
fighting
Those original conceptions of a whisky-sodden
brain.
CONSTABLE M'CARTY'S INVESTIGATIONS 201
Then the constable, retreating, scratched his head and
muttered ' Sorra
* Wan of me can undershtand it. But Oi'll keep
me Oi on him,
' Divil take him and his tantrums ; he's a lunatic,
begorra !
* Or, if he was up to mischief, he'd be sure to douse
the glim.'
But M'Carty wasn't easy, for he had a vague suspicion
That a ' skame ' was being plotted; and he thought
the matter down
Till his mind was pretty certain that the business was
sedition,
And the man, in league with others, sought to
overthrow the Crown.
But, in spite of observation, Mac received no infor-
mation
And was forced to stay inactive, being puzzled for
a charge.
That the lodger was a madman seemed the only
explanation,
Tho' the house would scarcely harbour such a
lunatic at large.
202 CONSTABLE M'CARTY'S INVESTIGATIONS
His appearance failed to warrant apprehension as a
vagrant,
Tho' 'twas getting very shabby, as the constable
could see ;
But M'Carty in the meantime hoped to catch him in
a flagrant
Breach of peace, or the intention to commit a
felony.
(For digression there is leisure, and it is the writer's
pleasure
Just to pause a while and ponder on a painful legal
fact,
Being forced to say in sorrow, and a line of doubtful
measure,
That there's nothing so elastic as the cruel Vagrant
Act)
Now, M'Carty knew his duty, and was brave as any
lion,
But he dreaded being 'landed' in an influential bog —
As the chances were he would be if the man he had
his eye on
Was a person of importance who was travelling
incog.
CONSTABLE M'CARTY'S INVESTIGATIONS 203
Want of sleep and over-worry seemed to tell upon
M'Carty :
He was thirsty more than ever, but his appetite
resigned ;
He was previously reckoned as a jolly chap and
hearty,
But the mystery was lying like a mountain on his
mind.
Tho' he tried his best, he couldn't get a hold upon
the lodger,
For the latter's antecedents weren't known to the
police —
They considered that the ' devil ' was a dark and
artful dodger
Who was scheming under cover for the downfall
of the peace.
'Twas a simple explanation, though M'Carty didn't
know it,
Which with half his penetration he might easily
have seen,
For the object of his dangerous suspicions was a poet,
Who was not so widely famous as he thought he should
have been.
204 CONSTABLE M'CARTY'S INVESTIGATIONS
And the constable grew thinner, till one morning,
* little dhramin'
' A.V the sword of revelation that was leapin' from
its sheath,'
He alighted on some verses in the columns of the
FRAYMAN,
* Wid the Christian name an surname av the lodger
onderneath!'
Now, M'Carty and the poet are as brother is to
brother,
Or, at least, as brothers should be ; and they very
often meet
On the lonely block at midnight, and they wink at
one another —
Disappearing down the by-way of a shanty in the
street.
And the poet's name you're asking 1 — well, the ground
is very tender,
You must wait until the public put the gilt upon
the name,
Till a glorious, sorrow-drowning, and, perhaps, a final
{ bender,'
Heralds his triumphant entrance to the thunder-
halls of Fame.
AT THE TUG-OF-WAR
'TWAS in a tug-of-war where I — the guvnor's hope and
pride —
Stepped proudly on the platform as the ringer on my
side ;
Old dad was in his glory there — it gave the old man
joy
To fight a passage through the crowd and barrack for
his boy.
A friend came up and said to me, { Put out your
muscles, John,
' And pull them to eternity — your guvnor's looking
on.'
I paused before I grasped the rope, and glanced
around the place,
And, foremost in the waiting crowd, I saw the old
man's face.
205
206 AT THE TUG-OF-WAR
My mates were strong and plucky chaps, but very
soon I knew
That our opponents had the weight and strength to
pull them through ;
The boys were losing surely and defeat was very near,
When, high above the mighty roar, I heard the old
man cheer !
I felt nay muscles swelling when the old man cheer'd
for me,
I felt as though I'd burst my heart, or gain the
victory !
I shouted, ' Now ! Together !' and a steady strain
replied,
And, with a mighty heave, I helped to beat the other
side!
Oh ! how the old man shouted in his wild, excited joy !
I thought he'd burst his boiler then, a-cheering for
his boy ;
The chaps, oh ! how they cheered me, while the girls
all smiled so kind,
They praised me, little dreaming, how the old man
pulled behind.
AT THE TUG-OF-WAR 207
He barracks for his boy no more — his grave is old
and green,
And sons have grown up round me since he vanished
from the scene ;
But, when the cause is worthy where I fight for
victory,
In fancy still I often hear the old man cheer for me.
HERE'S LUCK !
OLD Time is tramping close to-day — you hear his
bluchers fall,
A mighty change is on the way, an' God protect us
all;
Some dust'll fly from beery coats — at least it's been
declared.
I'm glad that wimin has the votes — but just a trifle
scared.
I'm just a trifle scared — For why ? The wimin mean
to rule ;
It makes me feel like days gone by when I was caned
at school.
The days of men is nearly dead — of double moons
and stars—
They'll soon put out our pipes, 'tis said, an' close the
public bars.
HERE'S LUCK ! 209
No more we'll take a glass of ale when pushed with
care an' strife,
An' chuckle home with that old tale we used to tell
the wife.
We'll laugh an' joke an' sing no more with jolly beery
chums,
An' shout 'Here's luck !' while waitin' for the luck
that never comes.
Did we prohibit swillin' tea clean out of common-
sense
Or legislate on gossipin' across a backyard fence 1
Did we prohibit bustles — or the hoops when they was
here?
The wimin never think of this — they want to stop
our beer.
The track o' life is dry enough, an' crossed with many
a rut,
But, oh ! we'll find it long an' rough when all the
pubs is shut ;
When all the pubs is shut, an' gone the doors we
used to seek,
An' we go toilin', thirstin' on through Sundays all the
week.
210 HERE'S LUCK !
For since the days when pubs was * inns ' — in years
gone past 'n' far —
Poor sinful souls have drowned their sins an' sorrers
at the bar ;
An' though at times it led to crimes, an' debt, and
such complaints —
I scarce dare think about the time when all mankind
is saints.
'Twould make the bones of Bacchus leap an' break
his coffin lid ;
And Burns's ghost would wail an' weep as Bobby
never did.
But let the preachers preach in style, an' rave and
rant — 'n' buck,
I rather guess they'll hear awhile the old war-cry :
'Here's Luck!'
The world might wobble round the sun, an' all the
banks go bung,
But pipes'll smoke an' liquor run while Auld Lang
Syne is sung.
While men are driven through the mill, an' flinty
times is struck,
They'll find a private entrance still !
Here's Luck, old man — Here's Luck !
THE MEN WHO COME BEHIND
THERE'S a class of men (and women) who are always
on their guard —
Cunning, treacherous, suspicious — feeling softly —
grasping hard —
Brainy, yet without the courage to forsake the
beaten track —
Cautiously they feel their way behind a bolder spirit's
back.
If you save a bit of money, and you start a little
store —
Say, an oyster-shop, for instance, where there wasn't
one before —
When the shop begins to pay you, and the rent is off
your mind,
You will see another started by a chap that comes
behind.
211
212 THE MEN WHO COME BEHIND
So it is, and so it might have been, my friend, with
me and you —
When a friend of both and neither interferes between
the two ;
They will fight like fiends, forgetting in their passion
mad and blind,
That the row is mostly started by the folk who come
behind.
They will stick to you like sin will, while your
money comes and goes,
But they'll leave you when you haven't got a shilling
in your clothes.
You may get some help above you, but you'll nearly
always find
That you cannot get assistance from the men who
come behind.
There are many, far too many, in the world of prose
and rhyme,
Always looking for another's ' footsteps on the sands
of time.'
J ournalistic imitators are the meanest of mankind ;
And the grandest themes are hackneyed by the pens
that come behind.
THE MEN WHO COME BEHIND 213
If you strike a novel subject, write it up, and do not fail,
They will rhyme and prose about it till your very own
is stale,
As they raved about the region that the wattle-
boughs perfume
Till the reader cursed the bushman and the stink of
wattle-bloom.
They will follow in your footsteps while you're
groping for the light ;
But they'll run to get before you when they see you're
going right ;
And they'll trip you up and baulk you in their blind
and greedy heat,
Like a stupid pup that hasn't learned to trail behind
your feet.
Take your loads of sin and sorrow on more energetic
backs !
Go and strike across the country where there are not
any tracks !
And— we fancy that the subject could be further
treated here,
But we'll leave it to be hackneyed by the fellows in
the rear.
THE DAYS WHEN WE WENT SWIMMING
THE breezes waved the silver grass,
Waist-high along the siding,
And to the creek we ne'er could pass
Three boys on bare-back riding ;
Beneath the sheoaks in the bend
The waterhole was brimming —
Do you remember yet, old friend,
The times we ' went in swimming ? '
The days we * played the wag ' from school —
Joys shared — and paid for singly —
The air was hot, the water cool —
And naked boys are kingly !
With mud for soap the sun to dry —
A well planned lie to stay us,
And dust well rubbed on neck and face
Lest cleanliness betray us.
214
THE DAYS WHEN WE WENT SWIMMING 215
And you'll remember farmer Kutz —
Though scarcely for his bounty —
He leased a forty -acre block,
And thought he owned the county ;
A farmer of the old world school,
That men grew hard and grim in,
He drew his water from the pool
That we preferred to swim in.
And do you mind when down the creek
His angry way he wended,
A green-hide cartwhip in his hand
For our young backs intended ?
Three naked boys upon the sand —
Half buried and half sunning —
Three startled boys without their clothes
Across the paddocks running.
We've had some scares, but we looked blank
When, resting there and chumming,
One glanced by chance along the bank
And saw the farmer coming !
And home impressions linger yet
Of cups of sorrow brimming ;
I hardly think that we'll forget
The last day we went swimming.
THE OLD BARK SCHOOL
IT was built of bark and poles, and the floor was full
of holes
Where each leak in rainy weather made a pool ;
And the walls were mostly cracks lined with calico
and sacks —
There was little need for windows in the school.
Then we rode to school and back by the rugged gully
track,
On the old grey horse that carried three or four ;
And he looked so very wise that he lit the master's
eyes
Every time he put his head in at the door.
216
THE OLD BARK SCHOOL 217
He had run with Cobb and Co. — ' that grey leader,
let him go ! '
There were men 'as knowed the brand upon his
hide,'
And : as knowed it on the course ' . Funeral ser-
vice : ' Good old horse ! '
When we burnt him in the gully where he died.
And the master thought the same. 'Twas from
Ireland that he came,
Where the tanks are full all summer, and the feed
is simply grand ;
And the joker then in vogue said his lessons wid a
brogue —
'Twas unconscious imitation, let the reader under-
stand.
And we learnt the world in scraps from some ancient
dingy maps
Long discarded by the public-schools in town ;
And as nearly every book dated back to Captain
Cook
Our geography was somewhat upside-down.
218 THE OLD BARK SCHOOL
It was 'in the book ' and so — well, at that we'd let it
g°>
For we never would believe that print could lie ;
And we all learnt pretty soon that when we came out
at noon
' The sun is in the south part of the sky.'
And Ireland ! that was known from the coast line to
Athlone :
We got little information re the land that gave us
birth ;
Save that Captain Cook was killed (and was very
likely grilled)
And ' the natives of New Holland are the lowest
race on earth.'
And a woodcut, in its place, of the same degraded
race
Seemed a lot more like a camel than the black-
fellows we knew ;
Jimmy Bullock, with the rest, scratched his head and
gave it best ;
But his faith was sadly shaken by a bobtailed
kangaroo.
THE OLD BARK SCHOOL 219
But the old bark-school is gone, and the spot it stood
upon
Is a cattle-camp in winter where the curlew's cry
is heard ;
There's a brick-school on the flat, but a schoolmate
teaches that,
For, about the time the}' built it, our old master
was ' transferred.'
But the bark-school comes again with exchanges 'cross
the plain —
With the OUT-BACK ADVERTISER ; and my fancy
roams at large
When I read of passing stock, of a western mob or flock,
With ' James Bullock,' ' Grey,' or * Henry Dale ' in
charge.
And I think how Jimmy went from the old bark
school content,
With his * eddication ' finished, with his pack-horse
after him ;
And perhaps if I were back I would take the self-same
track,
For I wish my learning ended when the Master
' finished ' Jim.
TROUBLE ON THE SELECTION
You lazy boy, you're here at last,
You must be wooden-legged :
Now. are you sure the gate is fast
And all the sliprails pegged
And all the milkers at the yard,
The calves all in the pen 1
We don't want Poley's calf to suck
His mother dry again.
And did you mend the broken rail
And make it firm and neat ?
I s'pose you want that brindle steer
All night among the wheat.
And if he finds the lueerne patch,
He'll stuff his belly full;
He'll eat till he gets ' blown ' on that
And busts like Ryan's bull.
220
TROUBLE ON THE SELECTION 221
Old Spot is lost ? You'll drive me mad,
You will, upon my soul !
She might be in the boggy swamps
Or down a digger's hole.
You needn't talk, you never looked ;
You'd find her if you'd choose,
Instead of poking 'possum logs
And hunting kangaroos.
How came your boots as wet as muck 1
You tried to drown the ants !
Why don't you take your bluchers off,
Good Lord, he's tore his pants !
Your father's coming home to-night ;
You'll catch it hot, you'll see.
Now go and wash your filthy face
And come and get your tea.
THE PROFESSIONAL WANDERER
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,
By a fancy that you ought to go and see the folks at
home.
You forget the family quarrels — little things that
used to jar —
And you think of how they'll worry — how they
wonder where you are ;
You will think you served them badly, and your own
part you'll condemn,
And it strikes you that you'll surely be a novelty
to them,
THE PROFESSIONAL WANDERER 223
For your voice has somewhat altered, and your face
has somewhat changed —
And your views of men and matters over wider fields
have ranged.
Then it's time to save your money, or to watch it
(how it goes !) ;
Then it's time to get a ' Gladstone ' and a decent suit
of clothes ;
Then it's time to practise daily with a hair- brush and
a comb,
Till you drop in unexpected on the folks and friends
at home.
When you've been at home for some time, and the
novelty's worn off,
And old chums no longer court you, and your friends
begin to scoff ;
When 4 the girls ' no longer kiss you, crying * Jack !
how you have changed ! '
When you're stale to your relations, and their manner
seems estranged ;
When the old domestic quarrels, round the table
thrice a day,
Make it too much like the old times — make you wish
you'd stayed away,
224 THE PROFESSIONAL WANDERER
When, in short, you've spent your money in the
fulness of your heart,
And your clothes are getting shabby . . . Then
it's high time to depart .
A LITTLE MISTAKE
'Tis a yarn I heard of a new-chum 'trap '
On the edge of the Never-Never,
Where the dead men lie and the black men lie,
And the bushman lies for ever.
'Twas the custom still with the local blacks
To cadge in the ' altogether ' —
They had less respect for our feelings then,
And more respect for the weather.
The trooper said to the sergeant's wife :
* Sure, I wouldn't seem unpleasant ;
' But there's women and childer about the place,
' And — barrin' a lady's present —
' There's ould King Billy wid niver a stitch
' For a month — may the drought cremate him ! —
* Bar the wan we put in his dhirty head,
1 Where his old Queen Mary bate him.
225
226 A LITTLE MISTAKE
' God give her strength !— and a peaceful reign —
' Though she flies in a bit av a passion
* If ony wan hints that her shtoyle an' luks
c Are a trifle behind the fashion.
' There's two of the boys by the stable now —
' Be the powers ! I'll teach the varmints
* To come wid nought but a shirt apiece,
1 And wid dirt for their nay ther garmints.
' Howld on, ye blaggards ! How dare ye dare
* To come widin sight av the houses ? —
c I'll give ye a warnin' all for wance
* An' a couple of ould pair of trousers.'
They took the pants as a child a toy,
The constable's words beguiling
A smile of something beside their joy ;
And they took their departure smiling.
And that very day, when the sun was low,
Two blackfellows came to the station ;
They were filled with the courage of Queensland rum
And bursting with indignation.
A LITTLE MISTAKE 227
The constable noticed, with growing ire,
They'd apparently dressed in a hurry ;
And their language that day, I am sorry to say,
Mostly consisted of ' plurry.'
The constable heard, and he wished himself back
In the land of the bogs and the ditches —
' You plurry big tight-britches p'liceman, what for
' You gibbit our missuses britches 1 '
And this was a case, I am bound to confess,
Where civilisation went under ;
Had one of the gins been less modest in dress
He'd never have made such a blunder.
And here let the moral be duly made known,
And hereafter signed and attested :
We should place more reliance on that which is shown
And less upon what is suggested.
A STUDY IN THE " NOOD
' A SAILOR named Grice was seen by the guard of a goods
train lying close to the railway-line near Warner Town (S.A.)
in a nude condition. He was unconscious, and had lain there
three days, during one of which the glass registed 110 in
the shade. Grice, expressed surprise that the train did not
pick him up.' — Daily paper. In consequence, the muse : —
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,
'Twas a naked condition, or nood,
Which amounts to the same thing, we think)
Uncovered he lay on the grass
That shrivelled and shrunk ; and he stayed
Three hot summer days, while the glass
Was one hundred and ten in the shade.
228
A STUDY IN THE "NOOD" 229
(We nearly remarked that he laid,
But that was bad grammar we thought —
It does sound bucolic, we think
It smacks of the barnyard —
Of farming — of pullets in short.)
Unheeded he lay on the dirt ;
Beside him a part of his dress,
A tattered and threadbare old shirt
Was raised as a flag of distress.
(On a stick, like a flag of distress —
Reversed — we mean that the tail-end was up
Half-mast — on a stick — an evident flag of
distress.)
Perhaps in his dreams he persood
Bright visions of heav'nly bliss ;
And artists who study the nood
Never saw such a study as this.
The * luggage ' went by and the guard
Looked out and his eyes fell on Grice —
We fancy he looked at him hard,
We think that he looked at him twice.
230 A STUDY IN THE "NOOD"
They say (if the telegram's true)
When he woke up he wondered (good Lord !)
4 Why the engine-man didn't heave to —
1 Why the train didn't take him aboard.'
And now, by the case of poor Grice,
We think that a daily express
Should travel with sunshades and ice,
And a lookout for flags of distress.
A WORD TO TEXAS JACK
TEXAS JACK, you are amusin'. By Lord Harry, how
I laughed
When I seen yer rig and saddle with its bulwarks
fore-and-aft ;
Holy smoke ! In such a saddle how the dickens can
yer fall 1
Why, I seen a gal ride bareback with no bridle on at
all!
Gosh ! so-help-me ! strike-me-balmy ! if a bit o'
scenery
Like ter you in all yer rig-out on the earth I ever see !
How I'd like ter see a bushman use yer fixins, Texas
Jack ;
On the remnant of a saddle he can ride to hell and
back.
232 A WORD TO TEXAS JACK
Why, I heerd a mother screamin' when her kid went
tossin' by
Ridin' bareback on a bucker that had murder in his
eye.
What 1 yer come to learn the natives how to squat
on horse's back !
Learn the cornstalk ridin' ! Blazes ! — w'at yer giv'n' us,
Texas Jack 1
Learn the cornstalk — what the flamin', jump tup !
where's my country gone 1
Why, the cornstalk's mother often rides the day afore
he's born !
You may talk about your ridin' in the city, bold an'
free,
Talk o' ridin' in the city, Texas Jack, but where'd yer
be
When the stock horse snorts an' bunches all 'is
quarters in a hump,
And the saddle climbs a sapling, an' the horse-shoes
split a stump 1
No, before yer teach the native you must ride without
a fall
Up a gum or down a gully nigh as steep as any wall —
A WORD TO TEXAS JACK 233
You must swim the roarin' Darlin' when the flood is
at its height
Bearin' down the stock an' stations to the great
Australian Bight.
You can't count the bulls an' bisons that yer copped
with your lassoo —
But a stout old myall bullock p'raps 'ud learn yer
somethin' new ;
Yer'd better make yer will an' leave yer papers neat
an' trim
Before yer make arrangements for the lassooin' of
him ;
Ere you'n' yer horse is catsmeat, fittin' fate for sich
galoots,
And yer saddle's turned to laces like we put in blucher
boots.
And yer say yer death on In j ins ! We've got some-
thin' in yer line —
If yer think your fitin's ekal to the likes of Tommy
Ryan.
Take yer karkass up to Queensland where the ally-
gators chew
And the carpet-snake is handy with his tail for a
lassoo ;
234 A WORD TO TEXAS JACK
Ride across the hazy regins where the lonely emus
wail
An' ye'll find the black'll track yer while yer lookin'
for his trail ;
He can track yer without stoppin' for a thousand miles
or more —
Come again, and he will show yer where yer spit the
year before.
But yer'd best be mighty careful, you'll be sorry you
kem here
When yer skewered to the fakements of yer saddle
with a spear —
When the boomerang is sailin' in the air, may heaven
help yer !
It will cut yer head off goin', an' come back again and
skelp yer.
P.S. — As poet and as Yankee I will greet you, Texas
Jack,
For it isn't no ill-feelin' that is gettin' up my back,
But I won't see this land crowded by each Yank and
British cuss
Who takes it in his head to come a-civilisin' us.
A WORD TO TEXAS JACK 235
So if you feel like shootin' now, don't let yer pistol
cough —
(Our Government is very free at chokin' fellers off) ;
And though on your great continent there's misery in
the towns
An' not a few untitled lords and kings without their
crowns,
I will admit your countrymen is busted big, an' free,
An' great on ekal rites of men and great on liberty ;
I will admit yer fathers punched the gory tyrant's
head,
But then we've got our heroes, too, the diggers that
is dead —
The plucky men of Ballarat who toed the scratch
right well
And broke the nose of Tyranny and made his peepers
swell
For yankin' Lib.'s gold tresses in the roarin' days
gone by,
An' doublin' up his dirty fist to black her bonny eye ;
So when it comes to ridin' mokes, or hoistin' out the
Chow,
Or stickin' up for labour's rights, we don't want
showin' how.
236 A WORD TO TEXAS JACK
They come to learn us cricket in the days of long ago,
An' Hanlan coine from Canada to learn us how to
row,
An' ' doctors ' come from 'Frisco just to learn us how
to skite,
An' ' pugs ' from all the lands on earth to learn us
how to fight ;
An' when they go, as like or not, we find we're taken
in,
They've left behind no larnin' — but they've carried
off our tin.
THE GROG-AN'-GRUMBLE STEEPLECHASE
'TwixT the coastline and the border lay the town of
Grog-an'-Grum ble
In the days before the bushman was a dull 'n'
heartless drudge,
An' they say the local meeting was a drunken rough-
and-tumble,
Which was ended pretty often by an inquest on the
judge.
An' 'tis said the city talent very often caught a
tartar
In the Grog-an'-Grumble sportsman, 'n' retired
with broken heads,
For the fortune, life, and safety of the Grog-an'-
Gruinble starter
Mostly hung upon the finish of the local thorough-
breds.
238 THE GROG-AN'-GRUMBLE STEEPLECHASE
Pat M'Durmer was the owner of a horse they called
the Screamer,
Which he called the ' quickest shtepper 'twixt the
Darling and the sea ;'
And I think it's very doubtful if the stomach-
troubled dreamer
Ever saw a more outrageous piece of equine
scenery ;
For his points were most decided, from his end to his
beginning,
He had eyes of different colour, and his legs they
wasn't mates.
Pat M'Durmer said he always came ' widin a flip av
winning '
An' his sire had come from England, 'n' his dam
was from the States.
Friends would argue with M'Durmer, and they said
he was in error
To put up his horse the Screamer, for he'd lose in
any case,
And they said a city racer by the name of Holy
Terror
Was regarded as the winner of the coming steeple-
chase ;
THE GROG-AN'-GRUMBLE STEEPLECHASE 239
But he said he had the knowledge to come in when
it was raining,
And irrelevantly mentioned that he knew the time
of day,
So he rose in their opinion. It was noticed that the
training
Of the Screamer was conducted in a dark,
mysterious way.
Well, the day arrived in glory; 'twas a day of jubila-
tion
With careless-hearted bushmen for a hundred miles
around,
An' the rum 'n' beer 'n' whisky came in waggons from
the station,
An' the Holy Terror talent were the first upon the
ground.
Judge M'Ard — with whose opinion it was scarcely
safe to wrestle —
Took his dangerous position on the bark-and-sapling
stand :
He was what the local Stiggins used to speak of as a
* wessel
* Of wrath,' and he'd a bludgeon that he carried in
his hand.
240 THE GROG-AN'-GRUMBLE STEEPLECHASE
1 Off ye go !' the starter shouted, as down fell a stupid
jockey-
Off they started in disorder — left the jockey where
he lay —
And they fell and rolled and galloped down the
crooked course and rocky,
Till the pumping of the Screamer could be heard a
mile away.
But he kept his legs and galloped ; he was used to
rugged courses,
And he lumbered down the gully till the ridge
began to quake :
And he ploughed along the siding, raising earth till
other horses
An' their riders, too, were blinded by the dust-
cloud in his wake.
From the ruck he'd struggled slowly — they were
much surprised to find him
Close abeam of Holy Terror as along the flat they
tore —
Even higher still and denser rose the cloud of dust
behind him,
While in more divided splinters flew the shattered
rails before.
THE GROG-AN'-GRUMBLE STEEPLECHASE 241
' Terror !' ' Dead heat !' they were shouting —
1 Terror !' but the Screamer hung out
Nose to nose with Holy Terror as across the creek
they swung,
An' M'Durmer shouted loudly, ' Put yer tongue out !
put yer tongue out !'
An' the Screamer put his tongue out, and he won
by half-a-tongue.
BUT WHAT'S THE USE
BUT what's the use of writing c 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,
Out where the sun is hottest and
The stars are most and brightest.
The crows at sunrise flopping round
Where some poor life has run down ;
The pair of emus trotting from
The lonely tank at sundown,
Their snaky heads well up, and eyes
Well out for man's manoeuvres,
And feathers bobbing round behind
Like fringes round improvers.
242
BUT WHAT'S THE USE 243
The swagman tramping 'cross the plain ;
Good Lord, there's nothing sadder,
Except the dog that slopes behind
His master like a shadder ;
The turkey-tail to scare the flies,
The water-bag and billy ;
The nose-bag getting cruel light,
The traveller getting silly.
The plain that seems to Jackaroos
Like gently sloping rises,
The shrubs and tufts that's miles away
But magnified in sizes ;
The track that seems arisen up
Or else seems gently slopin',
And just a hint of kangaroos
Way out across the open.
The joy and hope the swagman feels
Returning, after shearing,
Or after six months' tramp Out Back,
He strikes the final clearing.
His weary spirit breathes again,
His aching legs seem limber
When to the East across the plain
He spots the Darling Timber !
244 BUT WHAT'S THE USE
But what's the use of writing « bush ' —
Though editors demand it —
For city folk and cockatoos,
They do not understand it.
They're blind to what the whaler sees
The best with eyes shut tightest,
Out where Australia's widest, and
The stars are most and brightest.
JULY, 1905
LIST OF BOOKS
PUBLISHED BY
ANGUS & ROBERTSON
89 CASTLEREAGH STREET, SYDNEY
SOLO IN ENGLAND BY
THE AUSTRALIAN BOOK COMPANY
88 WEST SMITHFIELD, LONDON, E.C.
THE COMMONWEALTH SERIES
Crown 8vo., Is. each (post free h. 3d. each}.
JOE WILSON : New Stories. By HENRY LA WSON
JOE WILSON'S MATES : New Stories. By HENRY LA WSON
ON THE TRACK : Stories. By HENRY LA WSON
OVER THE SLIPRAILS : Stories. By HENRY LA WSON
POPULAR VERSES. By HENRY LA WSON
HUMOROUS VERSES. By HENRY LA WSON
WHILE THE BILLY BOILS : Australian Stories.
First Series. By HENRY LAW SON
WHILE THE BILLY BOILS : Australian Stories.
Second Series. By HENRY LA WSON
MY CHINEE COOK AND OTHER HUMOROUS VERSES.
By BRUXTON STEPHENS
HISTORY OF AUSTRALASIA : From the Earliest Times to
the Inauguration of the Commonwealth.
By A. W. JOSE
HISTORY OF AUSTRALIAN BUSHRANGING.
By CHARLES WHITE
PART I. — THE EARLY DAYS.
PART II.— 1850 TO 1862.
PART III.— 1863 TO 1869.
PART IV.— 1869 TO 1878.
*#* For press notices of these books see the cloth-bound editions
on pages 3, 4, 5, 7, 10, 15, and 18 of this catalogue.
JOE WILSON AND HIS MATES.
BY HENRY LAWSON, Author of " While the Billy
Boils"; "When the World was Wide and Other
Verses " ; " Verses, Popular and Humorous " ; " On
the Track and Over the Sliprails."
Crown 8 vo, cloth gilt, 3s. 6d. (post Jree 4s.) ;
in paper covers, 2s. 6d. (post free 3s.)
For Cheaper Edition see Commonwealth Series, page 2.
The Athenaeum (London) : " This is a long way
the best work Mr. Lawson has yet given us. These
stories are so good that (from the literary point
of view, of course) one hopes they are not auto-
biographical. As autobiography they would be good ;
as pure fiction they are more of an attainment/'
The Argus : " More tales of the Joe Wilson series
are promised, and this will be gratifying to Mr.
Lawson' s admirers, for on the whole the sketches are
the best work the writer has so far accomplished."
The Academy : " I have never read anything in
modern English literature that is so absolutely demo-
cratic in tone, so much the real thing, as Joe Wilson's
Courtship ; and so with all Lawson's tales and sketches.
Tolstoy and Howells, and Whitman and Kipling, and
Zola and Hauptmanu and Gorky have all written
descriptions of ' democratic ' life, but none of these
celebrated authors, not even Maupassant himself, has
so absolutely taken us inside the life as do the tales
Joe Wilson's Courtship and A Double Buggy at Lahey's
Creek, and it is this rare convincing tone of this
Australian writer that gives him a great value. The
most casual 'newspapery' and apparently artless art
of this Australian writer carries with it a truer, finer,
more delicate commentary on life than all the idealistic
works of any of our genteel school of writers/'
ON THE TRACK AND OVER
THE SLIPRAILS.
STORIES BY HENRY LAWSON, Author of " While
the Billy Boils," "Joe Wilson and his Mates,"
"When the World Was Wide and Other Verses,"
and "Verses, Popular and Humorous."
Crown 8vo, cloth gilt, 3s. 6d. (fwstfree 4s.).
For Cheaper Edition see Commonwealth Series, page 9.
Daily Chronicle : " Will well sustain the reputation
its author has already won as the best writer of
Australian short stories and sketches the literary
world knows. Henry Lawson has the art, possessed
in such eminent degree by Mr. J. M. Barrie, of
sketching in a character and suggesting a whole
life-story in a single sentence."
Pall Mall Gazette : " The volume now received will
do much to enhance the author's reputation. There
is all the quiet irresistible humour of Dickens in the
description of ' The Darling E/iver/ and the creator of
1 Truthful James ' never did anything better in the way
of character sketches than Steelman and Mitchell.
Mr. Lawson has a master's sense of what is dramatic,
and he can bring out strong effects in a few touches.
Humour and pathos, comedy and tragedy, are equally
at his command."
Glasgow Herald : " Mr. Lawson must now be
regarded as facile princeps in the production of the
short tale. Some of these brief and even slight
sketches are veritable gems that would be spoiled by
an added word, and without a word that can be looked
upon as superfluous."
Melbourne Punch : " Often the little stories are
wedges cut clean out of life, and presented with
artistic truth and vivid colour."
WHILE THE BILLY BOILS.
STORIES BY HENRY LAWSON, Author o! "When
the World Was Wide -and Other Verses," "Joe
Wilson and his Mates," "On the Track and Over
the Sliprails," and "Verses, Popular and Humorous."
Twenty-third Thousand. With eight plates
and vignette title, by P. P. Mahony. Crown
8vo, cloth gilt, 3s. 6d. (post free 4s.).
For Cheaper Edition see Commomcealth Series, page 2.
The Academy : ' ' A book of honest, direct, sympa-
thetic,, humorous writing about Australia from within
is worth a library of travellers' tales. . . . The
result is a real book — a book in a hundred. His
language is terse, supple, and richly idiomatic. He
can tell a yarn with the best."
Literature : " A book which Mrs. Campbell Praed
assured me made her feel that all she had written of
bush life was pale and ineffective."
The Spectator : " It is strange that one we would
venture to call the greatest Australian writer should
be practically unknown in England. Mr. Lawson
is a less experienced writer than Mr. Kipling, and
more unequal, but there are two or three sketches in
this volume which for vigour and truth can hold their
own with even so great a rival."
The Times : " A collection of short and vigorous
studies and stories of Australian life and character.
A little in Bret Harte's manner, crossed, perhaps, with
that of Guy de Maupassant."
The Scotsman : " There is no lack of dramatic
imagination in the construction of the tales ; and the
best of them contrive to construct a strong sensational
situation in a couple of pages."
WHEN THE WORLD WAS WIDE
AND OTHER VERSES.
BY HENRY LA WSON, Author of " While the Billy
Boils," "Joe Wilson and his Mates," "On the
Track and Over the Sliprails," and " Verses, Popular
and Humorous."
Twelfth Thousand. With photogravure
portrait and vignette title. Crown 8vo,
cloth gilt, gilt top, 5s. (post free 5s. 5d.).
Presentation edition., French Morocco, gilt edges, 9s.
The Speaker (LONDON) : " There are poems in ' In
the Days when the World was Wide ' which are of a
higher mood than any yet heard in distinctively Aus-
tralian poetry."
The Academy : "These ballads (for such they mostly
are) abound in spirit and manhood, in the colour and
smell of Australian soil. They deserve the popularity
which they have won in Australia, and which, we
trust, this edition will now give them in England."
Newcastle Weekly Chronicle : " Swinging, rhyth-
Sydney Morning- Herald: "The verses have
natural vigour, the writer has a rough, true faculty
of characterisation, and the book is racy of the soil
from cover to cover."
Bulletin: "How graphic he is, how natural, how
true, how strong."
OtagfO Witness : " It were well to have such books
upon our shelves. . . . They are true history."
I
VERSES: POPULAR AND
HUMOROUS.
By HENRY LAWSON, Author of "When the
World was Wide, and Other Verses," "Joe Wilson
and His Mates," " On the Track and Over the Slip-
rails," and « While the Billy Boils."
Crown 8vo, cloth gilt, 3s. 6d. (post free 4s.).
For Cheaper Edition see Commonwealth Series, page 2.
FEANCIS THOMPSON, in The Daily Chronicle : " He
is a writer of strong and ringing ballad verse, who
gets his blows straight in, and at his best makes them
all tell. He can vignette the life he knows in a few
touches, and in this book shows an increased power of
selection."
Academy : " Mr. Lawson's work should be well
known to our readers ; for we have urged them often
enough to make acquaintance with it. He has the
gift of movement, and ne rarely offers a loose rhyme.
Technically, short of anxious lapidary work, these
verses are excellent. He varies sentiment and humour
very agreeably."
New York Evening Journal : " Such pride as a
man feels when he has true greatness as his guest,
this newspaper feels in introducing to a million
readers a man of ability hitherto unknown to them.
Henry Lawson is his name."
The Book Lover : " Any book of Lawson's should
be bought and treasured by all who care for the real
beginnings of Australian literature. As a matter of
fact, he is the one Australian literary product, in any
distinctive sense."
THE MAN FROM SNOWY RIVER
AND OTHER VERSES.
BY A. B. PATERSON.
Thirtieth Thousand. With photogravure
portrait and vignette title. Crown 8vo,
cloth gilt, gilt top, 5s. (post free 5s. 5d.).
Presentation edition, French Morocco, yilt edges, 9s.
The Literary Year Book: "The immediate
success of this book of bush ballads is without parallel
in Colonial literary annals, nor can any living English
or American poet boast so wide a public, always
excepting Mr. Rudyard Kipling."
The Times : " At his best he compares not unfavour-
ably with the author of ( Barrack Room Ballads.' '
Spectator : " These lines have the true lyrical cry
in them. Eloquent and ardent verses/*
Athenaeum : " Swinging, rattling ballads of ready
humour, ready pathos, and crowding adventure.
Stirring and entertaining ballads about great
rides, in which the lines gallop like the very hoofs of
the horses."
Mr. A. PATCHETT MARTIN, in Literature (London) :
" In my opinion it is the absolutely un-English,
thoroughly Australian style and character of these
new bush bards which has given them such immediate
popularity, such wide vogue, among all classes of the
rising native generation."
London: Macmillan <£ Co., Limited.
8
RIO GRANGE'S LAST RACE AND
OTHER VERSES.
BY A. B. PATERSON.
Fifth Thousand. Crown 8vo, cloth gilt,
gilt top, 5s. (post free 5s. 5d.).
Spectator : 4f There is no mistaking the vigour of
Mr. Paterson's verse ; there is no difficulty in feeling
the strong human interest which moves in it."
Daily Mail : " Every way worthy of the man who
ranks with the first of Australian poets."
Scotsman : " At once naturalistic and imaginative,
and racy without being slangy, the poems have always
a strong human interest of every-day life to keep
them going. They make a book which should give
an equal pleasure to simple and to fastidious readers."
Bookman : " Now and again a deeper theme, like
an echo from the older, more experienced land, leads
him to more serious singing, and proves that real
poetry is, after all, universal. It is a hearty book."
Daily Chronicle : " Mr. Paterson has powerful and
varied sympathies, coupled with a genuine lyrical
impulse, and some skill, which make his attempts
always attractive and usually successful."
Glasgow Herald : " These are all entertaining, their
rough and ready wit and virility of expression making
them highly acceptable, while the dash of satire gives
point to the humour."
London : MacmiUan & Co. , Limited
9
THE POETICAL WORKS OF
BRUNTON STEPHENS.
New edition, with photogravure portrait.
Crown 8vo, cloth gilt, gilt top, 5s. (post
free 5s. 5d.\
See also Commonwealth Series, page 2.
The Times (London) : " This collection of the works
of the Queensland poet, who has for a generation
deservedly held a high place in Australian literature,
well deserves study."
The Athenaeum: "Brunton Stephens, .... well
known to all those who are curious in Australian
literature, as being, on the whole, the best of
Australian poets/'
Daily News: "In turning over the pages of this
volume one is struck by his breadth, his versatility,
his compass, as evidenced in theme, sentiment, and
style."
St. James' Gazette : " This substantial volume of
verse contains a great deal that is very fresh and
pleasing, whether grave or gay."
Manchester Guardian : " He shows a capacity for
forceful and rhetorical verse, which makes a fit
vehicle for Imperial themes/'
Speaker : " We gladly recognise the merit of much
that appears in The Poetical Works of Mr. Brunton
Stephens In the more ambitious pieces
(and in these the author is most successful) he models
himself on good masters, and his strains have power
and dignity."
10
A BUSH GIRL'S SONGS.
By 'RENA WALLACE.
With portrait. Crown 8vo., cloth gilt, gilt
top, 5s. (post free 5s. 4d.).
Sydney Daily Telegraph .- " There is passion as
well as melody in ' A Bush Girl's Songs ' ; and there
is thought also — real thought, that underlies the
music of the verse and gives the writer something
definite to communicate to her readers on the great
universal subjects that are the province of true poetry,
as distinct from mere verse. One cannot help remark-
ing with pleasure the prevailing note of hopefulness,
a sunshiny charm, that is felt throughout all this fresh
young writer's work. Miss 'Rena Wallace knows how
to be pathetic without being gloomy, and the morbid
pessimism, which marks so much of modern verse, is
delightfully absent."
Wellington (N.Z.) Mail: " Endowed with a musical
ear, and gifted with a facility of expression, our
authoress has woven together much that at once
strikes the ear as pleasing and musical verse."
Adelaide Advertiser : " There is melody and sweet-
ness and rhythm in them, and they are fresh from
nature's school."
11
WINSLOW PLAIN.
By SARAH P. McL. GREENE, Author of " Flood-
Tide," " Vesty of the Basins," <fec.
Crown 8vo, cloth gilt, with portrait, 3s. 6d.
(post free 4s.).
Sydney Daily Telegraph : " It is brimful of actu-
ality set with delicate embroidery of imagination and
of humour. It is pervaded by boys prankish, irresis-
tible, genuine."
Melbourne Age : " The Studies of New England
Life and Character presented to us in ' Winslow
Plain ' are fresh, vigorous and original."
FLOOD-TIDE.
BY SARAH P. McL. GREENE, Author of " Vesty
of the Basins," &c.
Cloth gilt, 3s. 6d. (post free 4s.).
The Times (MINNEAPOLIS) : " For gentle humour
that steals away all the cares and worries of living, I
can commend this book/'
VESTY OF THE BASINS.
BY SARAH P. McL GREENE, Author of « Wins-
low Plain," &c.
Crown 8vo, cloth gilt, 3s. 6d. (post free 4s.).
12
RHYMES FROM THE MINES
AND OTHER LINES.
BY EDWARD DYSON, Author of "A Golden Shanty.'
Second Thousand. With photogravure
portrait and vignette title. Crown 8vo.
cloth gilt, gilt top, 5s. (post free 5s. 5d.).
Presentation edition, French Morocco, gilt edges, 9s.
THE SPIRIT OF THE BUSH FIRE
AND OTHER AUSTRALIAN FAIRY
TALES.
BY J. M. WHITFELD.
Second Thousand. With 32 illustrations
by G. W. Lambert. Crown 8vo, cloth gilt,
2s. 6d. (post free 3s.).
Sydney Morning: Herald : " It is frankly written
for the young folks, and the youngster will find a
delight in Miss Whitfeld's marvellous company."
PRESBYTERIAN WOMEN'S
MISSIONARY ASSOCIATION
COOKERY BOOK.
Eighth Edition, enlarged, completing the
60th Thousand. Crown 8vo, cloth, Is.
(post free Is. 3d.).
13
THE GROWTH OF THE EMPIRE.
A Handbook to the History of Greater Britain.
BY ARTHUR W. JOSE, Author of " A Short History
of Australasia."
Second Edition. With 14 Maps. Crown
8vo, cloth gilt 5s. (post free 5s. 6d.).
Morning Post : "This book is published in Sydney,
but it deserves to be circulated throughout the United
Kingdom. The picture of the fashion in which British
enterprise made its way from settlement to settlement
has never been drawn more vividly than in these pages.
Mr. Jose's style is crisp and pleasant, now and then
even rising to eloquence on his grand theme. His
book deserves wide popularity, and it has the rare
merit of being so written as to be attractive alike to
the young student and to the mature man of letters."
Literature: "He has studied thoroughly, and
writes vigorously. . . . Admirably done. . . .
We commend it to Britons the world over."
Saturday Review : " He writes Imperially ; he also
often writes sympathetically. . . . We cannot
close Mr. Jose's creditable account of our misdoings
without a glow of national pride."
Yorkshire Post : " A brighter short history we do
not know, and this book deserves for the matter and
the manner of it to be as well known as Mr.
McCarthy's < History of Our Own Times/ "
The Scotsman : " This admirable work is a solid
octavo of more than 400 pages. It is a thoughtful,
well written, and well-arranged history. There are
fourteen excellent maps to illustrate the text."
14
HISTORY OF AUSTRALASIA.
From the Earliest Times to the Inauguration of the
Commonwealth.
BY ARTHUR W. JOSE, Author of " The Growth of
the Empire." The chapter on Federation revised by
R. R. Garran, C.M.G.
With 6 maps and 64 portraits and illustra-
tions. Crown 8vo, cloth, Is. 6d. (post
free Is. 10d.).
For Cheaper Edition see Commonwealth Series, page 9.
The Book Lover : " The ignorance of the average
Australian youth about the brief history of his native
land is often deplorable. . . . ' A Short History
of Australasia/ by Arthur W. Jose, just provides the
thing wanted. Mr. Jose's previous historical work
was most favourably received in England, and this
story of our land is capitally done. It is not too
long, and it is brightly written. Its value is consider-
ably enhanced by the useful maps and interesting illus-
trations."
Victorian Education Gazette: "The language is
graphic and simple, and there is much evidence of
careful work and acquaintance with original docu-
ments, which give the reader confidence in the
accuracy of the details. The low price of the book
leaves young Australia no excuse for remaining in
ignorance of the history of their native land."
Town and Country Journal: "The language is
graphic and simple, and he has maintained the unity
and continuity of the story of events despite the
necessity of following the subject along the seven
branches corresponding with the seven separate
colonies."
15
THE GEOLOGY OF SYDNEY AND
THE BLUE MOUNTAINS.
A Popular Introduction to the Study of Australian
Geology.
BY REV. J. MILNE CURRAN, late Lecturer in
Chemistry and Geology, Technical College, Sydney.
Second Edition. With a Glossary of Scien-
tific terms, a Reference List of commonly-
occurring Fossils, 2 coloured maps, and 83
illustrations. Crown 8vo, cloth gilt, 6s.
(post free, 6s. 6d.)
Nature : " This is, strictly speaking, an elementary
manual of geology. The general plan of the work is
good ; the book is well printed and illustrated with
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SIMPLE TESTS FOR MINERALS;
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CAUSERIES FAMILIERES ; OR
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THE AUSTRALIAN OBJECT
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CIVICS AND MORALS.
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SOLUTIONS OF TEACHERS'
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SOLUTIONS OF TEACHERS'
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GUIDE TO THE
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A NEW BOOK OF SONGS FOR
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GEOGRAPHY OF AUSTRALIA
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THE METRIC SYSTEM OF
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28
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32
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