Since Nellie Came to Live Along the Creek

My hut is built of stringy-bark, the window's calico, / The furniture a gin-case, one bush-table, and a / bunk; / Thick as wheat on my selection does the towering / timber grow, / And the stately blue-gums' taproots to the bedrock / all are sunk; / Then the ferns spring up like nettles, / And the ti-tree comes and settles / On my clearing if I spell-oh for a week; / But I work for love of labour / Since I've got a handy neighbour, / And Miss Nellie's come to live along the creek.

Time was when Death sat by me, and he stalked me / through the trees; / Then my arm was weak as water, and my heart a / weary thing; / I was sullen as a wombat on such still, wan days as / these, / And my wedges all were rusty, and my axe had / lost its ring. / Then a fear like sickness bound me, / And I cursed the trees around me, / For quite hopeless seemed the struggle I'd begun / And at night-time, cowed and sinking, / I would sit there thinking, thinking, / Gazing grimly down the barrels of my gun.