[Editor: This poem by Barcroft Boake was published in Where the Dead Men Lie and Other Poems (1897).]
Jim’s Whip.
Yes! there it hangs upon the wall
And never gives a sound:
The hand that trimmed its greenhide fall
Is hidden underground —
There, in that patch of sallee shade,
Beneath that grassy mound.
I never take it from the wall:
That whip belonged to him —
The man I singled from them all:
He was my husband, Jim.
I see him now — so straight and tall,
So long and lithe of limb.
That whip was with him night and day
When he was on the track:
I’ve often heard him laugh and say
That when they heard it crack,
After the breaking of the drought,
The cattle all came back.
And all the time that Jim was here,
A-working on the run,
I’d hear that whip ring sharp and clear
Just about set of sun,
To let me know that he was near
And that his work was done.
I was away that afternoon,
Penning the calves, when — bang!
I heard his whip: ’twas rather soon:
A thousand echoes rang
And died away among the hills,
As toward the hut I sprang.
I made the tea and waited, but,
Seized by a sudden whim,
I went and sat outside the hut
And watched the light grow dim:
I waited there till after dark,
But not a sign of Jim.
The evening air was damp with dew:
Just as the clock struck ten
His horse came riderless — I knew
What was the matter then …
Why should the Lord have singled out
My Jim from other men?
I took the horse and found him where
He lay beneath the sky,
With blood all clotted in his hair;
I felt too dazed to cry:
I held him to me as I prayed
To God that I might die.
But sometimes now I seem to hear —
Just when the air grows chill —
A single whip-crack, sharp and clear,
Re-echo from the hill.
That’s Jim! to let me know he’s near
And thinking of me still.
Source:
Barcroft Boake, Where the Dead Men Lie and Other Poems, Sydney (NSW): Angus and Robertson, 1897, pp. 26-28
Also published in:
The Bulletin (Sydney, NSW), 19 March 1892, p. 24, column 1 [by Barcroft H. Boake]
The Capricornian (Rockhampton, Qld.), 11 September 1897, p. 26
The Morning Bulletin (Rockhampton, Qld.), 13 September 1897, p. 3
The Worker (Sydney, NSW), 18 September 1897, p. 1 [by Barcroft Boake]
The Sydney Stock & Station Journal (Sydney, NSW), 13 October 1922, p. 3
Construction (Sydney, NSW), 8 June 1938, p. 6
Relevant notes from the “Notes to poems” section in this book:
6. JIM’S WHIP, p. 26. — Printed in The Bulletin, March 19, 1892. Signed ‘Barcroft H. Boake.’ A note by author was appended: ‘It is a very common thing for a stockman to say, speaking of its excellence, “That’s the whip that brought the cattle home after the drought.”’
Verse 1. ‘sallee.’ Vernacular for one of the 300 or so Australian species of acacia. Wattle, yarran, mulga, brigalow, myall, &c., are other common names of some of them. These names seem applied almost indiscriminately to different species in different districts — one man’s ‘yarran’ being another man’s ‘myall,’ and so on — to the confusion of botanists. Boake possibly refers to acacia longifolia — a good-sized shrub or small tree.
Editor’s notes:
The poem published in The Bulletin, 19 March 1892, included a notation (indicated by an asterix on the line, “The cattle all came back.*”); the footnote was as follows:
* It is a very common thing for a stockman to say, speaking of its excellence, “That’s the whip that brought the cattle home after the drought.”
lithe = flexible, limber, supple; graceful; thin, athletic; someone who is young, graceful, healthy-looking, and thin
Lord = in a religious context, and capitalized, a reference to God or Jesus Christ
run = a property on which stock are grazed, such as a “cattle run” or a “sheep run”
sallee = a snow gum (Eucalyptus pauciflora; also known as a cabbage gum or white sally), a eucalyptus tree with a smooth pale grey, white, or yellow bark, which is native to eastern Australia; any of various eucalyptus trees; any of various acacia (wattle) trees
See: “Eucalyptus pauciflora”, Wikipedia
’twas = (archaic) a contraction of “it was”
[Editor: Changed “in his hair.” to “in his hair;” (replaced the full stop with a semi-colon, in line with the version published in The Bulletin, 19 March 1892).]
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