Thy lengthening thread I love to see,
Thy whirring sound is dear to me:
Oh, swiftly turn by night and day,
And toil for him that’s far away.
Catherine. Hark! here come the children. No, ‘twas only the wind. What can keep these children so late?—but it is a fine moonlight night—they’ll have brave appetites for their supper when they come back—but I wonder they don’t come home.—Heigho! since their father has been gone, I am grown a coward—(a knock at the door heard)—Come in!—Why does every knock at the door startle me in this way?
Enter CHARLES, with a knapsack on his back
Charles. Mistress! mayhap you did not expect to see a stranger at this time o’ night, as I guess by the looks of ye—but I’m only a poor fellow, that has been a-foot a great many hours.
Cath. Then, pray ye, rest yourself, and such fare as we have you’re welcome to.
{She sets milk, &c., on a table. Charles throws himself into a chair, and flings his knapsack behind him.}
Charles. ‘Tis a choice thing to rest one’s self:—I say, mistress, you must know, I, and some more of us peasants, have come a many, many leagues since break of day.
Cath. Indeed, you may well be tired—and where do you come from?—Did you meet, on your road, any soldiers coming back from Finland?
Charles (eats and speaks). Not the soldiers themselves, I can’t say as I did; but we are them that are bringing home the knapsacks of the poor fellows that have lost their lives in the wars in Finland.
Cath. (during this speech of Charles, leans on the back of a chair. Aside) Now I shall know my fate.