Now it so happened that Mrs. Wolf was in want of a place in which to vend the garments she thus redeems from the jaws of the paper mill; and wandering along Monmouth-street, in search of some such place, she saw the under-ground apartments of Mrs. Welldone. They were to let, she liked them vastly, and she became Mrs. Welldone's tenant--with an express stipulation between them that Mrs. Welldone should stick to her _shoes_, and Mrs. Wolf to her _shifts_, &c.; so that neither of them might at all interfere with the trade of the other. Mrs. Wolf took possession of the under-ground apartments that same evening; but it would appear that she had more of the fox in her composition than the wolf, for she was no sooner safely housed, or _cellar'd_, than she broke the agreement, by making a grand display of translated shoes all around the sill of her cellar window. "Is this well done, Mrs. Wolf?" cried the astonished Mrs. Welldone--"if you don't take them away this moment, I'll kick them all down upon your false head!" Mrs. Wolf looked up from her subterranean abode, and grinned defiance--like the wolf that General Putnam pulled out of the cavern by his tail whilst the people pulled the General out by his hind leg. Mrs. Welldone repeated her threat of kicking down the shoes, and Mrs. Wolf grinned again, and told her she would _ramshackle_[33] her if she did. Then Mrs. Welldone, not having the fear of _ramshackleing_ before her eyes, swept the shoes into the cellar-hole upon the false head of Mrs. Wolf, and Mrs. Wolf emerged from her cavern amidst the cloud of flying shoes, "her soul in arms and eager for the 'fray." Mrs. Welldone gave back when she saw her, and it was well she did; for Mrs. Wolf came on like a tigress, as all the witnesses averred, and they thought it a miracle (_à-la-Hohenlohe_) that she was not torn to bits at the first rush. Mrs. Welldone, however, was not the woman to _back out_ of anything--she concentrated her powers--her eyes flashed like diamonds in dough, Mrs. Wolf closed upon her, they wrestled together like Death and the Dumpling, and when they were dragged apart by the bystanders, Mrs. Wolf's right eye was in mourning. This was all the witnesses could say about the matter, and the magistrate told Mrs. Welldone, she had done ill in committing the first assault. "I admit it, your worship," said Mrs. Welldone, "but it was enough to make any woman mad to have the bread taken out of one's mouth by _stratygim_ in that manner. _Howsever_, I don't know that I should have minded _that_ so much if she had not _undersold_ me." "Sold _under_ you, you mean," said his worship--"If you sold in the parlour, and she sold in the cellar, she sold under you, of course." "Aye, _coarse_ enough, your worship, and a coarse piece of goods she is--look at her which way you will," rejoined Mrs. Welldone. Well versed as Mrs. Welldone was in mending the _understandings_ of others, she herself, had not understanding enough to take this pun.