(Heaven's mother send us grace!) As if through a dungeon-grate he peer'd With broad and burning face. Alas! (thought I, and my heart beat loud,) And every tongue, through utter How fast she nears and nears! Are those her sails that glance in the sun, drought, Was wither'd at the root; The ancient ma. riner beholdeth a sign in the ele. ment afar off. About PART III. THERE pass'd a weary time. Each Was parch'd, and glazed each eye. At first it seem'd a little speck It moved and moved, and took at last A speck, a mist, a shape, I wist! At its nearer ap- With throats unslaked, with black proach, it seem. eth him to be a lips baked, A flash of joy. stood; I bit my arm, I suck'd the blood, And cried, A sail! a sail! him but the skeleton of a ship. Are those her ribs through which the And its ribs are sun Did peer, as through a grate; And is that woman all her crew? seen as bars en the face of the setting sun. Is that a DEATH, and are there two? The spectreIS DEATH that woman's mate? woman and her death-mate, and no other on board Her lips were red, her looks were the skeleton-ship. free, Her locks were yellow as gold: she, Who thicks man's blood with cold. The naked hulk alongside came, And the twain were casting dice; Like vessel, like crew! Death and Lifein-Death have diced for the "The game is done! I've won, I've ship's crew, and won !" Quoth she, and whistles thrice. she, the latter, winneth the ancient mariner. The steersman's face by his lamp gleam'd white; With throats unslaked, with black From the sails the dew did drip the moon, One after one, by the star-dogg'd One after an moon, Too quick for groan or sigh, pang, And cursed me with his eye. Four times fifty living men, other, His shipmates drop down dead. But Life-in-Death The souls did from their bodies fly,- Her beams bemock'd the sultry main, begins her work the ancient They fled to bliss or wo! And thou art long, and lank, and As is the ribb'd sea-sand.* "I fear thee and thy glittering eye, And thy skinny hand so brown." Like April hoar-frost spread; But where the ship's huge shadow lay, The charmed water burnt alway By the light of the moon he beholdeth God's crea Beyond the shadow of the ship And when they rear'd, the elfish light Within the shadow of the ship But the ancient Fear not, fear not, thou wedding-I watch'd their rich attire; mariner assureth bim of his bodily guest! life, and proceed. This body dropt not down. eth to relate his horrible penance. Alone, alone, all, all alone, Alone on a wide, wide sea! And never a saint took pity on He despiseth the The many men, so beautiful! creatures of the calm. And a thousand thousand slimy things And envieth that I look'd upon the rotting sea, I look'd to heaven, and tried to pray; I closed my lids, and kept them close, and the sky, Lay like a load on my weary eye But the curse liv. The cold sweat melted from their eth for him in the eye of the dead men. limbs, Blue, glossy green, and velvet black, They coil'd and swam; and every track Was a flash of golden fire. O happy living things! no tongue A spring of love gush'd from my heart, And I bless'd them unaware: The selfsame moment I could pray; PART V. O SLEEP! it is a gentle thing, The silly buckets on the deck, calm. Their beauty and their happiness. He blesseth them in his heart. The spell begins to break. By grace of the holy mother, the ancient mariner I dreamt that they were fill'd with is refreshed with dew; And when I awoke it rain'd. My lips were wet, my throat was cold, An orphan's curse would drag to hell And still my body drank. rain. He heareth sounds and seeth strange sights and But with its sound it shook the sails, commotions in That were so thin and sere. The upper air burst into life! And the coming wind did roar more And the sails did sigh like sedge; the sky and the element. And the rain pour'd down from one It ceased; yet still the sails made on black cloud; The moon was at its edge. A pleasant noise till noon, A noise like of a hidden brook In the leafy month of June, The thick black cloud was cleft, and That to the sleeping woods all night still Yet now the ship moved on! Beneath the lightning and the moon The dead men gave a groan. Singeth a quiet tune. Till noon we quietly sailed on, Under the keel nine fathom deep, The lonesome spirit from the south pole carries on the ship as far as the line, in obedience to the The sails at noon left off their tune, angelic troop, but They groan'd, they stirr'd, they all And the ship stood still also. The sun, right up above the mast, The helmsman steer'd, the ship moved Backwards and forwards half her length still requireth vengeance. The polar spiritu fellow dæmons, the invisible inhabitants of the element, take part in his wrong; and two of them relate, one to the other, that peaance long and heavy for the ascient mariser hath been accord With his cruel bow he laid full low ed to the polar The harmless albatross. "The spirit who bideth by himself The other was a softer voice, PART VI. FIRST VOICE. BUT tell me, tell me! speak again, SECOND VOICE. Still as a slave before his lord, His great bright eye most silently Up to the moon is cast spirit, who re turneth southward. Fly, brother, fly! more high, more The moonlight steep'd in silentness, The steady weathercock. The pang, the curse, with which they On every corse there stood. died, Had never pass'd away: I could not draw my eyes from theirs, Nor turn them up to pray. This seraph band, each waved his hand: It was a heavenly sight! They stood as signals to the land, The curse is final- And now the spell was snapt: once Each one a lovely light; ly expiated. more I view'd the ocean green, And look'd far forth, yet little saw Of what had else been seen Like one, that on a lonesome road on, And turns no more his head; Because he knows a frightful fiend Doth close behind him tread. But soon there breathed a wind on me, It raised my hair, it fann'd my cheek And the ancient O! dream of joy! is this, indeed, Is this the hill? is this the kirk? This seraph band, each waved his hand, No voice did they impart- But soon I heard the dash of oars, The pilot and the pilot's boy, I heard them coming fast: Dear Lord in heaven! it was a joy The dead men could not blast. I saw a third-I heard his voice: He singeth loud his godly hymns PART VII. THIS hermit good lives in that wood And appear in their own forms of light. The bermit of the wood, Approacheth the ship with wonder. The ship suddenly sinketh. He kneels at morn, and noon, and "Ha! ha!" quoth he, "full plain I eve He hath a cushion plump: It is the moss that wholly hides The rotted old oak stump. see, The devil knows how to row." And now, all in my own countrée, The skiff-boat near'd: I heard them The hermit stepp'd forth from the "Dear Lord! it hath a fiendish look- I am a-fear'd."-" Push on, push on!" What loud uproar bursts from that The boat came closer to the ship, Under the water it rumbled on, It reach'd the ship, it split the bay; The ancient ma Stunn'd by that loud and dreadful riner is saved in the pilot's boat. sound, Which sky and ocean smote, door! The wedding-guests are there O wedding-guest! this soul hath been O sweeter than the marriage-feast, Like one that hath been seven days With a goodly company !— drown'd, My body lay afloat; But swift as dreams, myself I found Upon the whirl, where sank the ship, I moved my lips-the pilot sh.iek'd, I took the oars: the pilot's boy, To walk together to the kirk, and the petanice of life falls on him. While each to his great Father bends, Fare ell, farewell! but this I tell He prayeth best, who loveth best The mariner, whose eye is bright, Laugh'd loud and long, and all the Whose beard with age is hoar, while His eyes went to and fro, Is gone and now the wedding-guest And ever And anon throughout his future life an agony constraineth him to travel from land to land. And to teach, by his own example, love and reverence to all things that God ale and loveth. |