'A Frog he would.' The chorus was the essence of the song; and, as each
gentleman sang it to the tune he knew best, the effect was very striking
indeed.

It was at the end of the chorus to the first verse, that Mr. Pickwick
held up his hand in a listening attitude, and said, as soon as silence
was restored--

'Hush! I beg your pardon. I thought I heard somebody calling from
upstairs.'

A profound silence immediately ensued; and Mr. Bob Sawyer was observed
to turn pale.

'I think I hear it now,' said Mr. Pickwick. 'Have the goodness to open
the door.'

The door was no sooner opened than all doubt on the subject was removed.

'Mr. Sawyer! Mr. Sawyer!' screamed a voice from the two-pair landing.

'It's my landlady,' said Bob Sawyer, looking round him with great
dismay. 'Yes, Mrs. Raddle.'

'What do you mean by this, Mr. Sawyer?' replied the voice, with great
shrillness and rapidity of utterance. 'Ain't it enough to be swindled
out of one's rent, and money lent out of pocket besides, and abused
and insulted by your friends that dares to call themselves men, without
having the house turned out of the window, and noise enough made to
bring the fire-engines here, at two o'clock in the morning?--Turn them
wretches away.'

'You ought to be ashamed of yourselves,' said the voice of Mr. Raddle,
which appeared to proceed from beneath some distant bed-clothes.

'Ashamed of themselves!' said Mrs. Raddle. 'Why don't you go down and
knock 'em every one downstairs? You would if you was a man.' 'I should
if I was a dozen men, my dear,' replied Mr. Raddle pacifically, 'but
they have the advantage of me in numbers, my dear.'

'Ugh, you coward!' replied Mrs. Raddle, with supreme contempt. 'DO you
mean to turn them wretches out, or not, Mr. Sawyer?'

'They're going, Mrs. Raddle, they're going,' said the miserable Bob.
'I am afraid you'd better go,' said Mr. Bob Sawyer to his friends. 'I
thought you were making too much noise.'

'It's a very unfortunate thing,' said the prim man. 'Just as we were
getting so comfortable too!' The prim man was just beginning to have a
dawning recollection of the story he had forgotten.

'It's hardly to be borne,' said the prim man, looking round. 'Hardly to
be borne, is it?'

'Not to be endured,' replied Jack Hopkins; 'let's have the other verse,
Bob. Come, here goes!'

'No, no, Jack, don't,' interposed Bob Sawyer; 'it's a capital song,
but I am afraid we had better not have the other verse