Lyrics:
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One Sunday morning as I went walking,
By the Brisbane's waters I chanced to stray,
I heard a prisoner his fate bewailing,
As on the sunny river bank he lay;
"I am a native of Erin's island
But banished now to the fatal shore,
They tore me from my aged parents
And from the maiden I do adore.
"I've been a prisoner at Port Macquarie,
Norfolk Island and Emu Plains,
At Castle Hill and cursed Toongabbie,
At all those settlements I've worked in chains;
But of all those places of condemnation,
In each penal station of New South Wales,
To Moreton Bay I've found no equal:
Excessive tyranny there each day prevails.
"For three long years I was beastly treated,
Heavy irons on my legs I wore,
My back from flogging it was lacerated,
And often painted with crimson gore,
And many a lad from downright starvation
Lies mouldering humbly beneath the clay,
Where Captain Logan he had us mangled
On his triangles at Moreton Bay.
"Like the Egyptians and ancient Hebrews,
We were oppressed under Logan's yoke,
Till a native black who lay in ambush
Did give our tyrant his mortal stroke.
Fellow prisoners, be exhilarated,
That all such monsters such a death may find!
And when from bondage we are liberated,
Our former sufferings shall fade from mind."
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