The Fact of the Matter (also known as 'The drovers in reply') is a poem by prolific Australian writer and poet Edward Dyson (1865–1931). It was first published in The Bulletin magazine on 30 July 1892 in reply to fellow poets Henry Lawson and Banjo Paterson. This poem formed part of the Bulletin Debate, a series of poems by Lawson, Paterson, and others, about the true nature of life in the Australian bush.

Background

In 'Up The Country' (9 July 1892) Lawson had criticised 'city bushmen' such as Banjo Paterson who tended to romanticise bush life. Paterson, in turn, in 'In Defence of the Bush' (23 July 1892) accused Lawson of representing bush life as nothing but doom and gloom. Dyson, who grew up in Ballarat, Victoria, working from an early age in the mines and on the land before moving to Melbourne, sided with Lawson, expressing the view that those who glorified country life should go and live there.

Original version

The four-line ten-stanza poem, making reference to some of Paterson's own phrases, first appeared as:

1896 variation

By 1896 the poem was reworded and renamed 'The drovers in reply' and appeared in Dyson's first anthology Rhymes from the Mines and Other Lines in 1896: