Page:Rudyard Kipling's verse - Inclusive Edition 1885-1918.djvu/224

So thank I God my birth
Fell not in isles aside—
Waste headlands of the earth,
Or warring tribes-untried—
But that she lent me worth
And gave me right to pride.

Surely in toil or fray
Under an alien sky,
Comfort it is to say:
"Of no mean city am I!"

(Neither by service nor fee
Come I to mine estate—
Mother of Cities to me,
But I was born in her gate,
Between the palms and the sea,
Where the world-end steamers wait.)

Now for this debt I owe,
And for her far-borne cheer
Must I make haste and go
With tribute to her pier.

And she shall" touch and remit
After the use of kings
(Orderly, ancient, fit)
My deep-sea plunderings,

And purchase in all lands.
And this we do for a sign
Her power is over mine,
And mine I hold at her hands!