It was a sort of vault on the ground floor at the back, with a despotic monster of a four-post bedstead in it, straddling over the whole place, putting one of his arbitrary legs into the fireplace and another into the doorway, and squeezing the wretched little washing-stand in quite a Divinely Righteous manner.
– Charles Dickens
Great Expectations, Chapter 45. Pip describes his surroundings in the hotel room at Covent Garden, where he spends an anxious and sleepless night. This follows Wemmick’s note warning him not to go home, suggesting that he may be in danger. Pip’s feeling of dread is emphasized by the metaphor of a “despotic monster” for the bedstead and its personification as straddling the room, putting its legs into the fireplace and doorway and squeezing the washing stand.