[Editor: This is section 9 of “Barcroft Boake: A Memoir ”, by A. G. Stephens, published in Where the Dead Men Lie and Other Poems (1897).]
[Letters from Cunnamulla (Banana-land)]
The Yowah cattle were mustered and brought to Burrenbilla to rest for two or three weeks before the journey to Bathurst. Boake was paid off, with the promise of a job when the cattle started; and came into Cunnamulla to wait for them. Thence he writes to his grandmother on 18th November, 1889 —
… I have not heard from any of my girls for a long time now; but I told them not to write, as I did not know where I might be. I am staying in this town for a fortnight until Mr. Leeds comes back to start a mob of cattle away to Bathurst. I hope to go with them. It is getting very hot and dry here now, and the sooner I turn my back on Banana-land for a few months the better I will be pleased.
… I am enjoying the unaccustomed luxuries of clean sheets and mosquito curtains. It seems quite strange to sleep in a bed once more; but I wish I was on the road again. Lying about doing nothing but smoke does not suit me at all.
Two days later (20th November, 1889), Boake writes to his father —
… I feel very lonely here — a stranger in a far land; and the time hangs very heavy.
He refers to the episode of the lost £100 narrated on page 165, and proceeds —
Only for that I would in all probability be in Sydney now. It is strange how easily the current of our life is turned. I don’t think in Sydney I could have found the pleasure in life that exists for me here — that is, at times: oftener I feel sick of the whole thing and long for some other country and a more stirring life.
There is a pleasure in a mad gallop; or in watching the dawn of day on a cattle camp — to see the beasts take shape, and change from an indistinguishable mass of white and black into their natural colours; in the dead of night to find yourself alone with the cattle — all the camp asleep, perhaps only a red spark betokening the camp. I always, when I think of it, find something unearthly in this assemblage of huge animals ready at any moment to burst forth like a pent-up torrent, and equally irresistible in their force. When every beast is down, asleep or resting, just pull up and listen. You will hear a low moaning sound rising to a roar, then subsiding to a murmur like distant surf — or, as I fancy, the cry of the damned in Dante’s ‘Inferno.’ When the cattle are like that it is a good sign. But in the moonlight this strange noise, the dark mass of cattle with the occasional flash of an eye or a polished horn catching the light — it always conjures up strange fancies in me: I seem to be in some other world.
If I could only write it, there is a poem to be made out of the back country. Some man will come yet who will be able to grasp the romance of Western Queensland and all that equally mysterious country in Central and Northern Australia. For there is a romance, though a grim one — a story of drought and flood, fever and famine, murder and suicide, courage and endurance.
And who reaps the benefit? Not the poor bushman; but Messrs. So-and-So, merchants, of Sydney or Melbourne — or the Mutual Consolidated Cut-down-the-drovers’-wages Company, Limited — or some other capitalist. If you showed them the map half of them could not point out the position of their runs. All they know is that their cheques come in regularly from the buyers; and if the expenses pass the limit they in their ignorance place, they sack the manager and get another easy enough.
I often wonder if a day will come when these men will rise up — when the wealthy man, perhaps renowned inside* for his benevolence, shall see pass before him a band of men — all of whom died in his service, and whose unhallowed graves dot his run — the greater portion hollow, shrunken, burning with the pangs of thirst — others covered with the evil slime of the Diamantina, Cooper, and those far western rivers — burnt unrecognisably in bush fires, struck down by sunstroke, ripped up by cattle, dashed against some tree by their horses, killed in a dozen different ways — and what for? A few shillings a week; and these are begrudged them. While their employer travels the Continent, and lives in all the luxury his wealth can command, they are sweating out their lives under a tropic sun on damper and beef.
This is no exaggerated picture, I can assure you. Marcus Clarke has grasped the meaning of Australia’s mountains and forests in his eloquent preface to Gordon’s poems; but neither he nor Gordon has written about the plains and sandhills of the far west — it remains for some future poet to do that.
I got a volume of Gordon here the other day, and at length had an opportunity of studying his writings in their entirety. I have long been familiar with his most well-known poems. There is no man within the last century who has achieved such lasting fame as he has. His poems appeal not only to one class of cultured minds, as Tennyson or Browning and that lot; but there is not a bushman or drover who does not know a verse or two of ‘How We Beat the Favourite’ or ‘The Sick Stock-rider.’ I call this fame.
Gordon is the favourite — I may say only poet of the back-blocker; and I am sorry to say Emile Zola is his favourite prose writer. His books are published now in very cheap form, and have a tremendous circulation. A strange partnership indeed, for these two men so different in their tone to share popularity! I am afraid after all the bushman is not a very fine animal; but at any rate, even in his most vicious moments, he is far above many of the so-called respectable dwellers in towns.
* I.e., in the coastal district; as opposed to outside, or out back — in the interior.
Source:
Barcroft Boake, Where the Dead Men Lie and Other Poems, Sydney (NSW): Angus and Robertson, 1897, pp. 188-191
Editor’s notes:
The reference to “page 165” is regarding the section of text beginning “When seventeen years old young Boake was placed in the office of a Sydney land-surveyor”; see Section 1 of the Memoir by A. G. Stephens.
Editor’s notes:
back-block = of or pertaining to the “back blocks” (normally used as a plural): an area that is far from the city, or far from town; a remote sparsely-settled area out in the country; a reference to a far-flung rural area (the phrase “out in the back blocks” is similar to “out in the boondocks” or “out in the sticks”) (may be spelt with or without a hyphen, or as one word)
back-blocker = someone who lives in the “back-blocks” [see: back-block]
Banana-land = (also spelt: Bananaland) Queensland, so-named as a lot of bananas are grown in that state, being located in the tropical north of Australia
Browning = Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1806-1861), an English poetess (née Moulton-Barrett)
See: “Elizabeth Barrett Browning”, Wikipedia
the Continent = (in a British context or from a British viewpoint) the continent of Europe (i.e. excluding the British Isles)
Cooper = Cooper Creek (also known as Cooper’s Creek), a river in central-west Queensland and north-east South Australia
See: “Cooper Creek”, Wikipedia
damper = a flat round cake which is made from flour and water (without yeast or any raising agent), which is baked in the coals and ashes of a campfire; the dough for damper cakes
Dante = Durante degli Alighieri (circa 1265-1321), known as Dante, an Italian poet (best known for his epic poem “Divine Comedy”)
See: “Dante Alighieri”, Wikipedia
Diamantina = the Diamantina River, a river in central-west Queensland and north-east South Australia
See: “Diamantina River”, Wikipedia
Emile Zola = Émile Édouard Charles Antoine Zola (1840-1902), a French novelist, journalist, and playwright
See: “Émile Zola”, Wikipedia
Gordon = Adam Lindsay Gordon (1833-1870), a poet who spent most of his working and literary life in Australia; he was born in Charlton Kings (Gloucestershire, England), and migrated to Adelaide (South Australia) in 1853, at the age of 20; he worked as a mounted policeman, a horse-breaker, a Member of Parliament (in SA), and as a sheep farmer; he became a popular poet, due to such writings as “The Sick Stockrider” (1870); he died in Brighton (Victoria) in 1870
See: 1) Leonie Kramer, “Gordon, Adam Lindsay (1833–1870)”, Australian Dictionary of Biography
2) “Adam Lindsay Gordon”, Wikipedia
i.e. = an abbreviation of the Latin term “id est”, meaning “it is” (the meaning of “i.e.” is commonly rendered in English as “that is”; it is also rendered as “that is to say”, “in other words”, and “namely”, depending on the context); “i.e.” is used to introduce a word or sentence as an explanation of what was said or written (for example, “Let’s meet for the first meal of the day, i.e. breakfast”, “All products are 50% off, i.e. they’re all half-price”, “He lives in Bananaland, i.e. Queensland”)
Inferno = the first section of the epic poem “Divine Comedy”, written by the Italian poet Dante (circa 1265-1321)
See: “Divine Comedy”, Wikipedia
Marcus Clarke = Marcus Clarke (1846-1881), author; especially known for his novel For the Term of His Natural Life (1870-1872); he was born in Kensington (London, England) in 1846, migrated to Australia in 1863, and died in Melbourne (Victoria) in 1881
See: “Marcus Clarke”, Wikipedia
Messrs. = an abbreviation of “messieurs” (French), being the plural of “monsieur”; used in English as the plural of “Mister” (which is abbreviated as “Mr.”); the title is used in English prior to the names of two or more men (often used regarding a company, e.g. “the firm of Messrs. Bagot, Shakes, & Lewis”, “the firm of Messrs. Hogue, Davidson, & Co.”)
out back = remote rural areas; sparsely-inhabited back country; often given as one word and capitalized, “Outback” (variations: out back, outback, out-back, Out Back, Outback, Out-Back)
run = a property on which stock are grazed, such as a “cattle run” or a “sheep run”
Tennyson = Alfred Tennyson (1809-1892), known as Lord Tennyson (he was the 1st Baron Tennyson), an English poet
See: “Alfred, Lord Tennyson”, Wikipedia
unhallowed = not hallowed (not blessed, not consecrated, not made holy); not blessed or sanctioned by a church, a member of the clergy, a religious entity, or a religious figure; can also mean: unholy; immoral, profane, sinful, wicked
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