Bill Brown

I met Bill Brown on the Prospect Track
Astride of a camel cow;
An' I said, "I heard you had got the sack,
An' where are you makin' now?"

"Well, mate," said William, "I thought it out,
An' I sez to myself, sez I:
There's not much hope for the rouseabout,
As the rousy can testify.

"So I'll drink the honey of Freedom's Cup,
An' do as it pleases Brown;
I'll roll me swag when the sun gets up,
An' I'll camp when the sun goes down.

"I'm makin' out where the diggers go,
Where the reefs run deep an' wide;
I'll wet my whistle at Tally-ho,
An' I'll yard me a Western bride.

"She'll make me rugs with the skins I get
When I'm off o' the veins of gold;
She'll strip an' thatch when the days are wet,
An' she'll stoke when the nights are cold.

"With only a fire in the trackless zone,
She'll cook like a chef, bet you;
Whatever she needs she will find alone
For her salmagundi too.

"If the tracks are barren this moke I've got
Will do with a mulga-tree,
An' the hobble-chains an' the old quart-pot
Still jingle a tune to me."

He filled his pipe ere he said, "So long!"
An' he rode where the sun grows red;
Where the bold are lured with a golden song
At times to a dead man's bed.

Though many ask, 'tis a nut to crack,
Where old Bill Brown is now;
He was heard of last on the Prospect Track
Astride of a camel cow.