,
His wits to the fore he can readily bring
In passing off ash as the genuine thing
When scarce in the forest the beech is.

In girthing a tree that he sells in the round,
He assumes, as a rule, that the body is sound,
And measures, forgetting to bark it!
He may be a ninny, but still the old dog
Can plug to perfection the pipe of a log
And palm it away on the market.

He splits a fair shingle, but holds to the rule
Of his father's, and, haply, his grandfather's school;
Which means that he never has blundered,
When tying his shingles, by slinging in more
Than the recognized number of ninety and four
To the bundle he sells for a hundred!

When asked by the market for ironbark red,
It always occurs to the Wollombi head
To do a "mahogany" swindle.
In forests where never the ironbark grew,
When Jim is at work, it would flabbergast you
To see how the ironbarks dwindle.

He can stick to the saddle, can Wollombi Jim,
And when a buckjumper dispenses with him,
The leather goes off with the rider.
And, as to a team, over gully and hill
He can travel with twelve on the breadth of a quill
And boss the unlucky offsider.

He shines at his best at the tiller of saw,
On the top of the pit, where his whisper is law
To the gentleman working below him.
When the pair of them pause in a circle of dust,
Like a monarch he poses--exalted, august--
There's nothing this planet can show him!

For a man is a _man_ who can sharpen and set,
And _he_ is the only thing masculine yet
According to sawyer and splitter--
Or rather according to Wollombi Jim;
And nothing will tempt me to differ from him,
For Jim is a bit of a hitter.

But, being full up, we'll allow him to rip,
Along with his lingo, his saw, and his whip--
He isn't the classical notion.
And, after a night in his humpy, you see,
A person of orthodox habits would be
Refreshed by a dip in the ocean.

To tot him right up from the heel to the head,
He isn't the Grecian of whom we have read--
His face is a trifle too shady.
The nymph in green valleys of Thessaly dim
Would never "jack up" her old lover for him,
For she has the tastes of a lady.

So much for our hero! A statuesque foot
Would suffer by wearing that heavy-nailed boot--
Its owner