Alas poor child of toil and poverty!
Amongst thy betters wouldn’t thou fain he seen?
No; like the Hebrew, siege with leprosy,
Stand by thyself and cry “Unclean! Unclean!”

This poem was probably written during Fenerty's time in Australia, during the Gold Rush. It starts off in a similar manner to this second Canto in Hid Treasure (the Labours of a Deacon). Fenerty disliked the gold rush and the effect it had on people. His feelings for the gold rush are more apparent in his three part cantos. In this poem he thinks of himself more of an aspiring poet; like Burns, Hogg, and Clifford. Just before this poem was written the was the great Burns' Centenary; a celebration taking place every 100 years to commemorate Robert Burns.

Like James Montgomery, Robert Burns had a great effect on Fenerty's life as a poet. Much of Burns' life is remarkably similar to Fenerty's (as a traveler and bard, religious life, the themes in their writings, and they were even tax collectors (something as noble as Socrates waiting for his death in the Phaedo). They were pious men; both to God and country. "I know thou urge’st, Clifford did the same" said Fenerty. His goal in Australia was not strike it rich in gold, nor was it to start a new life abroad, Fenerty was on a quest for knowledge; to better himself in someway. In his poem The Saxon's Sentimental Journey, Fenerty extends his imagination of the world by putting himself in places that characterize us, and says:

Of North, or South or East or West
Of men and things in all the round,
We have as good – perhaps the best –
That can be formed!