And appear in their own forms of light. A little distance from the prow Each corse lay flat, lifeless and flat, A man all light, a seraph-man, This seraph-band, each waved his hand : They stood as signals to the land, This seraph-band, each waved his hand, No voice did they impart No voice; but oh! the silence sank Like music on my heart. But soon I heard the dash of oars, I heard the Pilot's cheer; My head was turned perforce away, The Pilot and the Pilot's boy, Dear Lord in Heaven! it was a joy I saw a third-I heard his voice : He singeth loud his godly hymns He'll shrieve my soul, he'll wash away PART VII. HIS Hermit good lives in that wood How loudly his sweet voice he rears! He loves to talk with marineres That come from a far countree. He kneels at morn, and noon, and eve- It is the moss that wholly hides The rotted old oak-stump. The skiff-boat neared: I heard them talk, 66 Why, this is strange, I trow! Where are those lights so many and fair, That signal made but now?" 66 Strange, by my faith!" the Hermit said— "And they answered not our cheer! The planks looked warped! and see those sails, I never saw ought like to them, Unless perchance it were "Brown skeletons of leaves that lag My forest-brook along; The Hermit of the wood, Approacheth the ship with wonder. When the ivy-tod is heavy with snow, And the owlet whoops to the wolf below, "Dear Lord! it hath a fiendish look- The ship suddenly sinketh. The ancient I am a-feared"-" Push on, push on!" The boat came closer to the ship, The boat came close beneath the ship, Under the water it rumbled on, It reached the ship, it split the bay; Stunned by that loud and dreadful sound, Like one that hath been seven days drowned But swift as dreams, myself I found Upon the whirl, where sank the ship, I moved my lips-the Pilot shrieked The holy Hermit raised his eyes, I took the oars: the Pilot's boy, Who now doth crazy go, Laughed loud and long, and all the while His eyes went to and fro. "Ha! ha!" quoth he, "full plain I see, The Devil knows how to row." And now, all in my own countree, I stood on the firm land! The Hermit stepped forth from the boat, 66 "O shrieve me, shrieve me, holy man!" The Hermit crossed his brow. 66 Say quick," quoth he, “I bid thee say— What manner of man art thou?" Forthwith this frame of mine was wrenched Which forced me to begin my tale; Since then, at an uncertain hour, And till my ghastly tale is told, I pass, like night, from land to land; I have strange power of speech ; That moment that his face I see, I know the man that must hear me : To him my tale I teach. What loud uproar bursts from that door! The wedding-guests are there: But in the garden-bower the bride And bride-maids singing are: And hark the little vesper bell, O Wedding-Guest! this soul hath been The ancient Mariner earnestly entreateth the Hermit to shrieve him; and the penance of life falls on him. And ever and anon throughout his future life an agony constraineth him to travel from land to land, And to teach, by his own example,love and reverence to all things that God made and loveth. So lonely 'twas, that God himself O sweeter than the marriage-feast, To walk together to the kirk To walk together to the kirk, While each to his great Father bends, He prayeth best, who loveth best The Mariner, whose eye is bright, Is gone and now the Wedding-Guest He went like one that hath been stunned, A sadder and a wiser man, He rose the morrow morn. |