When by herself, she to herself And when she soothed her friend, through all Her soothing words 'twas plain She had a sore grief of her own, A haunting in her brain. And oft she said, I'm not grown thin! And then her wrist she spanned; 431 And once when Mary was down-cast, She took her by the hand, And gazed upon her, and at first She gently pressed her hand; Then harder, till her grasp at length 6 And then the hot days, all at once, 470 They came, we knew not how : It happened then ('twas in the bower, No path leads thither, 'tis not nigh 480 To any pasture-plot ; But clustered near the chattering brook, Those hollies of themselves a shape A close, round arbour; and it stands Within this arbour, which was still With scarlet berries hung, Were these three friends, one Sunday He sat upright; and ere the dream 530 morn, Just as the first bell rung. 'Tis sweet to hear a brook, 'tis sweet To hear the Sabbath-bell, 'Tis sweet to hear them both at once, Deep in a woody dell. His limbs along the moss, his head With shut-up senses, Edward lay: And he had passed a restless night, And talked as 'twere by stealth. 490 500 Had had time to depart, 'O God, forgive me!' (he exclaimed) 'I have torn out her heart.' Then Ellen shrieked, and forthwith burst And Mary shivered, where she sat, 1797-1809. Carmen reliquum in futurum tempus relegatum. To-morrow! and To-morrow! and To-morrow!--[Note of S. T. C.—1815.] THIS LIME-TREE BOWER MY PRISON ADDRESSED TO CHARLES LAMB, OF THE INDIA HOUSE, LONDON In the June of 1797 some long-expected friends paid a visit to the author's cottage; and on the morning of their arrival, he met with an accident, which disabled him from walking during the whole time of their stay. One evening, when they had left him for a few hours, he composed the following lines in the garden-bower. WELL, they are gone, and here must I remain, This lime-tree bower my prison ! I have lost Beauties and feelings, such as would have been Most sweet to my remembrance even صاد Flings arching like a bridge; branchless ash, Unsunned and damp, whose few pe yellow leaves Ne'er tremble in the gale, yet tremble still, Fanned by the water-fall! and there my friends Behold the dark green file of long lank weeds, That all at once (a most fantastic sight!) he wide landscape, gaze till all doth gross than bodily; and of such hues il the Almighty Spirit, when yet he makes Still nod and drip beneath the dripping This little lime-tree bower, have I no Much that has soothed me. Pale beneath the blaze Hung the transparent foliage; and I watched Some broad and sunny leaf, and loved to see The shadow of the leaf and stem above, Dappling its sunshine! And that wal nut-tree 51 Was richly tinged, and a deep radiance lay Full on the ancient ivy, which usurps Those fronting elms, and now, with blackest mass Makes their dark branches gleam a lighter hue Through the late twilight: and though now the bat Wheels silent by, and not a swallow twitters, Yet still the solitary humble-bee Sings in the bean-flower! Henceforth I shall know Behind the western ridge, thou glorious That Nature ne'er deserts the wise and Sun ! orb, pure; бо Shine in the slant beams of the sinking No plot so narrow, be but Nature there, No waste so vacant, but may well employ Ye purple heath-flowers! richlier burn, ye clouds! Live in the yellow light, ye distant groves! And kindle, thou blue Ocean! friend So my Each faculty of sense, and keep the heart Awake to Love and Beauty! and sometimes 'Tis well to be bereft of promised good, Struck with deep joy may stand, as I That we may lift the soul, and contem Silent with swimming sense; yea, gazing With lively joy the joys we cannot For thee, my gentle-hearted Charles, to Through wood and dale the sacred river whom ran, No sound is dissonant which tells of Then reached the caverns measureless to THE RIME OF THE ANCIENT MARINER IN SEVEN PARTS Facile credo, plures esse Naturas invisibiles quam visibiles in rerum universitate. Sed horum omnium familiam quis nobis enarrabit? et gradus et cognationes et discrimina et singulorum munera ? Quid agunt? quæ loca habitant? Harum rerum notitiam semper ambivit ingenium humanum, nunquam attigit. Juvat, interea, non diffiteor, quandoque in animo, tanquam in tabulâ, majoris et melioris mundi imaginem contemplari: ne mens assuefacta hodiernæ vitæ minutiis se contrahat nimis, et tota subsidat in pusillas cogitationes. Sed veritati interea invigilandum est, modusque servandus, ut certa ab incertis, diem a nocte, distinguamus.-T. BURNET, Archæol. Phil. p. 68. ARGUMENT How a Ship having passed the Line was driven by storms to the cold Country towards the South Pole; and how from thence she made her course to the tropical Latitude of the Great Pacific Ocean; and of the strange things that befell; and in what manner the Ancyent Marinere came back to his own Country. An ancient Mariner meeteth three Gallants bidden to a wedding-feast, and detaineth one. The Wedding-Guest is spell-bound by the eye of the old seafaring man, and constrained to hear his tale. PART I IT is an ancient Mariner, By thy long grey beard and glittering eye, The Bridegroom's doors are opened wide, And I am next of kin ; The guests are met, the feast is set: May'st hear the merry din.' He holds him with his skinny hand, There was a ship,' quoth he. 'Hold off! unhand me, grey-beard loon!' He holds him with his glittering eye- The Wedding-Guest sat on a stone: He cannot choose but hear; And thus spake on that ancient man, The bright-eyed Mariner. 'The ship was cheered, the harbour cleared, Below the kirk, below the hill, Below the lighthouse top. [1798.] ΙΟ 20 |