"It may be the rouseabout swiper who rode for the doctor that
night,
Is in Heaven with the hosts of the Blest, robed and sceptred,
and splendid with light."
18W. `The Argus,' Sept. 20, p. 13, col. 6:
"The `rouseabouts' are another class of men engaged in shearing time, whose work is to draft the sheep, fill the pens for the shearers, and do the branding. . . . The shearers hold themselves as the aristocrats of the shed; and never associate with the rouseabouts."
1892. Gilbert Parker, `Round the Compass in Australia,' p. 58:
"While we sat there, a rouseabout came to the door. `Mountain Jim's back,' he said. There was no `sir' in the remark of this lowest of stationhands to his master."
1894. `Sydney Morning Herald' (date lost):
"A rougher person—perhaps a happier—is the rouseabout, who makes himself useful in the shearing shed. He is clearly a man of action. He is sometimes with less elegance, and one would say less correctly, spoken of as a roustabout."
1896. H. Lawson, `When the World was Wide,' p. 98 [Title of poem, `Middleton's Rouseabout']:
"Flourishing beard and sandy,
Tall and robust and stout;
This is the picture of Andy,
Middleton's Rouseabout."
<hw>Rowdy</hw>, <i>adj</i>. troublesome. Common slang, but unusual as applied to a bullock or a horse.