Read "A Word to Texas Jack" by Henry Lawson online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
Texas Jack, you are amusin'. By Lord Harry, how I laughed / When I seen yer rig and saddle with its bulwarks fore-and-aft; / Holy smoke! In such a saddle how the dickens can yer fall? / Why, I seen a gal ride bareback with no bridle on at all! / Gosh! so-help-me! strike-me-balmy! if a bit o' scenery / Like ter you in all yer rig-out on the earth I ever see! / How I'd like ter see a bushman use yer fixins, Texas Jack; / On the remnant of a saddle he can ride to hell and back. / Why, I heerd a mother screamin' when her kid went tossin' by / Ridin' bareback on a bucker that had murder in his eye.
What? yer come to learn the natives how to squat on horse's back! / Learn the cornstalk ridin'! Blazes! -- w'at yer giv'n' us, Texas Jack? / Learn the cornstalk -- what the flamin', jumptup! where's my country gone? / Why, the cornstalk's mother often rides the day afore he's born!