IN TUNE WITH NATURE

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 200, 13 May 1918, Page 2

IN TUNE WITH NATURE

THE I'OETiCAL TKAMP. Having deposited Ilia sway beneath a shady tree, no put lus billy on to boil, shook a small portion of dust from his coat, lit his pipe, and commenced: "Most puoplo would call mo an-ordin-ary tramp, but IV not. What I call a tramp k> usually tho lazy deadbeat I pass on tho roads, who lives a cadging existence from ono end of the country to another. I tramp the country bocausu the life suits me. I earn my way by working for, say, a week in one pliico to keep me without working a week in tlhe next.. "Tho cily there are no big spaced wlicro 1 can breathe. When 1 ecino within coo-eo of Sydnoy I get just fur enough to seo the lights acrass the water. J. admit tho lighta fascinate, but those .awful jigging electrical signs that blare out and destroy tho peace of tho sky, 1 would sink in deep waters of tlio harbour. With iihose eternal flashes over before my eyes, how can' anyone expect to seo and know the wondrous glory of tho everlasting stars? "Ulii yes; I read poetry—lots of it— but I must read it in tho bush. I carry a Bible—tho most wonderful book of poetry the world has produced—a book of Emerson's essays, and a book of Australian poetry.' The last is a strangelooking volume, but it contains all that I love, and 1 am continually adding to it." Ho handed out a well-worn Tolumo of Henry Lawson'o "In the Days When tho World was Wide," thickly interleaved with newspaper cuttings from every available source. "That and this"—ho tapped his forehead—"give me all tho literature I require. I can jemeinber, for there is nothing else to clog my brain. I chop wood to the rhythm of poetry, I cut trees lo a swinging tune. Seal Australian poetry is to me an open Ixiok—l have memorised practically every good pieco worth remembering. Mind you, I said good, and the good is very scarco in the Australian domain.

"How do I know what is good? Well, I just know. There is a great difference between verse and poetry; but somehow pootry 'hits me as verse never does. And everybody knows verse, oven if they can't pick tho winner on the heights of poetry. . "Now, I toll yon what--'Andy's Gone with Cattle Now' is real gold. That sings ilsoll in tho back of my mind always and everywhere. I' can't forget it. ]n every breeze of the trees at night that thing rustles through the air. Perhaps it is only my imagination and tho solitude; but it's good to have a littlo of bol'Ji nowadays. You pcoplo ia tho crowded city have lost your imagination in your search f«r material things.

"i\ T o, not ever here, is anybody free. To bo treo you havo got to be out on .the endless plains, with only the birds flying overhead to bring you tho news. Or on.the long yellow beaches about the coast that only tho wanderer knows. Freedom is there, and no cramping and confining could possibly reach the placea that I know. 1 jog along from place (o place, boil my billy, and think my thoughts, and occasionally drift into tho outskirts of the city. The distant glare of thousands of lamps draws mo a little closer sometimes, and then I see the garishriess of it all, the hideonsness of the smiling face of a beautiful city. The air is stagnant, in every street there are crushed bodies, thwarted aims, and hopeless eyes. Thoee eyes stare at me from behind every light that Hushes from the heights and from the street. "But in tho bush there is nothing of. that. You remember what Ogtlvie said in his beautiful 'The Bush, My Lover?' Well that's what I lwlioyc. And I also believe that the true things of life are to be found only beneath the wide freedom of the eky. Of course, the individual must bo taken with consideration every time, for one man's meat is iinol'.her man's poison all the world over. Hut' nevertheless 1 truly think that the world would bo a very much bettor placo if we lived closer to ,nature, and enjoyed more of the simple things of life. My bill's boiling, and I camp here tonight. To-morrow when I sleep there will be many miles between this spot and the next. And I shall also have sweet air to breathe."—Sydney "Sun."