So as she sat at her wheel one afternoon in the Autumn, 865
  Alden, who opposite sat, and was watching her dexterous fingers,
  As if the thread she was spinning were that of his life
      and his fortune,
  After a pause in their talk, thus spake to the sound of the spindle. 
  “Truly, Priscilla,” he said, “when I see you spinning and spinning,
  Never idle a moment, but thrifty and thoughtful of others, 870
  Suddenly you are transformed, are visibly changed in a moment;
  You are no longer Priscilla, but Bertha the Beautiful Spinner."[50]
  Here the light foot on the treadle grew swifter and swifter;
      the spindle
  Uttered an angry snarl, and the thread snapped short in her fingers;
  While the impetuous speaker, not heeding the mischief, continued 875
  “You are the beautiful Bertha; the spinner, the queen of Helvetia;[51]
  She whose story I read at a stall[52] in the streets of Southampton,
  Who, as she rode on her palfrey, o’er valley and meadow and mountain,
  Ever was spinning her thread from a distaff[52] fixed to her saddle. 
  She was so thrifty and good, that her name passed into a proverb. 880
  So shall it be with your own, when the spinning-wheel shall no longer
  Hum in the house of the farmer, and fill its chambers with music. 
  Then shall the mothers, reproving, relate how it was
      in their childhood,
  Praising the good old times, and the days of Priscilla the spinner!”
  Straight uprose from her wheel the beautiful Puritan maiden, 885
  Pleased with the praise of her thrift from him whose praise
      was the sweetest,
  Drew from the reel on the table a snowy skein of her spinning,
  Thus making answer, meanwhile, to the flattering phrases of Alden: 
  “Come, you must not be idle; if I am a pattern for housewives,
  Show yourself equally worthy of being the model of husbands. 890
  Hold this skein on your hands, while I wind it, ready for knitting;
  Then who knows but hereafter, when fashions have changed
      and the manners,
  Fathers may talk to their sons of the good old times of John Alden!”
  Thus, with a jest and a laugh, the skein on his hands she adjusted,
  He sitting awkwardly there, with his arms extended before him, 895
  She standing graceful, erect, and winding the thread from his fingers,
  Sometimes chiding a little his clumsy manner of holding,
  Sometimes touching his hands, as she disentangled expertly
  Twist or knot in the yarn, unawares—­for how could she help it?—­
  Sending electrical thrills through every nerve in his body. 900