GOLDFIELD BALLADS.

Otago Witness, Issue 2240, 4 February 1897, Page 41

GOLDFIELD BALLADS.

111.-SIXTY-THREE.

I found a (frizzly aucicnt chap with his face of wrinkled tan Dozing on an old gin box, the boozer's pet divan. His dead pipe hung from his moißt lips, his fingers held a match ; I With tattered clothes, with open shirt, and with a ragged thatch Of tousled, wiry silver falling round his shrunken face, He was a relic of the past, one of the ancient race. He was but a battered hulk, his glories past and ' far; Like many another noble craft he'd been wrecked upon the bar. His dull and drooping form seemed dead, with I scarce an fyelid vrink, I But I galvanised him into life with '* Come and ■ have a drink t " , I wished him the usual wishes, "Merry Christmas and Happy New Year," 1 And he smiled the ghost of a smile ere he guzzled ', down his beer. ' Then he felt the falso life flowing through his old 1 and Blugeish veins — | , His eyes brightened, his lips quivered, and he ! gave hia memory reins. { Backward, backward flew his vision, glancing I lightly, glancing fast, , O'er the dull and doVnward years that link the present to the past. "Bow, indeed I feels much better, for I likes my glass o* heer, But I don't know where in these days I shall find ! » glad New Year. These are not so jolly times, leastways they are not to me, j Aa the good old times we had long way back in Sixty-three. Anyhow I reuiembor what glorious fun we coves had then, But 'perhaps the. fun's as good now, only we're much older men. I recollects the jollification an' tho friendly little spree We coves had at Long Tom Gully New Year time in Sixty-three. One-eyed Billy kep' the shanty, an' he asked the hloomin' lot Of us fellows up to his place— made us free of all he'd got. A real good-hearted cove was Billy, carried all his grog with eaite, Cut his throat up on the Palmer in a bad fit of D.T.'s. We rolled up at the shanty— grog and grub both up to snuff ; I never chewed such good roast beef —l never seed so line a duff. Firat of all things was quiet, but by-an'-bye the 1 • boozin 1 told ; 1 An* Yankee Sam an' Hans the Dane rowed about a run o' gold. * , Canadian Joe, Patsy Blake, an' Jack the Slogger all chips in, Myself an mv mate Jack an' big red-headed ' Mike the Finn. *- i Canadian Joe he got mad, an' started sloggiu' Yaukee Sam, " . An' big red-headed Mike the Finn floored Patsy with a tin of jam. ' I tell you, boss, we had fine times, I disremember what occurred, ; For 'tween the nghtin' an' the drinkin' my . memory! a little blurred. I knows we had a real good time, grog an 1 blood ' like water flowed ; i I stood up to Sloggin" Jack— he hit me — an' that's ; all I knowed. I comes to myself nex' mornin 1 , finds my head was fit to split, An' my tongue so big an' dry I could hardly speak with it ; An' my eye* was painted nicely, an' swelled up Bo's I couldn't see— Oh ! them was the jolly timea, long wsy back in Sixty-three. Once we started we kep 1 her goin' for a week or ; more than that, , An' thsn we went an' worked like niggers, an we ' didn't " whip the cat." • Why times now is so diffrent I never yet could I rightly lam, , But ray mouth dry as a chip i» jus' with spmnm this here yarn. I don't mind, bosß— just another— here's go«d times to you an' me — i But we'll never see the times, boss, that we seed j in Sixty-tkrefe*-" t January 1897. —A. W

FJKtfWKLL, WAIPORII

Northward '.he loadstar's leading, Northward the journey goes, To the land of tho magic silver springs, Where the gliding Avon flows Through her willow-sheltered valley On ii rumble to the sea— Silently *taid of purpose, Pruud ai her sons and free. 'Tis a route of pride and pleasure, Through harvtst-laden plains, Where toitoi guaids with golden plumes The sward where Daisy reigus. Yet strange in a land where grandeur O'er all nas a mantle thrown, O)i h spot of all the heart delights, One spot and one alone I That God reigus in the nortbland, Both east and west declare ; But the traveller found him in the south — Since then his heart v there. And who cau chide him, blaming The tear-dimmed longing look That sees the joys of » year now writ On v page of Sorrow's book? Aud who can blame the longing Tbat, forward bound, would fain Let gaudy crowns pass by— to rest On the plains of Love again ? Thus deep in the northland gloaming He'll dream of November nights, Where mountains loom like guards of peace Through the wavy louthern lights. And soft through the lnisia of dreaming Voices of friends shall come Fondly as joy to the sailor's heart When the sea-mews beckon home. Dunedin, January 26. — J. M.