there's game-fowl stew to-night!
For Mister Hall has a fighting cock, all feathered and clipped and spurred;
And he's fetched him here, for a bit of sport, to fight our Australian bird.
I've made a match that our pet will win, though he's hardly a fighting cock,
But he's game enough, and it's many a mile
that he's tramped with the travelling stock.'
The cook he banged on a saucepan lid; and, soon as the sound was heard,
Under the dray, in the shadows hid, a something moved and stirred:
A great tame Emu strutted out. Said Saltbush, `Here's our bird!'
But Rooster Hall, and his cronies two, drove home without a word.

The passing stranger within his gates that camps with old Rooster Hall
Must talk about something else than fowls, if he wishes to talk at all.
For the record lies in the local Court, and filed in its deepest vault,
That Peter Hall, of the Take 'Em Down, was tried for a fierce assault
On a stranger man, who, in all good faith, and prompted by what he heard,
Had asked old Hall if a British Game could beat an Australian bird;
And old McCrae, who was on the Bench, as soon as the case was tried,
Remarked, `Discharged with a clean discharge -- the assault was justified!'




Hay and Hell and Booligal



`You come and see me, boys,' he said;
`You'll find a welcome and a bed
And whisky any time you call;