Ballad of the Drover - Slim Dusty

Across the stony ridges, across the rolling plain

Young Harry Dale, the drover, comes riding home again

And well his stock-horse bears him, and light of heart is he

And stoutly his old pack-horse is trotting by his knee

Up Queensland way with cattle he travelled regions vast;

And many months have vanished since home-folk saw him last

He hums a song of someone he hopes to marry soon;

And hobble-chains and camp-ware keep jingling to the tune

Beyond the hazy dado against the lower skies

And yon blue line of ranges the homestead station lies

Thitherward the drover jogs through the lazy noon

While hobble-chains and camp-ware keep jingling to a tune

Instrumental

An hour has filled the heavens with storm-clouds inky black;

At times the lightning trickles around the drover’s track;

But Harry pushes onward, his horses' strength he tries

In hope to reach the river before the flood shall rise

The thunder stealing o’er him goes rolling down the plain;

And sing on thirsty pastures in past the flashing rain

And every creek and gully sends forth its trival flood

The river runs with anger, all stained with yellow mud

Now Harry speaks to Rover, the best dog on the plains

And to his hardy horses, and strokes their shaggy manes;

«We've breasted bigger rivers when floods were at their height

Nor shall this gutter stop us from getting home to-night!»

Instrumental

The thunder growls a warning, the blue fork lightnings streaks

As the drover turns his horses to swim the fatal creek

But, oh!

the flood runs stronger than e’er it ran before;

The saddle-horse is failing, and only half-way o’er!

When flashes next the lightning, the flood’s grey breast is blank

And a cattle dog and pack-horse are struggling up the bank

But in the lonely homestead the girl shall wait in vain

He’ll never pass the stations, in charge of stock again

The faithful dog a moment lies panting on the bank

And then pluges through the current to where his master sank

And round and round in circles he fights with failing strength

Till, ripped by wilder waters, he fails and sinks at length

O’er the flooded lowlands and slopes of sodden loam

The pack-horse struggles bravely, to take dumb tidings home

And mud-stained, wet, and weary, he goes by rock and tree

With flagon, chains and tinware are sounding eerily