Page:The man from Snowy River and other verses.pdf/47



was the way of it, don't you know—
 * Ryan was wanted' for stealing sheep,

And never a trooper, high or low,
 * Could find him—catch a weasel asleep!

Till Trooper Scott, from the Stockman's Ford—
 * A bushman, too, as I've heard them tell—

Chanced to find him drunk as a lord
 * Round at the Shadow of Death Hotel.

D' you know the place ? It's a wayside inn,
 * A low grog-shanty—a bushman trap,

Hiding away in its shame and sin
 * Under the shelter of Conroy's Gap—

Under the shade of that frowning range,
 * The roughest crowd that ever drew breath—

Thieves and rowdies, uncouth and strange,
 * Were mustered round at the Shadow of Death.