I looked to heaven, and tried to pray;
But or ever a prayer had gusht,

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 horrible than that

Is the curse in a dead man's eye!

Seven days, seven nights, I saw that curse,
And yet I could not die.

The moving Moon went up the sky,

And nowhere did abide:

*

But the curse liveth for him in the eye of the dead

men.

In his loneliness and fixedness,

he yearneth towards the journeying Moon, and the stars

that still sojourn, yet still move onward; and everywhere the blue sky belongs to them, and is their appointed rest, and their native country and their own natural homes, which they enter unannounced, as lords that are certainly expected, and yet there is a silent joy at their arrival.

Her beams bemocked the sultry main,
Like April hoar-frost spread;

*

"Hold off! unhand me, grey-beard loon!"
Eftsoons his hand dropt he.

The wed- He holds him with his glittering eye-
The wedding-guest stood still,

ding guest is spellbound by

the eye of

the old sea

And listens like a three years' child:

faring man, The Mariner hath his will.

and con

strained to hear his

tale.

The Mariner tells how the

ship sailed

The wedding-guest sat on a stone:
He cannot choose but hear;

And thus spake on that ancient man,
The bright-eyed Mariner.

The ship was cheered, the harbor cleared,

Merrily did we drop

Below the kirk, below the hill,

Below the light-house top.

The sun came up upon the left,

Out of the sea came he!

southward And he shone bright, and on the right

with a

good wind Went down into the sea.

and fair

weather till

it reached

the Line. Higher and higher every day, Till over the mast at noon

The wed

The Wedding-Guest here beat his breast,
For he heard the loud bassoon.

ding guest The bride hath paced into the hall, the bridal Red as a rose is she;

heareth

music; but

the mariner con.

Nodding their heads before her goes

tinueth his The merry minstrelsy.

tale.

The Wedding-Guest he beat his breast,
Yet he cannot choose but hear;

And thus spake on that ancient man,
The bright-eyed Mariner.

And now the storm-blast came, and he
Was tyrannous and strong:

He struck with his o'ertaking wings.
And chased us south along.

With sloping masts and dipping prow
As who pursued with yell and blow
Still treads the shadow of his foe,
And forward bends his head,

The ship drove fast, loud roared the blast,
And southward aye we fled,

And now there came both mist and snow,
And it grew wondrous cold:

And ice, mast-high, came floating by,

¡As

green as emerald.

And through the drifts the

Did send a dismal sheen:

snowy

clifts

Nor shapes of men nor beasts we ken—
The ice was all between.

The ice was here, the ice was there,
The ice was all around:

It cracked and growled, and roared and

howled,

Like noises in a swound!

At length did cross an Albatross,
Thorough the fog it came;

As if it had been a Christian soul,
We hailed it in God's name.

The ship drawn by a storm towards the

south pole.

The land of ice, and of fearful sounds, where no living thing was to be

seen.

Till a great sea-bird, called the Albatross,

came

through the snow

fog, and

was receiv It ate the food it ne'er had eat,

ed with

great joy

and hospitality.

And lo!

the Alba

And round and round it flew.

The ice did split with a thunder-fit ;
The helmsman steered us through.

And a good south wind sprung up behind;

tross prov- The Albatross did follow,

eth a bird of good omen, and

And every day, for food or play,

followeth Came to the mariner's hollo!

the ship as
it returneth
northward
through
fog and
floating
ice.

The an

cient ma

In mist or cloud, on mast or shroud,
It perched for vespers nine;

Whiles all the night, through fog-smoke
white,

Glimmered the white moon-shine.

"God save thee, ancient Mariner!

riner inhos From the fiends, that plague thee thus! pitably

killeth the

pious bird Why look'st thou so?" With my cross

of good

omen.

bow

I shot the Albatross.

PART II

His ship

HE Sun now rose upon the right:

THE

Out of the sea came he,

Still hid in mist, and on the left

Went down into the sea.

And the good south wind still blew 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,

mates cry And it would work 'em woe:

out against

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

Ah wretch! said they, the bird to slay,
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.

"Twas right, said they, such birds to 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!

the ancient Mariner, for killing the bird of good luck.

But when the fog cleared off, they justify the same, and thus make themselves

accom

plices in the crime.

The fair breeze continues; the

ship enters
the Pacific
Ocean, and
sails north-
ward, even
till it
reaches
the Line.

Down dropt the breeze, the sails dropt The ship

down,

'Twas sad as sad could be;

And we did speak only to break

hath been suddenly becalmed.

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;

And the Albatross begins to be aveng ed.