The Man From Snowy River | Page 7

his shearing mate who wrote it, and verbatim I will quote it: `Clancy's gone to Queensland droving, and we don't know where he are.'
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In my wild erratic fancy visions come to me of Clancy?Gone a-droving `down the Cooper' where the Western drovers go; As the stock are slowly stringing, Clancy rides behind them singing, For the drover's life has pleasures that the townsfolk never know.
And the bush hath friends to meet him, and their kindly voices greet him In the murmur of the breezes and the river on its bars,?And he sees the vision splendid of the sunlit plains extended, And at night the wond'rous glory of the everlasting stars.
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I am sitting in my dingy little office, where a stingy?Ray of sunlight struggles feebly down between the houses tall, And the foetid air and gritty of the dusty, dirty city?Through the open window floating, spreads its foulness over all
And in place of lowing cattle, I can hear the fiendish rattle Of the tramways and the 'buses making hurry down the street, And the language uninviting of the gutter children fighting, Comes fitfully and faintly through the ceaseless tramp of feet.
And the hurrying people daunt me, and their pallid faces haunt me As they shoulder one another in their rush and nervous haste, With their eager eyes and greedy, and their stunted forms and weedy, For townsfolk have no time to grow, they have no time to waste.
And I somehow rather fancy that I'd like to change with Clancy, Like to take a turn at droving where the seasons come and go, While he faced the round eternal of the cash-book and the journal -- But I doubt he'd suit the office, Clancy, of `The Overflow'.
Conroy's Gap
This was the way of it, don't you know --?Ryan was `wanted' for stealing sheep,?And never a trooper, high or low,?Could find him -- catch a weasel asleep!?Till Trooper Scott, from the Stockman's Ford --?A bushman, too, as I've heard them tell --?Chanced to find him drunk as a lord?Round at the Shadow of Death Hotel.
D'you know the place? It's a wayside inn,?A low grog-shanty -- a bushman trap,?Hiding away in its shame and sin?Under the shelter of Conroy's Gap --?Under the shade of that frowning range,?The roughest crowd that ever drew breath --?Thieves and rowdies, uncouth and strange,?Were mustered round at the Shadow of Death.
The trooper knew that his man would slide?Like a dingo pup, if he saw the chance;?And with half a start on the mountain side?Ryan would lead him a merry dance.?Drunk as he was when the trooper came,?To him that did not matter a rap --?Drunk or sober, he was the same,?The boldest rider in Conroy's Gap.
`I want you, Ryan,' the trooper said,?`And listen to me, if you dare resist,?So help me heaven, I'll shoot you dead!'?He snapped the steel on his prisoner's wrist,?And Ryan, hearing the handcuffs click,?Recovered his wits as they turned to go,?For fright will sober a man as quick?As all the drugs that the doctors know.
There was a girl in that rough bar?Went by the name of Kate Carew,?Quiet and shy as the bush girls are,?But ready-witted and plucky, too.?She loved this Ryan, or so they say,?And passing by, while her eyes were dim?With tears, she said in a careless way,?`The Swagman's round in the stable, Jim.'
Spoken too low for the trooper's ear,?Why should she care if he heard or not??Plenty of swagmen far and near,?And yet to Ryan it meant a lot.?That was the name of the grandest horse?In all the district from east to west?In every show ring, on every course?They always counted the Swagman best.
He was a wonder, a raking bay --?One of the grand old Snowdon strain --?One of the sort that could race and stay?With his mighty limbs and his length of rein.?Born and bred on the mountain side,?He could race through scrub like a kangaroo,?The girl herself on his back might ride,?And the Swagman would carry her safely through.
He would travel gaily from daylight's flush?Till after the stars hung out their lamps,?There was never his like in the open bush,?And never his match on the cattle-camps.?For faster horses might well be found?On racing tracks, or a plain's extent,?But few, if any, on broken ground?Could see the way that the Swagman went.
When this girl's father, old Jim Carew,?Was droving out on the Castlereagh?With Conroy's cattle, a wire came through?To say that his wife couldn't live the day.?And he was a hundred miles from home,?As flies the crow, with never a track,?Through plains as pathless as ocean's foam,?He mounted straight on the Swagman's back.
He left the camp by the sundown light,?And the settlers out on the Marthaguy?Awoke and heard, in the dead of night,?A single horseman hurrying by.?He crossed the Bogan at Dandaloo,?And many a