To a Billy

Old Billy, battered, brown and black
With many days of camping,
Companion of the bulging sack,
And friend in all our tramping:
How often on the Friday night,
Your cubic measure testing,
With jam and tea we stuffed you tight
Before we started nesting!

How often, in the moonlight pale,
Through gums and gullies toiling,
Weve been the first the hill to scale,
The first to watch you boiling;
When at the lane the tent was spread
The silver wattle under,
And early shafts of rosy red
Cleft sea-born mists asunder!

And so, old Billy, you recall
A host of sun-burnt faces,
And bring us back again to all
The best of camping places.
True flavour of the bush you bear,
Of camp and its surrounding,
Of freedom and of open air,
Of healthy life abounding.

You bring us more, with those we love
We watched you boil and bubble,
And in the sunny skies above
Forgot each schoolboy trouble
So not without a kindly glance
We eye you in the study,
Although youve met with some mischance,
Although youre black and muddy!

James Lister Cuthbertson

James Lister Cuthbertson, born on May 8, 1851, was a Scottish-Australian poet and classical master at Geelong Grammar School. He is remembered for his influence on Australian literature and education. During his tenure at Geelong Grammar, Cuthbertson became widely known for his poetic works, which include numerous verses that reflect both his Scottish heritage and his Australian experiences. He passed away on January 18, 1910, leaving a legacy as one of Australia's notable poets and educators.

James Lister Cuthbertson

At Cape Schanck

James Lister Cuthbertson, Simple Poetry

Solitude

James Lister Cuthbertson, Simple Poetry

Corona Inutilis

James Lister Cuthbertson, Simple Poetry

The Australian Sunrise

James Lister Cuthbertson, Simple Poetry

English

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At Cape Schanck

Down to the lighthouse pillar
The rolling woodland comes,
Gay with the gold of she-oaks
And the green of the stunted gums,
With the silver-grey of honeysuckle,
With the wasted bracken red,
With a tuft of softest emerald
And a cloud-flecked sky oerhead.

We climbed by ridge and boulder,
Umber and yellow scarred,
Out to the utmost precipice,
To the point that was ocean-barred,
Till we looked below on the fastness
Of the breeding eagles nest,
And Cape Wollomai opened eastward
And the Otway on the west.

Over the mirror of azure
The purple shadows crept,
League upon league of rollers
Landward evermore swept,
And burst upon gleaming basalt,
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Billy Of Queensland

Queensland, he heads his letters, thats all:
The date, and the month, and the year in brief;
He often sends me a cheerful scrawl,
With an undertone of ancient grief.
The first seems familiar, but might have changed,
As often the writing of wanderers will;
He seems all over the world to have ranged,
And he signs himself William, or Billy, or Bill.

He might have been an old mate of mine,
A shearer, or one of the station hands.
(There were some of em died, who drop me a line,
Signing other names, and in other hands.
There was one who carried his swag with me
On the western tracks, when the world was young,
And now he is spouting democracy
In another land with another tongue.)

He cheers me up like an old mate, quite,
And swears at times like an...

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On The Wallaby

Now the tent poles are rotting, the camp fires are dead,
And the possums may gambol in trees overhead;
I am humping my bluey far out on the land,
And the prints of my bluchers sink deep in the sand:
I am out on the wallaby humping my drum,
And I came by the tracks where the sundowners come.

It is nor'-west and west o'er the ranges and far
To the plains where the cattle and sheep stations are,
With the sky for my roof and the grass for my bunk,
And a calico bag for my damper and junk;
And scarcely a comrade my memory reveals,
Save the spiritless dingo in tow of my heels.

But I think of the honest old light of my home
When the stars hang in clusters like lamps from the dome,
And I think of the hearth where the dark shadows fall,
When my camp fire is built...

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Song Of The Old Bullock-Driver

Far back in the days when the blacks used to ramble
In long single file neath the evergreen tree,
The wool-teams in season came down from Coonamble,
And journeyed for weeks on their way to the sea,
Twas then that our hearts and our sinews were stronger,
For those were the days when the bushman was bred.
We journeyed on roads that were rougher and longer
Than roads where the feet of our grandchildren tread.

With mates who have gone to the great Never-Never,
And mates whom Ive not seen for many a day,
I camped on the banks of the Cudgegong River
And yarned at the fire by the old bullock-dray.
I would summon them back from the far Riverina,
From days that shall be from all others distinct,
And sing to the sound of an old concertina
Their rugged old songs wher...

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Song Of The Old Bullock-Driver

Far back in the days when the blacks used to ramble
In long single file neath the evergreen tree,
The wool-teams in season came down from Coonamble,
And journeyed for weeks on their way to the sea,
Twas then that our hearts and our sinews were stronger,
For those were the days when the bushman was bred.
We journeyed on roads that were rougher and longer
Than roads where the feet of our grandchildren tread.

With mates who have gone to the great Never-Never,
And mates whom Ive not seen for many a day,
I camped on the banks of the Cudgegong River
And yarned at the fire by the old bullock-dray.
I would summon them back from the far Riverina,
From days that shall be from all others distinct,
And sing to the sound of an old concertina
Their rugged old songs wher...

Henry Lawson