The Valley Virginian. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1865-1895, 1883-05-24
Story of q Bedstead.

| The folding bed" is amodern invention
designed to be converted into tables, imita-
| ton organs, &C., after day sets in. The
following experience of a man who had
purchased one is going the rounds:
1t was night.
The clearinghouse was wrapt in tene-
| brous gloom, family tinted with an odor of
kerosene.
| Suddenly there arose on the air veil,
followed by wild objuration and furious
anathemaS.
Then there was a clanking and rafting,
as OF an overturned picket fence, and an
other yell, with more anathemas. The fat
ted boarders listened, and ghostly clad, tip
toed along to Buffum s room, he of Buffum
Il Bird, secondhand furniture dealers. AS
they stood there, there was whiz, a grind
ing, rafting, and bang, and more yells
They consulted and knocked on the door,
Come in
'sOpen it,
| II can't
4Convinced that Buffum was in his last
agony, they knocked in the door with bed
post.
The sight was CHASTITY. Clasped between
two sturdy though slender frames of wal
nut, Buffum, pale as ghost, was six feet
up in the air. He couldn't move. He was
caught like bear in a log trap.
What on earth is it ?" they said.
s.Bedstead- combination. New patent
| was tellin' you about" gasped Buffum.
His story was simple, though fearful. He
had brought it home that day, and after
using it for a writing desk, had opened it
out and made his bed. Hewas going peace
fully to dreamland, when he rolled over and
1 accidentally touched spring. The faith
full invention Immediately became double
| crib, and turned Buffum into a squallng
wafer. Then he struggled, and was reach
ing for the spring, when the patent bed
stead thought it would show off some more
and Strengthened out and shot up in the
air and was clothes horse. Buffum said
he didn't like to be clothes, and he would
give the thing to anybody that would get
him out. They said they would try. They
didn't want any such fire extinguisher as
that for their trouble, but they would Try.
They inspected it cautiously. They walked
all around it. Then the commission mer-
chant laid his little finger on the top end of
it, The thing snOrted and reared as if it
had been shot, slapped over with bang
and became an extension table for ten peo-
pie. When they recovered from the panic
they came back. Then they found the
commission merchant in the corner trying
to get breath enough to swear, while he
rubbed his shins. Buffum had disappeared.
but they knew he had not gone far. The
invention appeared to have taken fancy
to him and incorporated him into the firm
SO to speak. He was down underneath.
straddling one of the legs with his head
damned into the mattress. Nobody dared
to touch it. The landlady got club and
reached for it's vital parts, but could not
lind them. She hammered her breath
away, and when she got through and drop
ped the club in despair, the thing swung
out its arms with a gasp and a rattle,
turned over twice and slapped itself into a
bed again with Buffum peacefully among
the sheets. He held his breath for min
ute, and then watching his opportunity,
made flying leap to the floor just in time
to save himself from being folding screen.
A man with black eye and cut lip told
the Wasp editor about it yesterday. He
said he owned the patent and Buffum had
been explaining to him how it worked