{
 "id": "robert-w-service/the-younger-son",
 "title": "The Younger Son",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "Robert W. Service",
 "poet_slug": "robert-w-service",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Songs of a Sourdough",
 "book_slug": "songs-of-a-sourdough",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 24,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1907,
  "venue": "Songs of a Sourdough (1907)",
  "note": "First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/songsofsourdoug00serv"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/robert-w-service_songs-of-a-sourdough",
  "file": "poetry.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/25546",
   "https://archive.org/details/songsofsourdoug00serv"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-20"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 48,
  "n_stanzas": 6,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 70,
  "max_indent": 1
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "If you leave the gloom of London and you seek a glowing land,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Where all except the flag is strange and new,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "There’s a bronzed and stalwart fellow who will grip you by the hand,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And greet you with a welcome warm and true;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "For he’s your younger brother, the one you sent away,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Because there wasn’t room for him at home;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And now he’s quite contented, and he’s glad he didn’t stay,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And he’s building Britain’s greatness o’er the foam.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "When the giant herd is moving at the rising of the sun,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And the prairie is lit with rose and gold;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And the camp is all a-bustle, and the busy day’s begun,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "He leaps into the saddle sure and bold.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Through the round of heat and hurry, through the racket and the rout,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "He rattles at a pace that nothing mars;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And when the night-winds whisper, and campfires flicker out,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "He is sleeping like a child beneath the stars.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "When the wattle-blooms are drooping in the sombre she-oak glade,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And the breathless land is lying in a swoon,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "He leaves his work a moment, leaning lightly on his spade,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And he hears the bellbird chime the Austral noon.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "The parakeets are silent in the gum-tree by the creek;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The ferny grove is sunshine-steeped and still;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "But the dew will gem the myrtle in the twilight ere he seek",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "His little lonely cabin on the hill.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Around the purple, vine-clad slope the argent river dreams;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The roses almost hide the house from view;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "A snow-peak of the Winterberg in crimson splendour gleams;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The shadow deepens down on the karroo.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "He seeks the lily-scented dusk beneath the orange-tree:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "His pipe in silence glows and fades and glows,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And then two little maids come out and climb upon his knee,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And one is like the lily, one the rose.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "He sees his white sheep dapple o’er the green New Zealand plain,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And where Vancouver’s shaggy ramparts frown,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "When the sunlight threads the pine-gloom he is fighting might and main",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To clinch the rivets of an Empire down.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "You will find him toiling, toiling, in the south or in the west,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "A child of nature, fearless, frank and free;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And the warmest heart that beats for you is beating in his breast,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And he sends you loyal greeting o’er the sea.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "You’ve a brother in the Army, you’ve another in the Church;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "One of you is a diplomatic swell;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "You’ve had the pick of everything and left him in the lurch;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And yet I think he’s doing very well.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "I’m sure his life is happy, and he doesn’t envy yours;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I know he loves the land his pluck has won;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And I fancy in the years unborn, while England’s fame endures,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "She will come to bless with pride⁠—the Younger Son.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ]
 ]
}