But rebels rose against me,
And dared my power disown—
You’ve heard, love, of the judges?
They drove me from my throne.
And I have wandered hither,
Across the stormy sea,
In search of glorious freedom,—
In search, my sweet, of thee!
The bush is now my empire,
The knife my sceptre keen;
Come with me to the desert wild,
And be my dusky queen.
I cannot give thee jewels,
I have nor sheep nor cow,
Yet there are kangaroos, love,
And colonists enow.
We’ll meet the unwary settler,
As whistling home he goes,
And I’ll take tribute from him,
His money and his clothes.
Then on his bleeding carcass
Thou’lt lay thy pretty paw,
And lunch upon him roasted,
Or, if you like it, raw!
Then come with me, my princess,
My own Australian dear,
Within this grove of gum-trees
We’ll hold our bridal cheer!
Thy heart with love is beating,
I feel it through my side:—
Hurrah, then, for the noble pair,
The Convict and his Bride!
The Doleful Lay of the Honourable I. O. Uwins.
Come and listen, lords and ladies,
To a woeful lay of mine;
He whose tailor’s bill unpaid is,
Let him now his ear incline!
Let him hearken to my story,
How the noblest of the land
Pined in piteous purgatory,
’Neath a sponging Bailiff’s hand.
I. O. Uwins! I. O. Uwins!
Baron’s son although thou be,
Thou must pay for thy misdoings
In the country of the free!
None of all thy sire’s retainers
To thy rescue now may come;
And there lie some score detainers
With Abednego, the bum.
Little recked he of his prison
Whilst the sun was in the sky:
Only when the moon was risen
Did you hear the captive’s cry.
For till then, cigars and claret
Lulled him in oblivion sweet;
And he much preferred a garret,
For his drinking, to the street.
But the moonlight, pale and broken,
Pained at soul the baron’s son;
For he knew, by that soft token,
That the larking had begun;—
That the stout and valiant Marquis [97]
Then was leading forth his swells,
Milling some policeman’s carcass,
Or purloining private bells.