Over the plains of the whitening grass 
and the stunted mulga the drovers pass, 
and in the red dust cloud, each side 
of the cattle, the native stockmen ride. 

And day after day lays bare the same 
endless plains as the way they came, 
and ever the cloven ranges lie 
at the end of the land and the opal sky. 

With creak of pack and saddle leather, 
and chink of chain and bit together, 
with moan of the herd with hobble and bell 
they come to the tanks at the tea-tree well. 

And through corroding blood-red hills 
by sanded rivers the Gulf-rain fills, 
far, where the morning star has shone 
and paled above, their tracks are gone.