This is a fine rousing song on the unlikely subject (for Australia, that is) of tea. The very words Talk of your whiskey, talk of your beer ... send shudders down the collective spines of the anti-temperance movement and the whole mood of the song jars with my personal cliché of the up-to-date, turn-of-the-century (the last one, that is the 1800-1900's) Foster-swilling Ozzie. Anyway, the song extols the virtues of lonely life in the Australian outback whereby one's only companion of any worth is The Billy of Tea.
This song is also to be found in The Bushwackers Australian Song Book.

Lyrics