And its ribs are seen as bars on the face of the

setting Sun.

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 !

Are those her ribs through which the Sun
Did peer, as through a grate?

And is that Woman all her crew?

The spectre- Is that a DEATH? and are there two?

woman and

her death

mate, and no

other on board the skeletonship.

Like vessel, like crew!

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.

DEATH, and The naked hulk alongside came,

LIFE-IN

DEATH have And the twain were casting dice;

diced for the ship's crew, and she (the latter)winneth the ancient Mariner.

"The game is done! I've, 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.

No twilight within the courts of the sun.

At the rising of the Moon,

One after another,

His shipmates drop down dead;

But LIFE-IN- The souls did from their bodies fly,

DEATH be

gins her work They fled to bliss or woe!

on the ancient

Mariner.

And every soul, it passed me by,
Like the whizz of my CROSS-BOW!

THE RIME

OF

THE ANCIENT MARINER.

PART THE FOURTH.

"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."-
Fear not, fear not, thou. Wedding-Guest!
This body dropt not down.

Alone, alone, all, all alone,

Alone on a wide wide sea!

The wedding guest feareth

that a spirit is talking to him;

But the ancient Mariner assureth him of his bodily life, and proceedeth to relate his horri

ble penance.

And never a saint took pity on

My soul in agony.

For the two last 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.

VOL. II.

C

18

He despiseth The many men, so beautiful !

the creatures

of the calm.

And envieth that they should live,

and so many lie dead.

But the curse

liveth for him

in the eye of

the dead men.

And they all dead did lie :

And a thousand thousand slimy 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 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.