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PART V.

"O sleep, it is a gentle thing
Beloved from pole to pole !

To Mary-queen the praise be given,
She sent the gentle sleep from Heaven
That slid into my soul.

The silly buckets on the deck

That had so long remained,

I dreamt that they were filled with dew, And when I awoke it rained.

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.

I moved and could not feel my limbs,
I was so light, almost

I thought that I had died in sleep,
And was a blessed ghost.

And soon I heard a roaring wind,

did not come anear;

But with its sound it shook the sails
That were so thin and sere.

The upper aîr burst into life,
And a hundred fire-flags sheen,

To and fro they were hurried about;
And to and fro, and in and out

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,

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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
A river steep and wide.

The loud wind never reached the ship,
Yet now the ship moved on!
Beneath the lightning and the moon,
The dead men gave a groan.

They groaned, they stirred, they all uprose,
Nor spake, nor moved their eyes:
It had been strange, e'en 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 body of my brother's son

Stood by me knee to knee:

The body and I pulled at one rope,

But he said nought to me."

"I fear thee, Ancient Mariner!"

"Be calm, thou wedding-guest!

"Twas not those souls, that fled in pain,

Which to their corses came again,

But a troop of spirits blest:

For when it dawned-they dropped their arms,

And clustered round the mast:

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
I heard the sky-lark sing;
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.

It ceased: yet still the sails made on
A pleasant noise till noon,

A noise like of a hidden brook

In the leafy month of June,
That to the sleeping woods all night
Singeth a quiet tune.

Till noon we silently sailed on,

Yet never a breeze did breathe: Slowly and smoothly went the ship, Moved onward from beneath.

Under the keel nine fathom deep
From the land of mist and snow

The spirit slid, and it was He

That made the ship to go.

The sails at noon left off their tune,
And the ship stood still also.

The sun right up above the mast

Had fixed her to the ocean : But in a minute she 'gan stir

With a short uneasy motionBackwards and forwards half her length, With a short uneasy motion.

Then, like a pawing horse let go,
She made a sudden bound;
It flung the blood into my head,
And I fell into a swound.

How long in that same fit I lay,
I have not to declare ;
But ere my living life returned.
I heard and in my soul discerned
Two voices in the air.

'Is it he?' quoth one, 'Is this the man?
By him who died on cross,
With his cruel bow he laid full low
The harmless albatross.

The spirit who bideth by himself

In the land of mist and snow,

He loved the bird that loved the man
Who shot him with his bow.'

The other was a softer voice,

As soft as honey dew:

Quoth he, 'The man hath penance done,

And penance more will do.'”

PART VI.

FIRST VOICE.

"But tell me, tell me! speak again,

Thy soft response renewing—
What makes that ship drive on so fast?
What is the ocean doing?'

SECOND VOICE.

'Still as a slave before his lord,
The ocean hath no blast:
His great bright eye most silently
Up to the moon is cast-

If he may know which way to go,
For she guides him smooth or grim
See, brother, see! how graciously
She looketh down on him.'

FIRST VOICE.

'But why drives on that ship so fast Without or wave or wind?'

SECOND VOICE.

'The air is cut away before,

And closes from behind.

Fly, brother, fly! more high, more high,
Or we shall be belated:

For slow and slow that ship will go,

When the Mariner's trace is abated.'

I woke, and we were sailing on

As in a gentle weather:

"Twas night, calm night, the moon was high · The dead men stood together.

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