[Editor: This is section 14 of “Barcroft Boake: A Memoir ”, by A. G. Stephens, published in Where the Dead Men Lie and Other Poems (1897).]
[The last days of Barcroft Boake]
In December, 1891, Boake’s engagement with Mr. Lipscomb ended, and he came to stay with his father and sisters at Croydon, Sydney: walking in unexpectedly one morning with a light portmanteau, and a ’possum-rug swag strapping up a few small articles — amongst them the lash of a stockwhip. His father continues the story —
When Bartie wrote to say that Mr. Lipscomb was breaking up camp, and he intended coming to Sydney, my heart sank within me, and I wished something might happen to deter him. The presentiment of evil was not without cause. I felt that he was coming full of spirits to a house of gloom, and feared the effect of my own despondency upon his sensitive nature. For my business had failed and left me embarrassed with debt, and I saw no prospect of re-establishing myself. So my welcome to him was dashed with bitterness; and, though I strove to conceal it, my depression must have made itself apparent.
One evening, shortly after his arrival, he came out to me on the verandah with his pipe, and said: ‘Addie tells me things are not very blooming with you, Dad. Well, I’ve got £50, and that will square off the household debts, at all events.’ I accepted the money after a faint struggle, being vaguely conscious that I was wrong to do so; and he paid it into my bank account next day.
He was for a few days alert, cheerful, and happy; and he had what in one of his letters he expresses a wish for — ‘a quiet room and an easy chair’ to sit at work in; but gradually I could see that the oppression of the surroundings made itself felt. He thought he could get some small employment sufficient to keep him going; but he was so wanting in ‘push’ and pretension that he soon saw this was next to impossible. His grandmother was invalided and confined to her bed; and family troubles helped to weigh us down. I myself was hopeless about everything, and quite unfit to cope with the melancholia that I plainly saw oppressed him. I have sat in a room with him for perhaps hours at a time, silent, and enraged with myself that I could not say something cheerful. I have made efforts to rouse him, but their stilted artificiality only sickened me the more, and produced no effect upon Bartie. Once I suggested that he should join me in business somewhere in the country. He just raised his head, but answered never a word.
He remained with us from December till May, his only earnings being a few guineas received for odd contributions to The Bulletin. His last composition was ‘An Easter Rhyme,’ published in that journal on 7th May, 1892.
An Easter Rhyme.
Easter Monday in the city —
Rattle, rattle, rumble, rush!
Tom and Jerry, Nell and Kitty,
All the down-the-harbour ‘push’ —
Little thought have they, or pity,
For a wanderer from the bush.Shuffle, feet, a merry measure!
Hurry, Jack, and find your Jill!
Let her — if it give her pleasure —
Flaunt her furbelow and frill!
Kiss her while you have the leisure;
For to-morrow brings the mill.Go ye down the harbour winding
’Mid the eucalypts and fern,
Respite from your troubles finding:
Kiss her till her pale cheeks burn;
For to-morrow will the grinding
Millstones of the city turn.Stunted figures, sallow faces,
Sad girls striving to be gay
In their cheap sateens and laces …
Ah! how different ’tis to-day
Where they’re going to the races
Yonder — up Monaro way!Light mist flecks the Murrumbidgee’s
Bosom with a silver stain:
On the trembling wire bridge is
Perched a single long-legged crane;
While the yellow, slaty ridges
Sweep up proudly from the plain.Somebody is after horses —
Donald, Charlie, or young Mac —
Suddenly his arm he tosses;
Presently you’ll hear the crack,
As the symbol of the cross is
Made on Possum’s steaming back.Stirling first! the Masher follows —
Ly-ee-moon and old Trump Card;
Helter-skelter through the shallows
Of the willow-shaded ford:
Up the lane and past the gallows.
Driven panting to the yard.In the homestead, what a clatter!
Habits black and habits blue.
Full a dozen red lips patter:
‘Who is going to ride with who?’
Mixing sandwiches and chatter;
Gloves to button, hair to do.Horses stamp and stirrups jingle,
‘Dash the filly! won’t she wait?’
Voices, bass and treble, mingle.
‘Look sharp, May, or we’ll be late!’
How the pulses leap and tingle
As you lift her featherweight!At the thought the heart beats quicker
Than an old Bohemian’s should —
Beating like my battered ticker
(Pawned this time, I fear, for good).
Bah! I’ll go and have a liquor
With the genial Jimmy Wood.The comparison between city and country indicates whither his thoughts were turning. It was his habit to show me his verses before sending them for publication, but he never showed me this piece.
About this time he received a letter from the country, and in reference to it said to one of his sisters: ‘I have had rather a knock to-day. I hear that my best girl is going to be married.’ He said no more than this, and this much was unusual; for, beyond general impressions, he never confided his loves or friendships to any of us.
Things had gone from bad to worse, till I had given up making any effort to rouse him. In his state of mind at that time he could not have had a worse companion than myself. The sight of him was a pain to me, and probably to see me pained him; and our deep mutual affection made matters worse. For the last fortnight in April he used to come into my office daily to assist me in any small way; but I had really nothing for him to do.
The last time I saw him in life was at breakfast on 2nd May, 1892. As usual, I was moodily and silently leaving the room, and I glanced furtively at him (as I often did — I suppose in the hope of seeing some improvement). He raised his head, and our eyes met. This was so rare that I remarked it; and the effect remained with me for some few moments after leaving the room. Had I been a woman I should have returned and by some means or other extorted his confidence; for there was meaning in his glance, though he himself may not have intended it. I now know it was his farewell.
The next eight days passed in enquiries as to his whereabouts, but I soon felt sure that the discovery would only be a miserable one. His grandmother and I used to discuss his absence, only disagreeing as to the ‘how.’ She said his body would be found in the harbour. I said No, for he was a swimmer, and swimmers do not usually drown themselves. Yet my revolver was in its place; and I knew Bartie had none.
On 10th May, as I came to my office , I saw one of the Water Police at the door, and realised that the end had come. My mind naturally turned to drowning, and it was some time before the man made the mode of death clear to me. The place Bartie chose was on the shore of Long Bay, one of the arms of Middle Harbour. His body was found, suspended by the lash of his stockwhip from the limb of a tree, by a man engaged in clearing the bush for a proposed sewer. So secluded was the spot that he might otherwise have hung there for months.
At the coroner’s inquest a verdict of suicide was returned. I was required to identify the body, which I could only do by the letters ‘F.E.B.’ (his mother’s initials) tattooed on the left arm by Assimul, a black-boy from Nouméa. The police handed me two library tickets found in a pocket. On the backs was written in pencil:—
Dear Father, — Write to Miss McKeahnie. — Your loving son, BARTIE.
Give ‘Jack Corrigan’ and ‘Featherstonhaugh’ to Mr. Archibald; he will pay you for them.
I did as desired, and had the body conveyed to the North Sydney cemetery, where it was buried.
Source:
Barcroft Boake, Where the Dead Men Lie and Other Poems, Sydney (NSW): Angus and Robertson, 1897, pp. 200-205
Editor’s notes:
Addie = a diminutive form of the names “Addison”, “Adelaide”, “Adele”, and “Adeline” [in this instance, Barcroft H. Boake’s sister’s name was Adelaide]
Archibald = Jules François Archibald (1856-1919), baptised John Feltham Archibald, commonly known as J. F. Archibald; journalist, publisher, and editor of The Bulletin (Sydney, NSW); he was born in Kildare (now Geelong West, Victoria) in 1856, and died in Sydney (NSW) in 1919
See: 1) Sylvia Lawson, “Jules François Archibald (1856–1919)”, Australian Dictionary of Biography
2) “J. F. Archibald”, Wikipedia
Bartie = (also spelt: Barty) a diminutive form of the names “Barcroft”, “Bart”, “Bartholomew”, and “Barton”
Bohemian = someone who is socially unconventional in appearance and/or behaviour, who lives in an informal manner, especially someone who is involved in the arts (authors, musicians, painters, poets, etc.); an artistic type who does not conform to society’s norms; can also refer to a citizen or resident of Bohemia; (archaic) a Gypsy or Romani; of or relating to a Bohemian, a group or class of Bohemians, or the Bohemian lifestyle
gay = happy, joyous, carefree; well-decorated, bright, attractive (in modern times it may especially refer to a homosexual, especially a male homosexual; can also refer to something which is no good, pathetic, useless)
habit = a long loose article of clothing (e.g. a nun’s habit, a riding habit); (archaic) attire, dress; (archaic) to clothe, to dress (verb)
helter-skelter = to move fast in a confused or disorderly manner; to run or move quickly in a hasty and disorderly fashion; to act in a hurried and haphazard manner, with carelessness, disorder, or turmoil
Jimmy Wood = to have a drink with “Jimmy Wood” is to drink alone [see: Jimmy Woodser]
Jimmy Woodser = someone who drinks alone, or a drink taken alone; the phrase dates from at least the 1870s, and was notably used in the poem “Jimmy Wood” (1892), by Barcroft H. Boake, about a man who did not join in the custom of “shouting” (buying drinks for friends), and which ended with the line, “Who drinks alone — drinks toast to Jimmy Wood, sir”
’mid = an abbreviation of “amid” or “amidst”: of or in the middle of an area, group, position, etc.
Monaro = a region in the south of New South Wales
See: “Monaro (New South Wales)”, Wikipedia
Murrumbidgee = a river in New South Wales, a tributary of the Murray River
See: “Murrumbidgee River”, Wikipedia
Nouméa = the capital city of New Caledonia
See: “Nouméa”, Wikipedia
portmanteau = a large suitcase that opens into two compartments (abbreviated as “port”); from the French “porter”, to carry, and “manteau”, cloak or coat (can also refer to the combining of several items or qualities, especially to the combining of two existing words to form a new word)
’possum = an opossum or “possum”, a tree-dwelling marsupial species native to Australia; opossums are actually those animals of the Didelphimorphia order of marsupials (which are colloquially known as “possums”), whilst the term “possums” technically refers to those animals of the suborder Phalangeriformes, of the Diprotodontia order of marsupials; however, the two are often confused as being the same animal; the confusion arises from when Joseph Banks (the botanist with Captain Cook’s expedition) thought the Australian marsupial was an opossum, as it looked similar to the American opossum
’tis = (archaic) a contraction of “it is”
ye = (archaic; dialectal) you (still in use in some places, e.g. in Cornwall, Ireland, Newfoundland, and Northern England; it can used as either the singular or plural form of “you”, although the plural form is the more common usage)
yonder = at a distance; far away
[Editor: Added a full stop after “next to impossible” and “no effect upon Bartie”.]
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