Judge, 1893-12-02 · page 4 of 16
Judge — December 2, 1893 — page 4: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page contains several satirical pieces typical of late 19th-century American humor: **"Trespassing on Eugene's Field"** mocks Eugene Field, a famous Chicago poet. The satire depicts Field as operating a mechanical "poetry-machine"—a keyboard device operated by foot pedals that produces rhyming verse automatically. The joke: Field claims he no longer writes genuine poetry himself, relying instead on this contraption to churn out commercial verse like "Her and Jane." This satirizes both Field's prolific output and the era's anxiety about industrial mechanization replacing human creativity. **Other brief items** include jokes about Shakespeare's residence (implying Chicago forgot he existed), a woman cautiously buying a damaged Venus de Milo statue at half-price, and various short comedic dialogues about marriage, Thanksgiving, and royalty visiting America. The illustrations are period pen-and-ink sketches accompanying each joke. The overall tone reflects Judge's satirical coverage of American cultural life, targeting literary pretension, consumer culture, and marital comedy.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
TRESPASSING ON EUGENE’S FIELD, With apologies to Eugene, HEN in Chicago I arrived I went to see Eugene, Whose great distinction ‘tis to run a poetry-machine ; ‘The wonder of the town it is, and well deserves to be, And I was glad to have Eugene explain the thing to me. It had a keyboard, double-banked, whereon the letters all Appeared in strange confusion, both the capitals and small, ‘Along with punctuation marks and figures, quite complete, And when you wished to work the thing you worked it with your feet. Said I, ‘Eugene, if you feel well enough to leave your prose, I wish that you would seat yourself and show me how it goes."* At which Eugene at once sat down (few men there be like Said he, **1'll do a poem now in style like * Me and Jim.’ " He pulled alittle ratchet down, and * What's that for?” asked I. “That makes it spell in dialect,” he answered, by and by. “By simply moving that around, as fits the case in hand, You get the dialect of any district in the land.” * For lullabies,” he added then, ** this pedal here below Arranges matters in the verse quite pianissimo ; For comic stuff this crank adjusts the many wheels. And no} Eugene remarked as he began to play, “I'll show you how.” “Click, click,” the wonderful machine kept going all the time, And inside fifteen minutes it had made a foot of rhyme, **1 don't write poems,” said Eugene, in these progressive days. Behold the lyric ‘ Her and Jane’—this is the thing that pays!” OUT OF SIGHT, OUT OF MIND. po yourit—"' Is Shakespeare a Chicago man, papa?” Shakespeare? Shakespeare ? Let—me—s-e-e—Shakes-peare. Seems to me ed from business here ‘bout the time of the fre, and T dunno where he is now. “The fair is quite a miracle,” Eugene remarked to me, * But nothing there so wonderful as this machine you see; And not a poet in the land can match me," quoth Eugene, “So long as I have strength enough to work at this machine.” A CAUTIOUS PURCHASER. 64] DON'T ike to buy any damaged goods,” said Mrs. Newmunney to the dealer who had urged her to purchase a fine copy of the Venus of Milo, “but if you can replace that arm so that it can't be detected I am willing to give you half price for the statue.” ROYALTY VISITS AMERICA. MERELY AN EXPERIMENT. Tom—" Why, you're not going to call on Rosalie Budd to-day, are you? They've got a regular Thanks- giving party.” Jack—" That's why I'm going. 1 want to see if I could get along with her relatives if necessary.” HIS OPINION OF IT. Visitor —“ How did your husband like your new gown?” Mrs. Longwed—* Oh, he didn’t ‘swear quite as hard as usual at the bill ; in fact, seemed pleased.” Visitor —“Oh, I understand. Praised with faint damns, did he?” NEVER SATISFIED. WERE hard to please; though praise is due Fooruay (exiled count) —"Ahy, there, old This season of Thanksgiving, WALEING:' CURE; chappie! Does Mamselle Shaikalegge hang out It's safe to say there are but few Mr. Sedentary’s physician ordered him to walk twenty miles a at the same old place 7” Who are thankful they are living, day. This is how he felt that he looked at the end of the first day. Warten (exiled baron) — Jackie, old Driver (exiled lord) —"* girl, you don't happen to have that ‘thou 'I'lent you last year, about your clothes, do you ?” Just_a_ moment, Hotet-cierk (exiled duke) —“* Hullo, old Maud! I've got your I. O. U.'s on that poker stockinets ! Little Marie Setemwilde is in Chi- game at Baden for twenty-five "hun," See you cago now. You may see her.” to-morrow.” comicbooks.com