midnight
Our trade , steady and leisurable until the last week of March , then went up with a rush and continued at high pressure through April and May , so that , dog-tired in every limb , I had much ado to drag myself to bed up the garret stairs after Mrs. Trapp had rubbed my ankles with goose-fat where the climbing-irons galled them . While this was doing , Mr. Trapp would smoke his pipe and watch and assure me that mine were the `` growing-pains '' natural to sweeps , and Mrs. Trapp -LRB- without meaning it in the least -RRB- lamented the fate which had tied her for life to one . `` It being well known that my birthday is the 15th of the month and its rightful motto in Proverbs thirty-one , ` She riseth also while it is yet night and giveth meat to her household and a portion to her maidens ' ; and me never able to hire a gel at eight pounds a year even ! '' `` If you did , '' retorted Mr. Trapp , `` I do n't see you turning out at midnight to feed her . '' Early in June this high-tide of business slackened , and by the close of the second week we were moderately idle . On Midsummer morning I descended to find , to my vast astonishment , Mr. Trapp seated at table before a bowl of bread and milk and wearing a thick blue guernsey tucked inside his trousers , the waist of which reached so high as to reduce his braces to mere shoulder-straps . I could not imagine why he , a man given to perspiration , should add to his garments at this season .