|SOME enemy to mankind has recently invented an infernal machine known
as the pillow-sham holder, which is attached to the head of the bedstead
and works with a spiral spring. It is a kind of refined towel-rack on
which you hang your pillow-shams at night so they wont get busted by the
man of the house. The man of the house generally gets the pillow-shams
down under his feet when he undresses and polishes off his cunning
little toes on the lace poultice on which his wife prides herself. This
pillow-sham holder saves all this. You just yank your pillow-sham off
the bed and hang it on this high-toned sham holder, where it rests all
night. At least that's the intention. After a little while, however, the
spring gets weak, and the holder buckles to, or caves in, or whatever
you may call it, at the most unexpected moment. The slightest movement
on the part of the occupant of the bed, turns loose the pillow-sham
holder, and the slumberer gets it across the bridge of his or her nose,
as the case may be. Sometimes the vibration caused by a midnight snore,
will unhinge this weapon of the devil, and it will whack the sleeper
across the features in a way that scares him almost to death. If
you think it is a glad surprise to get a lick across the perceptive
faculties in the middle of a sound slumber, when you are dreaming of
elysium and high-priced peris and such things as that, just try the
death-dealing pillow-sham holder, and then report in writing to the
chairman of the executive committee. It is well calculated to fill the
soul with horror and amaze. A raven-black Saratoga wave, hanging on the
back of a chair, has been known to turn white in a single night as the
result of the sudden kerflummix of one of these cheerful articles of
furniture.