585 I pass, like night, from land to land; I have strange power of speech; That moment that his face I see, I know the man that must hear me: To him my tale I teach.

590 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 't was, that God himself Scarce seemed there to be.

600 O sweeter than the marriage-feast, 'T is sweeter far to me, To walk together to the kirk With a goodly company!-- To walk together to the kirk, 605 And all together pray, While each to his great Father bends, Old men, and babes, and loving friends And youths and maidens gay! [Sidenote: And to teach, by his own example, love and reverence to all things that God made and loveth.] Farewell, farewell! but this I tell 610 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; 615 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 620 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.

625 CHRISTABEL.