 CHAPTER XIV of Popular and Humorous Verses by Henry Lawson. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. O'Hara, Justice of the Peace. James Patrick O'Hara, the Justice of Peace. He bossed the PM, 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 we elected as mayor was he, the flies couldn't roost on O'Hara, J.P. Now Sandy McFly, of the ax and the saw, was charged with a breach of the licensing law. He sold after hours whilst talking to Free on matters concerning O'Hara, J.P. And each contradicted the next witness flat, concerning back parlours, side doors, and all that. T'was very conflicting, as all must agree. He'd better take care, said O'Hara, J.P. That baby the barmaid her evidence gave, a poor timid darling who tried to be brave. Now don't be afraid, if it's frightening you 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 women 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, J.P. Case postponed. T'was early next morning, or late the same night, T'was early next morning, we think would be right, and sounds that be token a breach of the law, escape through the cracks of the axe and the saw, and Constable Dogarty, 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, while pantomime hinting of revels within. Will drop on McFly, if you listen to me, and prove your right to O'Hara, J.P. But Clancy was up to the lay of the land. He cautiously shaded his mouth with his hand. Wished, man, hold your wished, or its ruined will be. It's the justice himself, it's O'Hara, J.P. They hished and they wished, and turned themselves round, and got themselves off like two cats on wet ground, agreeing to be on their honor 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 I at the keyhole could see, in less than a wink, T'was O'Hara, J.P. 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 sighed 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 eukase 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 knew not the power of barmaids and beer, don't see for yourself from temptation, steer free, remember the fall of O'Hara, J.P. End of Chapter 40, Chapter No. 41 of Popular and Humorous Verses, by Henry Lawson. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Bill and Jim Fall Out Bill and Jim are mates no longer, they would scorn the name of mate, those two bushmen hate each other with a soul consuming hate, yet erstwhile they were as brothers should be, though they never will, nor 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 to us Jim who always itched, soot, to argify, they would on most abstract subjects contradict each other flat, and at times in lurid language they were mates in spite of that. Bill believed the Bible story, read 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 Blutcher's Persians won the fight at Waterloo, and he hoped the colored 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 Māori land, 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 sap. Night after night they argued how the kangaroo was born, and each other held the other's stupid theories in scorn. Bill believed it was born inside, Jim declared it was born out. Each as two his own opinions never had the slightest doubt. They left the earth to argue, and they went among the stars. Reconditions atmospheric, Bill believed the hair of Mars was too thin for human beings to exist in mortal states. Jim declared it was too thick, if anything, yet they were mates. Bill for free trade, 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. To 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. End of Chapter 41, Chapter 42 of Popular and Humorous Verses by Henry Lawson. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. The Peru. 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 forever, but now we knew that we were near our camp, the Peru River. With blighted eyes and blistered feet, with stomachs out of order, half mad with flies and dust and heat we crossed the Queensland border. I longed to hear a stream go by and see the circles quiver. I longed to lay me down and die that night on Peru River. Tis said the land out west is grand, I do not care who says it. It is an 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 might, a native of the land, in fiery speech and vulgar, condemned the flies and cursed the sand and doubly damned the moga. He peered ahead, he peered about, a bushman hee and clever. Now mind you keep a sharp look out, we must be near the river. The nose-bags heavy on each chest, God blessed 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 Peru River. A cloud was on my mate's broad brow, and once I heard him mutter. I'd like to see the darling now, God blessed the grand old gutter. And now and then he stopped and said, in tones that may be shiver. It cannot well be on ahead, I think we've crossed the river. But soon we saw a strip of ground that crossed the track we followed. No bearer than the surface round, but just a little hallowed. His brows assumed a thoughtful frown, this speech he did deliver. I wonder if we'd best go down or up the blessed river. But where, said I, is the blooming stream, and he replied, we're at it. I stood a while as in a dream, great Scott, I cried, is that it? Why that is some old bridal track, he chuckled, well, I never. It's nearly time you came out back, this is the Peru River. No place to camp, no spot of damp, no moisture to be seen there. If ere there was, it left no sign, that it had ever been there. But ere the mourn with heart and soul, we'd cause to thank the giver. We found a muddy water-hole, some ten miles down the river. CHAPTER 42 CHAPTER 43 of popular and humorous verses by Henry Lawson. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. THE GREEN HAND ROWS ABOUT. Call this hot, I beg your pardon, hot! You don't know what it means. What's that waiter, lamb or mutton? Like you, mine is beef and greens, bread and butter while I'm waiting, milk, oh yes, a bookful. I'm just in from West the Darling, picking up and rolling wool. Mutton stewed or chops for breakfast, dry and tasteless, boiled in fat, bread or brownie, tea or coffee, two hours graft in front of that. Eggs of mutton boiled for dinner, mutton greasy warm for tea, mutton curried, gave my order, beef and plenty greens for me. Breakfast curried rice and mutton till your innards sacrifice, and you sicken at the color 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 vedur, cabbage plots and water clear, and you crave for beef and butter as a boozer, craze or beer. Dusty patch in baking moga, glaring iron hut and shed, feel and smell of rain forgotten, water scarce and feed brass 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, sinner's string towards the shed, great black greasy crows round carcass, screen behind of dust cloud red, engine whistles, go it tigers, and the agony begins, picking up for seven devils out of haids, for my sins, picking up for seven devils, seven demons out of hell, sell their souls to get the bell sheep, half a dozen Christ they sell, they grows hot as where they come from, too damn 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, bark who leaves his pen door open, and the sheep come bucking out, when the rouser goes to pen them, bark who blasts, the rose about, injury with insult added, trial of our cursing powers, cursed and cursing back enough to dam a dozen worlds like ours, take my combs down to the grinder, will you, seen my cattle pop, there's a sheep fell down in my shoot, just jump down and pick them up, give the office when the boss comes, catch that glory sheep old man, count the sheep in my pen will you, fetch my combs back when you can, when you got a chance old feller, will you pop down to the hut, fetch my pipe, the cook'll show you, and I'll let you have a cut, shearer yells for tar and needle, ringers roaring like a bull, wool away you son of angels, where's the hell, the fondling, wool, pound a week and station prices, mustn't kick against the pricks, seven weeks of lurid mateship, ruined soul and four pound six, what's that waiter, me, stuffed mutton, look here waiter, to be brief, I said beef, you blood-stained villain, beef, moo cow, roast bullock, beef. Chapter 44 of Popular and Humorous Verses by Henry Lawson. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. 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 tough, 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. They couldn't let the townie be, they sneered like anything. They 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, when he was shearing sheep. His loaded fork, his grimy halt, was poised, his jaws moved fast, impatient till his throat could bolt, the muffle taken last. He couldn't stand a something tough, much less a jackaroo, and swore to take the trimmings off the man from Waterloo. The townie saw he must be up, or else be underneath. And so one day, before them all, he dared to clean his teeth. The man came running from the shed, and shouted, Here's a lark! Is gone to clean his tooties, said the man from Ironbark. His feeble joke was much enjoyed, he sneered as bullies do, and with a scrubbing brush he guide 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. The dirt was on him like a sheath. He seldom washed its fizz. 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. Chapter 45 of Popular and Humorous Verses by Henry Lawson This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. St. Peter Now I think there is a likeness, Twix 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 organize. And I am 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. He denied the Saviour's union, which was weak of him, no doubt. Yet 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'd 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. When I done the best I could, and he'll understand me better than the other angels would. 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 humping swags. But I'll rest about the station, where the work bell never rings, till they blow the final trumpet and the great judge sees to things. End of Chapter forty-five. Chapter forty-six of popular and humorous verses by Henry Lawson. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. 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 outback are matters of every day, may be on account of the lives they lead, or the life that their hearts discard. But never a fool can be too mad or a hard case be too hard. I met him in Burke in the Union days, with which we have not 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. 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 seen devils or different breeds and his pockets were filled with snakes. In the joyful mood, in the solemn mood, in his cynical stages too, in the modeling stage, in the fighting stage, in the stage 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 ID that he was the Stranger's Friend. The feller as knows he can battle a round for his blooming self, he'd say, I don't give a curse for the blanks I know, send the heart up bloke this way, send the Stranger round and I'll see him through and in as the Bushman spoke. The chaps and fellers would tip the wink to a casual heart up bloke. And it wasn't only a Bushman'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 get helplessly drunk himself till he'd got the Stranger drunk. And the chaps and the fellers would speculate by way of ghastly joke, as to who'd be caught by the Jim Jems first, the Friend or the heart up bloke. 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 heart up bloke in the shape of the Stranger's Friend. When mattered not to the Stranger's Friend what the rest might say or think, he always held that the heart upstate was due to the curse of drink, to the evils of cards and of company, but a young coase built that way, and I was a bloomin' fool misself when I started out, he'd say, 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 outback 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 heart up bloke. They'd say, tis a song of a sought, perhaps, but the song of a sought 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 checks and his strength are done. That amongst the sober and thrifty mates, the Stranger's Friend has won. End of Chapter 46, Chapter 47 of Popular and Humorous Verses by Henry Lawson. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. The God-forgotten Election. Pat McDermar brought the tidings to the town of God-forgotten. There were lively days before ye, common partyments 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 common parliament. 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 the neglected mobs of cattle went astraying down the river at their sweet, bulkolic will. Some spouter stood for free trade, and his votes were split by nothing. He had influence behind them, 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. Jack McDermar said, ye shamers, please to shut your ugly faces. Lend your dirty ears a moment, while I give ye all a hint. Keep ye sober till tomorrow, and record your vote for Blazes, if ye want to send a ringer to the common parliament. As a young and growing township, God-forgotten's been neglected, and if we'd be represented, now's the moment to begin. Have it the local towns encouraged, local industries protected, vote for Blazes and protection, and the land you're living in. I don't say that William Blazes is a perfect out and outer. I don't say he have the learning, for he never had the luck. I 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 governments are rotten. But he'll save the public credit, and protect the public tin. To the everlasting glory of the name of God-forgotten, vote for Blazes and protection, and the land you're living in. Pat McDee went on the war-path, and he worked like salts and senna. For he organized committees full of energy and push, and those wild committees riding through the whiskey-fed Gajana, routed out astonished voters from their humpies in the bush. Everything on wheels was rented, and half-sobered drunks were shot in. Said McDermot to the driver, if you want to save your skin, never stop to wet your whistles. Drive like hell to God-forgotten. Make the villains pump for Blazes, and the land they're living in. Half the local long departed, for the purpose resurrected, plumped for Blazes and protection, and the country where they died. So he topped the pole by sixty, and when Blazes was elected, there was victory and triumph on the God-forgotten side. Then the boys got up a banquet, and our chairman, Pat McDermot, was next day discovered sleeping in the local baker's bin. All the dough had risen round him, but we heard a smothered murmur, vote for Blazes and protection, and the land you're living in. Now the great Sir William Blazes lives in London, across the waters, and they say his city mansion is the swellest in West End. But I very often wonder if his Tony, sons, and daughters ever heard of Billy Blazes, who was once the people's friend. Does his biased 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, vote for Blazes and protection, and the land you're living in? 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 common Parliament. 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 living in. CHAPTER 48 OF popular and humorous verses by Henry Lawson. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. THE BOSS'S BOOTS The shearers squint along the pens. They squint along the chutes. 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 rouser has no soul to save, condemn the rouse about, and sling him in and rip him through and get the bell sheep out, and skim it by the tips at times or take it with the roots, but pink them nice and pretty when you see the boss's boots. The shearing super sprained his foot, as bosses sometimes do, and wore until the shed cut out one sidespring 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 air 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 of 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. Ye sons of sin that tramp and shear in hot and dusty scrubs, just keep away from heaven him, 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 today, he's buckin' everywhere. He's trainin' for a bike, I think, the way he comes and scoots. 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 ew a bit. He hurried up to get her through, when close behind his shoe. He saw a large and ancient shoe in mateship with a boot. He thought that he'd be fine, all right, he couldn't turn the ew. The more he wished the boss away, the more he wouldn't go. And Bogan swore amniously beneath his breath he swore, and he was never known to pink so prettily before. And Bogan threw his bristling sculpt 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. And while he sure so mightily 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, then swiftly to the features from a plated 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 vinket look, and Bogan saw the boss outside consulting with his cook, and Bogan Bill was hurt and mad to see that roast about, and Bogan laid his Woolsey down and knocked that trouser out. He knocked him right across the board, he tumbled through the chute. I'll learn the fool, said Bogan Bill, to flash the boss's boot. The trouser squints along the pens, he squints along the chutes, 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 trouser has no soul to lose, it's blarsed the roast about, and rip him through and yell for tar and get the bell sheep out, and take it with the scum at times or take it with the roots, but pink of nice and pretty when you see the boss's boots. Rouser bout 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 shear is paid by the hundred, the rouser by the weak, pink and pretty to shear clean to the skin. Bell sheep shearers are not supposed to take another sheep out of pen when smoke-hole, breakfast or dinner bell goes, but some time themselves to get so many sheep out, and one as the bell goes, which makes more work for the rouser and entrenches on his smoke-hole as he must leave his board clean, shearers or seldom or never find now. End of Chapter 48, Recording by Linda Marie Nielsen, Vancouver, B.C. Chapter 49 of Popular and Humorous Verses by Henry Lawson This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. The captain of the push. As the night was falling slowly down on city, town and bush, from a slum in Jones Alley slope 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 the whistle loud and shrill spoke the echoes of the rocks, and a dozen gulls came sloping round the corners of the blocks. There was not to rouse their anger, yet the oath that each one swore seemed less fit for publication than the one that went before, 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, hauled 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 Larkin. In his hat was most suggestive of the city where we live, with the gallows tilt that no one save a Larkin can give, and the coat a little shorter than the rider would desire showed a more or less uncertain portion of the strange attire. At which Taylors know as trousers, known by him as bloomin' bags, hanging loosely from his person, swept with tattered ends the flags, and he had a pointed stern-post to the boots that peeped below, which he laced up from the center of the nail of his great toe, and he wore his shirt uncollared, and the tie correctly wrong, but I think his vest was shorter than should be in one so long, and the captain croaked his finger at a stranger on the curb, whom he qualified politely with an adjective and verb, and he begged the gory bleaters that they wouldn't interrupt, till they gave an introduction, it was painfully abrupt. Here's the bleeding push, McCovey, here's a something from the bush, 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 bleaters in the weekly gas bag once, sitting lonely in the humpy, when the wind began to wash, how I longed to share the dangers and the pleasures of the push, gosh I hate the swells and goodens, I could burn them in their beds, I am with you, if you'll have me, and I'll break their blaze and heads. Now look here, exclaimed the captain to the stranger from the bush, 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, would you lay him out and kick him to a jelly on the ground, would you jump upon the nameless, kill or cripple him or both, speak or else I'll speak, the stranger answered, my colonel oath, now look here, exclaimed the captain to the stranger from the bush, now look here, suppose the bleaters let you come and join the push, would you smash a bleedin' bobby, if you got the blank alone, would you break a swell or chinky, spit his garret with a stone, would you have a ball to keep your like to swear off work for good, yes my oath replied the stranger, my colonel oath, I would, now look here, exclaimed the captain to the stranger from the bush, now look here, before the bleaters let you come and join the push, you must prove that you're blazer, you must prove that you have grit, worthy of a gory bleater, you must show you form a bit, take a rock and smash that winder, and the stranger, nothing loth, took the rock and smash, they only muttered, my colonel 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 excess of zeal, he was good at throwing metal, but weak chronicle with pain, that he jumped upon a victim, damaging the watch and chain, or the bleaters had secured them, yet the captain of the push swore a dozen o's in favor of the stranger from the bush, late next mourn the captain, rising, hoarse and thirsty from his lair, called the newly feathered bleater, but the stranger wasn't there, quickly going through the pockets of his blooming bags he learned, that the stranger had been through him for the stuff his maul 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 bleaters sloping through the shadows of the blocks, and they swore the stranger's action was of blood escaping shame, while they waited for the nameless, but the nameless never came, and the bleaters soon forgot him, but the captain of the push still is laying round in ballast for the nameless from the bush. Chapter 50 of Popular and Humorous Verses by Henry Lawson This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. 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 rumored that the gory bees 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 peace, 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. He wanted clothes, a masher suit, he wanted boots and hat. His girl had earned a quitter too, 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 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 gill-less presence he had ceased to chew or swear, he knew the kind of barrack that can fetch a square affair. To thus desert he done a wold was risky and a sin, and would 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 Street got sent a Billy's square affair. He took her to the stalls, twas dear, but Billy said what 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 Street got wind of Billy's square affair. The blank and space and stars she yelled, the nameless Crimson Dash, I'll smash the blanky 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. 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 bleed and lark. A cop arrived in time to hear a gory bee declare, gore blarmy, here's the red streak, fowl of Billy's square affair. Now Billy scowls about the rocks, his manly beauty marred, and Billy's girl upon her ed is doing six months arred. Billy's swivel eye is in a sling, his heart is in despair, and in Sydney hospital lies Billy's square affair. End of Chapter 50, Recording by Linda Marie Nielsen, Vancouver, B.C. Chapter 51 of Popular and Humorous Verses by Henry Lawson This LibriVox Recording is in the public domain. A dairy 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 awful when the police has got a dairy on a chap. I am a honest working cove, as any bloke can see, is just because the police has got a dairy sir on me. Oh yes, the legal gents can grin. I say it ain't no joke, it's cruel when the police has got a dairy on a bloke. Why don't you go to work, he said, he muttered, why don't you? Your honour knows, as well as me, there ain't no work to do. And when I try to find a job, I'm shattered by a trap. It's awful when the police has got a dairy on a chap. I sighed and shed a tearlet for that noble nature, marred. But awe the bench was rough on him, and gave him six months hard. But only said, beyond the grave, you'll cop it hot by jove. There ain't no angel pleased to get a dairy on a cove. They would treat ye worse than slaves, they would treat ye worse than brutes. Rise and crush the selfish tyrants, crush them with your hobnail boots. Rise ye, rise ye glorious toilers, rise ye, rise ye noble toilers. Awake, arise! Rise ye, rise ye noble toilers, tyrants come across the waves. Will ye yield the rights of labour? Will ye, will ye still be slaves? Rise ye, rise ye mighty toilers, and revoke the rotten laws. Low your wives go out of washing, while ye battle for the cause. Rise ye, rise ye glorious toilers, rise ye, rise ye noble toilers. Awake, arise! Oh glorious dawn is breaking, low the tyrant trembles now. He will starve 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 and have a pint of beer. Rise ye, rise ye noble toilers, rise ye, rise ye glorious toilers. Awake, arise! Low the poor are starved, my brothers, low are wives and children weep. Low are women toil to keep us while the toilers are asleep. 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. Awake, arise! End of Chapter 52 Chapter 53 of Popular and Humorous Verses by Henry Lawson. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. 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 ideas new. So be it sung, by hot intent, 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. Ye preached that every man was free, and also echo-born. 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 gotten too. A stranger at the neighbouring run, sojourn the swatter's guest. He was unknown to any one, but like a swell was dressed. 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. He wore the latest tuggery, the loudest thing in ties, to as 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 it 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 Radla and Carlisle. 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. O say no more, Lord Colony, O say no more, she said, O say no more, Lord Colony, I wish that I was dead. My head is in a hoffle whirl, the truth, I dare not tell. I am a democratic girl, and cannot wed a swell. O love he cried, but you forget, that you are most unjust, twas not my fault that I was set within the upper crust. He'd not the yarns the poets tell, O darling, do not doubt. A simple Lord can love as well as any rouse about. 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. O fly with me, O fly with me across the mountains blue. O fly with me, O fly with me that very night she flew. She 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 exclaim, Lord Colony, what ails my own this bridal night, O love confide in me. O now she said that I am yas, you'll let me weep, I must. I did desert the people's cause to join the upper crust. O proudly smiled his lordship then, his chimney-pot he floored. Look up my love and smile again, for I am not a lord. His eyeglass from his eye he tore the dickey from his breast, and turned and stood his bride before a rouse about, confessed. Unown I loved you long, he said, and I have loved you true. A shearing in your governor's shed I learned to worship you. I do not care for place or palf. 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 check to buy this swell rig out. So fling your arms about my neck, for I'm a rouse about. At first she gave a startled cry, then safe from Cares' alarms. She sighed a soul subduing sigh, and sank into his arms. He ponded the togs, and home he tucked his bride in all her charms. The proud o' cockatoo received the pair with open arms, and long they lived the faithful bride the noble rose about, and if she wasn't satisfied he never let it out. CHAPTER XVIII Constable McCarthy's investigation. 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 misses or the notice or the street, but at last there came a lodger whose appearances and actions puzzled Constable McCarthy, the policeman on the beat. He, the single gent, was wasted almost to emaciation, and his features were the palest that McCarthy ever saw, and these indications pointing to a pass of dissipation greatly strengthened the suspicions of the agent of the law. He, the lodger, hanged 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. Said the Constable on duty, sure, I wonder what his trait is, 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 McCarthy had arrested more than one notorious dodger. He had heard of men afflicted with the strangest kind of fads, but he couldn't fix a station or the business of the lodger, who at times would chum with cages, and at other times with cads, and the Constable would often stand and wonder how the gory should the stranger got his living, for he loathed the time away, and 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. Mack had noticed that the lodger did a mighty lot of smoking, and could stow away a longen, never winking so he could, and McCarthy 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 welcome with effusion by a dozen Tony gents, seen him driving in the buggy of a rising politician, through the gateway of a member's Tony 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 anchored shipping, but he never took his coat off so it wasn't suicide, 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, or he takes his first and final plunge into eternity, and McCarthy 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 in dining, now it indicated toothache, or the headache, and again, to exaggerate the gestures of a dip somaniac fighting, those original conceptions of a whiskey sought in brain. Then the Constable retreating scratched his head and muttered, Sora, want of me can understand it, but I'll keep my eye on him. Divel take him and his tantrums, he's a lunatic bigora, or if he was up to mischief he'd be sure to douse the glim, but McCarthy wasn't easy, for he had a vague suspicion that a game 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 Mack received no information, and was forced to stay inactive, being puzzled for a charge, that the lodger was a madman, seeing the only explanation, though the house was scarcely harbour such a lunatic at large. His appearance failed to warrant apprehension as a vagrant, though twas getting very shabby as the Constable could see, but McCarthy in the meantime hoped to catch him in a flagrant, reach a 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 in 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 McCarthy 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 in cog. And a sleep and over-worry seemed to tell upon McCarthy. 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. Though he tried his best, he couldn't get a hold upon the lodger, for the ladders and decedents weren't known to the police. They considered that the devil was a dark and artful dodger who was scheming undercover for the downfall of the peace. It was a simple explanation, though McCarthy 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 wildly famous as he thought he should have been, and the constable grew thinner till one morning, little Drammen, of the sort of revelation that was leaping from his sheath. He alighted on some verses in the columns of the Freymen, with the Christian name and surname of the lodger underneath. Now McCarthy 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 byway of a shanty in the street. And the poet's name you're asking, well, the ground is very tender. You must wait until the public put the guilt upon the name. To glorious, sorrow-drowning, and perhaps a final bender, heralds his triumphant entrance to the thunder-halls of fame. CHAPTER VIV of Popular and Humorous Verses by Henry Lawson This Libor Vox recording is in the public domain. At the tug-of-war, was in a tug-of-war where I, the governor'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 governor'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. 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 my muscles swelling when the old man cheered for me. I felt as though I burst my heart or gained the victory. I shouted now, together and a steady strain, replied, and with a mighty heave I helped to beat the other side. O 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 owe how they cheered me, while the girls all smiled so kind. They praised me little dreaming how the old man pulled behind. 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 eyes still often hear the old man cheer for me. Chapter 56 of Popular and Humorous Verses by Henry Lawson This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Here's Luck. Old time is tramping close to day, you hear his blutcher's fall. A mighty change is on the way, and God protect us all. Some dust'll fly from beery coats, at least it's been declared. I'm glad that women has the votes, but just a trifle scared. I'm just a trifle scared for why the women mean to roll. 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. Though soon put out are pipes to sed and close the public bars. No more will take a glass of ale when pushed with care and strife, and chuckle home with that old tale we used to tell the wife. We'll laugh and joke and sing no more with jolly, beery chums, and shout, here's luck while waiting for the luck that never comes. Did we prohibit swollen tea clean out of common sense, or legislate on gossiping across a backyard fence? Did we prohibit bustles or the hoax when they were here? The women never think of this, they want to stop our beer. The track o' life is dry enough and crossed with many a rut. But oh we find it long and rough when all the pubs is shut, when all the pubs is shut and gone the doors we used to seek, and we go toiling thirstin' on through Sundays all the week. For since the days when pubs were ends in years gone past and far, poor sinful souls have drowned their sins and sores at the bar, and though at times it led to crimes and debt and such complaints, I scarce dare think about the time when all mankind is saints, would make the bones of Bacchus leap and break his coffin-lid, and Burn's ghost would wail and weep as Bobby never did. But let the preachers preach in style and rave and rant in buck, I'd rather guess they'll hear a while the old war cry, here's luck, the world might wobble round the sun and all the banks go bung, but pipes they'll smoke and liquor run, while odd langzine is sung, while men are driven through the mill, and flinty times is struck, they'll find a private entrance still, here's luck, oh man, here's luck. End of Chapter 56 Chapter 57 of Popular and Humorous Verses by Henry Lawson This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. 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. 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 pros and rhyme, always looking for another's footsteps on the sand of time. Like imitators are the meanest of mankind, and the grandest themes are hackneyed by the pins that come behind. If you strike a novel subject, write it up, and do not fail. They will rhyme in prose about it till your very own is stale, as they raved about the region that the wattle boughs perfume, till the reeder cursed the bushmen 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 balk you in their blind and greedy heat, like a stupid pop 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. End of Chapter 57 Chapter 58 of Popular and Humorous Verses by Henry Lawson. This Libra Vox recording is in the public domain. The days when we went swimming, the breezes waved the silver grass, waist high along the siding, and to the creek where Nair could pass, three boys on bareback riding. Beneath the shoaks in the bend, the water-hole was brimming. Do you remember yet, old friend, the times we went in swimming? The days we played the wag from school, joy 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 deck and face, less cleanliness betray us. And you'll remember farmer cuts, 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 winded? A green-eyed cart whip 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 look blank, when resting there and chumming. When 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. CHAPTER 59 of popular and humorous verses by Henry Lawson. This Libra Vox recording is in the public domain. The old bark school. It was built up 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 gray 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, he had run with Cobb and Coe. That gray leader let him go. There are men as node the brand upon his hide, and, as node it on the horse, funeral service, good old horse, when we burnt him in the gully where he died. Then 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 with a brogue, twas unconscious imitation let the reader understand, and we learned the world in scraps from some ancient dinghy 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. It was in the book, and so, well, all that we'd let it go, for we never would believe that print could lie, and we all learned pretty soon that when we came out at noon, the sun is in the south part of the sky. In Ireland that was known from the coastline to Athlone, that we got little information re the land that gave us birth, say that Captain Cook was killed and was very lightly 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. But the old bark school is gone, and the spot it stood upon is a cattle camp in winter where the curlews cry is heard. There's a brick school on the flat, but a schoolmate teaches that. For about the time they built it, our old master was transferred. But the bark school comes again, with exchanges cross the plain, with the outback advertiser, and my fancy roams at large, when I read of passing stock of a western mob or flock, with James Bullock, Gray, or Henry Dale in charge, and I think how Jimmy went from the old bark school content, with his education 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. End of Chapter 59 Chapter 60 of Popular and Humorous Verses by Henry Lawson This Libber Vox recording is in the public domain. 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 slip-rails pegged, and all the milkers at the yard, the calves all in the pen. We don't want Poli's calf to suck, his mother dry again. And did you mend the broken rail, and make it firm and neat? I suppose you want the brittle steer, all night among the wheat. And if he finds the looser patch, he'll stuff his belly full, he'll eat till he gets blown on that, and busts like Brian's bow. Old spot is lost, you'll drive me mad. You will upon my soul. She might be in the buggy swamps or down a digger's hole. You needn't talk, you never looked. You'd find her if you choose, instead of poking paw-some-logs and hunting kangaroos. How came your boots as wet as muck? You tried to drown the ants. Why don't you take your butchers 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. CHAPTER 60 THE PROPHESTIONAL WONDERER When you've knocked about the country, been away from home for years. In the past, by distance softened, nearly fills your eyes with tears. You are haunted oft, whenever 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 the 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. 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 glad stone, and a decent suit of clothes. Then it's time to practice daily with a hairbrush 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 novelties warn off, and old chums no longer court you, and your friends begin to scoff. When the girls no longer kiss you, crying Jack, how you have changed. When you're stale to your relations, and the 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. When in short you spent your money in the fullness of your heart, and your clothes are getting shabby, then it's high time to depart. CHAPTER 62 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 bushmen lie, for ever. Tos a custom still with the local blacks, to cage in the altogether. They had less respect for our feelings than, and more respect for the weather. The trooper said to the surgeon's wife, Sure, I wouldn't seem unpleasant, but there's women and children about the place, and barn a lady's present. There's old King Billy with never a stitch, for a month may the drought cremate him, by the wand we put in his jerky head, where his own Queen Mary bait him. God save her strength and a peaceful reign, though she flies in a bit of a passion. If only want hints that her shul and luxe are a trifle behind the fashion. There's two of the boys by the stable now, be the powers of each the varmints, to come with naught but a shirt apiece, and with dirt for their nether garments. Hold eon ye blaggards, how dare ye dare, to come with in sight of the houses. I'll give ye a warning all for once, and a couple odd pair of trousers. They took the pants as a child a toy, the constable's words beguiling, a smile as something beside their joy, and they took their departure smiling. And that very day, when the sun was low, two black fellows came to the station. They were filled with the courage of Queensland rum and bursting with indignation. The constable noticed with growing ire they'd apparently dressed in a hurry, and their language that day, I'm 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, policemen, what for? You give it our Mrs. Britches. And this was a case I am bound to confess, where civilization 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. CHAPTER 63 A Study in the Nod A sailor named Grace was seen by the guard of a goods train lying close to the railway line near Warner Town, South Africa, in a nude condition. He was unconscious, and had lain there three days, during one of which the glass registered a hundred and ten in the shade. Grace 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 nod, which amounts to the same thing we think. We mean his condition we think, towards a naked condition or nod, which amounts to the same thing we think. Uncovered he lay on the grass, that shriveled and shrunk, and he stayed. Three hot summer days while the glass was one hundred and ten in the shade. We nearly remarked that he laid, but that was back grammar we thought. It does sound buccalic, we think. It smacks out the barnyard, a farming of pallets 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. Left masked on a stick an evident flag of distress. Perhaps in his dreams he pursued bright visions of heavenly bliss, and artists who study the nod never saw such a study as this. The luggage went by, and the guard looked out, and his eyes fell on Grace. We fancy he looked at him hard. We think that he looked at him thrice. They say, if the telegram's true, when he woke up he wondered, Good Lord! Why the injured man didn't heave too, why the train didn't take him aboard. And now, by the case of poor Grace, we think that a daily express should travel with the sunshades and ice, and a look out for flags of distress. CHAPTER 64 A WORD TO TEXAS JACK Texas Jack, you are amusing. By Lord Harry, how I laughed. When I seen your rig and saddle, with its bulwarks, for an aft. Holy smoke, in such a saddle, how the dickens can you fall. Why I seen a gal ride bareback, with no bridle on and all. Gosh, so help me, strike me balmy. If a bit, O scenery, like to you in all your rig out on the earth I ever see. How I'd like to see a bushman use your fixin', Texas Jack. On the remnant of a saddle he can ride to hell and back. Why I heard a mother screamin' when her kid went tossin' by. Ridein' bareback on a bucker that had murder in his eye. What? You come to learn the needles how to squat on horses back. Learn the cornstalk writing, blazes. What you're givin' us, Texas Jack. Learn the cornstalk, what the flamin' jumped up, where's my country gone? Why the cornstalk's mother often rides the day afore he's born. You may talk about your ridin' in the city, bold and free. Talk o' ridin' in the city, Texas Jack, but where'd your be? When the stock horse snorts and bunches all its quarters in a hump, and the saddle climbs a sapling, and the horseshoes split a stump. Know before you teach the native you must ride without a fall. Up a gum or down a golly, nigh as steep as any wall. You must swim the roar and darlin' when the flood is at its height, bearing down the stock and stations to the great Australian blight. You can't count the bulls and bisons that you're copped with your lassoe, but a stilt old mile-bullock, perhaps you'd learn you're somethin' new. You'd better make your will and leave your papers neat and trim, before you make arrangements for the lassoon of him. Or you and your horse is cat's meat, fit in fate for sitch galutes, and your saddles turn to laces like we put in butcher boats. And you say your death on engines, we've got somethin' in your line. If you think you're fit and equal to the likes of Tommy Ryan, take your carcass up to Queensland where the alligators chew, and the carpet snake is handy with his tail for a lassoe. Ride across the hazy regions where the lonely oomus wail, and you'll find the black track while you're lookin' for his trail. He can track your with outstoppin' four thousand miles or more. Come again, and he will show you're where you're split the year before. But your best be mighty careful, you'll be sorry you come here, while you're skewered to the fakements of your saddle with a spear. When the boomerang is sailin' in the air, may heaven help you. It will cut your head off goin' and come back again and scalp your PS. As poet and as ganky, I will greet you, Texas Jack, for it isn't no ill-feeling 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 as civilized in us? So if you feel like shoutin' now, don't let your pistol cough. Our government is very free at chokin' fellers off, and though on your great continent there's misery in the towns, and not a few entitled lords and kings without their crowns. I will admit your countrymen is busted big and free, and great on equal rights of men and great on liberty. I will admit your fathers punched the gory tyrant's head, but then we've got our heroes, too, the diggers that is dead. The plucky man of Battle Rat, who told the scratch right well, and broke the nose of tyranny and made his peepers swell, for yankin' lips gold tresses in the roaring days gone by, and doublin' up his dirty fists to black her bony eye. So when it comes to ridin' moaks or hoisin' out the chow, or stickin' up for labor's rights, we don't want showin' how. They come to learn us cricket in the days of long ago, and handlin' come from Canada to learn us how to row, and doctors come from fresco just to learn us how to skate, and pugs from all the lands on earth to learn us how to fight. And when they go, as like or not, we find we're takin' in. They've left behind no learning, but they've carried off our tin. End of Chapter 64, Chapter 65 of Popular and Humorous, Verses by Henry Lawson. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. The grog and grumble steeple-chase. Twix the coastline and the border lay the town of grog and grumble in the days before the bushmen was a dull and heartless drudge, and they say the local meeting was a drunken rough and tumble, which was ended pretty often by an inquest on the judge. And Twix said the city talent very often caught a tartar in the grog and grumble sportsmen and retired with broken heads. For the fortune, life, and safety of the grog and grumble starter mostly hung upon the finish of the local thoroughbreds. Pat McDermar was the owner of a horse they called the Screamer, which he called the quickest shepherd, Twix the darlin' on the sea, and I think it 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 color and his legs they wasn't mates. Pat McDermar said he always came within a flip of winning, and his sire had come from England, and his dam was from the States. Friends would argue with McDermar, 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, but he said he had the knowledge to come in when it was raining, and irrevenly mention 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, was a day of jubilation, with careless hearted bushmen four hundred miles around, and the rum in beer and whisky came in wagons from the station, and the Holy Terror talent were the first upon the ground. Judge McArde, with whose opinion it was scarcely safe to wrestle, took his dangerous position on the bark and sapling stand. He was what the local stiggens used to speak of as a whistle, of wrath, and he'd a bludgeon that he carried in his hand. 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 golly till the ridge began to quake, and he plowed along the siding, raising earth till other horses, and their riders too were blinded by the dust cloud in his wake. From the rock he'd struggled slowly, they were much surprised to find him, close a beam of holy terror as along the flat they tore, even higher still in dancer rose the cloud of dust behind him, while in more divided splinters. Through the shattered rails before terror dead heat they were shouting, terror but the Screamer hung out, nose to nose with holy terror as across the creek they swung, and McDermour shouted loudly, put your tongue out, put your tongue out, and the Screamer put his tongue out, and he won by half a tongue. End of Chapter sixty-five. Chapter sixty-six of popular and humorous verses by Henry Lawson. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. But what's the use? But what's the use of writing Bush? Though editors demand it, for city folk and farming folk can never understand it. They're blind to what the Bushman sees, the best with eyes shut tightest. 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 sneaky heads well up and eyes well out from man's maneuvers, and feathers bobbing round behind like fringes round improvers. The swagman tramping across the plane, good lord, there's nothing sadder, except the dog that slopes behind his master like a shader, the turkey tail to scare the flies, the water bag and billy, the nose bag getting cruel light, the traveler getting silly. The plane that seems to jack a ruse like gently sloping rises, the shrubs and tops that smiles away, but magnified in sizes. The track that seems arisen up or else seems gently sloping, and just a hint of kangaroos way out across the open. The joy and hype 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 plane he spots the darling timber. But what's the use of writing Bush, though editors demand it? For city folk and cuckatoos they do not understand it. They're blind to what, the way they're seized, the best with eyes shut tightest. Out where Australia's widest and the stars are most and brightest. End of chapter 66, recording by Linda Marie Nielsen, Vancouver, BC. End of popular and humorous verses by Henry Lawson.