She could not so easily recover from the disasters of the hard winter, and she had but just paid off the little debts she had contracted.

She was nervous and uneasy as the day approached.

Mr.Hardhand always abused her when she told him she could not pay him, and she dreaded his coming.
It was the first of July on which Bobby caught those pouts, caught the horse, and on which Tom Spicer had "caught a Tartar." Bobby hastened home, as we said at the conclusion of the last chapter.

He was as happy as a lord.

He had fish enough in his basket for dinner, and for breakfast the next morning, and money enough in his pocket to make his mother as happy as a queen, if queens are always happy.
The widow Bright, though she had worried and fretted night and day about the money which was to be paid to Mr.Hardhand on the first of July, had not told her son anything about it.