This is an early Porter song from "See America First", 1916.
"I've a Shooting Box in Scotland":
Nowadays, it's rather nobby
To regard one's private hobby
As the object of one's tenderest affections;
Some excel at Alpine climbing
Others have a turn for rhyming,
While a lot of people go in for collections.
Such as prints by Hiroshigi,
Edelweiss from off the Rigi,
Jacobean soup tureens,
Early types of limousines,
Pipes constructed from a dry cob,
Baseball hits by Mister Ty Cobb,
Locks of Mrs. Browning's hair,
Photographs of Ina Claire,
First editions still uncut,
Daily pranks of Jeff and Mutt,
Della Robia singing boys,
Signatures of Alfred Noyes,
Fancy bantams,
Grecian vases,
Tropic beetles,
Irish laces,
But my favorite pastime
Is collecting country places.
I've a shooting box in Scotland,
I've a chateau in Touraine,
I've a silly little chalet
In the Interlaken Valley,
I've a hacienda in Spain,
I've a private fjord in Norway,
I've a villa close to Rome,
And in traveling
It's really quite a comfort to know
That you're never far from home!
Now it's really very funny
What an awful lot of money
On exorbitant hotels a chap can squander;
But I never have to do so,
Like resourceful Mister Crusoe,
I can find a home however far I wander.
I've a bungalow at Simla,
I've an island east of Maine,
If you care for hotter places,
I've an African oasis
On an uninhabited plain;
I've a houseboat on the Yangtse,
I've an igloo up at Nome,
Yes, in traveling
It's really quite a comfort to know
That you're never far from home!
Having lots of idle leisure
I pursue a life of pleasure,
Like a rolling stone in constant agitation
For tho' stay-at-homes may cavil,
I admit I'd rather travel,
Than collect a crop of mossy vegetation!
I've a shanty in the Rockies,
I've a castle on the Rhine,
I've a Siamese pagoda,
I've a cottage in Fashoda,
Near the equatorial line!
On my sable farm in Russia
O'er the barren steppes we'll roam,
And in traveling
It's really quite a comfort to know
That you're never far from home.
