Explore "The Captain of the Push" by Henry Lawson on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
As the night was falling slowly down on city, town and bush, / From a slum in Jones' Alley sloped the Captain of the Push; / And he scowled towards the North, and he scowled towards the South, / As he hooked his little finger in the corners of his mouth. / Then his whistle, loud and shrill, woke the echoes of the ‘Rocks,' / And a dozen ghouls came sloping round the corners of the blocks.
There was nought to rouse their anger; yet the oath that each one swore / Seemed less fit for publication than the one that went before. / For they spoke the gutter language with the easy flow that comes / Only to the men whose childhood knew the brothels and the slums. / Then they spat in turns, and halted; and the one that came behind, / Spitting fiercely on the pavement, called on Heaven to strike him blind.