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Out West, where the stars are brightest,
   Where the scorching north wind blows,
And the bones of the dead gleam whitest,
   And the sun on a desert glows --
Yet within the selfish kingdom
   Where man starves man for gain,
Where white men tramp for existence --
   Wide lies the Great Grey Plain.

No break in its awful horizon,
   No blur in the dazzling haze,
Save where by the bordering timber
   The fierce, white heat-waves blaze,
And out where the tank-heap rises
   Or looms when the sunlights wane,
Till it seems like a distant mountain
   Low down on the Great Grey Plain.

No sign of a stream or fountain,
   No spring on its dry, hot breast,
No shade from the blazing noontide
   Where a weary man might rest.
Whole years go by when the glowing
   Sky never clouds for rain --
Only the shrubs of the desert
   Grow on the Great Grey Plain.

From the camp, while the rich man's dreaming,
   Come the "traveller" and his mate,
In the ghastly dawnlight seeming
   Like a swagman's ghost out late;
And the horseman blurs in the distance,
   While still the stars remain,
A low, faint dust-cloud haunting
   His track on the Great Grey Plain.

And all day long from before them
   The mirage smokes away --
That daylight ghost of an ocean
   Creeps close behind all day
With an evil, snake-like motion,
   As the waves of a madman's brain:
'Tis a phantom NOT like water
   Out there on the Great Grey Plain.

There's a run on the Western limit
   Where a man lives like a beast,
And a shanty in the mulga
   That stretches to the East;
And the hopeless men who carry
   Their swags and tramp in pain --
The footmen must not tarry
   Out there on the Great Grey Plain.

Out West, where the stars are brightest,
   Where the scorching north wind blows,
And the bones of the dead seem whitest,
   And the sun on a desert glows --
Out back in the hungry distance
   That brave hearts dare in vain --
Where beggars tramp for existence --
   There lies the Great Grey Plain.

'Tis a desert not more barren
   Than the Great Grey Plain of years,
Where a fierce fire burns the hearts of men --
   Dries up the fount of tears:
Where the victims of a greed insane
   Are crushed in a hell-born strife --
Where the souls of a race are murdered
   On the Great Grey Plain of Life!

First published in The Worker, 7 October 1893;
and later in
In the Days When the World Was Wide and Other Verses by Henry Lawson, 1900;
The Oxford Book of Australasian Verse edited by Walter Murdoch, 1924;
A Treasury of Colonial Poetry, 1982;
A Camp-Fire Yarn : Henry Lawson Complete Works 1885-1900 edited by Leonard Cronin, 1984;
Henry Lawson edited by Geoffrey Blainey, 2002.

Author reference sites: Austlit, Australian Dictionary of Biography, Australian Poetry Library, The Poetry of Henry Lawson website

See also.

So you're back from up the country, Mister Lawson, where you went,
And you're cursing all the business in a bitter discontent;
Well, we grieve to disappoint you, and it makes us sad to hear
That it wasn't cool and shady -- and there wasn't plenty beer,
And the loony bullock snorted when you first came into view;
Well, you know it's not so often that he sees a swell like you;
And the roads were hot and dusty, and the plains were burnt and brown,
And no doubt you're better suited drinking lemon-squash in town.

Yet, perchance, if you should journey down the very track you went
In a month or two at furthest you would wonder what it meant,
Where the sunbaked earth was gasping like a creature in its pain
You would find the grasses waving like a field of summer grain,
And the miles of thirsty gutters blocked with sand and choked with mud,
You would find them mighty rivers with a turbid, sweeping flood;
For the rain and drought and sunshine make no changes in the street,
In the sullen line of buildings and the ceaseless tramp of feet;
But the bush hath moods and changes, as the seasons rise and fall,
And the men who know the bush-land -- they are loyal through it all.

But you found the bush was dismal and a land of no delight,
Did you chance to hear a chorus in the shearers' huts at night?
Did they "rise up, William Riley" by the camp-fire's cheery blaze?
Did they rise him as we rose him in the good old droving days?
And the women of the homesteads and the men you chanced to meet --
Were their faces sour and saddened like the "faces in the street",
And the "shy selector children" -- were they better now or worse
Than the little city urchins who would greet you with a curse?
Is not such a life much better than the squalid street and square
Where the fallen women flaunt it in the fierce electric glare,
Where the sempstress plies her sewing till her eyes are sore and red
In a filthy, dirty attic toiling on for daily bread?
Did you hear no sweeter voices in the music of the bush
Than the roar of trams and 'buses, and the war-whoop of "the push"?
Did the magpies rouse your slumbers with their carol sweet and strange?
Did you hear the silver chiming of the bell-birds on the range?
But, perchance, the wild birds' music by your senses was despised,
For you say you'll stay in townships till the bush is civilised.
Would you make it a tea-garden and on Sundays have a band
Where the "blokes" might take their "donahs",  with a "public" close at hand?
You had better stick to Sydney and make merry with the "push",
For the bush will never suit you, and you'll never suit the bush.

First published in The Bulletin, 1 October 1892;
and later in
The Man From Snowy River and Other Verses by A.B. Paterson, 1895;
The Collected Verse of A.B. Paterson by A.B. Paterson, 1982;
Singer of the Bush, A.B. (Banjo) Paterson: Complete Works 1885-1900 compiled by Rosamund Campbell and Philippa Harvie, 1983;
The Penguin Book of Australian Satirical Verse edited by Bill Scott, 1986;
Banjo Paterson's Poems of the Bush by A.B. Paterson, 1987;
A Vision Splendid: The Complete Poetry of A.B. 'Banjo' Paterson by A.B. Paterson, 1990;
Selected Poems: A. B. Paterson compiled by Les Murray, 1992;
The Collected Verse of Banjo Paterson edited by Clement Semmler, 1993;
Banjo Paterson: His Poetry and Prose compiled by Richard Hall, 1993; and
The Penguin Book of Australian Ballads edited by Elizabeth Webby and Philip Butterss, 1993.

Author reference sites: Austlit, Australian Dictionary of Biography, Australian Poetry Library

See also.

Dedicated to W., in remembrance of a dry time.

No water! none! Great God, can it be true?
Is this the waterhole he said he knew,
That never failed, no matter what the drought?
His certain knowledge left me with no doubt ---
Witnesses silent! In the clear moonlight
The plains ahead, and scrub upon the right!
By Heaven! but 'tis too true; the grateful drink,
Of which for weary miles 'twas sweet to think,
Is not! But lo! The something in its place
Is, that King Death and I meet face to face!
As stops the heart, and curdles in the veins
(At some dread scene) the blood, so those broad plains
Struck to my heart a cold and dark despair! A
h! well I knew Death would await me there.
Now! Shall I turn? Go back the way I came? ---
Full well I feel that none would deem it shame.
Rest us awhile, and make the best, old horse?   
And in an hour pursue a backward course?
We should get back for certain, and the worst
Some little suffering from toil and thirst --
Never! so help me now the God above!
Adieu, my little ones, and those I love.
So far my work is done; and none shall say
That Death himself hath power or fear to stay
That course I fixed so surely when I said,
"You'll find I'll do it, or --- you'll find me dead;"
No power exists to alter my resolve!
I care not what the future may involve!---
Then through the silent hours of the night
Together --- horse and man --- we fought that fight.
I thought about the battle on the heights
Of Alma, and of all the Russian fights;
I thought about the splendid Light Brigade,
And of the famous headlong charge they made;
I thought of battles both on land and sea;
Oh, God! I longed, as each occurred to me,
That I'd been there, and numbered with the slain,
Instead of dying on this weary plain
Alone, unheeded --- of all deaths the worst,
Dying a maddening death of raging thirst!
Poor horse! --- poor tottering limbs and staring eyes!
My God! it seems a cruel sacrifice.
Stop here! Enough. Something within me warns
The end is near! See where the morning dawns.
I laid my head against a leaning tree;
Slowly in sleep a dream came over me.
Magical change! What radiant lovely sight!
Is this an angel? Do I see aright?
What wondrous flowers! --- and fragrance all around!
And green as loveliest emeralds the ground!   
While through the peerless flowers I see the gleam,
And hear the ripple, of a sparkling stream.
Speak! Who art thou, of form so fair and bright?
Fair as the flowers, brighter than the light!
With heavenly smile the Angel-face looked down:
"Brother, behold--brother, accept -- thy crown!
Truly and well has thy hard task been done ---
Nobly the battle fought, and victory won;
Acceptable is thy self-sacriflce
To Duty's stern demand. Behold! arise!"
Slowly I wakened --- slow the Vision passed:
Water! By Heaven! --- there it is at last!

Though the life that was nearly gone is vouchsafed yet,
For better or worse, I feel I shall never forget
All that I suffered from thirst in a few short hours,
And the dream of the Angel Form, the stream, and the flowers.

First published in The Queenslander, 18 March 1882

Author reference site: Austlit

See also.

Out on the wastes of the Never Never --
   That's where the dead men lie!
There where the heat-waves dance forever --
   That's where the dead men lie!
That's where the Earth's loved sons are keeping
Endless tryst: not the west wind sweeping
Feverish pinions can wake their sleeping --
   Out where the dead men lie!

Where brown Summer and Death have mated --
   That's where the dead men lie!
Loving with fiery lust unsated --
   That's where the dead men lie!
Out where the grinning skulls bleach whitely
Under the saltbush sparkling brightly;
Out where the wild dogs chorus nightly --
   That's where the dead men lie!

Deep in the yellow, flowing river --
   That's where the dead men lie!
Under the banks where the shadows quiver --
   That's where the dead men lie!
Where the platypus twists and doubles,
Leaving a train of tiny bubbles;
Rid at last of their earthly troubles --
   That's where the dead men lie!

East and backward pale faces turning --
   That's how the dead men lie!
Gaunt arms stretched with a voiceless yearning --
   That's how the dead men lie!
Oft in the fragrant hush of nooning
Hearing again their mother's crooning,
Wrapt for aye in a dreamful swooning -
   That's how the dead men lie!

Only the hand of Night can free them --
   That's when the dead men fly!
Only the frightened cattle see them --
   See the dead men go by!
Cloven hoofs beating out one measure,
Bidding the stockmen know no leisure --
That's when the dead men take their pleasure!
   That's when the dead men fly!

Ask, too, the never-sleeping drover:
   He sees the dead pass by;
Hearing them call to their friends -- the plover,
   Hearing the dead men cry;
Seeing their faces stealing, stealing,
Hearing their laughter pealing, pealing,
Watching their grey forms wheeling, wheeling
   Round where the cattle lie!

Strangled by thirst and fierce privation --
   That's how the dead men die!
Out on Moneygrub's farthest station --
   That's how the dead men die!
Hard-faced greybeards, youngsters callow;
Some mounds cared for, some left fallow;
Some deep down, yet others shallow.
   Some having but the sky.

Moneygrub, as he sips his claret,
   Looks with complacent eye
Down at his watch-chain, eighteen carat -
   There, in his club, hard by:
Recks not that every link is stamped with
Names of the men whose limbs are cramped with
Too long lying in grave-mould, cramped with
   Death where the dead men lie.

First published in The Bulletin, 19 December 1891 and again on 21 May, 1892; 29 January 1980; 27 December 1983; and 12 May 1992;
and later in
The Coolgardie Review, 3 August 1895;
Where the Dead Men Lie and Other Poems by Barcroft Boake, 1897;
The Golden Treasury of Australian Verse edited by Bertram Stevens, 1909;
Aussie: The Australian Soldiers Magazine, April 1919;
The Oxford Book of Australian Verse edited by Walter Murdoch, 1924;
Freedom on the Wallaby: Poems of the Australian People edited by Marjorie Pizer, 1953;
A Book of Australian Verse edited by Judith Wright, 1956;
Favourite Australian Poems edited by Ian Mudie, 1963;
From the Ballads to Brennan edited by T. Inglis Moore, 1964;
The Penguin Book of Australian Verse edited by Harry Heseltine, 1972;
The Collins Book of Australian Poetry compiled by Rodney Hall, 1981;
Complete Book of Australian Folk Lore edited by Bill Scott, 1976;
The Illustrated Treasury of Australian Verse edited by Beatrice Davis, 1984;
Cross-Country: A Book of Australian Verse edited by John Barnes and Brian McFarlane, 1984;
A Treasury of Bush Verse by G. A. Wilkes, 1991;
The Penguin Book of Australian Ballads edited by Elizabeth Webby and Philip Butterss, 1993;
Australian Verse: An Oxford Anthology edited by John Leonard, 1998;
Classic Australian Verse edited by Maggie Pinkney, 2001;
Where the Dead Men Lie: The Story of Barcroft Boake, Bush Poet of the Monaro: 1866-1892  by Hugh Capel, 2002;
An Australian Treasury of Australian Verse edited by Jim Haynes, 2002;
Our Country: Classic Australian Poetry: From the Colonial Ballads to Paterson & Lawson  edited by Michael Cook, 2004;
Barcroft Boake: Collected Works, Edited, with a Life edited by W. F. Refshauge, 2007;
Two Centuries of Australian Poetry edited by Kathrine Bell, 2007;
100 Australian Poems You Need to Know edited by Jamie Grant, 2008;
The Penguin Anthology of Australian Poetry edited by John Kinsella, 2009;
Macquarie PEN Anthology of Australian Literature edited by Nicholas Jose, Kerryn Goldsworthy, Anita Heiss, David McCooey, Peter Minter, Nicole Moore and Elizabeth Webby, 2009; and
The Puncher & Wattmann Anthology of Australian Poetry edited by John Leonard, 2009.

Author reference sites: Austlit, Australian Dictionary of Biography, Australian Poetry Library

See also.

Around me lie the scatter'd wrecks
Of my brave company,
Who journey'd forth into the midst   
Of this vast plain, to die.--
Fierce Sun! thou can'st not light again
The fires in each closed eye,--
Nor loose the black parched tongue of death,
Even unto God to cry.

Dwellers beside your cherished hearths!
Kind friends who greeted me,   
Even as a brother when I came,
The mourned one, o'er the sea; --
And helped me forth, (my bosom's thirst,)
This central waste to see --  
I cry, tho' death may stop my words,
God's blessings upon ye.

Oh! take my fame, for good or ill,
Nor let my name be lost;
I sought a household word to be,
Nor do I grudge the cost: --  
Some hearts, I deem may grieve for him,
Midst central sands now toss'd,
And blame the lingering steps that might
The dead man's path have crossed.

First published in The Empire, 9 December 1851

Author reference sites: Austlit, Australian Dictionary of Biography

See also.

I thought, in the days of the droving,
   Of steps I might hope to retrace,
To be done with the bush and the roving
   And settle once more in my place.
With a heart that was well nigh to breaking,
   In the long, lonely rides on the plain,
I thought of the pleasure of taking
   The hand of a lady again.

I am back into civilisation,
   Once more in the stir and the strife,
But the old joys have lost their sensation --
   The light has gone out of my life;
The men of my time they have married,
   Made fortunes or gone to the wall;
Too long from the scene I have tarried,
   And, somehow, I'm out of it all.

For I go to the balls and the races
   A lonely companionless elf,
And the ladies bestow all their graces
   On others less grey than myself;
While the talk goes around I'm a dumb one
   'Midst youngsters that chatter and prate,
And they call me "the Man who was Someone
   Way back in the year Sixty-eight."

And I look, sour and old, at the dancers
   That swing to the strains of the band,
And the ladies all give me the Lancers,
   No waltzes -- I quite understand.
For matrons intent upon matching
   Their daughters with infinite push,
Would scarce think him worthy the catching,
   The broken-down man from the bush.

New partners have come and new faces,
   And I, of the bygone brigade,
Sharply feel that oblivion my place is --
   I must lie with the rest in the shade.
And the youngsters, fresh-featured and pleasant,
   They live as we lived -- fairly fast;
But I doubt if the men of the present
   Are as good as the men of the past.

Of excitement and praise they are chary,
   There is nothing much good upon earth;
Their watchword is NIL ADMIRARI,
   They are bored from the days of their birth.
Where the life that we led was a revel
   They "wince and relent and refrain" --
I could show them the road -- to the devil,
   Were I only a youngster again.

I could show them the road where the stumps are
   The pleasures that end in remorse,
And the game where the Devil's three trumps are,
   The woman, the card, and the horse.
Shall the blind lead the blind -- shall the sower
   Of wind reap the storm as of yore?
Though they get to their goal somewhat slower,
   They march where we hurried before.

For the world never learns -- just as we did,
   They gallantly go to their fate,
Unheeded all warnings, unheeded
   The maxims of elders sedate.
As the husbandman, patiently toiling,
   Draws a harvest each year from the soil,
So the fools grow afresh for the spoiling,
   And a new crop of thieves for the spoil.

But a truce to this dull moralising,
   Let them drink while the drops are of gold,
I have tasted the dregs -- 'twere surprising
   Were the new wine to me like the old;
And I weary for lack of employment
   In idleness day after day,
For the key to the door of enjoyment
   Is Youth -- and I've thrown it away.

First published in The Bulletin, 20 October 1894
and later in
The Man From Snowy River and Other Verses by A.B. Paterson, 1895;
The Collected Verse of A.B. Paterson by A.B. Paterson, 1982;
Singer of the Bush, A.B. (Banjo) Paterson: Complete Works 1885-1900 compiled by Rosamund Campbell and Philippa Harvie, 1983; and
A Vision Splendid: The Complete Poetry of A.B. 'Banjo' Paterson by A.B. Paterson, 1990.

Author reference sites: Austlit, Australian Dictionary of Biography, Australian Poetry Library

See also.

They left the vine-wreathed cottage and the mansion on the hill,
The houses in the busy streets where life is never still,
The pleasures of the city, and the friends they cherished best:
For love they faced the wilderness-the Women of the West.

The roar, and rush, and fever of the city died away,
And the old-time joys and faces-they were gone for many a day;
In their place the lurching coach-wheel, or the creaking bullock chains,
O'er the everlasting sameness of the never-ending plains.

In the slab-built, zinc-roofed homestead of some lately-taken run,
In the tent beside the bankment of a railway just begun,
In the huts on new selections-in the camps of man's unrest,
On the frontiers of the Nation, live the Women of the West.

The red sun robs their beauty, and, in weariness and pain,
The slow years steal the nameless grace that never comes again;
And there are hours men cannot soothe, and words men cannot say
The nearest woman's face may be a hundred miles away.

The wide Bush holds the secrets of their longings and desires,
When the white stars in reverence light their holy altar-fires,
And silence, like the touch of God, sinks deep into the breast--
Perchance He hears and understands the Women of the West.

For them no trumpet sounds the call, no poet plies his arts--  
They only hear the beating of their gallant, loving hearts.
But they have sung with silent lives the song all songs above
The holiness of sacrifice, the dignity of love.

Well have we held our fathers' creed. No call has passed us by.
We faced and fought the wilderness, we sent our sons to die.
And we have hearts to do and dare, and yet o'er all the rest
The hearts that made the Nation were the Women of the West.  

First published in The Argus, 7 September 1901;
and later in
The Queenslander, 21 September 1901;
The Brisbane Courier, 14 September 1901;
The North Queensland Register, 23 September 1901;
The Secret Key and Other Verses by George Essex Evans, 1906;
An Anthology of Australian Verse edited by Bertram Stevens, 1907;
School Paper for Classes V and VI, July 1909;
The Golden Treasury of Australian Verse edited by Bertram Stevens, 1909;
The School Paper for Grades VII and VIII, May 1922;
The Daily Mail, 10 August 1924;
A Book of Queensland Verse edited by J.J. Stable, and A.E.M. Kirwood, 1924;
Selections from the Australian Poets edited by Bertram Stevens, 1925;
The School Paper: Grades VII and VIII, December 1927;
The Victorian Reading-Books: Eighth Book, 1928;
The Queenslander, 5 October 1938;
The Victorian Reading-Books: Eighth Book, 1940;
Australian Bush Songs and Ballads edited by Will Lawson, 1944;
Favourite Australian Poems edited by Ian Mudie, 1963;
From the Ballads to Brennan edited by T. Inglis Moore, 1964;
Along the Western Road: Bush Stories and Ballads, 1981;
This Australia, Spring 1982;
A Treasury of Colonial Poetry, 1982;
The Illustrated Treasury of Australian Verse compiled by Beatrice Davis, 1984;
My Country: Australian Poetry and Short Stories, Two Hundred Years edited by Leonie Kramer, 1985;
A Treasury of Bush Verse edited by G. A. Wilkes, 1991;
The Penguin Book of 19th Century Australian Literature edited by Michael Ackland, 1993;
The Romance of the Stockman: The Lore, Legend and Literature of Australia's Outback Heroes, 1993;
The Penguin Book of Australian Ballads edited by Elizabeth Webby and Philip Butterss, 1993;
The Illustrated Treasury of Australian Verse compiled by Beatrice Davis, 1996;
Classic Australian Verse edited by Maggie Pinkney, 2001;
Our Country: Classic Australian Poetry: From the Colonial Ballads to Paterson & Lawson edited by Michael Cook, 2004; and
The Book of Australian Popular Rhymed Verse: A Classic Collection of Entertaining and Recitable Poems and Verse: From Henry Lawson to Barry Humphries edited by Jim Haynes, 2008.

Author reference sites: Austlit, Australian Dictionary of Biography, Australian Poetry Library

See also.

The vast and open spaces;
   They are calling me again;
The many sun-tanned faces;
   The life upon the plain;
      Back o' beyond.

The call comes loud and stronger,
   Till the longing seems to burn
For the homestead down by Wonga,
   Just when will I return?
      Back o' beyond.

First published in The Sydney Morning Herald, 24 July 1926

Author: nothing is known about the author of this poem

Come, Stumpy, old man, we must shift while we can;
   All our mates in the paddock are dead.
Let us wave our farewells to Glen Eva's sweet dells
   And the hills where your lordship was bred;
Together to roam from our drought-stricken home --
   It seems hard that such things have to be,
And it's hard on a "hoss" when he's nought for a boss
   But a broken-down squatter like me!

No more shall we muster the river for fats,
   Or spell on the Fifteen-mile plain,
Or rip through the scrub by the light of the moon,
   Or see the old stockyard again.
Leave the slip-panels down, it won't matter much now,
   There are none but the crows left to see,
Perching gaunt in yon pine, as though longing to dine
   On a broken-down squatter like me.

When the country was cursed with the drought at its worst,
   And the cattle were dying in scores,
Though down on my luck, I kept up my pluck,
   Thinking justice might temper the laws.
But the farce has been played, and the Government aid
   Ain't extended to squatters, old son;
When my dollars were spent they doubled the rent,
   And resumed the best half of the run.   

'Twas done without reason, for leaving the season
   No squatter could stand such a rub;
For its useless to squat, when the rents are so hot
   That one can't save the price of one's grub;
And there's not much to choose 'twixt the banks and the Jews
   Once a fellow gets put up a tree;
No odds what I feel, there's no court of appeal
   For a broken-down squatter like me.

First published in The Queenslander, 30 June 1894;
and later in
Old Bush Songs: Composed and Sung in the Bushranging, Digging and Overlanding Days edited by A. B. Paterson, 1905;
The North Queensland Register, 25 February 1924;
The Bulletin, 17 January 1951;
From the Ballads to Brennan edited by T. Inglis Moore, 1964;
The Penguin Australian Song Book edited by J.S. Manifold, 1964;
Folk Songs of Australia and the Men and Women Who Sang Them edited by John Meredith and Hugh Anderson, 1967;
The Overlander Songbook edited by Ronald George Edwards, 1971;
Complete Book of Australian Folk Lore edited by Bill Scott, 1976;
Old Bush Songs and Rhymes of Colonial Times edited by Douglas Stewart and Nancy Keesing, 1976; and
The Penguin Book of Australian Ballads edited by Elizabeth Webby and Philip Butterss, 1993.

Author:  Charles Augustus Flower (1856-1948) was born in Port Fairy, Victoria and worked as a jackaroo there until moving to South West Queensland. He owned and ran properties in that area until his death in 1948.

Author reference sites: Austlit

On Nungar the mists of the morning hung low,
The beetle-browed hills brooded silent and black,
Not yet warmed to life by the sun's loving glow,
As through the tall tussocks rode young Charlie Mac.
What cared he for mists at the dawning of day,
What cared he that over the valley stern 'Jack',
The monarch of frost, held his pitiless sway? -
A bold mountaineer, born and bred, was young Mac.

A galloping son of a galloping sire -
Stiffest fence, roughest ground, never took him aback;
With his father's cool judgement, his dash and his fire,
The pick of Monaro, rode young Charlie Mac.
And the pick of the stable the mare he bestrode -
Arab-grey, built to stay, lithe of limb, deep of chest,
She seemed to be happy to bear such a load
As she tossed the soft forelock that curled on her crest.

They crossed Nungar Creek, where its span is but short
At its head, where together spring two mountain rills,
When a mob of wild horses sprang up with a snort -
'By thunder!' quoth Mac, 'there's the Lord of the Hills.'

Decoyed from her paddock, a Murray-bred mare
Had fled to the hills with a warrigal band.
A pretty bay foal had been born to her there,
Whose veins held the very best blood in the land -
'The Lord of the Hills', as the bold mountain men,
Whose courage and skill he was wont to defy,
Had named him; they yarded him once, but since then
He'd held to the saying 'Once bitten twice shy.'

The scrubber, thus suddenly roused from his lair,
Struck straight for the timber with fear in his heart;
As Charlie rose up in his stirrups, the mare
Sprang forward, no need to tell Empress to start.
She laid to the chase just as soon as she felt
Her rider's skilled touch, light, yet firm, on the rein.
Stride for stride, lengthened wide, for the green timber belt,
The fastest half-mile ever done on the plain.

They reached the low sallee before he could wheel
The warrigal mob; up they dashed with a stir
Of low branches and undergrowth - Charlie could feel
His mare catch her breath on the side of the spur
That steeply slopes up till it meets the bald cone.
'Twas here on the range that the trouble began,
For a slip on the sidling, a loose rolling stone,
And the chase would be done; but the bay in the van
And the little grey mare were a surefooted pair.
He looked once around as she crept to his heel
And the swish that he gave his long tail in the air
Seemed to say, 'Here's a foeman well worthy my steel.'

They raced to within half a mile of the bluff
That drops to the river, the squadron strung out.
"I wonder," quoth Mac, "has the bay had enough?"
But he was not left very much longer in doubt,
For the Lord of the Hills struck a spur for the flat
And followed it, leaving his mob, mares and all,
While Empress (brave heart, she could climb like a cat)
Down the stony descent raced with never a fall.

Once down on the level 'twas galloping-ground,
For a while Charlie thought he might yard the big bay
At his uncle's out-station, but no! He wheeled round
And down the sharp dip to the Gulf made his way.

Betwixt those twin portals, that, towering high
And backwardly sloping in watchfulness, lift
Their smooth grassy summits towards the far sky,
The course of the clear Murrumbidgee runs swift;
No time then to seek where the crossing might be,
It was in at one side and out where you could,
But fear never dwelt in the hearts of those three
Who emerged from the shade of the low muzzle-wood.

Once more did the Lord of the Hills strike a line
Up the side of the range, and once more he looked back,
So close were they now he could see the sun shine
In the bold grey eyes flashing of young Charlie Mac.

He saw little Empress, stretched out like a hound
On the trail of its quarry, the pick of the pack,
With ne'er-tiring stride, and his heart gave a bound
As he saw the lithe stockwhip of young Charlie Mac
Showing snaky and black on the neck of the mare
In three hanging coils with a turn round the wrist.
And he heartily wished himself back in his lair
'Mid the tall tussocks beaded with chill morning mist.

Then he fancied the straight mountain-ashes, the gums
And the wattles all mocked him and whispered, "You lack
The speed to avert cruel capture, that comes
To the warrigal fancied by young Charlie Mac,
For he'll yard you, and rope you, and then you'll be stuck
In the crush, while his saddle is girthed to your back.
Then out in the open, and there you may buck
Till you break your bold heart, but you'll never throw Mac!"

The Lord of the Hills at the thought felt the sweat
Break over the smooth summer gloss of his hide.
He spurted his utmost to leave her, but yet
The Empress crept up to him, stride upon stride.
No need to say Charlie was riding her now,
Yet still for all that he had something in hand,
With here a sharp stoop to avoid a low bough,
Or a quick rise and fall as a tree-trunk they spanned.

In his terror the brumby struck down the rough falls
T'wards Yiack, with fierce disregard for his neck -
'Tis useless, he finds, for the mare overhauls
Hi slowly, no timber could keep her in check.

There's a narrow-beat pathway that winds to and fro
Down the deeps of the gully, half hid from the day,
There's a turn in the track, where the hop-bushes grow
And hide the grey granite that crosses the way
While sharp swerves the path round the boulder's broad base -
And now the last scene in the drama is played:
As the Lord of the Hills, with the mare in full chase,
Swept towards it, but, ere his long stride could be stayed,
With a gathered momentum that gave not a chance
Of escape, and a shuddering, sickening shock,
He struck on the granite that barred his advance
And sobbed out his life at the foot of the rock.

Then Charlie pulled off with a twitch on the rein,
And an answering spring from his surefooted mount,
One might say, unscathed, though a crimsoning stain
Marked the graze of the granite, but that would ne'er count
With Charlie, who speedily sprang to the earth
To ease the mare's burden, his deft-fingered hand
Unslackened her surcingle, loosened tight girth,
And cleansed with a tussock the spur's ruddy brand.

There he lay by the rock - drooping head, glazing eye,
Strong limbs stilled for ever; no more would he fear
The tread of a horseman, no more would he fly
Through the hills with his harem in rapid career,
The pick of the Mountain Mob, bays, greys, or roans.
He proved by his death that the place 'tis that kills,
And a sun-shrunken hide o'er a few whitened bones
Marks the last resting-place of the Lord of the Hills.

First published in The Bulletin, 30 May 1891
and later in
Where the Dead Men Lie and Other Poems by Barcroft Boake, 1897;
Old Ballads from the Bush edited by Bill Scott, 1987;
A Collection of Australian Bush Verse, 1989;
Barcroft Henry Boake edited by Hugh Capel, 2002;
Where the Dead Men Lie: The Story of Barcroft Boake, Bush Poet of the Monaro: 1866-1892  by Hugh Capel, 2002;
Barcroft Boake: Collected Works, Edited, with a Life edited by W. F. Refshauge, 2007; and
Two Centuries of Australian Poetry edited by Kathrine Bell, 2007.

Author reference sites: Austlit, Australian Dictionary of Biography, Australian Poetry Library

See also.

There was movement at the station, for the word had passed around
That the colt from old Regret had got away,
And had joined the wild bush horses - he was worth a thousand pound,
So all the cracks had gathered to the fray.
All the tried and noted riders from the stations near and far
Had mustered at the homestead overnight,
For the bushmen love hard riding where the wild bush horses are,
And the stockhorse snuffs the battle with delight.

There was Harrison, who made his pile when Pardon won the cup,
The old man with his hair as white as snow;
But few could ride beside him when his blood was fairly up -
He would go wherever horse and man could go.
And Clancy of the Overflow came down to lend a hand,
No better horseman ever held the reins;
For never horse could throw him while the saddle girths would stand,
He learnt to ride while droving on the plains.

And one was there, a stripling on a small and weedy beast,
He was something like a racehorse undersized,
With a touch of Timor pony - three parts thoroughbred at least -
And such as are by mountain horsemen prized.
He was hard and tough and wiry - just the sort that won't say die -
There was courage in his quick impatient tread;
And he bore the badge of gameness in his bright and fiery eye,
And the proud and lofty carriage of his head.

But still so slight and weedy, one would doubt his power to stay,
And the old man said, "That horse will never do
For a long a tiring gallop - lad, you'd better stop away,
Those hills are far too rough for such as you."
So he waited sad and wistful - only Clancy stood his friend -
"I think we ought to let him come," he said;
"I warrant he'll be with us when he's wanted at the end,
For both his horse and he are mountain bred.

"He hails from Snowy River, up by Kosciusko's side,
Where the hills are twice as steep and twice as rough,
Where a horse's hoofs strike firelight from the flint stones every stride,
The man that holds his own is good enough.
And the Snowy River riders on the mountains make their home,
Where the river runs those giant hills between;
I have seen full many horsemen since I first commenced to roam,
But nowhere yet such horsemen have I seen."

So he went - they found the horses by the big mimosa clump -
They raced away towards the mountain's brow,
And the old man gave his orders, "Boys, go at them from the jump,
No use to try for fancy riding now.
And, Clancy, you must wheel them, try and wheel them to the right.
Ride boldly, lad, and never fear the spills,
For never yet was rider that could keep the mob in sight,
If once they gain the shelter of those hills."

So Clancy rode to wheel them - he was racing on the wing
Where the best and boldest riders take their place,
And he raced his stockhorse past them, and he made the ranges ring
With the stockwhip, as he met them face to face.
Then they halted for a moment, while he swung the dreaded lash,
But they saw their well-loved mountain full in view,
And they charged beneath the stockwhip with a sharp and sudden dash,
And off into the mountain scrub they flew.

Then fast the horsemen followed, where the gorges deep and black
Resounded to the thunder of their tread,
And the stockwhips woke the echoes, and they fiercely answered back
From cliffs and crags that beetled overhead.
And upward, ever upward, the wild horses held their way,
Where mountain ash and kurrajong grew wide;
And the old man muttered fiercely, "We may bid the mob good day,
No man can hold them down the other side."

When they reached the mountain's summit, even Clancy took a pull,
It well might make the boldest hold their breath,
The wild hop scrub grew thickly, and the hidden ground was full
Of wombat holes, and any slip was death.
But the man from Snowy River let the pony have his head,
And he swung his stockwhip round and gave a cheer,
And he raced him down the mountain like a torrent down its bed,
While the others stood and watched in very fear.

He sent the flint stones flying, but the pony kept his feet,
He cleared the fallen timber in his stride,
And the man from Snowy River never shifted in his seat -
It was grand to see that mountain horseman ride.
Through the stringybarks and saplings, on the rough and broken ground,
Down the hillside at a racing pace he went;
And he never drew the bridle till he landed safe and sound,
At the bottom of that terrible descent.

He was right among the horses as they climbed the further hill,
And the watchers on the mountain standing mute,
Saw him ply the stockwhip fiercely, he was right among them still,
As he raced across the clearing in pursuit.
Then they lost him for a moment, where two mountain gullies met
In the ranges, but a final glimpse reveals
On a dim and distant hillside the wild horses racing yet,
With the man from Snowy River at their heels.

And he ran them single-handed till their sides were white with foam.
He followed like a bloodhound on their track,
Till they halted cowed and beaten, then he turned their heads for home,
And alone and unassisted brought them back.
But his hardy mountain pony he could scarcely raise a trot,
He was blood from hip to shoulder from the spur;
But his pluck was still undaunted, and his courage fiery hot,
For never yet was mountain horse a cur.

And down by Kosciusko, where the pine-clad ridges raise
Their torn and rugged battlements on high,
Where the air is clear as crystal, and the white stars fairly blaze
At midnight in the cold and frosty sky,
And where around The Overflow the reed beds sweep and sway
To the breezes, and the rolling plains are wide,
The man from Snowy River is a household word today,
And the stockmen tell the story of his ride.

First published in The Bulletin, 26 April 1890, and in the same magazine on 1 February 1950 an 29 January 1980;
and later in
The Man From Snowy River and Other Verses by A.B. Paterson, 1895;
Selections from the Australian Poets edited by Bertram Stevens, 1925;
Favourite Australian Poems edited by Ian Mudie, 1963;
From the Ballads to Brennan edited by T. Inglis Moore, 1964;
Banjo Paterson's Horses: The Man from Snowy Rover, Father Riley's Horse, Story of Mongrel Grey by A.B. Paterson, 1970;
The Penguin Book of Australian Poetry edited by Harry Heseltine, 1972;
Australia Poems in Perspective: A Collection of Poems and Critical Commentaries edited by P.K. Elkin, 1978;
The Collins Book of Australian Poetry compiled by Rodney Hall, 1981;
The Collected Verse of A.B. Paterson by A.B. Paterson, 1982;
A Treasury of Colonial Poetry, 1982;
Singer of the Bush, A.B. (Banjo) Paterson: Complete Works 1885-1900 compiled by Rosamund Campbell and Philippa Harvie, 1983;
Cross-Country: A Book of Australian Verse edited by John Barnes and Brian McFarlane, 1984;
The Illustrated Treasury of Australian Verse compiled by Beatrice Davis, 1984;
My Country: Australian Poetry and Short Stories, Two Hundred Years edited by Leonie Kramer, 1985;
The Banjo's Best-Loved Poems edited by Rosamund Campbell and Philippa Harvie, 1989;
A Collection of Australian Bush Verse, 1989;
A Vision Splendid: The Complete Poetry of A.B. 'Banjo' Paterson by A.B. Paterson, 1990;
A Treasury of Bush Verse edited by G. A. Wilkes, 1991;
A.B. 'Banjo' Paterson: Bush Ballads, Poems, Stories and Journalism edited by Clement Semmler, 1992;
Selected Poems: A. B. Paterson compiled by Les Murray, 1992;
The Advertiser, 27 January 1992;
The Collected Verse of Banjo Paterson edited by Clement Semmler, 1993;
Banjo Paterson: His Poetry and Prose compiled by Richard Hall, 1993;
The Penguin Book of Australian Ballads edited by Elizabeth Webby and Philip Butterss, 1993;
The Age, 16 October 1995;
The Australian, 17 October 1995;
An Anthology of Australian Literature edited by Ch'oe Chin-yong and Cynthia Van Den Driessen, 1995;
The Illustrated Treasury of Australian Verse compiled by Beatrice Davis, 1996;
The Arnold Anthology of Post-Colonial Literatures in English edited by John Thieme, 1996;
Australian Verse: An Oxford Anthology edited by John Leonard, 1998;
Our Country: Classic Australian Poetry: From the Colonial Ballads to Paterson & Lawson  edited by Michael Cook, 2004;
Two Centuries of Australian Poetry edited by Kathrine Bell, 2007;
The Bush Poems of A. B.(Banjo) Paterson by A.B.Paterson, 2008;
The Book of Australian Popular Rhymed Verse: A Classic Collection of Entertaining and Recitable Poems and Verse: From Henry Lawson to Barry Humphries edited by Jim Haynes, 2008;
Macquarie PEN Anthology of Australian Literature edited by Nicholas Jose, Kerryn Goldsworthy, Anita Heiss, David McCooey, Peter Minter, Nicole Moore and Elizabeth Webby, 2009; and
The Puncher & Wattmann Anthology of Australian Poetry edited by John Leonard, 2009.

Author reference sites: Austlit, Australian Dictionary of Biography, Australian Poetry Library

See also.

The bush tracks of Australia
   Run, dusty, through the day,
And whisper to the gum trees
   That guard their sun-kissed way.
They chatter with the breezes,
   And dance among the flowers;
And send their love songs ringing
   Through perfume-laden hours.

The bush tracks of Australia
   Run westward from the sea;
For they love the unbound bushland,
   That stretches wide and free.
They clamber to the hilltops,
   And wave at skies of blue;
And where the kookaburras laugh,
   You'll hear them laughing, too.

Oh, the bush tracks of Australia
   Go rambling through my heart;
They wave across the ocean,
   And smile when moonbeams dart.
They beckon in my dreaming,
   And no matter where I roam;
Their voices ever follow me.
   And call, "Come home, come home."

First published in The Sydney Morning Herald, 22 April 1933

Author: nothing is known about the author of this poem.

Are you tired of the South Land, comrade
   The smoke and the city's din,
And the roar of the chiding ocean
   When the sobbing tide comes in?
Would you ride to the northward, rather,
   To the skirmish-posts of earth,
Where the darkest dust-storms gather
   And the wildest floods have birth?
Are you tired of the revel, comrade,
   The life of folly and wine
With its one half lived in the shadow
   And one half lived in shine?
Are you tired of the poison glasses,
   The lawless love and the kiss,
Out East where the brown range passes
   Do you hope for dearer than this --
Where the sweetest maid that ever knew
   Love's bliss and parting's pain
Is waiting open-armed for you
   Beyond the Barrier Chain?
Let us steer to the northward, comrade,
   To the Bush, with her witching spells,
The sun-bright days and the camp-fire blaze
   And the chime of the bullock-bell--
Down the long, long leagues behind us
   The rain shall cover our track,
And the dust of the North shall blind us
   Or ever we follow it back,
Away from the old friends, comrade,
   The grasp of the strong, brown hand,
The love and the life and the laughter
   That brighten the brave North Land --
So long as the sunlight fills it,
   So long as the red stars shine,
So long as the Master wills it
   The North is your home and mine.

First published in The Bulletin, 21 April 1894;
and later in
Fair Girls and Gray Horses: With Other Verses by Will H. Ogilvie, 1958; and
Breaker's Mate: Will Ogilvie in Australia edited by John Meredith, 1996.

Author reference sites: Austlit, Australian Dictionary of Biography

See also.

There is a track, away "out back,"
   Which opens up when bushmen fall,
And there, they say, you hear alway
   The lonely curlew's wandering call.

And many a soul has reached its goal
   By passing down that misty hall;
And many an ear devoid of fear
   Has heard the lonely curlew's call.

What need of shroud? Enough of cloud
   Is there to form an endless pall.
What need of psalm? For nought can harm
   Those souls who hear the curlew's call.

Though when alone the track is shown,
   What need to dread which waits for all
Who gather near to save from fear
   Those who have heard the curlew's call?

There is a track away out back
   Which opens up when bushmen fall,
And there, they say, you hear alway
   The lonely curlew's wandering call.

First published in The Queenslander, 10 April 1897

Author reference sites: Austlit, Australian Dictionary of Biography

See also.

Alone with the silence, the sun and sky,
Alone on the tussocky plain I lie.
An ocean of yellow from East to West
Still rolling and sweeping, far crest on crest;
And billow on billow the tussocks bend
Until in one shimmering haze they blend;
Where, under the distance, the heat and noon,
The plains, in an ecstasy thrilling, swoon
And melt in the yellow-tinged sombre air,
Like perfume from roses on evenings rare!
Where the sky and the misty horizon meet
The flax-bushes float like a far-of fleet.
And slowly they swim with no spray nor splash,
While swell their green sails and their brown oars flash!
So, lost in two oceans --- of plain and sky --
Full-length on the tussocks alone I lie!

First published in The Bulletin, 6 April 1895

Author: Arthur Henry Adams (1872-1936) was born in Lawrence, New Zealand, and arrived in Australia in 1898.  He studied law at the University of Otago but gave it up for journalism.  He arrived in Sydney to stage an opera, but left in 1900 to cover the Boxer Rebellion in China for the Sydney Morning Herald.  He returned to New Zealand where he started as an associate editor of the New Zealand Times before returning to Sydney and taking over the "Red Page" of The Bulletin. He was later editor of the Lone Hand and the Sydney Sun.  He died of pneumonia in Sydney in 1936.

Author reference sites: Austlit, Australian Dictionary of Biography

See also.

Across the stony ridges,
   Across the rolling plain,
Young Harry Dale, the drover,
   Comes riding home again.
And well his stock-horse bears him,
   And light of heart is he,
And stoutly his old pack-horse
   Is trotting by his knee.

Up Queensland way with cattle
   He travelled regions vast;
And many months have vanished
   Since home-folk saw him last.
He hums a song of someone
   He hopes to marry soon;
And hobble-chains and camp-ware
   Keep jingling to the tune.

Beyond the hazy dado
   Against the lower skies
And yon blue line of ranges
   The homestead station lies.
And thitherward the drover
   Jogs through the lazy noon,
While hobble-chains and camp-ware
   Are jingling to a tune.

An hour has filled the heavens
   With storm-clouds inky black;
At times the lightning trickles
   Around the drover's track;
But Harry pushes onward,
   His horses' strength he tries,
In hope to reach the river
   Before the flood shall rise.

The thunder from above him
   Goes rolling o'er the plain;
And down on thirsty pastures
   In torrents falls the rain.
And every creek and gully
   Sends forth its little flood,
Till the river runs a banker,
   All stained with yellow mud.

Now Harry speaks to Rover,
   The best dog on the plains,
And to his hardy horses,
   And strokes their shaggy manes;
"We've breasted bigger rivers
   When floods were at their height
Nor shall this gutter stop us
   From getting home to-night!"

The thunder growls a warning,
   The ghastly lightnings gleam,
As the drover turns his horses
   To swim the fatal stream.
But, oh! the flood runs stronger
   Than e'er it ran before;
The saddle-horse is failing,
   And only half-way o'er!

When flashes next the lightning,
   The flood's grey breast is blank,
And a cattle dog and pack-horse
   Are struggling up the bank.
But in the lonely homestead
   The girl will wait in vain --
He'll never pass the stations
   In charge of stock again.

The faithful dog a moment
   Sits panting on the bank,
And then swims through the current
   To where his master sank.
And round and round in circles
   He fights with failing strength,
Till, borne down by the waters,
   The old dog sinks at length.

Across the flooded lowlands
   And slopes of sodden loam
The pack-horse struggles onward,
   To take dumb tidings home.
And mud-stained, wet, and weary,
   Through ranges dark goes he;
While hobble-chains and tinware
   Are sounding eerily.

      .    .    .    .    .

The floods are in the ocean,
   The stream is clear again,
And now a verdant carpet
   Is stretched across the plain.
But someone's eyes are saddened,
   And someone's heart still bleeds
In sorrow for the drover
   Who sleeps among the reeds.

First published in The Australian Town and Country Journal, 9 March 1889,
then in the same newspaper on 21 September 1889;
and later in
In the Days When the World Was Wide and Other Verses by Henry Lawson, 1900;
The Coo-ee Reciter: Humourous, Pathetic, Dramatic, Dialect, and Readings compiled by William T. Pyke, 1904; 
The Children's Treasury of Australian Verse edited by Bertram Stevens, 1913;
Winnowed Verse by Henry Lawson, 1924;
Selection from Australian Poets edited by Bertram Stevens, 1925;
The Children's Lawson by Henry Lawson, 1949;
Songs from Lawson by Henry Lawson, 1957;
From the Ballads to Brennan edited by T. Inglis Moore, 1964;
The World of Henry Lawson edited by Walter Stone, 1974;
A Treasury of Colonial Poetry, 1982;
and
An Australian Treasury of Popular Verse edited by Kathrine Bell, 2002,
amongst many others.

Author reference sites: Austlit, Australian Dictionary of Biography, Australian Poetry Library, The Poetry of Henry Lawson website

See also.

I long for the streets but the Lord knoweth best,
   For there I am never a saint;
There are lovable characters out in the West,
   with humour heroic and quaint;
And, be it Up Country, or be it Out Back,
   When I shall have gone to my Home,
I trust to be buried 'twixt River and Track
   Where my lovable characters roam.
 
There are lovable characters drag through the scrub,
   Where the Optimist ever prevails;
There are lovable characters hang round the pub,
   There are lovable jokers at sales
Where the auctioneer's one of the lovable wags
   (Maybe from his "order" estranged),
And the beer is on tap, and the pigs in the bags
  Of the purchasing cockies are changed.

There are lovable characters out in the West,
   Of fifty hot summers, or more,
Who could not be proved, when it came to the test,
   Too old to be sent to the war;
They were all forty-five and were orphans, they said,
   With no one to keep them, or keep;
And mostly in France, with the world's bravest dead,
   Those lovable characters sleep.

I long for the streets but the Lord knoweth best,
   For there I am never a saint;
There are lovable characters out in the West,
   with humour heroic and quaint;
And, be it Up Country, or be it Out Back,
   When I shall have gone to my Home,
I trust to be buried 'twixt River and Track
   Where my lovable characters roam.

First published in The Bulletin, 8 February 1917 ;
and later in
A Fantasy of Man: Henry Lawson Complete Works 1901-22 edited by Leonard Cronin, 1984

Author reference sites: Austlit, Australian Dictionary of Biography, Australian Poetry Library, The Poetry of Henry Lawson website

See also.

Grey-lying miles to the nor'ward of Nor'ward,
Red-leaping leagues to the westward of West,
Further than keenest of sight follows forward,
Further than boldest of hearts ever guessed;
Still with its secret to Man unimparted,
Still with its beckoning wealth unattained,
Lies the dim goal that has Never been Charted,
Down the long Road that has Never been Chained.

Day after day, and from morrow to morrow,
Pointing the way where the wide road begins,
Sweep the red scorpion scourges of Sorrow,
Lashing her children out West for their sins;
Beef wood and white wood, and redgum and wilga,
Lead them and goad them, and guide them and guard,
Till hidden in tangle of sandal and mulga,
The gates to the East and the Southward are barred.

Westward and Nor'ward! and fainter behind them
The roll of the waggons, the roar of the whips,
The towering red dust-storms that waltz down and wind them,
The blue mocking mirage that rise to their lips;
Beyond the last camp of the furthest-west drover,
Beyond the last team-track, the last rotting steer,
Beyond the last foot-pad the camels crossed over,
Beyond the lone grave of the last pioneer.

Westward and Westward! Out past the last horror
Of thirst and starvation, of lorn lives and lost,
The bleaching white bones of the boldest explorer,
The scrubs and the plains that have never been crossed, --
Where the heat haze no lunger in mockery dances,
Where no more the sand-drift whirls brown on the blue,
Where the pitying Sun lays at rest his red lances,
With white flags of truce where his war banner flew.

The last birds have waked them -- they sleep now no longer!
The last dark has lifted -- they take no more rest!
For the aching feet heal and the tired heart grows stronger
As every league bears them a league to the West.
Gold ! Did they hear her sweet voice as they started?
Now she is dumb to them, scorned and disdained,
And their goal is a Goal that has Never been Charted;
Their route is a Road that has Never been Chained.

Westward and -- Homeward! Brown hands at the back of them;
Far in the distance white hands -- and the rest;
One by one, outward, we lose the last track of them,
All the world wending its way to the West;
One after one, till the last shall have started,
Yet no more the last than the first shall have gained
In the lore of the Goal that has Never been Charted,
Down the long Road that has Never been Chained.

First published in The Bulletin, 8 January 1898;
and later in:
Fair Girls and Gray Horses and Other Verses by Will H. Ogilvie, 1898

Author: Will H. Ogilvie (1869-1963) was born in Scotland and travelled to Australia in 1889, due, in part, to his love of the horses and the poetry of Adam Lindsay Gordon. He spent the next 12 years working in the bush and took to writing poetry that would later put him in the company of the best of bush balladists, especially the "horse poets".  He returned to Scotland in 1901 and stayed there until his death in 1963.  He continued to write poetry for Scottish publications throughout his life.

Author reference sites: Austlit, Australian Dictionary of Biography

See also.