Scots of the Riverina
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Scots of the Riverina is an Australian bush poem by Henry Lawson. It is set in the Riverina, New South Wales in the town of Gundagai. It tells of a boy who leaves home at the start of the harvest to move to the city, an unheard of and unforgivable thing for a Scot to do in the early 1900's, according to the poet: "They were Scots of the Riverina, and to run from home was a crime.". The boy's father, the old "Scot of the Riverina", burns all of his son's letters, removes his son's name from the Family Bible, and vowes to never speak of his son again. Eventually the boy goes to war and is killed at Flanders, and the poem ends with the father writing his son's name back into the bible.
Australian country singer Lee Kernaghan interpreted the poem musically on his album The Outback Club in 1992.
