Robert Lowe Sherbrooke

Rating: 4.33
Rating: 4.33

Robert Lowe Sherbrooke Poems

The Commissioner bet me a pony—I won,
So he cut off exactly two-thirds of my run;
For he said I was making a fortune too fast,
And profit gained slower the longer would last.
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Robert Lowe Sherbrooke Biography

A British statesman. He emigrated (1842) to Australia and achieved recognition as a reform politician. Returning (1850) to England, he entered (1852) the House of Commons, distinguished himself as a speaker, and held subordinate offices in the ministries of Lord Aberdeen and Lord Palmerston. In 1866 he led the "cave of Adullam," the insurgent Liberals who attacked and defeated their government's reform bill. Despite this action, he served William Gladstone as chancellor of the exchequer (1868–73). In his first budgets Sherbrooke successfully reduced taxes, but he carried the Liberal policy of retrenchment too far and was transferred (1873) to the post of home secretary. He was created Viscount in 1880.)

The Best Poem Of Robert Lowe Sherbrooke

Song Of The Squatter

The Commissioner bet me a pony—I won,
So he cut off exactly two-thirds of my run;
For he said I was making a fortune too fast,
And profit gained slower the longer would last.

He remarked, as devouring my mutton he sat,
That I suffered my sheep to grow sadly too fat;
That they wasted waste land, did prerogative brown,
And rebelliously nibbled the droits of the Crown;

That the creek that divided my station in two
Showed that Nature designed that two fees should be due.
Mr. Riddle assured me’t was paid but for show,
But he kept it and spent it, that ’s all that I know.

The commissioner fined me because I forgot
To return an old ewe that was ill of the rot,
And a poor wry-necked lamb that we kept for a pet;
And he said it was treason such things to forget.

The commissioner pounded my cattle because
They had mumbled the scrub with their famishing jaws
On the part of the run he had taken away,
And he sold them by auction the costs to defray.

The border police they were out all the day
To look for some thieves who had ransacked my dray;
But the thieves they continued in quiet and peace,
For they ’d robbed it themselves, had the border police!

When the white thieves had left me the black thieves appeared,
My shepherds they waddied, my cattle they speared;
But from fear of my license I said not a word,
For I knew it was gone if the Government heard.

The commissioner’s bosom with anger was filled
Against me because my poor shepherd was killed;
So he straight took away the last third of my run,
And got it transferred to the name of his son.

The son had from Cambridge been lately expelled,
And his license for preaching most justly withheld!
But this is no cause, the commissioner says,
Why he should not be fit for my license to graze.

The cattle, that had not been sold at the pound,
He took with the run at five shillings all round,
And the sheep the blacks left me at sixpence a head,—
A very good price, the commissioner said.

The Governor told me I justly was served,
That commissioners never from duty had swerved;
But that if I’d a fancy for any more land
For one pound an acre he ’d plenty on hand.

I ’m not very proud! I can dig in a bog,
Feed pigs, or for firewood can split up a log,
Clean shoes, riddle cinders, or help to boil down—
Anything that you please, but graze lands of the Crown!

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