PACIFIC NORTHWEST ABOARD M.V. AURORA EXPLORER- Part 4: Ship's Library

By shear coincidence today - out for a walk with all the neighbours on a rather dull, but not cold, Sunday - I had the occasion to mention something I came across in this little ship's library. There were 2 well-stocked bookcases with a variety of books which had been left or given by previous passengers. And there were reference books, like the big Oxford Dictionary.

I came across a book of sea-faring poetry and spent one jet-lagged night reading it in my bunk. In it was a familiar friend: The Rime of the Ancient Mariner!!

I read it from end to end, or should I say pole to pole*, re-visiting those chunks that I had to learn off-by-heart at school. Heavens! Do they still do that these days?

This visit down memory lane all started when Peter asked (when talking about the Equator and its association with the albatross): "How does The Ancient Mariner start?"

I found I could quote the bits I learned as a 14 year old but was unaware of how it started. So no prizes for me. However, it sent me to the bookcase ... only to find we do not own a book with that in it. And, incidently, the poetry books we did have all were indexed by ... wait for it ... the first line!

First the good bits, then the answer to the puzzle:


And now there came both mist and snow
And it grew wondrous cold:
And ice, mast-high, came floating by,
As green as emerald.

And through 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 cracked and growled, and roared and howled,
Like noises in a swound!

The Sun now rose upon the right:
Out of the sea came he,
Still hid in mist, and on the left
Went down into the sea.


Down dropt the breeze, the sails dropt down,
Twas sad as sad could be;
And we did speak only to break
The silence of the sea!

All in a hot and copper sky,
The bloody Sun, at noon,
Right up above the mast did stand,
No bigger than the Moon.

Day after day, day after day,
We stuck, nor breath nor motion;
As idle as a painted ship
Upon a painted ocean.

Water, water, everywhere,
And all the boards did shrink;
Water, water, everywhere,
Nor any drop to drink.

* * * * * * * And how does it start? * * * * * * * *

It is an ancient mariner,
And he stoppeth one of three ....

______________________________________________________
* Oh sleep! it is a gentle thing,
Beloved from pole to pole!
(Part V)

The Rime of the Ancient Mariner by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, 1798.