[Editor: This song was published in the “Flotsam and Jetsam” column of The Queenslander (4 August 1894). Two different versions of the same song were included on the same page; this is the version supplied by F. Harrison, which uses the phrase “strapping young stockman” (the other version, supplied by G. Doyle, uses the phrase “stalwart young stockman”). This song was also published in Banjo Paterson’s collection, The Old Bush Songs (1905), with some variations.]
The Dying Stockman.
A strapping young stockman lay dying,
With his saddle supporting his head,
And his two mates beside him sat crying,
As he rose on his elbow and said:
Chorus.— “Wrap me up in my stockwhip and blanket
And bury me deep down below,
Where the dingoes and crows won’t molest me,
In the shade where the coolibahs grow.
“There’s tea in the old battered billy;
Fill the pannikins all out in a row,
And drink to the health of our meeting,
The way all good Oddfellows do.
“Then cut a couple of saplings,
Put one at my head and my toe;
Carve on them a stockwhip and saddle
To show there’s a stockman below.
“If I had the wings of a bronzewing
Across the wide plains I would fly —
I’d fly to the home of my childhood,
And there I would lay down and die.”
Source:
The Queenslander (Brisbane, Qld.), Saturday 4 August 1894, page 212
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