Travel poems
/ page 113 of 119 /
Saltbush Bill, J.P.
© Andrew Barton Paterson
That Edward Rex, confiding in
His known integrity,
By hand and seal on parchment skin
Had made hiim a J.P.
Saltbush Bill on the Patriarchs
© Andrew Barton Paterson
Those Patriarchs of olden time, when all is said and done,
They lived the same as far-out men on many a Queensland run
A lot of roving, droving men who drifted to and fro,
The same we did out Queensland way a score of years ago.
On the Trek
© Andrew Barton Paterson
Oh, the weary, weary journey on the trek, day after day,
With sun above and silent veldt below;
And our hearts keep turning homeward to the youngsters far away,
And the homestead where the climbing roses grow.
Saltbush Bill
© Andrew Barton Paterson
Now is the law of the Overland that all in the West obey --
A man must cover with travelling sheep a six-mile stage a day;
But this is the law which the drovers make, right easily understood,
They travel their stage where the grass is bad, but they camp where the grass is good;
The Road to Hogan's Gap
© Andrew Barton Paterson
Well, run that right-hand ridge along
It aint, to say, too steep
Theres two fresh tracks might put you wrong
Where blokes went out with sheep.
With the Cattle
© Andrew Barton Paterson
The drought is down on field and flock,
The river-bed is dry;
And we must shift the starving stock
Before the cattle die.
T.y.s.o.n.
© Andrew Barton Paterson
Across the Queensland border line
The mobs of cattle go;
They travel down in sun and shine
On dusty stage, and slow.
Saltbush Bill's Second Flight
© Andrew Barton Paterson
'Twas Saltbush Bill, and his travelling sheep were wending their weary way
On the Main Stock Route, through the Hard Times Run, on their six-mile stage a day;
And he strayed a mile from the Main Stock Route, and started to feed along,
And when Stingy Smith came up Bill said that the Route was surveyed wrong;
And he tried to prove that the sheep had rushed and strayed from their camp at night,
But the fighting man he kicked Bill's dog, and of course that meant a fight.
The Old Tin Hat
© Andrew Barton Paterson
And a very great man is the man who holds an Army Corps command,
For he hurries his regiments here and there as the C. in C. has planned.
By day he travels about in state and stirreth them up to rights,
He toileth early and toileth late, and sitteth up half the nights;
But the evening comes when the candle throws twin shadows upon the mat,
And one of the shadows is like a wreath, and one like an Old Tin Hat.
The Lost Leichardt
© Andrew Barton Paterson
Rash men, that know not what they seek,
Will find their courage tried.
For things have changed on Cooper's Creek
Since Ludwig Leichhardt died.
A Walgett Episode
© Andrew Barton Paterson
The sunburnt stranger was gaunt and brown,
But it soon appeared that he meant to flout
The iron law of the country town,
Which is -- that the stranger has got to shout:
"If he will not shout we must take him down,"
Remarked the yokels of Walgett Town.
The Old Australian Ways
© Andrew Barton Paterson
The London lights are far abeam
Behind a bank of cloud,
Along the shore the gaslights gleam,
The gale is piping loud;
Song of the Wheat
© Andrew Barton Paterson
We have sung the song of the droving days,
Of the march of the travelling sheep;
By silent stages and lonely ways
Thin, white battalions creep.
The Travelling Post Office
© Andrew Barton Paterson
The roving breezes come and go, the reed-beds sweep and sway,
The sleepy river murmers low,and loiters on its way,
It is the land of lots o'time along the Castlereagh.
. . .. . . . .
Saltbush Bill's Gamecock
© Andrew Barton Paterson
'Twas Saltbush Bill to the station rode ahead of his travelling sheep,
And sent a message to Rooster Hall that wakened him out of his sleep --
A crafty message that fetched him out, and hurried him as he came --
"A drover has an Australian bird to match with your British Game."
'Twas done, and done in half a trice; a five-pound note a side;
Old Rooster Hall, with his champion bird, and the drover's bird untried.
The Billy-Goat Overland
© Andrew Barton Paterson
The squatters started to drive them back, but that was no good at all,
Their horses ran for the lick of their lives from the scent that was like a wall:
And never a dog had pluck or gall in front of the mob to stand
And face the charge of a thousand goats on the billy-goat overland.
The Mountain Squatter
© Andrew Barton Paterson
But when the summer sun
Gleams down like burnished brass,
You have to leave your run
And hustle off for grass.
Brumby's Run
© Andrew Barton Paterson
It lies beyond the Western Pines
Towards the sinking sun,
And not a survey mark defines
The bounds of "Brumby's Run".
Those Names
© Andrew Barton Paterson
The shearers sat in the firelight, hearty and hale and strong,
After the hard day's shearing, passing the joke along:
The "ringer" that shore a hundred, as they never were shorn before,
And the novice who, toiling bravely, had tommy-hawked half a score,
The All Right Un
© Andrew Barton Paterson
He came from "further out",
That land of fear and drought
And dust and gravel.
He got a touch of sun,
