<P> After relaying the story, the mariner leaves, and the wedding guest returns home, and wakes the next morning "a sadder and a wiser man". </P> <P> The poem received mixed reviews from critics, and Coleridge was once told by the publisher that most of the book's sales were to sailors who thought it was a naval songbook . Coleridge made several modifications to the poem over the years . In the second edition of Lyrical Ballads, published in 1800, he replaced many of the archaic words . </P> <P> "Ah! well a-day! what evil looks Had I from old and young! Instead of the cross, the Albatross About my neck was hung ." </P> <P> The poem may have been inspired by James Cook's second voyage of exploration (1772--1775) of the South Seas and the Pacific Ocean; Coleridge's tutor, William Wales, was the astronomer on Cook's flagship and had a strong relationship with Cook . On this second voyage Cook crossed three times into the Antarctic Circle to determine whether the fabled great southern continent existed . Critics have also suggested that the poem may have been inspired by the voyage of Thomas James into the Arctic . </P>

How many verses in the rime of the ancient mariner