I took the oars: the Pilot's boy,

Who now doth crazy go,

Laugh'd 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,
And scarcely he could stand.

"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 With a woful agony,

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,
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 seemèd there to be.

'O sweeter than the marriage-feast,

'Tis sweeter far to me,

To walk together to the kirk

With a goodly company!

'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.

THE HAUNTED PALACE

I

In the greenest of our valleys,
By good angels tenanted,
Once a fair and stately palace,

Radiant palace, reared its head.

In the monarch Thought's dominion,
It stood there;

Never seraph spread a pinion

Over fabric half so fair!

COLERIDGE.

R

II

Banners-yellow, glorious, golden-

On its roof did float and flow (This, all this, was in the olden

Time, long ago);

And every gentle air that dallied,

In that sweet day,

Along the ramparts plumed and pallid,

A winged odour went away.

III

Wanderers in that happy valley,
Through two luminous windows saw
Spirits moving musically,

To a lute's well-tuned law,
Round about a throne where, sitting

(Porphyrogene !)

In state his glory well befitting,

The ruler of the realm was seen.

IV

And all with pearl and ruby glowing

Was the fair palace-door,

Through which came flowing, flowing, flowing,

And sparkling evermore,

A troop of Echoes, whose sweet duty

Was but to sing,

In voices of surpassing beauty,

The wit and wisdom of their king.

V

But evil things, in robes of sorrow,
Assailed the monarch's high estate.
(Ah, let us mourn!-for never morrow
Shall dawn upon him desolate ;)
And round about his home the glory
That blushed and bloomed,
Is but a dim-remembered story
Of the old time entombed.

VI

And travellers now within that valley,
Through the red-litten windows see
Vast forms, that move fantastically
To a discordant melody,