The Queer Ways Of Australia
Dick Briggs, a wealthy farmer’s son,
To England lately took a run,
To see his friends, and have some fun,
For he’d been ten years in Australia.
Arrived in England, off he went
To his native village down in Kent—
’Twas there his father drew his rent,
And many happy days he’d spent.
No splendid, fine clothes on had he,
But jumper’n boots up to the knee,
With dirty Sydney ‘cabbage-tree’—
The costume of Australia. The blessed cattle on the farm
Regarded Dick with great alarm;
His swearing acted like a charm
When he gave ’em a ‘touch’ of Australia.
He could talk ‘bullock’ and ‘no flies’,
And when he blessed poor Strawberry’s eyes,
She looked at him with great surprise
As out of her he ‘took a rise’.
‘Fie, fie,’ his mother said one day,
‘What naughty, wicked words you say.’
‘Bless you, mother, that’s the way
We wake ’em up in Australia.’
Dick went to London for a spree,
And got drunk there most gloriously;
He gave them a touch of ‘Coo-oo-ee’
The bush cry of Australia.
He took two ladies to the play,
Both so serene, in dresses gay,
He had champagne brought on a tray
And said, ‘Now girls, come fire away.’
They drank till they could drink no more,
And then they both fell on the floor.
Cried Dick, as he surveyed them o’er,
‘You wouldn’t do for Australia!’