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,
And still it neared and neared:
As if it dodged a water-sprite,
It plunged, and tacked, and veered.

With throats unslaked, with black lips baked,
We could not 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;
Gramercy! 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 a-flame,
The day was wellnigh 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 !)

At its near er approach, it seemeth him to be a ɛhip, and ag a dear ransom he freeth his speech from the bonds

of thirst.

A flash of joy.

And horror follows; for can it be a ship that

comes onward without wind or tide ?

It seemeth him but the skeleton of a ship.

396

are seen as

THE ANCIENT MARINER.

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!

Are those her sails that glance in the sun
Like restless gossameres?

And its ribs Are those her ribs through which the sun
bars on the Did peer, as through a grate ?

face of the

setting sun. And is that woman all her crew?

The spectre

her death

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

no other, on board the skeleton ship.

like crew.

Her lips were red, her looks were free,

Like vessel, Her locks were yellow as gold;
Her skin was as white as leprosy,
The Nightmare Life-in-Death was she,
Who thicks man's blood with cold.

Death and The naked hulk alongside came,
Death have And the twain were casting dice;

Life-in

diced for the

ship's crew; and she (the

"The game is done! I've won, I 've won !

atter) win- Quoth she, and whistles thrice.

neth the

ancient mariner.

No twilight

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

courts of the sun.

At the rising We listened and looked sideways up !

of the moon,

Fear at my heart, as at a cup,

My life-blood seemed to sip!

The stars were dim, and thick the night;

99

The steersman's face by his lamp gleamed white;

From the sails the dew did drip;
Till clomb above the eastern bar
The hornèd 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 crossbow !

One aftor another,

His shipmates drop down dead,

But Life-inDeath begins her work on the ancient mariner,

PART IV.

"I FEAR thee, ancient mariner!
I fear thy skinny hand!

And thou art long, and lank, and brown,
As is the ribbed sea-sand! *

*

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

,,

*For the last two lines of this stanza, I am indebted to Mr. Wordsworth. It was on a delightful walk from Nether Stowey to Dulverton, with him and his sister, in the autumn of 1797, that this poem was planned, and in part composed.

The wedding-guest feareth that a spirit is talking to him;

398

THE ANCIENT MARINER.

But the an- Fear not, fear not, thou wedding-guest!

cient mari

ner assureth This body dropt not down.

him of his

bodily life,

and pro

ceedeth to Alone, alone, all, all alone,

relate his

horrible penance.

He despis.

eth the

creatures of

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 !

the calm; And a thousand thousand slimy things

eth that

Lived on and so did I.

And envi- I looked upon the rotting sea,
they should And drew my eyes away;
live, and so I looked upon the rotting deck,
And there the dead men lay.

many lie dead.

But the

curse liveth for him in

the eye of the dead men.

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, O, 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;
Softly she was going up,

And a star or two beside.

In his lone liness and fixedness, he yearneth towards the Journeying moon, and the stars that still soa

journ vet still move onward, and everywhere the blue sky belongs to them, and is their appointe I rest, and their native country, and their own natural homes, which they enter unans nounced, 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;

But 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,
And when they reared, the elfish light
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.

By the light of the moon he beholdeth God's creatures of the great calm.

Their beauty and their happiness.

He blesseth them in his heart.