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Came the refrain from the surveyors’ camp:

We twa hae run about the braes,
An’ pu’d the gowans fine;
But we’ve wandered mony a weary foot
Sin’ Auld Lang Syne.

“We feel sorry for our quarrels with our worst enemy when we see him lying still and quiet–dead. Why can’t we try and feel a bit sorry beforehand?”

For Auld Lang Syne.
We twa ha’ padl’t i’ the burn,
Fra mornin’ sun till dine;
But seas between us braid ha’ roar’d
Sin’ Auld Lang Syne.

“I used to feel blazing bitter against things one time but it never hurt anybody but myself in the end. I argued and quarrelled with a girl once–and made a problem of the thing and went away. She’s married to a brute now, and I’m what I am. I made a problem of a good home or the world once, and went against the last man in God’s world that I should have gone against, and turned my back on his hand, and left him. His hand was very cold the next time I took it in mine. We don’t want problems to make us more bitter against the world than we get sometimes.”

And here’s a han’ my trusty frien’,
An’ gie’s a han’ o’ thine,
We’ll tak’ a cup o’ kindness yet
For Auld Lang Syne.

“And that song’s the answer of all problems,” said Mitchell. But it was I who lay awake and thought that night.

[Children of the Bush by Henry Lawson II]

[The end]

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Some definitions and Australian slangs:

anabranch: A bend in a river that has been cut through by the stream. The main current now runs straight, the anabranch diverges and then rejoins. See billabong.

Barcoo-rot. “Persistent ulceration of the skin, chiefly on the hands, and often originating in abrasions”. (Morris, Australian English). Barcoo is a river in Queensland.

billabong. Based on an aboriginal word. Sometimes used for an anabranch, but more often used for one that, in dry season or droughts especially, is cut off at either or both ends from the main stream. It is often just a muddy pool, and may indeed dry up completely.

blackfellow: condescending for Australian Aboriginal

blackleg: someone who is employed to cross a union picket line to break a workers’ strike. As Molly Ivins said, she was brought up on the three great commandments: do not lie; do not steal; never cross a picket line. Also scab.

blanky or — : Fill in your own favourite word. Usually however used for “bloody”–see crimson/gory.

blooming: actually used in speech instead of “bloody” (see crimson).

bluey: swag. Explanation in Lawson’s “The romance of the Swag” here.

bob: one shilling

bullocky: Bullock driver. A man who drove teams of bullocks yoked to wagons carrying e.g. wool bales or provisions. Proverbially rough and foul mouthed.

bummer: A cadger or bludger. Someone who begs for food. Interesting Americanism already. Also, tramp. (Different meaning today)

bush: originally referred to the low tangled scrubs of the semi-desert regions (cf. `mulga’ and `mallee’), and hence equivalent to “outback”. Now used generally for remote rural areas (“the bush”) and scrubby forest.

bushfire: wild fires: whether forest fires or grass fires.

bushman/bushwoman: someone who lives an isolated existence, far from cities, “in the bush”. (today: a “bushy”)

bushranger: an Australian “highwayman”, who lived in the `bush’– scrub–and attacked especially gold carrying coaches and banks. Romanticised as anti-authoritarian Robin Hood figures–cf. Ned Kelly–but usually very violent.

bunyip: Aboriginal monster, inhabiting waterholes, billabongs particularly. Adopted into European legends.

caser: Five shillings (12 pence to the shilling, 20 shillings to the pound (“quid”)). As a coin, a crown piece.

chaffing: teasing, mocking good-humouredly

churchyarder: Sounding as if dying–ready for the churchyard = cemetery

crimson = gory: literary substitutes for “bloody”–the “colonial oath”, unacceptable in polite company. Why, is a complete mystery. Popularly explained as contraction of “by Our Lady”. Unproved. In reproducing (badly) a German’s pronunciation of Australian, Lawson retains the word, but spells it “pluddy”.