Immediately after the breakfast things had been taken away, I slipt on my things, and stepped round to dear mother’s, just to tell her what a dreadful creature we had got in the house, and that I really began to have fears for my life again. When the dear, affectionate old lady had heard of Mrs. Yapp’s fearful goings-on, she said that it really would not be safe to trust me alone with such a woman during my confinement; and that, as my mother, she insisted upon being allowed to come and sleep in the house, too. Though I told her I didn’t know how we were to manage it, unless she consented to take half of Mrs. Yapp’s bed--which, I regretted to say, was only a small tent, and it was impossible to say how it would ever be able to hold the pair of them. But the dear, good old soul declared, she didn’t mind what hardship she underwent, so long as she was by, to watch over me, and prevent my being poisoned to death by pills, and herbs, and draughts, and such like. I told her, it was very kind indeed of her, and I had no doubt that Mr. Sk--n--st--n would be as grateful to her as I was; and we arranged together that she should sleep in the house that very night. When I informed Edward of what my mother had so kindly consented to do for me, he began grinning again, and said, that he was delighted to hear it, for that he was sure such a state of things could not last long, and that he should have the pair of them getting together by the ears, and going at it hammer and tongs, and both his dear mothers-in-law leaving the premises in less than a week--thank Heaven! Though when I told him that I didn’t know where on earth I could put him to, unless, indeed, I made him up a nice comfortable bed on the sofa in the back drawing-room, with coats and cloaks, and odd things, to cover him--for Mrs. Yapp, I regretted to say, had got all the spare blankets we had--of course he must go flying into a passion again, and said that matters had come to a pretty pass, when a man’s mothers-in-law walked into his house, and didn’t leave him even a bed to lie upon. And after he had railed against Mrs. B--ff--n and Mrs. Yapp till he was quite out of breath, he got a little better tempered, and said, that as it would be impossible for his two blessed mothers-in-law to sleep in the same bed without falling out, why he didn’t mind what amicable arrangement he came to, so long as he could make them enemies for life.