In the Days When the World Was Wide and Other Verses Part 8

_They knelt around, He raised his head And faintly gasped, 'Jack Denver's dead, Roll up at Talbragar!'_

But one short hour before he died he woke to understand, They told him, when he asked them, that the funeral was 'grand'; And then there came into his eyes a strange victorious light, He smiled on them in triumph, and his great soul took its flight.

And still the careless bushmen tell by tent and shanty bar How Duggan raised a funeral years back on Talbragar.

_And far and wide When Duggan died, The bushmen of the western side Rode in to Talbragar._

The Star of Australasia

We boast no more of our bloodless flag, that rose from a nation's slime; Better a shred of a deep-dyed rag from the storms of the olden time.

From grander clouds in our 'peaceful skies' than ever were there before I tell you the Star of the South shall rise -- in the lurid clouds of war.

It ever must be while blood is warm and the sons of men increase; For ever the nations rose in storm, to rot in a deadly peace.

There comes a point that we will not yield, no matter if right or wrong, And man will fight on the battle-field while pa.s.sion and pride are strong -- So long as he will not kiss the rod, and his stubborn spirit sours, And the scorn of Nature and curse of G.o.d are heavy on peace like ours.

There are boys out there by the western creeks, who hurry away from school To climb the sides of the breezy peaks or dive in the shaded pool, Who'll stick to their guns when the mountains quake to the tread of a mighty war, And fight for Right or a Grand Mistake as men never fought before; When the peaks are scarred and the sea-walls crack till the furthest hills vibrate, And the world for a while goes rolling back in a storm of love and hate.

There are boys to-day in the city slum and the home of wealth and pride Who'll have one home when the storm is come, and fight for it side by side, Who'll hold the cliffs 'gainst the armoured h.e.l.ls that batter a coastal town, Or grimly die in a hail of sh.e.l.ls when the walls come cras.h.i.+ng down.

And many a pink-white baby girl, the queen of her home to-day, Shall see the wings of the tempest whirl the mist of our dawn away -- Shall live to shudder and stop her ears to the thud of the distant gun, And know the sorrow that has no tears when a battle is lost and won, -- As a mother or wife in the years to come, will kneel, wild-eyed and white, And pray to G.o.d in her darkened home for the 'men in the fort to-night'.

But, oh! if the cavalry charge again as they did when the world was wide, 'Twill be grand in the ranks of a thousand men in that glorious race to ride And strike for all that is true and strong, for all that is grand and brave, And all that ever shall be, so long as man has a soul to save.

He must lift the saddle, and close his 'wings', and shut his angels out, And steel his heart for the end of things, who'd ride with a stockman scout, When the race they ride on the battle track, and the waning distance hums, And the sh.e.l.led sky shrieks or the rifles crack like stockwhip amongst the gums -- And the 'straight' is reached and the field is 'gapped'

and the hoof-torn sward grows red With the blood of those who are handicapped with iron and steel and lead; And the gaps are filled, though unseen by eyes, with the spirit and with the shades Of the world-wide rebel dead who'll rise and rush with the Bush Brigades.

All creeds and trades will have soldiers there -- give every cla.s.s its due -- And there'll be many a clerk to spare for the pride of the jackeroo.

They'll fight for honour and fight for love, and a few will fight for gold, For the devil below and for G.o.d above, as our fathers fought of old; And some half-blind with exultant tears, and some stiff-lipped, stern-eyed, For the pride of a thousand after-years and the old eternal pride; The soul of the world they will feel and see in the chase and the grim retreat -- They'll know the glory of victory -- and the grandeur of defeat.

The South will wake to a mighty change ere a hundred years are done With a.r.s.enals west of the mountain range and every spur its gun.

And many a rickety son of a gun, on the tides of the future tossed, Will tell how battles were really won that History says were lost, Will trace the field with his pipe, and s.h.i.+rk the facts that are hard to explain, As grey old mates of the diggings work the old ground over again -- How 'this was our centre, and this a redoubt, and that was a scrub in the rear, And this was the point where the guards held out, and the enemy's lines were here.'

They'll tell the tales of the nights before and the tales of the s.h.i.+p and fort Till the sons of Australia take to war as their fathers took to sport, Their breath come deep and their eyes grow bright at the tales of our chivalry, And every boy will want to fight, no matter what cause it be -- When the children run to the doors and cry: 'Oh, mother, the troops are come!'

And every heart in the town leaps high at the first loud thud of the drum.

They'll know, apart from its mystic charm, what music is at last, When, proud as a boy with a broken arm, the regiment marches past.

And the veriest wreck in the drink-fiend's clutch, no matter how low or mean, Will feel, when he hears the march, a touch of the man that he might have been.

And fools, when the fiends of war are out and the city skies aflame, Will have something better to talk about than an absent woman's shame, Will have something n.o.bler to do by far than jest at a friend's expense, Or blacken a name in a public bar or over a backyard fence.

And this you learn from the libelled past, though its methods were somewhat rude -- A nation's born where the sh.e.l.ls fall fast, or its lease of life renewed.

We in part atone for the ghoulish strife, and the crimes of the peace we boast, And the better part of a people's life in the storm comes uppermost.

The self-same spirit that drives the man to the depths of drink and crime Will do the deeds in the heroes' van that live till the end of time.

The living death in the lonely bush, the greed of the selfish town, And even the creed of the outlawed push is chivalry -- upside down.

'Twill be while ever our blood is hot, while ever the world goes wrong, The nations rise in a war, to rot in a peace that lasts too long.

And southern nation and southern state, aroused from their dream of ease, Must sign in the Book of Eternal Fate their stormy histories.

The Great Grey Plain

Out West, where the stars are brightest, Where the scorching north wind blows, And the bones of the dead gleam whitest, And the sun on a desert glows -- Yet within the selfish kingdom Where man starves man for gain, Where white men tramp for existence -- Wide lies the Great Grey Plain.

No break in its awful horizon, No blur in the dazzling haze, Save where by the bordering timber The fierce, white heat-waves blaze, And out where the tank-heap rises Or looms when the sunlights wane, Till it seems like a distant mountain Low down on the Great Grey Plain.

No sign of a stream or fountain, No spring on its dry, hot breast, No shade from the blazing noontide Where a weary man might rest.

Whole years go by when the glowing Sky never clouds for rain -- Only the shrubs of the desert Grow on the Great Grey Plain.

From the camp, while the rich man's dreaming, Come the 'traveller' and his mate, In the ghastly dawnlight seeming Like a swagman's ghost out late; And the horseman blurs in the distance, While still the stars remain, A low, faint dust-cloud haunting His track on the Great Grey Plain.

And all day long from before them The mirage smokes away -- That daylight ghost of an ocean Creeps close behind all day With an evil, snake-like motion, As the waves of a madman's brain: 'Tis a phantom NOT like water Out there on the Great Grey Plain.

There's a run on the Western limit Where a man lives like a beast, And a shanty in the mulga That stretches to the East; And the hopeless men who carry Their swags and tramp in pain -- The footmen must not tarry Out there on the Great Grey Plain.

Out West, where the stars are brightest, Where the scorching north wind blows, And the bones of the dead seem whitest, And the sun on a desert glows -- Out back in the hungry distance That brave hearts dare in vain -- Where beggars tramp for existence -- There lies the Great Grey Plain.

'Tis a desert not more barren Than the Great Grey Plain of years, Where a fierce fire burns the hearts of men -- Dries up the fount of tears: Where the victims of a greed insane Are crushed in a h.e.l.l-born strife -- Where the souls of a race are murdered On the Great Grey Plain of Life!

The Song of Old Joe Swallow

When I was up the country in the rough and early days, I used to work along ov Jimmy Nowlett's bullick-drays; Then the reelroad wasn't heered on, an' the bush was wild an' strange, An' we useter draw the timber from the saw-pits in the range -- Load provisions for the stations, an' we'd travel far and slow Through the plains an' 'cross the ranges in the days of long ago.

_Then it's yoke up the bullicks and tramp beside 'em slow, An' saddle up yer horses an' a-ridin' we will go, To the bullick-drivin', cattle-drovin', n.i.g.g.e.r, digger, roarin', rovin'

Days o' long ago._

Once me and Jimmy Nowlett loaded timber for the town, But we hadn't gone a dozen mile before the rain come down, An' me an' Jimmy Nowlett an' the bullicks an' the dray Was cut off on some risin' ground while floods around us lay; An' we soon run short of tucker an' terbacca, which was bad, An' pertaters dipped in honey was the only tuck we had.

An' half our bullicks perished when the drought was on the land, An' the burnin' heat that dazzles as it dances on the sand; When the sun-baked clay an' gravel paves for miles the burnin' creeks, An' at ev'ry step yer travel there a rottin' carcase reeks -- But we pulled ourselves together, for we never used ter know What a feather bed was good for in those days o' long ago.

But in spite ov barren ridges an' in spite ov mud an' heat, An' dust that browned the bushes when it rose from bullicks' feet, An' in spite ov cold and chilblains when the bush was white with frost, An' in spite of muddy water where the burnin' plain was crossed, An' in spite of modern progress, and in spite of all their blow, 'Twas a better land to live in, in the days o' long ago.