The Drones - Sixteen Straws lyrics

One Sunday morning While I was out walking By the Brisbane's waters I chanced to stray There I found a prisoner Layed half in the water He'd seen me coming And he began to say "I was a native of Erin's Ireland And before I was brought To this terrible place They dragged me away From my wife and newborn And my ailing parents I've been a prisoner at Port Macquarie Norfolk Island and Emu Plains At Castle Hill and cursed Toongabbie At all of these settlements I've worked in chains But of all the places of condemnation At each penal station of New South Wales To Moreton Bay I've found no equal The tyranny there makes all the rest pale There I met O'Brien The defender from Ulster He'd left Ireland burning Came here for the wake He was a schemer A Jacobite nightmare He could not be broken But he became displaced The Jew had one hand He was a violent man He'd worn the 20 pound irons Since before time began Just before the dawn broke His starvation awoke He'd pick the corn from the filth He'd find laying around There ain't no walls at all So remote is the North The Commandant Logan Was the devil for sure His chief flogger was mad I heard a prison guard say He'd wash his lash in a bucket Then drinks the remains Well I heard a rumour In the barracks one night The Jew and O'Brien had fashioned a knife They meant to k** Logan But my will was broke My brain reeled with this secret And the next day I spoke They put me back on the gang With no word of my actions O'Brien and the Jew Got 300 lashes O'Brien came off his triangle With exposed shoulder blades His skin never healed He turned morbid and strange We was out on the road gang Just digging a hole I was struggling with conscience My nerves had dissolved To 15 pairs of eyes O'Brien proposed, 'Shall we go to the gallows Be done with our woes? You know the game Fair play's all I'm asking We'll draw 16 straws then nothing is wanting Why should we grasp at the straws of our lives When we're only condemned by our will to survive?' 16 straws we did then did draw I picked the long one The Jew picked the short He said 'pray God forgives you At least make it quick' 14 pairs of eyes watched me Pounding a a shiv through his heart And for a few moments there was no stopping the blood Then O'Brien said 'friends! On a scaffold this ends But it's a long was to Brisbane And we are dangerous men' Well Logan was wild We filled him with bile He'd seen the Catholic dodge Plain suicide We'd ascended his powers But not that of the King's Or the judge down the river's But we was happy to swing We were marched through the scrub Off to Brisbane for trial Chained into a whaler Set off at low tide With 6 nervous marines And 6 Enfield rifles The arse end of the world And indifferent blue sky Well I turned to torpor At the stern in the sun But I gathered the others must have come undone I woke breathing smoke in a chaos of limbs A red coat squirting blood Through a hole in his chin And a volley of fire in my general direction There was panic and shot And the smell of powder burning I threw a rifle up over the side It was dark by the water But I could see the shore lights Crouched down in the back The wrong side of the guns Getting scorched by the powder I thought surely I'm done I seen ghoulish things Men show limb from limb O'Brien was dead There were pieces of him I tore off my shirt I was quite badly burnt My eyes poured like well springs They were swollen and hurt I'm not sure who survived My whole trunk was on fire But they borke the chains off me And I bailed over the side." Well I was amazed by this poor wretch's tale I'd heard not of the friends He had left in the whaler But I'd just seen the paper and I had to explain How his Commander Logan had died just this day "He'd set out behind you He was out hunting game When he startled some natives Took a spear through his brain" Then the prisoner said "good" I heard someone in boots I turned around and that's when The Royal Marines came