The following significant; and touching ballad is from Sydney " Trnfch " :~ Under the trees in Sydney Domain— under the leaves of the spreading fig, Drenched by the pitiless, misty rain, huddle the sleepers, little and big. Here a pallid-faced, wretched boj, there a stalwart saOoring man. With the youngster's rags the chill winds toy ; such a worn old face for so brief a span Of life; but what is Life to these 1 The wretched dossers beneath the trees. Singly, In pairs, in groups they lie; stretched on the sodden, chilling ground, While the death-damp night-wind sigheth by, as mourning the human wrecks around, And many a prayer its sent on high ; many a groan on the night-winds borne Prayers —"Oh, Jesus ! let me die. Let me bo found a carpße at morn," For Life 1 Why, what is Life to these ? The wretched dossers beneath the trees. No work to do, no home to hide ; no hope for the morrow to bring relief. No fireside's glow and a " full inside " to 'sijage these outcasts' bitter grief. Many a wretch who ehu Mering lies under the trees in the bleak Domain, Was once the head of a happy home—a home he never will own again. And Life ! What left in Life for these 'I The starving dossers beneath the trees. Scattered now o'er the starving earth, single-handed to fight for lif a Parents, and them they have cursed with birth ; parted—husband, children, wife. Capital's greed and strikers' haste ; sick ness, idleness, drunkenness, crime. Have strewn these saddening wrecks to I waste; these "images of a God sub lime." A God ! Oh, where is the God of these. The shivering dossers beneath the trees'? Oh, Christ J who soothed the widow's panga, who ever pitied the poor and weak, Rend the cloud that over them hangs; succor these starving wretches meek. Soften the hearts of the rich and great; show them the way to help Thy poor ; Enlighten the leaders of the State, ere the people 11 faith in Thee abjure. Jesus ! we beg it upon our knees, Pity the dossers beneath the trees. .Neville Fob deb. Sydney, January 28,1894.
