[Editor: This poem by Jack Moses was published in The Gundagai Times and Tumut, Adelong and Murrumbidgee District Advertiser (Gundagai, NSW), 25 November 1919.]
How history was made.
“The Dog Sat on the Tucker Box.”
The man who originally composed the now historic and oft-repeated lines anent the “dog and the tucker box” undoubtedly made history for Gundagai. In far off France and Belgium, in train, bus and tram it has been made known by the use of those lines which are reminiscent of the “days when the beards were black.” To Mr. Jack Moses we are indebted for the following copy of these popular lines:—
I’ve done my share of shearing sheep
And droving and all that,
And bogged a bullock team as well
On a Murrumbidgee flat.
I’ve seen the bullock stretch and strain,
And blink his bleary eye,
And the dog sat on the tucker box,
Five miles from Gundagai.
I’ve been jilted, jarred and crossed in love,
And sand-bagged in the dark,
And if a mountain fell on me
I’d treat it as a lark.
It’s when you’ve got your bullocks bogged,
That’s the time you flog and cry,
And the dog sits on the tucker box,
Five miles from Gundagai.
We’ve all got our little troubles,
In life’s hard thorny way,
Some strike them in a motor car
And others in a dray.
But when your dog and bullocks strike
It ain’t no apple pie,
And the dog sits on the tucker box,
Five miles from Guudagai.
But that’s all past and dead and gone,
And I’ve sold the team for meat,
And perhaps some day where I was bogged
There’ll be an asphalt street.
The dog, ah well, he got a bait
And thought he’d like to die,
So I buried him in the tucker box,
Five miles from Gundagai.
Source:
The Gundagai Times and Tumut, Adelong and Murrumbidgee District Advertiser (Gundagai, NSW), 25 November 1919, p. 2
Editor’s notes:
This copy of the poem differs slightly from the version published in the book by Jack Moses. This copy uses “Five miles”, instead of “Nine miles”; and, on the 7th line, “sat”, instead of “sit”.
See: Jack Moses, “Nine Miles from Gundagai: The Dog and the Tucker Box”, in: Beyond the City Gates: Australian Story & Verse (1923)
ain’t = (vernacular) isn’t (is not)
anent = about, concerning, as regards, with regard to, in respect to; adjoining, across from, alongside, beside, close to, near; in line with, on a level with
bait = poison bait, such as that laid out for dingoes or foxes
tucker = food
tucker box = a box to store food in (as well as cutlery, plates, mugs, napkins, etc.)
[Editor: Changed “orignally” to “originally”; “lines.—” to “lines:—” (replaced full stop with a colon); “Its when” to “It’s when”.]
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