Within the shadow of the ship I watched their rich attire: Blue, glossy green, and velvet black, Their beauty O happy living things! no tongue and their happiness. He blesseth them in his heart. A spring of love gushed from my heart, Sure my kind saint took pity on me, The spell be- The self same moment I could pray; gins to break. And from my neck so free The Albatross fell off, and sank Like lead into the sea. THE RIME OF THE ANCIENT MARINER. PART THE FIFTH. OH 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, Sure I had drunken in my dreams, By grace of the holy Mother, the ancient Mariner is refreshed with rain. He heareth sounds, and I moved, and could not feel my I was so light-almost limbs: I thought that I had died in sleep, And soon I heard a roaring wind: seeth strange It did not come anear; sights and commotions in But with its sound it shook the sails, the sky and the element. That were so thin and sere. The upper air burst into life! The wan stars danced between. 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 loud wind never reached the ship, Beneath the lightning and the Moon The dead men gave a groan. They groaned, they stirred, they all uprose, It had been strange, even in a dream, To have seen those dead men rise. The helmsman steered, the ship moved on ; Yet never a breeze up blew; 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 bodies of on; 24 But not by the souls of the men, nor by dæmons of earth or middle air, but by a blessed troop of angelic spirits, sent down by the invocation of the guardian saint. "I fear thee, ancient Mariner!" Be calm, thou Wedding-Guest! But a troop of spirits blest: For when it dawned-they dropped their arms, Sweet sounds rose slowly through their mouths, And from their bodies passed. Around, around, flew each sweet sound, Then darted to the Sun; Slowly the sounds came back again, Now mixed, now one by one. Sometimes a-dropping from the sky Sometimes all little birds that are, How they seemed to fill the sea and air With their sweet jargoning! And now 'twas like all instruments, Now like a lonely flute; And now it is an angel's song, That makes the Heavens be mute. |