I need help with a line from 'The man from snowy river poem'! PLEASE HELP!?

The 'cracks' referred to are sort of the Top Guns of horsemen, and they have gathered because of the challenge of recovering the Colt from Old Regret (the fray or conflict or fight), who has taken off with the Snowy Mountains brumbies, and is unlikely to want to come home after tasting freedom. Those brumbies run wild and cover a lot of territory, so the hunt and chase would have been something that only the Top Guns would attempt in that rough country.