As Leichhardt Saw It Then - Slim Dusty

In the days of great explorers

Ludwig Leichhardt rose to fame

He saw this country’s beauty

Before the settlers came

The water holes were full of fish

He saw the emus run

And wildfowl rose in millions

Till they hid the rising sun

He camped among the woodlands

Untouched by white man’s hands

Swam unpolluted rivers

And trod their unmarked sands

The wild sand of the bushland

Soaked deep into his chest

His horses grazed new pastures

As he headed north by west

Let me take a page from history

And write this land again

Or I’d like to see this country

Just as Leichhardt saw it then

He didn’t that know that progress

Would rape this virgin scene

And change the face of nature

With pests and foreign weeds

He couldn’t see as we have seen

Our topsoil disappear

From fires and overstocking

And scrub being pulled each year

His vision never pictured the future would unfold

The side of old car bodies and litter on our roads

Back where the silent blue gums stood

And native bears would peer

We now hear rows of traffic like an insult to our ear

Let me take a page from history

And write this land again

Or I’d like to see this country

Just as Leichhardt saw it then

Perhaps there’s few of us who care

Or dream about the past

We’re busy doing better with our modern ways so fast

But should they grant to me a wish

Before I meet my end

Oh, I’d like to see this country

Just as Leichhardt saw it then

Let me take a page from history

And write this land again

'Cause I’d like to see this country

Oh I’d like to see this country (yeah)

Oh I’d like to see this country

Just as Leichhardt saw it then