• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

The Institute of Australian Culture

Heritage, history, and heroes; literature, legends, and larrikins

  • Home
  • Articles
  • Biographies
  • Books
  • Ephemera
  • Poetry & songs
  • Slang
  • Timeline
  • Topics
    • Anzac Day
    • Australia Day
    • Australian Aborigines
    • Australianism
    • Australian literature
    • The Eureka Rebellion
    • Explorers
    • Significant events and commemorative dates

The Squatter’s Farewell [song, 1 November 1884]

12 May 2012 · Leave a Comment

[Editor: This song was published in The Queenslander, 1 November 1884. It was also included in Banjo Paterson’s collection, The Old Bush Songs (1905), under the title of “The Broken-Down Squatter”, with some variations.]

The Squatter’s Farewell.

A.D. 1885.

Come, “Stumpy,” old man, we must shift while we can;
All your mates in the paddock are dead:
Let us wave our farewells to Glen Eva’s sweet dells,
And the hills where your lordship was bred;
Together to roam from our drought-stricken home;
It seems hard that such things have to be;
And it’s hard on a “hoss” when he’s nought for a boss
But a broken-down squatter like me.

No more shall we muster the river for fats,
Or spiel on the fifteen-mile plain;
Or rip through the scrub by the light of the moon,
Or see the old stockyard again.
Leave the slip-panels down; it won’t matter much now;
There are none but the crows left to see,
Perching gaunt in yon pine, as though longing to dine
On a broken-down squatter like me.

When the country was cursed with the drought at its worst,
And the cattle were dying in scores,
Though down on my luck I kept up my pluck,
Thinking justice might temper the laws.
But the farce has been played, and the Government aid
Ain’t extended to squatters, old son;
When my dollars were spent then they trebled the rent
And resumed the best half of the run.

’Twas done without reason, for, barring the season,
No squatter could stand such a rub;
For it’s useless to squat when the rents are so hot
That one can’t save the price of one’s grub;
And there’s not much to choose ’twixt the banks and the Jews
Once a fellow gets put up a tree;
No odds what I feel, there’s no Court of Appeal
For a broken-down squatter like me.

ANTHOS.



Source:
The Queenslander (Brisbane, Qld.), Saturday 1 November 1884, page 705

Editor’s notes:
fats = fatstock, livestock which are fat and ready for market

grub = food

hoss = horse

squatter = in the context of Australian history, a squatter was originally someone who kept their livestock (mostly cattle and sheep) upon Crown land without permission to do so (thus illegally occupying land, or “squatting”); however, the practice became so widespread that eventually the authorities decided to formalise it by granting leases or licenses to occupy or use the land; and, with the growth of the Australian economy, many of the squatters became quite rich, and the term “squatter” came to refer to someone with a large amount of farm land (they were often regarded as rich and powerful)

Filed Under: songs Tagged With: song, SourceTrove, variation of Paterson's Bush Songs, year1884

Reader Interactions

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Primary Sidebar

Australian flag, 100hThe Institute of Australian Culture
Heritage, history, and heroes. Literature, legends, and larrikins. Stories, songs, and sages.

Featured books

The Man from Snowy River and Other Verses, by Banjo Paterson A Book for Kids, by C. J. Dennis  The Bulletin Reciter: A Collection of Verses for Recitation from The Bulletin The Songs of a Sentimental Bloke, by C. J. Dennis The Complete Inner History of the Kelly Gang and Their Pursuers, by J. J. Kenneally The Foundations of Culture in Australia, by P. R. Stephensen The Australian Crisis, by C. H. Kirmess Such Is Life, by Joseph Furphy
More books (full text)

Featured lists

Timeline of Australian history and culture
A list of significant Australiana
Significant events and commemorative dates
Australian slang
Books (full text)
Australian literature
Rock music and pop music (videos)
Folk music and bush music (videos)
Early music (videos)
Recommended poetry
Poetry and songs, 1786-1900
Poetry and songs, 1901-1954
Australian explorers
Topics
Links

Featured posts

Advance Australia Fair: How the song became the Australian national anthem
Brian Cadd [music videos and biography]
Ned Kelly: Australian bushranger
Under the Southern Cross I Stand [the Australian cricket team’s victory song]

Some Australian authors

E. J. Brady
John Le Gay Brereton
C. J. Dennis
Mary Hannay Foott
Joseph Furphy
Mary Gilmore
Charles Harpur
Grant Hervey
Lucy Everett Homfray
Rex Ingamells
Henry Kendall
“Kookaburra”
Henry Lawson
Jack Moses
“Dryblower” Murphy
John Shaw Neilson
John O’Brien (Patrick Joseph Hartigan)
“Banjo” Paterson
Marie E. J. Pitt
A. G. Stephens
P. R. Stephensen
Agnes L. Storrie (Agnes L. Kettlewell)

Recent Posts

  • Vale! Percy Mahoney [by H. A. Burton, 14 December 1950]
  • Early-day sportsman’s death [obituary of Percy Mahoney, 7 December 1950]
  • Visits to the IAC site from various countries
  • Poems by J. Shaw Neilson [book review, 22 December 1923]
  • “Australia in Palestine” [book review, 6 November 1919]

Top Posts & Pages

  • The Man from Snowy River [poem by Banjo Paterson]
  • Clancy of The Overflow [poem by Banjo Paterson]
  • The Man from Ironbark [poem by Banjo Paterson]
  • The drover’s wife [by Henry Lawson]
  • The Bastard from the Bush [poem, circa 1900]

Categories

Archives

Posts of note

The Bastard from the Bush [poem, circa 1900]
A Book for Kids [by C. J. Dennis, 1921]
Click Go the Shears [traditional Australian song, 1890s]
Core of My Heart [“My Country”, poem by Dorothea Mackellar, 24 October 1908]
Freedom on the Wallaby [poem by Henry Lawson, 16 May 1891]
The Man from Ironbark [poem by Banjo Paterson]
Nationality [poem by Mary Gilmore, 12 May 1942]
The Newcastle song [music video, sung by Bob Hudson]
No Foe Shall Gather Our Harvest [poem by Mary Gilmore, 29 June 1940]
Our pipes [short story by Henry Lawson]
Rommel’s comments on Australian soldiers [1941-1942]
Shooting the moon [short story by Henry Lawson]

Recent Comments

  • Rawlinson R on Rommel’s comments on Australian soldiers [1941-1942]
  • Mike Gregory on Australian slang
  • Peter Morgan on Rise of the wool industry: John Macarthur’s work for Australia [chapter 10 of “The story of Australia” by Martin Hambleton]
  • raymond on Ballad and Lyrical Poems [by John Shaw Neilson, 1923]
  • IAC on Ballad and Lyrical Poems [by John Shaw Neilson, 1923]

Search this site



For Australia


Copyright © 2022 · Log in