Jonahs Luck
By Edward Dyson
Out of luck, mate? Have a liquor. Hang it, wheres the use complaining?
Take your fancy, Im in funds now, I can stand the racket, Dan.
Dump your bluey in the corner; camp here for the night, its raining;
Bet your life Im glad to see you,glad to see a Daylesford man.
Swell? Correct, Dan. Spot the get up; and I own this blooming shanty,
Me the fellows christened Jonah at Jim Crow and Blanket Flat,
Cause my luck was so infernal,you remember me and Canty?
Rough times, those,the very memory keeps a chap from getting fat.
Whered I strike it? Thats a yarn. The fires a comfort,sit up nearer.
Hoist your heels, man; take it easy till Kates ready with the stew.
Yes, Ill tell my little story; taint a long one, but its queerer
Than those lies that Tullock pitched us on The Flat in 52.
Fancy Phil a parson now! Hes smug as grease, the Reverend Tullock.
Yes, hes big,his wife and famly are a high and mighty lot.
Didnt I say his jaw would keep him when he tired of punching mullock?
Well, it has,hes made his pile here. How dyou like your whiskey, hot?
Luck! Well, now, I like your cheek, Dan. You had luck, theres no denying.
I in thirty years had averaged just a wage of twenty bob,
Why, at Alma there I saw men making fortunes without trying,
While for days I lived on possums, and then had to take a job.
Bah! you talk about misfortune,my ill-luck was always thorough:
Gold once ran away before me if I chased it for a week.
I was starved at Tarrangower, lived on tick at Maryborough,
And I fell and broke my thigh-bone at the start of Fiery Creek.
At Avoca Canty left me. Jim, you know, was not a croaker,
But he jacked the whole arrangement,found we couldnt make a do:
Said he loved me like a brother, but twas rough upon a joker
When hed got to fight the devil, and find luck enough for two.
Jim was off. I didnt blame him, seeing what hed had to suffer
When Maginnis, just beside us, panned out fifty to the tub.
We had pegged out hours before him, and had struck another duffer,
And each store upon the lead, my lad, had laid us up for grub.
After that I picked up Barlow, but we parted at Dunolly
When wed struggled through at Alma, Adelaide Lead, and Ararat.
See, my luck was hard upon him; he contracted melancholy,
And he hung himself one morning in the shaft at Parrot Flat.
Ding it? No. Where gold was getting I was on the job, and early,
Struck some tucker dirt at Armstrongs, and just lived at Pleasant Creek,
Always grafting like a good un, never hopeless-like or surly,
Living partly on my earnings, Dan, but largely on my cheek.
Good old days, they like to call them,they were tough old days to many:
I was through them, and they left me still the choice to graft or beg,
Left me gray, and worn, and wrinkled, aged and stumped,without a penny,
With a chronic rheumatism and this darned old twisted leg.
Other work? Thats true,in plenty. But you know the real old stager
Who has followed up the diggings, how he hangs on to the pan,
How he hates to leave the pipeclay. Though you mention it Ill wager
That you never worked on top until you couldnt help it, Dan.
Years went by. On many fields I worked, and often missed a meal, and
Then I found Victoria played out, and the yields were very slack,
So I took a turn up Northward, tried Tasmania and New Zealand,
Dan, I worked my passage over, and I sneaked the journey back.
Times were worse. I made a cradle, and went fossicking old places;
But the Chows had been before me, and had scraped the country bare;
There was talk of splendid patches mongst the creeks and round the races,
But twas not my luck to strike them, and I think I lived on air.
Rough? Thats not the word. So help me, Dan, I hadnt got a stiver
When I caved in one fine Sunday,found I couldnt lift my head.
They removed me, and the doctor said Id got rheumatic fever,
And for seven months I lingered in a ward upon a bed.
Came out crippled, feeling done-up, hopeless-like and very lonely,
And dead-beat right down to bed rock as Id never felt before.
Bitter? Just! Those hopeful years of honest graft had left me only
This bent leg; and some asylum was the prospect Id in store.
Youll be knowing how I felt then,cleaned-out, lame, completely gravelled,
All the friends Id known were scattered widely north, and east, and west:
There seemed nothing there for my sort, and no chances if I travelled;
No, my digging days were over, and I had to give it best.
Though twas hard, I tried to meet it like a man in digger fashion:
Twasnt good enough,I funked it; I was fairly on the shelf,
Cursed my bitter fortune daily, and was always in a passion
With the Lord, sir, and with everyone, but mostly with myself.
I was older twenty years then than I am this blessed minute,
But I got a job one morning, knapping rock at Ballarat;
Two-and-three for two-inch metal. You may say theres nothing in it,
To the man whos been through Eaglehawk and mined at Blanket Flat.
Wait,youd better let me finish. We and ill, I bucked in gladly,
But to get the tools I needed I was forced to pawn my swag.
Id no hope of golden patches, but I needed tucker badly,
And this job, I think, just saved me being lumbered on the vag.
Fortune is a fickle party, but in spite of all her failings,
Dont revile her, Dan, as I did, while youve still a little rope.
Well, the heap that I was put on was some heavy quartz and tailings,
That was carted from a local mine, I think the Band of Hope.
Take the lesson that is coming to your heart, old man, and hug it:
For I started on the heap with scarce a soul to call my own,
And in less than twenty minutes Id raked out a bouncing nugget
Scaling close on ninety ounces, and just frosted round with stone.
How is that for high, my hearty? Miracle! It was, by thunder!
After forty years of following the rushes up and down,
Getting old, and past all prospect, and about to knuckle under,
Struck it lucky knapping metal in the middle of a town!
Pass the bottle! Have another! Soon well get the word from Kitty,
Shes a daisy cook, I tell you. Yes, the public business pays
But my pile was made beforehand,made it broking in the city.
Thats the yarn I pitch the neighbours. Heres to good old now-a-days.