They’ll tell the tales of the ‘nights before’ and the tales of the ship and fort, Till the sons of Australia take to war as their fathers took to sport, Their breath come deep and their eyes grow bright at the tales of chivalry, And every boy will want to fight, no matter what cause it be-- When the children run to the doors and cry, ‘O, mother, the troops are come!’ And every heart in the town leaps high at the first loud thud of the drum. They’ll know, apart from its mystic charm, what music is at last, When, proud as a boy with a broken arm, the regiment marches past; And the veriest wreck in the drink-fiend’s clutch, no matter how low or mean, Will feel, when he hears the march, a touch of the man he might have been. And fools, when the fiends of war are out and the city skies aflame, Will have something better to talk about than a sister’s or brother’s shame, Will have something nobler to do by far than to jest at a friend’s expense, Or to blacken a name in a public bar or over a backyard fence. And this you learn from the libelled past (though its methods were somewhat rude), _A nation’s born when the shells fall fast, or its lease of life renewed;-- We in part atone for the ghoulish strife--for the crimes of the peace we boast-- And the better part of a people’s life in the storm comes uppermost_.
Come, my hearties--work will stand-- Here’s your Mother calling!-- Wants us all to lend a hand, And go out Uncle-Pauling. Catch your nags, and saddle slick, Quick to join the banners! Folks that treat the fam’ly thick Must be taught their manners.
Who would potter round a farm Fearful of clubbed gunstroke, And, keeping cosy out of harm, Die of loafer’s sunstroke? Gusts of distant battle-noise Tell that men are falling; Get your guns, my bonny boys, Here’s your Mother calling!
Buckle on your cartridge belts, Waste no time about it! Force is massing on the veldts, We must off and rout it. What if fate should work its worst! Men can grin in falling; Come on, chaps, and be the first,-- Here’s your Mother calling!
They lie unwatched, in waste and vacant places, In sombre bush or wind-swept tussock spaces, Where seldom human tread And never human trace is-- The dwellings of our dead!