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And wherefore have they come, this warlike band, / That o'er the ocean many a weary day / Have tossed; and now beside Suakim's Bay, / With faces stern and resolute, do stand, / Waking the desert's echoes with the drum -- / Men of Australia, wherefore have ye come?
To keep the Puppet Khedive on the throne, / To strike a blow for tyranny and wrong, / To crush the weak and aid the oppressing strong! / Regardless of the hapless Fellah's moan, / To force the payment of the Hebrew loan, / Squeezing the tax like blood from out the stone?
And fair Australia, freest of the free, / Is up in arms against the freeman's fight; / And with her mother joined to crush the right -- / Has left her threatened treasures o'er the sea, / Has left her land of liberty and law / To flesh her maiden sword in this unholy war.
Enough! God never blessed such enterprise -- / England's degenerate Generals yet shall rue / Brave Gordon sacrificed, when soon they view / The children of a thousand deserts rise / To drive them forth like sand before the gale -- / God and the Prophet! Freedom will prevail.
The Bulletin, 28 February 1885