(Eric Bogle)

When I was a young man I carried my pack

And I lived the free life of a rover

From the Murrays green basin to the dusty outback

I waltzed my Matilda all over

Then in nineteen fifteen my country said Son

It's time to stop rambling 'cause there's work to be done

So they gave me a tin hat and they gave me a gun

And they sent me away to the war

And the band played Waltzing Matilda

As we sailed away from the quay

And amidst all the tears and the shouts and the cheers

We sailed off to Gallipoli



How well I remember that terrible day

How the blood stained the sand and the water

And how in that hell that they called Suvla Bay

We were butchered like lambs at the slaughter

Johnny Turk he was ready, he primed himself well

He chased us with bullets, he rained us with shells

And in five minutes flat he'd blown us all to hell

Nearly blew us right back to Australia

But the band played Waltzing Matilda

As we stopped to bury our slain

We buried ours and the Turks buried theirs

Then we started all over again



Now those that were left, well we tried to survive

In a mad world of blood, death and fire

And for ten weary weeks I kept myself alive

But around me the corpses piled higher

Then a big Turkish shell knocked me arse over tit

And when I woke up in my hospital bed

And saw what it had done, I wished I was dead

Never knew there were worse things than dying

For no more I'll go waltzing Matilda

All around the green bush far and near

For to hump tent and pegs, a man needs two legs

No more waltzing Matilda for me



So they collected the cripples, the wounded, the maimed

And they shipped us back home to Australia

The armless, the legle