The Stringy-Bark Tree

There's the whitebox and pine on the ridges afar,     Where the iron-bark, blue-gum, and peppermint are;     There is many another, but dearest to me,     And the king of them all was the stringy-bark tree.     Then of stringy-bark slabs were the walls of the hut,     And from stringy-bark saplings the rafters were cut;     And the roof that long sheltered my brothers and me     Was of broad sheets of bark from the stringy-bark tree.     And when sawn-timber homes were built out in the West,     Then for walls and for ceilings its wood was the best;     And for shingles and palings to last while men be,     There was nothing on earth like the stringy-bark tree.     Far up the long gullies the timber-trucks went,     Over tracks that seemed hopeless, by bark hut and tent;     And the gaunt timber-finder, who rode at his ease,     Led them on to a gully of stringy-bark trees.     Now still from the ridges, by ways that are dark,     Come the shingles and palings they call stringy-bark;     Though you ride through long gullies a twelve months youll see     But the old whitened stumps of the stringy-bark tree.