We learnt the creed at Hungerford,
We learnt the creed at Bourke;
We learnt it in the good times
And learnt it out of work.
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Old Mate! In the gusty old weather,
When our hopes and our troubles were new,
In the years spent in wearing out leather,
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The future was dark and the past was dead
As they gazed on the sea once more –
But a nation was born when the immigrants said
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’Tis a wonderful time when these hours begin,
These long ‘small hours’ of night,
When grass is crisp, and the air is thin,
And the stars come close and bright.
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It chanced upon the very day we'd got the shearing done,
A buggy brought a stranger to the West-o'-Sunday Run;
He had a round and jolly face, and he was sleek and stout,
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The boy cleared out to the city from his home at harvest time --
They were Scots of the Riverina, and to run from home was a crime.
The old man burned his letters, the first and last he burned,
And he scratched his name from the Bible when the old wife's back was turned.
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You almost heard the surface bake, and saw the gum-leaves turn --
You could have watched the grass scorch brown had there been grass to burn.
In such a drought the strongest heart might well grow faint and weak --
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The night too quickly passes
And we are growing old,
So let us fill our glasses
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So you rode from the range where your brothers “select,”
Through the ghostly grey bush in the dawn---
...