Page:An Encyclopædia of Cottage, Farm, and Villa Architecture and Furniture.djvu/356

 332 COTTAGE, rAllM, AND VILLA AllCHlTECTURE. sash, towel, or piece of girth webbing, might be suspended, or even a hooked walking-stick put on, for the bedridden patient to take hold of, to assist him in turning, or otherwise changing his position. Every person who has been long confined to a bed knows that this simple contrivance is the most valuable part of a sick man's bedstead ; and it is one reason why the beds of all elderly people should have bedposts and testers, because from the centre cross laths this simple contrivance, for the comfort of an invalid, may be suspended. Both figs. 690 and 692, we are informed, can be afforded for less than the price of the frame of a common wooden bedstead. 657. Couch Beds may be described as sofas used as beds ; and, for our parts, we prefer them to either the press or the half-tester bedstead. They are very common in France and Germany. Fig. 693 is a Design, by Mr. William Mallet of Dublin, for an iron couch bed frame. The head is cast in one piece, the back in another, and the frame in a third. All the rest is of wrought iron ; the four legs of gas pipe, the braces of quarter-inch wire, and the bottom of iron hooping. Castors might easily be added ; and this Design would then form a suitable article for some descriptions of cottages. 658. liox Bads are common in the better description of cottages in Scotland, and also in Alsace, Ix)rvaine, and other parts of the nortli of France, and in Holland and Flanders. This bed is of the uiiual length, and in general four feet wide within. There arc four