The wedding. He holds him with his glittering eyeguest is spell

bound by the

eye of the old sea-faring

man, and constrained to

hear his tale.

The Mariner

tells how the ship sailed southward with a good wind and fair weather, till

it reached the line.

The wedding-guest stood still,

And listens like a three years child:

The Mariner hath his will.

The wedding-guest sat on a stone:

He cannot chuse but hear;

And thus spake on that ancient man,

The bright-eyed mariner.

The ship was cheered, the harbour cleared,

Merrily did we drop

Below the kirk, below the hill,

Below the light house top.

The Sun came up upon

Out of the sea came he!

the left,

And he shone bright, and on the right

Went down into the sea.

Higher and higher every day,

Till over the mast at noon

The Wedding-Guest here beat his breast,

For he heard the loud bassoon.

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

Nodding their heads before her goes
The merry minstrelsy.

The Wedding-Guest he beat his breast,
Yet he cannot chuse 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.

The weddingguest heareth the bridal music; but the mariner continueth his tale.

The ship drawn by a storm toward the south pole.

The land of And through the drifts the

ice, and of fearful

sounds, where no living

thing was to be seen.

Till a great sea-bird,

called the Albatross,

Did send a dismal sheen:

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;

came through As if it had been a Christian soul,

the snow-fog,

and was received with great joy and hospitality.

And lo! the
Albatross

proveth a bird

We hailed it in God's name.

It ate the food it ne'er had eat,
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;

of good omen, The Albatross did follow,

and followeth

the ship as it

returned northward through fog and floating

And every day, for food or play,

Came to the mariner's hollo!

ice.

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 !

From the fiends, that plague thee thus !—
Why look'st thou so?"-With my cross-bow
I shot the ALBATROSS.

The ancient Mariner inhospitably killeth the pious bird of good omen.

His ship

mates cry out against the ancient Mari

ner, for killing

the bird of good luck.

THE Sun now rose upon the right:

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 mariners' hollo!

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

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 !