Saltbush Bill J.P., and Other Verses | Page 7

that ride the Robbo style, and bump at every stride; While
others sit a long way back, to get a longer ride.
There's some that ride
like sailors do, with legs and arms, and teeth; And some ride on the
horse's neck, and some ride underneath.
But all the finest horsemen out -- the men to Beat the Band -- You'll
find amongst the crowd that ride their races in the Stand. They'll say
"He had the race in hand, and lost it in the straight." They'll show how
Godby came too soon, and Barden came too late.

They'll say Chevalley lost his nerve, and Regan lost his head; They'll
tell how one was "livened up" and something else was "dead" -- In fact,
the race was never run on sea, or sky, or land,
But what you'd get it
better done by riders in the Stand.
The rule holds good in everything in life's uncertain fight; You'll find
the winner can't go wrong, the loser can't go right. You ride a slashing
race, and lose -- by one and all you're banned! Ride like a bag of flour,
and win -- they'll cheer you in the Stand.
Waltzing Matilda
(Carrying a Swag.)
Oh! there once was a swagman camped in the Billabong,
Under the
shade of a Coolabah tree;
And he sang as he looked at his old billy
boiling,
"Who'll come a-waltzing Matilda with me."
Who'll come a-waltzing Matilda, my darling,
Who'll come a-waltzing
Matilda with me?
Waltzing Matilda and leading a water-bag --

Who'll come a-waltzing Matilda with me?
Down came a jumbuck to drink at the water-hole,
Up jumped the
swagman and grabbed him in glee;
And he sang as he put him away
in his tucker-bag,
"You'll come a-waltzing Matilda with me!"
Down came the Squatter a-riding his thorough-bred;
Down came
Policemen -- one, two, and three.
"Whose is the jumbuck you've got
in the tucker-bag?
You'll come a-waltzing Matilda with me."
But the swagman, he up and he jumped in the water-hole,
Drowning
himself by the Coolabah tree;
And his ghost may be heard as it sings
in the Billabong,
"Who'll come a-waltzing Matilda with me?"
An Answer to Various Bards

Well, I've waited mighty patient while they all came rolling in, Mister
Lawson, Mister Dyson, and the others of their kin,
With their
dreadful, dismal stories of the Overlander's camp, How his fire is
always smoky, and his boots are always damp; And they paint it so
terrific it would fill one's soul with gloom, But you know they're fond
of writing about "corpses" and "the tomb". So, before they curse the
bushland they should let their fancy range, And take something for
their livers, and be cheerful for a change.
Now, for instance, Mr. Lawson -- well, of course, we almost cried At
the sorrowful description how his "little 'Arvie" died, And we
lachrymosed in silence when "His Father's Mate" was slain; Then he
went and killed the father, and we had to weep again. Ben Duggan and
Jack Denver, too, he caused them to expire, And he went and cooked
the gander of Jack Dunn, of Nevertire; So, no doubt, the bush is
wretched if you judge it by the groan Of the sad and soulful poet with a
graveyard of his own.
And he spoke in terms prophetic of a revolution's heat,
When the
world should hear the clamour of those people in the street; But the
shearer chaps who start it -- why, he rounds on them in blame, And he
calls 'em "agitators" who are living on the game.
But I "over-write"
the bushmen! Well, I own without a doubt That I always see a hero in
the "man from furthest out".
I could never contemplate him through
an atmosphere of gloom, And a bushman never struck me as a subject
for "the tomb".
If it ain't all "golden sunshine" where the "wattle branches wave", Well,
it ain't all damp and dismal, and it ain't all "lonely grave". And, of
course, there's no denying that the bushman's life is rough, But a man
can easy stand it if he's built of sterling stuff; Tho' it's seldom that the
drover gets a bed of eider-down, Yet the man who's born a bushman, he
gets mighty sick of town, For he's jotting down the figures, and he's
adding up the bills While his heart is simply aching for a sight of
Southern hills.
Then he hears a wool-team passing with a rumble and a lurch, And,

although the work is pressing, yet it brings him off his perch. For it stirs
him like a message from his station friends afar And he seems to sniff
the ranges in the scent of wool and tar; And it takes him back in fancy,
half in laughter, half in tears, To a sound of other voices and a thought
of other years,
When the woolshed rang with bustle