The Old Australian Ways

The London lights are far

Behind a bank of cloud,

Along the shore the gaslights gleam,

The gale is piping loud;

And down the Channel, groping blind,

We drive her through the

Towards the land we left behind —The good old land of `never mind',

And old Australian ways.

The narrow ways of English

Are not for such as we;

They bear the long-accustomed

Of staid conservancy:

But all our roads are new and strange,

And through our blood there

The vagabonding love of

That drove us westward of the

And westward of the suns.

The city folk go to and

Behind a prison's bars,

They never feel the breezes

And never see the stars;

They never hear in blossomed

The music low and

Of wild birds making melodies,

Nor catch the little laughing

That whispers in the wheat.

Our fathers came of roving

That could not fixed abide:

And we have followed field and

Since e'er we learnt to ride;

By miner's camp and shearing shed,

In land of heat and drought,

We followed where our fortunes led,

With fortune always on

And always further out.

The wind is in the barley-grass,

The wattles are in bloom;

The breezes greet us as they

With honey-sweet perfume;

The parakeets go screaming

With flash of golden wing,

And from the swamp the wild-ducks

Their long-drawn note of revelry,

Rejoicing at the Spring.

So throw the weary pen

And let the papers rest,

For we must saddle up and

Towards the blue hill's breast;

And we must travel far and

Across their rugged maze,

To find the Spring of Youth at last,

And call back from the buried

The old Australian ways.

When Clancy took the drover's

In years of long ago,

He drifted to the outer

Beyond the Overflow;

By rolling plain and rocky shelf,

With stockwhip in his hand,

He reached at last, oh lucky elf,

The Town of

In Rough-and-ready Land.

And if it be that you would

The tracks he used to ride,

Then you must saddle up and

Beyond the Queensland side —Beyond the reach of rule or law,

To ride the long day through,

In Nature's homestead — filled with

You then might see what Clancy

And know what Clancy knew.