Mechanical Aids to Indolence.

Otago Witness, Issue 2387, 30 November 1899, Page 58

Mechanical Aids to Indolence.

The ingenuity of the inventor has made it useless to plead any longer forgetfulnes3 of an engagement or drowsiness in the mornir:™. A clever device to remind one of an appointment takes the form ot a watch-bracelet. The watch is "set," like an alarm clock, to the hour of the appointment, and when the hour arrives, an ingenious mechanism releases a needle, which pricks the wrist slightly and thus gives a pointed reminder that " time

The devices for .rousing " sleepy heads " in tho morning are " legion." Tn one of them a huge weight, connected with a clock, hangs suspended over a metal tray. When the hour of waking is i cached, the weight is released and falls on the tray with a noise sufficient to rouse the heaviest sleeper.

By other arrangements, of which there are several varieties involving the same principle, tho mattress on which the sleeper lies is tilted at one end so that its occupant is bundled unceremoniously on to the floor. Nor do mechanical aids to the indolent end nere, for by similar clockwork devices his fire is lit and his breakfast eggs are cooked for him. At the proper time a match is struck on a piece of pand-paper and the flame anpliect to tho fire, which has been laid overnight. Whan the fire is properly alight and "the water .boiling, the eggs, contained in a wirework basket, are plunged into the hot water, _ and, at the end of three minutes, are mechanically lifted out, ready for breakfast. _

By a further e-xereise of this ingenuity one roay very shortly expect to see mechanical contrivances for dressing, washing, and shaving a man, if not for eating his breakfast for him !