(By "Oriel")
We were humping old Matilda on the Gunbar-Hillston line.
Me cobbers, Bull Maloney, Murph, and me ;
We were booked to shear for Creswick, at a place called Silver Pine,
Which is forty weary miles from "Billy Tea."
We were broke and fairly busted after bein' on the booze
For a fortnight at the pub. at Carrathool.
Where we'd lived on pickled emus and curried kangaroos,
And spent our sober hours playin' pool.
Our throats were dry and cracking from the dust along the road,
Our eyes were bloodshot, burning, sore and tired :
And faithful old Matilda seemed to be a half-ton load-
A good deal more than we poor tramps required.
But Matilda on the ramble is a partner ever true,
So we took. her up and mooched our weary way
Along the road to Creswick's-that shearing job to do-
Which we hoped to reach at dinner time next day.
We cadged a bit of tucker from the bloke who keeps the dam
At the thirty mile post on that cursed track ;
The menu for the morning was sour bread and jam,
For which we promised payment comin' back.
With twenty miles of tramping and the thoughts of decent grub,
And Creswiek's forty thousand sheep to shear,
We forgot our fortnight's orgy at Murphy's wayside pub,
The two-up mob, the sheilas, and the BEER.
And humped Matilda onward o'er that twenty miles of plain,
That was scorched by many months of drought and heat,
Where the cockies' worldly blessing is an inch or two of rain,
Which makes that country mighty hard to beat.
Darkness had descended when we reached that blanky shed,
And dumped Matilda down beside the bore,
Where we spruced ourselves for supper, though mighty close to dead ;
We were hungry, grumpy, thirsty, tired and sore.
In the morning we were anxious to knuckle down to graft,
So we hunted up the bloke they call the boss,
And told him we were shearers, but he looked at us and laughed,
And wondered how the dickens we got lost.
For the shearing it had started just a fortnight from the day
That they kicked us from the pub. along the line,
To hit the dusty waggon track per boot out Hillston way,
To shear for Bandy Creswick at that place called Silver Pine.
So we cadged a bit of tucker and mooched along the track,
And cursed ourselves for going on the spree
As we humped poor old Matilda for a station further back,
Just EIGHTY weary miles from "Billy Tea."
Notes
From the NSW Newspaper The Braidwood Review and District Advocate Tue 13 Nov 1923 p. 5.