File:The courtship of Miles Standish and other poems (1910) (14778557052).jpg

Identifier: courtshipofmiles00long7 (find matches)
Title: The courtship of Miles Standish and other poems
Year: 1910 (1910s)
Authors: Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth, 1807-1882
Subjects: Standish, Myles, 1584?-1656
Publisher: New York, Grosset & Dunlap
Contributing Library: The Library of Congress
Digitizing Sponsor: Sloan Foundation

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ifty and thoughtfulof others. 94 THE COURTSHIP OF Suddenly you are transformed, are visibly changed in a moment;You are no longer Priscilla, but Bertha the Beautiful Spinner.Here the light foot on the treadle grew swifter and swifter; the spindleUttered an angry snarl, and the thread snapped short in her fingers;While the impetuous speaker, not heeding the mischief, continued:You are the beautiful Bertha, the spinner, the queen of Helvetia;She whose story I read at a stall in the streets of Southampton,Who, as she rode on her palfrey, oer valley and meadow and mountain.Ever was spinning her thread from a distaff fixed to her saddle.She was so thrifty and good, that her name passed into a proverb.So shall it be with your own, when the spinning-wheel shall no longerHum in the house of the farmer, and fill its cham-bers with music.Then shall the mothers, reproving, relate how it was in their childhood, MILES STANDISH 95 Praising the good old times, and the days of Pris-cilla the spinner!
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-7^-^^^=^H^=^==: Straight uprose from her wheel the beautifulPuritan maiden, 96 THE COURTSHIP OF Pleased with the praise of her thrift from himwhose praise was the sweetest, Drew from the reel on the table a snowy skein ofher spinning, Thus making answer, meanwhile, to the flatter-ing phrases of Alden: Come, you must not be idle; if I am a patternfor housewives, Show yourself equally worthy of being the modelof husbands. Hold this skein on your hands, while I wind it,ready for knitting; Then who knows but hereafter, when fashionshave changed and the manners, Fathers may talk to their sons of the good oldtimes of John Alden! Thus, with a jest and a laugh, the skein on hishands she adjusted. He sitting awkwardly there, with his arms ex-tended before him. She standing graceful, erect, and winding thethread from his fingers. Sometimes chiding a little his clumsy manner ofholding, Sometimes touching his hands, as she disen-tangled expertly MILES STANDISH 97 Twist or knot in the yarn, unawa

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