One after another, His shipmates drop down dead. But Life-inDeath begins her work on the ancient Mariner. One after one, by the star-dogged Moon, Each turned his face with a ghastly pang, Four times fifty living men, The souls did from their bodies fly,- And every soul, it passed me by, 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 horrible penance. PART IV. 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, Alone, alone, all, all alone, 1 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. And never a saint took pity on The many men, so beautiful! And they all dead did lie : And a thousand thousand slimy things I looked upon the rotting sea, I looked upon the rotting deck, I looked to heaven, and tried to pray; A wicked whisper came, and made 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 The cold sweat melted from their limbs, The look with which they looked on me An orphan's curse would drag to hell But oh! more horrible than that Is the curse in a dead man's eye! Seven days, seven nights, I saw that curse, He despiseth the creatures of the calm. And envieth that they should live, and so many lie dead. But the curse eye of the dead men. V In his loneliness and fixedness he yearneth to wards the journeying Moon, and The moving Moon went up the sky, And no where did abide : Softly she was going up, And a star or two beside 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. 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. The spell begins to break Her beams bemocked the sultry main, But where the ship's huge shadow lay, Beyond the shadow of the ship, They moved in tracks of shining white, Within the shadow of the ship I watched their rich attire: Blue, glossy green, and velvet black, O happy living things! no tongue A spring of love gushed from my heart, Sure my kind saint took pity on me, The selfsame moment I could pray; PART V. H sleep! it is a gentle thing, To Mary Queen the praise be given! She sent the gentle sleep from Heaven, The silly buckets on the deck, I dreamt that they were filled with dew; My lips were wet, my throat was cold, My garments all were dank; Sure I had drunken in my dreams, And still my body drank. By grace of the holy Mother, the ancient Mariner is refreshed with rain. I moved, and could not feel my limbs : I was so light—almost I thought that I had died in sleep, And soon I heard a roaring wind: But with its sound it shook the sails, The To and fro they were hurried about! He heareth sounds and seeth strange sights and commotions in the sky and the element. The bodies of the ship's crew are inspired, and the ship moves on; But not by the souls of the men, nor by demons of earth or middle air, And the coming wind did roar more loud, And the sails did sigh like sedge; And the rain poured down from one black cloud; The Moon was at its edge. The thick black cloud was cleft, and still The Moon was at its side: Like waters shot from some high crag, The lightning fell with never a jag, The loud wind never reached the ship, Beneath the lightning and the moon They groaned, they stirred, they all uprose, It had been strange, even in a dream, The helmsman steered, the ship moved on; The mariners all 'gan work the ropes, Where they were wont to do; They raised their limbs like lifeless tools We were a ghastly crew. The body of my brother's son Stood by me, knee to knee : The body and I pulled at one rope, "I fear thee, ancient Mariner!" |