He singeth loud his godly hymns

That he makes in the wood.

He'll shrieve my soul, he'll wash away

The Albatross's blood.

PART VII.

510

The hermit of the wood,

Approacheth the ship

with wonder.

THIS hermit good lives in that wood

Which slopes down to the sea.

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—

He hath a cushion plump:

It is the moss that wholly hides

The rotted old oak-stump.

The skiff-boat neared: I heard them talk,

"Why, this is strange, I trow!

515

520

Where are those lights so many and fair, 525
That signal made but now?"

"Strange, by my faith!" the hermit said—
"And they answered not our cheer!

The planks look warped! and see those sails,
How thin they are and sere!

530

I never saw aught like to them,

Unless perchance it were

Brown skeletons of leaves that lag

My forest-brook along;

When the ivy-tod is heavy with snow,

535

And the owlet whoops to the wolf below,

That eats the she-wolf's young."

"Dear Lord! it hath a fiendish look

(The pilot made reply)

I am a-feared"-"Push on, push on!"

540

Stunned by that loud and dreadful sound, 550 The ancient

Which sky and ocean smote,

Like one that hath been seven days drowned

My body lay afloat;

But swift as dreams, myself I found

Within the pilot's boat.

555

Mariner is saved in the

pilot's boat.

Upon the whirl, where sank the ship,
The boat spun round and round;
And all was still, save that the hill
Was telling of the sound.

I moved my lips-the pilot shrieked

560

And fell down in a fit;

The holy hermit raised his eyes,

And prayed where he did sit.

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."

565

570

The ancient Mariner earnestly entreateth the hermit to shrieve him; and the penance of life falls on him.

I stood on the firm land!

The hermit stepped forth from the boat,

And scarcely he could stand.

"O shrieve me, shrieve me, holy man !
The hermit crossed his brow.

Say quick," quoth he, "I bid thee say—
What manner of man art thou?"

Forthwith this frame of mine was wrenched
With a woful agony,

575

Which forced me to begin my tale;
And then it left me free.

Since then, at an uncertain hour

That agony returns:

And till my ghastly tale is told,

This heart within me burns.

I pass, like night, from land to land;

I have strange power of speech;

The 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,

595

Which biddeth me to prayer!

O wedding-guest! this soul hath been
Alone on a wide wide sea:

So lonely 'twas, that God himself

Scarce seemed there to be.

O sweeter than the marriage-feast,

"Tis sweeter far to me,

To walk together to the kirk

With a goodly company!

600

And to teach,
by his own
example,
love and re-
verence to
all things
that God
made and
loveth.

To walk together to the kirk,

And all together pray,

While each to his great Father bends,
Old men, and babes, and loving friends,
And youths and maidens gay!

Farewell, farewell! but this I tell
To thee, thou wedding-guest!
He prayeth well, who loveth well
Both man and bird and beast.

He prayeth best, who loveth best
All things both great and small;

For the dear God who loveth us,
He made and loveth all.

The Mariner, whose eye is bright,
Whose beard with age is hoar,

Is gone and now the wedding-guest
Turned from the bridegroom's door.

He went like one that hath been stunned,

And is of sense forlorn :

A sadder and a wiser man,

He rose the morrow morn.

605

610

615

620

625