It was first published in The Argus newspaper on 7 September 1901,[1] and later in the poet's poetry collection The Secret Key and Other Verses (1906).

"This poem is dedicated to the pioneering women of the outback who left 'the pleasures of the city and faced the wilderness'.

Not only did the 'red sun rob their beauty' and “the slow years steal the nameless grace', these women 'faced and fought the wilderness' and the man should be thankful.

Evans realizes this and sees all the hard things that life in the bush brought to these women.

[2] Reverend M. Lane, in The Catholic Press called this poem "the best-known verse of Essex Evans, who pays a well-deserved tribute to those who faced the wilderness, the everlasting sameness of the never-ending plains, and left behind the roar and rush and fever of the city for the slab-built hut or the tout in the wide, lone bush — the silent, 'han-shunned plans' of the land of the 'Never-never'.