G'day again Mark,

Sorry about no words! I realise you only asked about the tune but I intended posting the words as well (indeed, I thought I had, but I was showing Patricia around the Mudcart site and I either forgot to post words or posted the music over them.

BTW: The name Rabbitohs for Souths mostly referred to eating them, not catching them and, of course, the bloke that sold them was a Barritoh.

THE RABBITER
Words and music: Stan Wakefield

I read about the fortunes that the rabbiters make outback -
The sporting life and the lairy tales of prices fetched at Sydney sales,
So I started out across New South Wales on the roving rabbiters' track.

CHORUS: With a hool-em-up and a sool-em-up And the fool-em-up decoys;
The men who scalp the rabbiters Are the Sydney market boys.

A free and independent life, a life of simple joys
I camped beneath an old belah ' and my tucker was mostly fried galah,
And I trapped 'em near and I trapped 'em far, for the Sydney market boys.

I poisoned out at Hillston, and I trapped at Gundagai,
I followed 'em over creeks and bogs, and chopped 'em out of hollow logs,
And tailed 'em up with yelping dogs, 'way back of Boggabri.

Besides the bunnies that you catch, there's things that you despise:
A hawk, a snake, a crow, a rat., a bandicoot, a tiger cat,
And when you're lucky, a lamb that's fat is a welcome enough surprise.

I skinned and scalped and scalped and skinned, till my back was nearly broke,
With blood and muck all stiff and brown, the stink of my clothes would knock you down,
And I slaved all day for half a crown for the Sydney market bloke.

I thought I'd get a snifter cheque for skins I sent from Bourke,
But the broker rogues in Sydney Town, they weigh them short and they grade them down,
And they sent me back three lousy pound, for a month of slavin' work.

Some day we're going to set our traps to catch the hungry crew
Who live on useful workers' sweat -- we'll stop their thieving racket yet,
And to make them earn their tucker, you bet, is the job for me and you.

With a hool-em-up and a sool-em-up,
And there'll be no more decoys;
Then a-hunting, hunting we will go
For the Sydney market boys.

Regards,

Bob Bolton ^^