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Gaston de Blondeville, or The court of Henry III

Keeping festival in Ardenne, a romance. St. Alban's Abbey, a metrical tale; With some poetical pieces. By Anne Radcliffe ... To which is prefixed: A memoir of the author, with extracts from her journals. In four volumes

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211

DECEMBER'S EVE, ABROAD.

Awful is Winter's setting sun,
When, from beneath a sullen cloud,
He eyes his dreary course now run,
And shrinks within his lurid shroud—
Leaving to Twilight's cold, grey sky
Yon Minster's dark and lonely tower,
That seems to shun the searching eye,
And vanish with the parting hour.
Dim is the long roof's sloping line,
Whose airy pinnacles I trace,
Point over point, and o'er the shrine
And eastern window's gothic grace.

212

While loud the winds, in chorus clear,
Swell, or in sinking murmurs grieve,
The Ministers of Night I hear
In requiem o'er December's Eve.
Wide o'er the plains and distant wolds
I see her pall of darkness flow;
And all around, in mighty folds,
Her winding sheet of new-fallen snow.
Farewell December's dismal night!
Appalled I hear thy shrieking breath;
And view, aghast, by glimmering light,
Thy visage, terrible in death!
Farewell December's dismal night!