SOURCE: Elliott, Brian. “An R. H. Horne Poem on Burke and Wills.” Australian Literary Studies 1, no. 2 (December 1963): 122-26.

In the following essay, Elliott discusses an obscure Horne elegiac poem about explorers Robert Burke and William Wills, who were the first to cross the Australian continent from north to south but died on the return trip. Elliott finds the most intriguing aspect of the work to be the depiction of the Australian culture and countryside by Horne, an English expatriate.

The Sydney Morning Herald of Friday, 23 January, 1863, prints among its ‘Telegraphic Despatches’ the following reference to the ceremonies associated with the reburial in Melbourne on the previous Wednesday of the remains of the explorers Burke and Wills:

Melbourne, Wednesday. 6 p.m. The funeral of Burke and Wills took place today, and attracted the largest concourse of people ever assembled in the city. The bells of the various churches tolled...