reflects the easy-come, easy-go style of the times.

Next in order come the ballads of the days when the
squatters had established themselves, and the poorer classes
found it harder to live. “The Squatter’s Man” is a balled
of these harder times. Compare it with “Paddy Malone.”
There is no talk of sending a new-chum out with sheep and
bullocks now. The first rush of settlement is over, and the
haughty squatter contemptuously offers ten shillings a week
as wages to a man for a variety of drudgery that is set out
with much spirit in the song.

Next come the free-selection days, when the runs of these
squatters were thrown open to purchase on certain easy conditions,
and at once the ballads change their tone, and there
is quite a pæan of victory in “The Free Selector—a Song of
1861.” The reader will note that “The Land Bill has passed
and the good time has come,” and further on the singer says

“We may reside
In a home of our own by some clear waterside.”

The squatters also had a word to say, and “The Broken-down
Squatter” puts their side of the case in a sort of
ad misericordiam appeal; while “The Eumerella Shore” is a
smart hit at the cattle-stealers who availed themselves of the
chances afforded by the new state of things in the country.
Later still comes the time when the selectors became
employers of labour, and “The Stringy-bark Cockatoo,”
though rough in style and versification, is a splendid hit at