It raised my hair, it fann'd my cheek He singeth loud his godly hymns
Like a meadow-gale of spring- That he makes in the wood.
It mingled strangely with my fears, He'll shrive my soul, he'll wash
Yet it felt like a welcoming.

away

The Albatross's blood.
Swiftly, swiftly flew the ship,
Yet she sail'd softly too:

PART VII.
Sweetly, sweetly blew the breeze
On me alone it blew.

This Hermit good lives in that wood The Hermit of

Which slopes down to the sea. the Wood, And the ancient Oh! dream of joy! is this indeed

How loudly his sweet voice he rears! Mariner behold- The light-house top I see?

He loves to talk with marineres eth his native Is this the hill ? is this the kirk?

That come from a far countrée.
country.
Is this mine own countrée ?

He kneels at morn, and noon, and
We drifted o'er the harbor bar,

.eve-
And I with sobs did pray-

He hath a cushion plump:
O let me be awake, my God! It is the moss that wholly hides
Or let me sleep alway.

The rotted old oak-stump.
The harbor-bay was clear as glass, The skiff-boat near'd: I heard them
So smoothly it was strewn!

talk,
And on the bay the moonlight lay, " Why this is strange, I trow!
And the shadow of the moon. Where are those lights so many and

fair,
The rock shone bright, the kirk no That signal made but now?"

less
That stands above the rock:

'Strange, by my faith!” the Hermit Approacheth the The moonlight steep'd in silentness said

ship with wonder. The steady weathercock.

“ And they answer not our cheer!

The planks look warp'd! and see
And the bay was white with silent

those sails,
light,

How thin they are and sere! The angelic spir. Till, rising from the same,

I never saw aught like to them,
its leave the Full many shapes that shadows were, Unless perchance it were
dead bodies,

In crimson colors came.
And appear in A little distance from the prow

“ Brown skeletons of leaves that lag their own forma Those crimson shadows were:

My forest-brook along; of light.

When the ivy-tod is heavy with snow,
I turn'd my eyes upon the deck-
Oh, Christ! what saw I there!

And the owlet whoops to the wolf

below,
Each corse lay flat, lifeless and flat;

That eats the she-wolf's young."
And, by the holy rood !

“Dear Lord! it hath a fiendish look-
A man all light, a seraph-man,

(The Pilot made reply,)
On every corse there stood.

I am a-fear'd”—“Push on, push on!"
This seraph band, each waved his Said the Hermit cheerily.

hand :
It was a heavenly sight!

The boat came closer to the ship,
They stood as signals to the land But I nor spake nor stirrid;
Each one a lovely light;

The boat came close beneath the ship,

And straight a sound was heard.
This seraph band, each waved his
hand,
Under the water it rumbled on, The ship suddenly

sinketh.
No voice did they impart-

Still louder and more dread:
No voice; but oh! the silence sank It reach'd the ship, it split the bay;
Like music on my heart.

The ship went down like lead.
But soon I heard the dash of oars,

Stunn'd by that loud and dreadful The ancient Ma
sound,

riner is saved in
I heard the Pilot's cheer;
My head was turn'd perforce away, Like one that hath been seven days
Which sky and ocean smote,

the Pilot's boat. And I saw a boat appear.

drown'd
The Pilot and the Pilot's boy,

My body lay afloat;
I heard them coming fast :

But swift as dreams, myself I found

Within the Pilot's boat.
Dear Lord in Heaven! it was a joy
The dead men could not blast. Upon the whirl, where sank the ship,

The boat spun round and round;
I saw a third- I heard his voice : And all was still, save that the hill
It is the Hermit good!
Was telling of the sound.

I moved my lips—the Pilot shriek’d, But in the garden-bower the bride
And fell down in a fit;

And bride-maids singing are :
The holy Hermit raised his eyes, And hark! the little vesper-bell,
And pray'd where he did sit. Which biddeth me to prayer.
I took the oars: the Pilot's boy, O Wedding-Guest! this soul hath been
Who now doth crazy go,

Alone on a wide wide sea:
Laugh'd loud and long, and all the So lonely 't was, that God himself
while

Scarce seemed there to be.
His eyes went to and fro.
“Ha! ha!" quoth he,“ full plain I see, o sweeter than the marriage-feast,
The Devil knows how to row.”

'Tis sweeter far to me,

To walk together to the kirk,
And now, all in my own countrée,

With a goodly company -
I stood on the firm land !
The Hermit stepp'd forth from the
boat,

To walk together to the kirk,

And all together pray,
And scarcely he could stand.

While each to his great Father bends, The ancient Ma- "O shrive me, shrive me, holy man!" Old men, and babes, and loving riner earnestly en- The Hermit cross'd his brow.

friends, treateth the Hermit to shrive him ;

Say quick,” quoth he, “ I bid thee And youths and maidens gay! and the penance say

And to teach, by of life falls on -What manner of man art thou ?” Farewell, farewell! but this I tell

his own example, him.

To thee, thou Wedding-Guest !

love and reverForthwith this frame of mine was He prayeth well, who loveth well ence to all things wrench'd

Both man and bird and beast. that God made With a woful agony,

and loveth. Which forced me to begin my tale ; He prayeth best, who loveth best And then it left me free.

All things both great and small; And over and Since then, at an uncertain hour,

For the dear God who loveth us, anon throughout That agony returns :

He made and loveth all. his future life an And till my ghastly tale is told, agony constraineth him to travel This heart within me burns.

The Mariner, whose eye is bright, from land to land,

Whose beard with age is hoar,
I pass, like night, from land to land ;

Is gone: and now the Wedding-Guest
I have strange power of speech;

Turn'd from the bridegroom's door.
That moment that his face I see,
I know the man that must hear me:

He went like one that hath been
To him my tale I teach.

stunn'd,
What loud uproar bursts from that|And is of sense forlom,
door!

A sadder and a wiser man
The wedding-guests are there : He rose the morrow morn.

Christabel.

PREFACE.*

| at either of the former periods, or if even the first and second part had been published in the year 1800, the impression of its originality would have been

much greater than I dare at present expect. But The first part of the following poem was written in for this, I have only my own indolence to blame. the year one thousand seven hundred and ninety. The dates are mentioned for the exclusive purpose seven, at Stowey in the county of Somerset. The of precluding charges of plagiarism or servile imi. second part, after my return from Germany, in the tation from myself. For there is amongst us a set of year one thousand eight hundred, at Keswick, Cum- critics, who seem to hold, that every possible thought berland. Since the latter date, my poetic powers and image is traditional; who have no notion that there have been, till very lately, in a state of suspended are such things as fountains in the world, small as animation. But as, in my very first conception of the well as great; and who would therefore charitably tale, I had the whole present to my mind, with the derive every rill they behold Nowing, from a perforawholeness, no less than with the loveliness of a tion made in some other man's tank. I am confident, vision, I trust that I shall yet be able to embody in however, that as far as the present poem is concerned, verse the three parts yet to come.

the celebrated poets whose writings I might be susIt is probable, that if the poem had been finished pected of having imitated, either in particular pas

sages, or in the tone and the spirit of the whole, * To the edition of 1816,

would be among the first to vindicate me from the