[85]
[Illustration: New chum talking with old gold miner]
OLD BILL BATES
[86] No, thanks, Mister, I’ve no message—since I’ve opened out my drum,
    Where a suit o’ tailor’s clobber pulls the strings;
But (I wouldn’t say it public) I am feelin’ pretty glum
    When I start a-cogitatin’ about things:
But you’ll find a hearty welcome where the sky begins ter dip,
    Out where mates is mostly men, and men is mates,
                And I wish yer luck ... and say!
                If yer chance upon his way,
    Jest remember me to Old Bill Bates.

[Decoration: Black Swan]

[87]
[Illustration: Men observing fantastic creatures]
WE TOOK THE PLEDGE TILL MAY.

Dave Barker is a mate of mine,
    A solid mate and chum,
And when we’re out upon the wine
    I guess we make things hum:

We go the pace all fair and square,
    But rapid, I’ll allow;
And start from—well, just anywhere,
    And wind up—anyhow.

[88]
When Dave and me’s out on the loose
    We follers close and keen,
And samples every kind of juice
    From rum to kerosene.

It’s all good fish comes to our net,
    To Barker’s net and mine,
And our intentions are, you bet!
    Most strictly genuwine.

We beats about upon the ramp,
    And does up all our tin;
Then Dave—well, Dave strikes out for camp,
    And I—well, I jines in.

And then the panoramy starts—
    The queerest kind of fakes—
Fat little blokes and smaller tarts,
    And funny bob-tailed snakes.

And presently, a big galoot
    Drops down the chimbly flue,
And takin’ up Dave’s blucher boot,
    Sez, “Lads! Here’s luck to you!”

But all the time it’s bilin’ hot,
    And, spare me (crimson) days!
You never heerd such blanky rot
    As what them fantods says.

[89]
Well, comin’ on this last old year,
    I sez to David B.,
“Old chap, we pays a lot too dear
    These fan-tod fakes ter see.

“We grafts and grinds and stints our grub,
    But if we socked our rent
We soon could buy a blanky pub,
    Or stand for Parlyment.

“What say to puttin’ in the peg?
    Swear off, old man!—what say?”
Sez Dave, “I’m on—we’ll spike the keg
    Fer good and all, till May.”

And then our two right hands we clasps
    The ’greement fer to bind;
And felt like them there “Army” chaps
    Wot’s left all sin behind.

If any tries to pull our leg
    This coming Hogmanay
We’ll shout, “No, no! we’ve driv’ the peg
    Home flush and fast till May.”

Well, Dave and me, we saunters down
    Along the bloomin’ street,
And every ’quaintance in the town
    ’Ud want to stand us treat.

[90]
They’d pull and press, and chaff and beg,
    Till ’t last we’d break away,
A-shoutin’ “No! we’ve spiked the keg—
    No booze for us, till May!”

Well, Dave, he comes from Aberdeen,
    And Sandy Mac. was tight:
Sez Mac., “Old Scotland’s hills are green!
    One drink on Scotia’s night!”

Then Dave he looks acrost at me,
    And I looks ’crost at Dave—
It allus after seemed to be
    A kind of mootual “cave.”

For Barker sidles to’rds the bar:
    “A whisky from the bin,”
Sez he, “my gay young Lochinvar!”
    And I—well, I chimes in.

That was a night—we drank and stept,
    And joined the Scotchy’s lilt,
Till all the rest were drunk or slept,
    And all the casks a-tilt.

Then, as we staggered home at four,
    It was a sight ter see
A-troopin’ from our “rubby” door
    Our fan-tod familee!

[91]
They tended on us jest like kings,
    And darnced around the bunk,
And seemed, the ’fectionate little things,
    So glad to see us drunk!

One smilin’ dwarf with flowin’ beard,
    He sang (as sure as sin)
The sweetest song you ever heerd—
    “Our dad’s kem home agin!”

And you may all take this from me,
    For gorspel truth to-day—
The best way to injy a spree
    Is, Take the pledge till May.

[Decoration: Mining with a windsail]

[92]
TOO OLD.

It is durned hard lines, when a man grows sere
    And his whiskers are flecked with grey,
And he wears the boots that he wore last year
    When he worked for a miner’s pay,
To be brushed aside, with a callous word,
    By the arms of sturdier men,
As they rush and crush, with a hope deferred,
    For the coveted three-pound-ten!

Oh! he sold his strength, and he sold his health,
    And he bartered his manhood’s prime
As he toiled and moiled, in the stores of wealth—
    Where they banter the whole crib-time;
And they sweat, and sweat, and they crack their jokes
    To the tune that the “banjos” play;
For the world wags fine with the bow-yanged blokes
    While they work for a miner’s pay!

[93]
And To-morrow’s left for To-morrow’s self
    To provide for as best it can;
For there comes no dream of a workless shelf
    To the brain of the miner man—
Not a whining call from the voice of Thrift!
    Not a cramp in the open hand!
As they play and pay—and they drift and drift
    To the ranks where the grey-heads stand.

But his kids are cold, and their feet are bare,
    And the prospect is bleak and brown,
And the missus has never a hat to wear
    That’s fit to be seen in the town;
And the spectres flock—that were held last year,
    With the rattle of coin, at bay:
When the old man smiled at his old wife’s fear
    While he worked for a miner’s pay.

There are none to heckle; there’s nought to blame
    But the curse of a gambler’s quest!
And the men pass out, as they lose the game
    That we play in the Golden West:
But their thoughts must turn as the days grow late.
    In a dream, to some “cocky” patch
Where the old folk stand at their homestead gate,
    And they laugh ’neath their whitening thatch.

[94]
[Illustration: An old gold miner]
DAN THE HATTER.
An Old North Country Identity.

I tramped again ’neath a blazing sky,
In a Western land where the deserts lie:
But the rush and roar, and the life we knew,
When the ’Nineties echoed the whole world through,
Were silent, or uttered their speech alone
With a drab and dreary monotone.

[95]
I sought a field where a thousand men,
Stout-limbed, strong-hearted, toiled madly then;
But the hessian flapped on the rotting camps,
And the rust was eating the silent stamps;
And of all the throng of that mildewed past
There was only one who stuck to the last.
Just one old man, and his beard of grey
Kept time with his chatter the live-long day.

“What luck, old friend?”—and he turned around,
Where his hopperings fell in a cone-shaped mound;
And he rested his arm on the shaker’s side,
With the air of a man when the world was wide—
And his tongue ran off with a ceaseless flow,
For the hermits talk of their cronies so.

He spoke, with a digger’s quenchless zest,
Of the early days of the Golden West:
Of a surging wave, of a seething tide,
That rolled to the fields from the Eastern side;
Of the wondrous slugs and the mighty men
Who answer not to the call again.
“And I was right in their midst,” said he,
“For I followed Bayley in ’Ninety-three.”

Then he led the way, and he led me far
With the changing trend of each dip and bar,
And he pointed out with a palsied hand
[96] All the work he’d done, all the plans he’d planned;
“For there’s gold,” he yelled, “that would pave a street,
At the spot where the slate and granite meet.”

I chanced that track on my way once more,
And I sought my friend of a year before;
But his shaker cracked in the midday sun,
And the old man’s search for the joint was done,
For he’d stacked his tools, and had drawn his stake.
And had followed the army in Bayley’s wake.

Oh, I trust he’s gone—as the priests insist—
Where the streets are paved with the gold he missed;
And they’ll weave his crown, and they’ll string his lyre,
From the trusty strands of his shaker wire;
And they’ll let him fossick for dip and bar
In the likely places ’twixt star and star.
It will please old Dan, for a man was he
Not planned for an angel minstrelsy.

[97]
[Illustration: By a Kopi Hill]

He rests at the foot of a kopi hill
    By the old Coolgardie track;
But whether his name was Claude, or Bill,
    Or Clarence, or “Hell-fire Jack,”
There isn’t a legend at all to say—
And what does it signify, anyway?

There’s nought of funereal pomp or show—
    Just a rough-hewn slab that states,
The leisurely chap that lies below
    Had honestly paid his rates
Somewhere in the summer of ’Ninety-four;
And then he came hither—to pay no more.

[98]
So he wearied soon of the storm and strife,
    And he cast his swag aside,
When men were strong with the lust of life
    And the world seemed opened wide.
Were the castles fair, that he built that day,
Ere the Fever came in its cloak of grey?

Does he rest well there, by his kopi hill,
    Now the tale of his life is told?
Does a fear disturb his dreaming still,
    Or a sigh strike through the mould?
Does a mother weep, or a sweetheart wait,
Where they said “Good-bye,” at the old farm gate?

However it be, by the wind-swept hills
    Of leisure he nothing lacks;
And he laughs, perchance, at the dust that fills
    For ever his earthly tracks.
—Peace, Peace, old chap! It is half a prayer
In the name of a friend—Someone—Somewhere.

[99]
AT BUMMER’S CREEK.

I planted Dave at Bummer’s Creek
        Somewhere in ’Ninety-five,
When all the country round about
        Was like a busy hive—
And good blokes pegged like rotten sheep,
        And wasters stopped alive.

And here, to-day, I’m t’ilin’ still
        Beside the same old soak
Where we pitched camp twelve years agone,
        Played out and stony broke;
And after work I think right back,
        And smoke, and smoke, and smoke.

We two were fitted, j’int fer j’int,
        And toiled and starved and spreed;
But one ’ud watch around the stump
        When t’other one was treed;
The same when Luck was in full bloom,
        As when she run to seed.

[100]
But now I’m getting old and hipped,
        And kick against the ruts,
I often think I’ll have a pray,
        But can’t sit down fer nuts—
And Dave ’ud say, “A prayin’ pea,
        He’s never got no guts!”

D’ye think it’s true, this ’ere report
        That parson blokes kin tell
As who is bound fer parrydise,
        And who is booked fer ’ell?
Fer I’ve got dust enough to pay
        If they’ve the noos to sell.

Y’ see, us partners never ’ad
        Religion much in mind,
And didn’t think to make no plan
        Fer ’im who stopped behind—
But ’course you tumble to my graft:
        I’ve got an axe to grind.

D’ye think now if I went to town,
        Got up all smart and sleek,
A short-necked shammy, just like that,
        ’Ud make them pilots speak
And say which track the battlers took
        Who pegged on Bummer’s Creek!