Where sunless creatures dwell;
The iron-welded doors of wealth
The old road knoweth well. It hears the sun-browned sailors speak
The tongues of many climes
And hour by hour its stones give back
The note of city chimes. It knows the commerce-crowded quay,
The traffic of the mart ;
It threads a lean and crabbed course
Across! the city's heart. And where are lawns and bowered trees,
And villas row by row,
It wound through Virgin wilderness
A hundred years ago. Where league by league to west it lies,
In smoke and evening haze,
I love to people it with ghosts
Of old Colonial days. Lo ! here among the mighty boles
The firelight flickered red,
And wreathing low behind the boughs
The evening camp smoke spread. And here, where sun and shadows knit
Their spell by dip and stream,
With crackling whip and haze of dust
Crept on the lumbering team. Where meeting o'er the narrow track
The giant trees encroach,
Bold Donohoe and comrades twain
Held up the Sydney coach. I hear the tramp of Shackled feet
With shuffling tread and slow.
The clank of merry cavalcades
A hundred years ago. And here, where broad and timbered parks
Still shelter massive walls,
Were twinkling casements all aglow,
And gaily lighted halls ; And sound of music and of dance,
With festival and glow,
And coaches bore their silken freights
A hundred years ago. I hear. across the evening air
The traffic's constant hum,
The murmur of the busy wheels,
The feet that go and come. And where the many churches raise
Their spiry needles high,
I see the glare of Sydney's lights
Along the eastern sky. And through the rustling garden palms,
That never more are still,
I see the golden lights align
The paths of Taverner's Hill. By wood and waste, in sun and shine,
The grey road wanders down.
And finds its goal among the hills A little old, grey town. --Ella McFadyen. Notes From the NSW Newspaper The Uralla Times 12 Mar 1931 p 4.