The Songs of a Sentimental Bloke
From Henry Lawson's Foreword to The Songs of a Sentimental Bloke:
The Sentimental Bloke, while running through the Bulletin, brightened up many dark days for me. He is more perfect than any alleged "larrikin" or Bottle-O character I have ever attempted to sketch, not even excepting my own beloved Benno. Take the first poem for instance, where the Sentimental Bloke gets the hump. How many men, in how many different parts of the world - and of how many different languages - have had the same feeling - the longing for something better - to be something better?
The exquisite humour of The Sentimental Bloke speaks for itself; but there's a danger that its brilliance may obscure the rest, especially for minds, of all stations, that, apart from sport and racing, are totally devoted to boiling
"The cabbitch storks or somethink"
in this social "pickle found-ery" of ours.