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His Old Bally Mare

Edward S. Sorenson

One day the old man marvelled at the speed that “Bally” had,
An’ reckoned he would train her for the sports at Boggembad.
So he ground our battered axes with the file that Jerry found;
Then he set us nippers cuttin’ grass on Michael Carey’s ground.
We’d to lump it home in bundles—you can bet we didn’t laugh;
An’ the mater, with her scissors, helped us to cut it into chaff.
“Old-’un” sed it was so prime that, fed on such nutritious fare,
He’d be game to bet some pumpkins on his old Bally mare.

When we’d brought her from the mulga ‘twas the stablin’ troubled him,
Till the mater went to work an’ put the poultry-house in trim.
If you’d seen him lead her in there you’d a thought ‘twas Carabine,
Only for the corn-sack blanket he’d together stitched with twine.
‘Twas such awful sultry weather she was lather to her feet,
An’ I used to think he rugged her to protect her from the heat;
But at nights he took the blanket off an’ left her body bare;
So, the poultry did some paintin’ on the old Bally mare.

You could hear the “Old-’un” goin’ while the stars wur shinin’ still.
For her hoofs were flat an’ whopprous, an’ they clattered ‘cross the hill.
Then her corn he’d set us crackin’ with a wedge at break o’ day,
Or a-cleanin’ out the manger where old Speckley used ter lay.
He would brush her with the house broom, an’ a purrin’ noise he’d make.
As he combed her mane an’ bob-tail with the rusty garden rake;
All the while confidin’ to us that he meant to run her square—
There would be no shady bizness ‘bout the old Bally mare.

Hours an’ hours, we’d see him standin’, dreamin’ wondrous dreams of her,
And in fancy ridin’ races, till he’d prick him with his spur.
He would even go at midnight, when the moon was up, to peep,
So he could tell his neighbors how a racer looked asleep;
An’ he used ter ‘ave me writin’ till my eyes begun to squint,
Jes’ ter see how “Jones’s Bally” would appear in naked print;
An’ he got poor mum rehearsin’ how to kiss her, I declare,
When the “Cockies’ Cup” was landed by the old Bally mare.

Stag and Brindle yoked together to the races drew the slide,
With the “Old-’un”—togged up—drivin’, an’ the fam’ly packed inside.
On the course he backed his racer, talked in supercilious tones,
Fancied everyone attracted by the sight o’ Mister Jones.
While he shouted for his neighbors, an’ was plankin’ money down,
Guessin’ he’d a winner hidden in the mulga near the town,
Up runs Jerry, skeered an’ gas’pin’, an’, by gum! he made him stare:
“There’s a widgy foal a-suckin’ at the old Bally mare!”

When the rorty crowd had grasped the fact that Jones’s mare had foaled,
With a roar they hurried down to her, an’ some lay down an’ rolled;
Bookes yelled, “Ten thousand pounds against the double yet unlaid:
Jones’s antiquated Bally an’ her new-born ‘Little Maid’!”
She was posted up as top-weight in a bogus Tittie Stakes,
Whilst the youths wur askin’ Jones about the price of ducks an’ drakes.
Then Jones’s heavy blucher boot caught Jerry in the rear,
An’ sent him ploddin’ homeward with the old Bally mare.

Still the people roared with laughter till it rumbled thro’ the town,
An’ you could ‘ave with a feather knocked me poor old daddy down.
Bushies nudged him, grinned an’ nodded, till they got his dander up,
An’ he set ter work to fight ‘em for their hyphenated Cup.
When the bobbies pounced upon him, an’ ter gaol began to steer,
You’d a-thought he had the mully-grubs, he looked so very queer.
E’en to-day Mick Carey’s laughin’—but the “Old-’un” doesn’t care;
He is fetchin’ up the milkers on the old Bally mare.

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