Read "Cassidy's Epitaph" by Andrew Barton Paterson online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
Here lies a bloke who's just gone West, / A Number One Australian; / He took his gun and did his best / To mitigate the alien. / So long as he could get to work / He needed no sagacity; / A German, Austrian, or Turk, / Were all the same to Cassidy.
Whenever he could raise "the stuff" -- / A liquor deleterious / The question when he'd have enough / Was apt to be mysterious. / 'Twould worry prudent folks a lot / Through mental incapacity; / If he could keep it down or not, / Was all the same to Cassidy.
And when the boys would start a dance, / In honour of Terpsichore, / 'Twas just an even-money chance / You'd find him rather shickery. / But once he struck his proper stride, / And heard the band's vivacity, / The jazz, the tango, or the slide / Was all the same to Cassidy.
And now he's gone to face the Light, / With all it may reveal to him, / A life without a drink or fight / Perhaps may not appeal to him; / But when St Peter calls the roll / Of men of proved tenacity, / You'll find the front-rank right-hand man / Will answer: "Here. Cassidy."
Smith's Weekly, 14 June 1919