People's Pilot, Volume 3, Number 44, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 20 April 1894 — A Javanese Bed. [ARTICLE]

A Javanese Bed.

The very bed on which a man reclines at night affords him considerable opportunity for reflection. At first sight it never occurred to him that the great square object—looking with its covering of mosquito curtains more like a huge bird cage than anything else —was a bed. He knows better now and proceeds to examine it with interest before turning in for the night. He finds that the large square mattress is covered by a sheet, but otherwise entirely devoid of bed-clothing. At the top are two pillows for the head, and down the center is placed a long, round bolster called a Dutch wife. Thia scarcely comes up to his notion of what a bed should be, but after he has slept (or tried to sleep) for two or three nights in the hot, steamy atmosphere of Batavia he changes his mind. He finds that bed-clothes are not wanted in the coast towns of Java, and in particular he learns to appreciate the relief which he experiences by throwing arm or leg over that useful contrivuaoe for securing coolness, the Dutch wife. —Fortnightly Review.