"This seraph-band, each waved his hand: It was a heavenly sight!

They stood as signals to the land,
Each one a lovely light;

"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, 500
I heard the Pilot's cheer:
My head was turned perforce away,
And I saw a boat appear.

"The Pilot and the Pilot's boy,
I heard them coming fast:
Dear Lord in Heaven! it was a joy
The dead men could not blast.

"I saw a third-I heard his voice:
It is the Hermit good!

He singeth loud his godly hymns
That he makes in the wood.

He'll shrieve my soul,2 he'll wash away
The Albatross's blood.

PART VII

510

"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.

600

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."

610

The Mariner, whose eye is bright,
Whose beard with age is hoar,
Is gone; and now the Wedding-Guest 620
Turned from the bridegroom's door.

He went like one that hath been stunned,
And is of sense forlorn :2

A sadder and a wiser man, He rose the morrow morn. (1798)

2 forlorn. Deprived.