Judge, 1888-06-16 · page 6 of 16
Judge — June 16, 1888 — page 6: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page satirizes working-class street characters and social pretension in late 19th-century America. **"On the Corner"** ridicules the stereotypical tough, boisterous street corner loafer—a figure "as plentiful as the cigar-store Indian." The text mocks his paradoxical nature: simultaneously violent (ready to fight anyone), destitute (steals clothes), and politically influential in the ward. The satire targets his outsized self-regard despite his lowly status. **Lower cartoons** include domestic humor: a society woman suggesting a vacation retreat ("Home, my dear") and a bathing incident where a woman mistakes a barrel for a person named John. **"Sentence Reversed"** jokes about court corruption—a judge's authority undermined by a criminal defendant who claims to "run this court." The page reflects Judge's typical mockery of urban corruption, class pretension, and the disorder of American city life in the Gilded Age, targeting both street-level toughs and their enablers in city government.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
— iz JUDGE ON THE CORNER. HE sas plentiful as the segar-store Indian ; he is either in liquor or in a fight, and when be isn’t in either he is ready to be put under their soothing influences. He can whip all creation with his heroic right hand; all things on the earth, and in the waters under the earth, besides the local alderman, do him homage. His power is as wide asa Jerseyman’s trousers, and his fiat as decisive as an unquench- able mosquito’s. In his own inimitable way he is quite 4 dude. He recognizes no law of fashion, but is as original as the clothes he steals can make him, What is mine is his, ‘Talk back at him and you'll find yourself taking involuntary acrobatic exercises to the tune of a brass-knuckled fist. Be conciliatory and he'll simply yo through your pockets; be pagnacious and he'll completely annihilate you. He's as “tough” as a twenty-minutes-for-refreshments beefsteak, He's amenable to reason when you treat him; what if his tastes do run to sour mash and gin fizz? Youcannot tell when you may be running for assembly- man or sheriff of the county. No common beers for him. His ambition knoweth not humility, nor his aspirations def He smokes what he can pick up: a stump is to him a vision of Arcadia, a perfected weed, a very elysium, As a mathematician he knows the cor- rect angle at which to hold the inspiring cigar, His motto is excelsior; he is not afraid of heaven, though heaven may well be of him. He's a sort of homogeneous equation in the terms of “don't touch me.” Being irresistible all over, he sticks like a maiden aunt, or like a fly in the blessed June time. ‘To sum up the virtues and graces of his character would take a modern Sunday newspaper or a white-wash brush. He may sometimes be stuck-up ainst the family entrance), but he’s never proud. In short, to the ward he's a necessity, to the hospital an agent, to the district policeman a. brother in conversation and consolation, and to the corner an ever-needed fixture and transcendent adornment NEW PLACE. Society belle—" Mamma, where shall we go this summer? Can‘t you suggest some place where we have not already spent so many seasons ? Kind mother — \voceurs tome that it would be a capital idea, and 1 know we would be equally benetited by a quiet sojourn at” — Society belle (imterrupting)—" Ah, where, mamma 2" Kind mother —* Wome, my dear.’ HER SIGHT WAS A TRIFLE IMPAIRED—SHE THOUGHT THE BARREL WAS JOHN. Mr. Porter has brought along a private basket to the picnic, and has gone off by himself Mes. Poca (ue a searching expedition) John, 1 want you to come away frum the water! Vou've been in lung enough, Ma. Porrnn (ft Admsel/)—"" Lame coming away from it SENTENCE REVERSED. Corstey jostick oF THR HEACE Guhe has been painting the city creem—W how this be the fust time (uc 4) you been beought before me (ick) VIL recormend yer : murcy of ther court His wosou— Vou forget, sir, that Lam running this court. Officer, usher the p the ten-day aparime NOT THE “ICE MAIDEN.” Rashful youth— Mf you will take my hand—1 mean arm—I will en- deavor to get you an ice.” Encouraging maid— Thanks. | don't care for an ice, Mr. Muchin. love, but | would be pleased to accept your hand.” THE SWIFT AND THE SURE. Jawkins (who has read the morning paper)—* Dreadful accick at the Royal Berlin theatre —six taken out dead ! Harkins (who is reading the evening paper)—" Dreadful! Hut 1 se you're not acquainted with the new life-saving service. Here's the Evening Comet that has brought five of them to life: only one was killed AN INCONSIDERATE HOST. Jones came back home one day furious. He had spent a dollar ia hiring a cab to pay a call of ceremony on a friend who happened to be out he idea of putting me to such an expen and all for nothing!" he grumbled. “If Ud known he wasn’t at home I'd gone on foot RONDEAU FOR ’88. Propose wo her? Oh, yess she's fair. With lovely eyes and golden h And dainty rose-tints on her ¢ That lips of lover often pique, And sweetly fascinating air, Then can I beauty tind more rare? Ti whisper you the flaw-speck there, Without it, | were he who'd eke Propose to her Truly for the maiden care; My heart's best love with her Id share But have you learned her latest freak ? For woman's rights she’s bound (o speak So in this year / scarcely dare Propose to her “WASHING DONE HERE.” Poor old Martha Holmes devotes her decline years to cleansing the soiled linen of the vitizens her section of the suburb of Hoboken. This $@ adorns the front of her humble dwelling * Martha Holmes washes every day “What a very clean person Martha sist be the inevitable comment of the ingenuour paesers tensibly to bathe, comicbooks.com