But this misfortune was their preservation—­for when the mattress came down, it came down upon Snarleyyow.  The animal contrived to clear his loins, or he would have perished; but he could not clear his long mangy tail, which was now caught and firmly fixed in a new species of trap, the widow’s broadest proportions having firmly secured him by it.  Snarleyyow pulled, and pulled, but he pulled in vain—­he was fixed—­he could not bite, for the mattress was between them—­he pulled, and he howled, and barked, and turned himself every way, and yelped; and had not his tail been of coarse and thick dimensions, he might have left it behind him, so great were his exertions; but, no, it was impossible.  The widow was a widow of substance, as Vanslyperken had imagined, and as she now proved to the dog—­the only difference was, that the master wished to be in the very situation which the dog was now so anxious to escape from—­to wit, tailed on to the widow.  Babette, who soon perceived that the dog was so, now got out of the bed, and begging her mistress not to move an inch, and seizing the broom, she hammered Snarleyyow most unmercifully, without any fear of retaliation.  The dog redoubled his exertions, and the extra weight of Babette being now removed, he was at last able to withdraw his appendage, and probably-feeling that there was now no chance of a quiet night’s rest in his present quarters, he made a bolt out of the room, down the stairs, and into the street.  Babette chased him down, threw the broom at his head as he cleared the threshold, and then bolted the door.

“O the beast!” exclaimed Babette, going up stairs again, out of breath; “he’s gone at last, ma’am.”

“Yes,” replied the widow, rising up with difficulty from the hole made with her own centre of gravity; “and—­and his master shall go too.  Make love indeed—­the atomy—­the shrimp—­the dried-up stock-fish.  Love, quotha—­and refuse to hang a cur like that.  O dear!  O dear! get me something to put on.  One of my best chemises all in rags—­and his nasty teeth in my leg in two places, Babette.  Well, well, Mr Vanslyperken, we shall see—­I don’t care for their custom.  Mr Vanslyperken, you’ll not sit on my sofa again, I can tell you;—­hug your nasty cur—­quite good enough for you.  Yes, yes, Mr Vanslyperken.”

By this time the widow had received a fresh supply of linen from Babette; and as soon as she had put it on she rose from the bed, the fractured state of which again called forth her indignation.

“Thirty-two years have I had this bed, wedded and single, Babette!” exclaimed the widow.  “For sixteen years did I sleep on that bed with the lamented Mr Vandersloosh—­for sixteen years have I slept in it, a lone widow—­but never till now did it break down.  How am I to sleep to-night?  What am I to do, Babette?”

“’Twas well it did break down, ma’am,” replied Babette, who was smoothing down the jagged skin at her ankles; “or we should never have got the nasty biting brute out of the house.”