The Sun, right up above the mast,
Had fixt 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.

The PolarSpi- How long in that same fit I lay,

rit's fellow

dæmons, the invisible in

habitants of the element, take part in his wrong; and two of them relate, one to the other, that penance long and heavy for the ancient Mariner bath been accord

ed to the

I have not to declare;

But ere my living life returned,

I heard and in my soul discerned
Two VOICES in the air.

"Is it he ?" quoth one, "Is this the man? By him who died on cross,

With his cruel bow he laid full low,

The harmless Albatross.

Polar Spirit, who returneth southward.

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.”

THE RIME OF THE ANCIENT MARINER.

PART THE SIXTH.

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 stony eyes,
That in the Moon did glitter.

The Mariner

hath been

cast into a trance; for the angelic power

causeth the vessel to drive

northward,

faster than

human life

could endure.

The supernatural mo

tion is retard

ed; the Ma

riner awakes, and his penance begins

anew.

The curse is finally expiated.

The pang, the curse, with which they died,
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 forth, 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 turn'd round, walks on,

And turns no more his head d;

Because he knows, a frightful fiend

Doth close behind him tread.

But soon there breathed a wind on me,

Nor sound nor motion made:

Its path was not upon

In ripple or in shade.

the sea,

It raised my hair, it fanned my cheek

Like a meadow-gale of spring