His Country Thomas Hardy

[He travels southward, and looks around;]
I journeyed from my native spot
        Across the south sea shine,
And found that people in hall and cot
Laboured and suffered each his lot
        Even as I did mine.

[and cannot discern the boundary]
Thu        s noting them in meads and marts
It did not seem to me
That my dear country with its hearts,
Minds, yearnings, worse and better parts
        Had ended with the sea.

[of his native country;]
I further and further went anon,
         As such I still surveyed,
And further yet—yea, on and on,
And all the men I looked upon
        Had heart-strings fellow-made.

[or where his duties to his fellow-creatures end;]
I traced the whole terrestrial round,
        Homing the other side;
Then said I, "What is there to bound
My denizenship? It seems I have found
        Its scope to be world-wide."