But thou will live with me in love,
And what if my poor cheek be brown?
’Tis well for me, thou canst not see
How pale and wan it else would be.
Dread not their taunts, my little life!
I am thy father’s wedded wife;
And underneath the spreading tree
We two will live in honesty.
If his sweet boy he could forsake,
With me he never would have stay’d:
From him no harm my babe can take,
But he, poor man! is wretched made,
And every day we two will pray
For him that’s gone and far away.
I’ll teach my boy the sweetest things;
I’ll teach him how the owlet sings.
My little babe! thy lips are still,
And thou hast almost suck’d thy fill.
— Where art thou gone my own dear child?
What wicked looks are those I see?
Alas! alas! that look so wild,
It never, never came from me:
If thou art mad, my pretty lad,
Then I must be for ever sad.
Oh! smile on me, my little lamb!
For I thy own dear mother am.
My love for thee has well been tried:
I’ve sought thy father far and wide.
I know the poisons of the shade,
I know the earth-nuts fit for food;
Then, pretty dear, be not afraid;
We’ll find thy father in the wood.
Now laugh and be gay, to the woods away!
And there, my babe; we’ll live for aye.
THE ANCIENT MARINER.
A POET’S REVERIE.
By Samuel Taylor Coleridge
ARGUMENT.
How a Ship, having first sailed to the Equator, was driven by Storms, to the cold Country towards the South Pole; how the Ancient Mariner cruelly, and in contempt of the laws of hospitality, killed a Seabird; and how he was followed by many and strange Judgements; and in what manner he came back to his own Country.
THE ANCIENT MARINER.
A POET’S REVERIE.
I.
It is an ancient Mariner,
And he stoppeth one of three:
”By thy long grey beard and thy glittering eye
Now wherefore stoppest me?”
”The Bridegroom’s doors are open’d wide
And I am next of kin;
The Guests are met, the Feast is set, —
May’st hear the merry din.”
But still he holds the wedding guest —
”There was a Ship, quoth he—”
”Nay, if thou’st got a laughsome tale,
Mariner! come with me.”
He holds him with his skinny hand,
Quoth he, there was a Ship —
”Now get thee hence, thou greybeard Loon
Or my Staff shall make thee skip.”
He holds him with his glittering eye —
The wedding guest stood still
And listens like a three year’s child;
The Mariner hath his will.
The wedding-guest sate on a stone,
He cannot chuse but hear:
And thus spake on that ancient man,
The bright-eyed Mariner.
The Ship was cheer’d, the Harbour clear’d —
Merrily did we drop
Below the Kirk, below the Hill,
Below the Lighthouse top.
The Sun came up upon the left,
Out of the Sea came he:
And he shone bright, and on the right
Went down into the Sea.
Higher and higher every day,
Till over the mast at noon —
The wedding-guest here beat his breast,
For he heard the loud bassoon.
The Bride hath pac’d into the Hall,
Red as a rose is she;
Nodding their heads before her goes
The merry Minstralsy.
The wedding-guest he beat his breast,
Yet he cannot chuse but hear:
And thus spake on that ancient Man,
The bright-eyed Mariner.
But now the Northwind came more fierce,
There came a Tempest strong!
And Southward still for days and weeks
Like Chaff we drove along.
And now there came both Mist and Snow,
And it grew wond’rous cold;
And Ice mast-high came floating by
As green as Emerald.
And thro’ the drifts the snowy clifts
Did send a dismal sheen;
Nor shapes of men nor beasts we ken —
The Ice was all between.
The Ice was here, the Ice was there,
The Ice was all around:
It crack’d and growl’d, and roar’d and howl’d —
A wild and ceaseless sound.
At length did cross an Albatross,
Thorough the Fog it came;
As if it had been a Christian Soul,
We hail’d it in God’s name.
The Mariners gave it biscuit-worms,
And round and round it flew:
The Ice did split with a Thunder-fit;
The Helmsman steer’d us thro’.
And a good south wind sprung up behind.
The Albatross did follow;
And every day for food or play
Came to the Mariner’s hollo!
In mist or cloud on mast or shroud
It perch’d for vespers nine,
Whiles all the night thro’ fog-smoke white
Glimmer’d the white moonshine.
”God save thee, ancient Mariner!
From the fiends that plague thee thus—”