behind,

But no sweet bird did follow,

Nor any day, for food or play,
Came to the mariner's hollo!

And I had done a hellish thing,
And it would work 'em woe:

For all averred, I had killed the bird
That made the breeze to blow.

Nor dim nor red, like God's own head The glorious Sun uprist:

Then all averred, I had killed the bird That brought the fog and mist,

Was withered at the root;

We could not speak, no more than if

We had been choked with soot.

Ah! well a-day! what evil looks
Had I from old and young!
Instead of the cross, the albatross
About my neck was hung.

PART III.

slay,

That bring the fog and mist.

The fair breeze blew, the white foam flew,

The furrow followed free;

We were the first that ever burst

Into that silent sea.

A something in the sky.

At first it seemed a little speck,
And then it seemed a mist;

It moved and moved, and took at last
A certain shape I wist.

A speck, a mist, a shape, I wist!

down,

"Twas sad as sad could be;

And we did speak only to break

The silence of the sea!

All in a hot and copper sky,

The bloody Sun, at noon,

Right up above the mast did stand,
No bigger than the Moon.

Day after day, day after day,

We stuck, nor breath nor motion;
As idle as a painted ship
Upon a painted ocean.

Water, water, everywhere,
And all the boards did shrink;
Water, water, everywhere,
Nor any drop to drink.

The very deep did rot: O Christ!
That ever this should be!

Yea, shiny things did crawl with legs
Upon the shiny sea.

About, about, in reel and rout,
The death-fires danced at night,
The water, like a witch's oils,
Burnt

green, and blue, and white.
And some in dreams assured were
Of the spirit that plagued us so;
Nine fathom deep he had followed us
From the land of mist and snow.

As if it dodged a water sprite,

It plunged and tacked and veered.

With throats unslaked, with black lips baked,

We could nor laugh nor wail;

Through utter drought all dumb we stood!
I bit my arm, I sucked the blood,
And cried, A sail! a sail!

With throats unslaked, with black lips baked,

Agape they heard me call:

Grammercy! they for joy did grin,
And all at once their breath drew in,
As they were drinking all.

See! see! (I cried,) she tacks no more!
Hither to work us weal;

Without a breeze, without a tide,
She steadies with upright keel!
The western wave was all aflame.
The day was well-nigh done!
Almost upon the western wave
Rested the broad bright Sun;
When that strange shape drove suddenly
Betwixt us and the Sun.

And straight the Sun was flecked with bars,
(Heaven's Mother send us grace!)
As if through a dungeon-grate he peered
With broad and burning face.

Alas! (thought I, and my heart beat loud,) How fast she nears and nears!

I fear thee and thy glittering eye, And thy skinny hand so brown."

Did peer, as through a grate ?
And is that woman all her crew?

Is that a Death? and are there two?
Is Death that woman's mate?

Her lips were red, her looks were free,
Her locks were yellow as gold:
Her skin was as white as leprosy,
The night-mare Life-in-Death was she,
Who thicks man's blood with cold.
The naked hulk alongside came,
And the twain were casting dice;
"The game is done! I've won, I've won!"
Quoth she, and whistles thrice.

The Sun's rim dips; the stars rush out;
At one stride comes the dark;
With far-heard whisper, o'er the sea,
Off shot the spectre-bark.

We listened and looked sideways up!
Fear at my heart, as at a cup,
My life-blood seemed to sip!
The stars were dim, and thick the night,
The steersman's face by his lamp gleamed
white;

From the sails the dew did drip

Till clomb above the eastern bar
The horned Moon, with one bright star
Within the nether tip.

One after one, by the star-dogged Moon,
Too quick for groan or sigh,
Each turned his face with a ghastly pang,
And cursed me with his eye.
Four times fifty living men,
(And I heard nor sigh nor groan,)
With heavy thump, a lifeless lump,
They dropped down one by one.
The souls did from their bodies fly,-
They fled to bliss or woe!
And every soul, it passed me by,
Like the whizz of my cross-bow!
PART IV.

"I fear thee, ancient mariner!

I fear thy skinny hand!

Alone on a wide, wide sea!
And never a saint took pity on
My soul in agony.

The many men so beautiful!
And they all dead did lie:
And a thousand thousand shiny things
Lived on; and so did I.

I looked upon the rotting sea,
And drew my eyes away;
I looked upon the rotting deck,
And there the dead men lay.

I looked to heaven, and tried to pray;
But, or ever a prayer had gushed,
A wicked whisper came, and made
My heart as dry as dust.

I closed my lids, and kept them close,
And the balls like pulses beat;
For the sky and the sea, and the sea and
the sky,

Lay like a load on my weary eye,
And the dead were at my feet.
The cold sweat melted from their limbs,
Nor rot nor reek did they ;

The look with which they looked on me
Had never passed away.

An orphan's curse would drag to hell
A spirit from on high ;

But oh more terrible than that

eye

!

Is the curse in a dead man's
And yet I could not die.
Seven days, seven nights, I saw that curse,

The moving Moon went up the sky,
And nowhere did abide :
Softly she was going up
And a star or two beside-
Her beams bemocked the sultry main,
Like April hoar-frost spread;
And where the ship's huge shadow lay,
The charmed water burnt alway
A still and awful red.

Beyond the shadow of the ship

I watched the water-snakes:

They moved in tracks of shining white

As is the ribbed sea-sand.

Fell off in hoary flakes.

Within the shadow of the ship

I watched their rich attire:

Blue, glossy green, and velvet black,

They coiled and swam; and every track
Was a flash of golden fire.

O happy living things! no tongue
Their beauty might declare :

A spring of love gushed from my heart,

And I blessed them unaware:
Sure my kind saint took pity on me,
And I blessed them unaware.

The selfsame moment I could pray;
And from my neck so free
The albatross fell off, and sank
Like lead into the sea.

I thought that I had died in sleep,
And was a blessed ghost.

And soon I heard a roaring wind:

It did not come anear;

But with its sound it shook the sails,
That were so thin and sere.

The upper air burst into life!
And a hundred fire-flags sheen,
To and fro they were hurried about!
And to and fro, and in and out,
The wan stars danced between.
And the coming wind did roar more loud,
And the sails did sigh like sedge;
And the rain poured down from one black
cloud;

The Moon was at its edge.

COLERIDGE.

The loud wind never reached the ship,
Yet how the ship moved on!
Beneath the lightning and the Moon
The dead men gave a groan.

They groaned, they stirred, they all up

rose,

Nor spake, nor moved their eyes :
It had been strange, even in a dream,
To have seen those dead men rise.

The helmsman steered, the ship moved on;
Yet never a breeze up-blew;

The mariners all 'gan work the ropes,
Where they were wont to do;

They raised their limbs like lifeless tools--
We were a ghastly crew.

The body of my brother's son

Stood by me, knee to knee:

The body and I pulled at one rope,
But he said nought to me.

The Moon was at its side:

Like waters shot from some high crag,

The lightning fell with never a jag,
A river steep and wide.

I heard the sky-lark sing;

Sometimes all little birds that are,

How they seemed to fill the sea and air With their sweet jargoning!

And now 'twas like all instruments,

Now like a lonely flute;

And now it is an angel's song

That makes the heavens be mute.

It ceased; yet still the sails made on
A pleasant noise till noon,
A noise like of a hidden brook
In the leafy month of June,

That to the sleeping woods all night
Singeth a quiet tune.

Till noon we quietly sailed on,
Yet never a breeze did breathe:
Slowly and smoothly went the ship,
Moved onward from beneath,
Under the keel nine fathom deep,
From the land of mist and snow,
The spirit slid and it was he
That made the ship to go.
The sails at noon left off their tune,
And the ship stood still also.

The Sun, right up above the mast,
Had fixed her to the ocean:
But in a minute she 'gan stir,
With a short uneasy motion-
Backwards and forwards half her length
With a short uneasy motion.

Then like a pawing horse let go,
She made a sudden bound:
It flung the blood into my head,
And I fell down in a swound.
How long in that same fit I lay,
I have not to declare ;

But ere my living life returned,
I heard, and in my soul discerned
Two voices in the air.

PART VI.

First Voice.

But tell me, tell me! speak again, Thy soft response renewing

What makes that ship drive on so fast! What is the ocean doing?

Second Voice.

Still as a slave before his lord,
The ocean hath no blast;
His great bright eye most silently
Up to the Moon is cast.

If he may know which way to go;
For she guides him smooth or grim
See, brother, see! how graciously
She looketh down on him.

First Voice.

But why drives on that ship so fast, Without or wave or wind?

Second Voice.

The air is cut away before,
And closes from behind.

Fly, brother, fly! more high, more high!
Or we shall be belated:

For slow and slow that ship will go,
When the mariner's trance is abated.
I woke, and we were sailing on
As in a gentle weather:

'Twas night, calm night, the moon was high;

The dead men stood together.
All stood together on the deck,
For a charnel-dungeon fitter:
All fixed on me their stopy eyes
That in the Moon did glitter.

man?

By him who died on cross,

With his cruel bow he laid full low

The harmless albatross.

"The spirit who bideth by himself
In the land of mist and snow,

He loved the bird that loved the man
Who shot him with his bow."

The other was a softer voice,
As soft as honey-dew:

Quoth he, "The man hath penance done,

And penance more will do."

Had never passed away:

I could not draw my eyes from theirs, Nor turn them up to pray.

And now this spell was snapt: once more

I viewed the ocean green,

And looked far north, yet little saw

Of what had else been seen

Like one, that on a lonesome road

Doth walk in fear and dread,

And having once turned round walks on,
And turns no more his head;
Because he knows a frightful fiend
Doth close behind him tread.