"The Blue Mountains", An Invitation by Douglas B. W. Sladen

Come to the Mountains, Blue Mountains, Blue Mountains,
   Come to the Mountains this lovely spring day,
To see crisp runnels and bright little fountains,
   Bubbling and gushing and hurrying away!

Come to the Mountains, to see the spring flowers,
   The wattle, the tea tree, the heath in bloom,
To quaff the fresh breeze that blows through their bowers,
   Refreshing the sense and sowing perfume!

Come to the Mountains, to look on the forest,
   Spread out like a cushion beneath your feet,
To look on the monstrous crags, where thou soarest,
   O Eagle, to render the awe complete!

Come to the Mountains, to gaze down the gorges,
   Huge bays with their sealess expanse tree-lined,
To learn how the waterfall roars and surges,
   And drifts its spray with the will of the wind!

Come to the Mountains, to hunt for a valley,
   Deep down in the breast of a rifted hill,
With a shade of woven tree-tops, and gaily
   Bedizened with ferns round each drip and rill!

Come to the Mountains, to roam on the Mountains,
   The Blue Mountains you see so far away,
If it is but to hear our careless fountains,
   O ye who toil in the city all day.

First published in The Australian Town & Country Journal, 23 June 1883;
and later in
A Century of Australian Song edited by Douglas Sladen, 1888.

Author reference sites: Austlit, Australian Dictionary of Biography

See also.