Judge — March 6, 1897 — page 16: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

This is a temperance cartoon satirizing alcohol's impact. The sequential narrative shows a drunk man at a watering trough progressively losing control—pouring out liquor in a drunken promise of reform, then becoming increasingly intoxicated while driving a cart pulled by a horse. The joke culminates when the horse, presumably affected by alcohol fumes or the chaotic driving, also appears drunk or disoriented. The final panels show both man and animal in complete disarray—the cart overturned, the man collapsed. The satire mocks not just alcohol's destructive power but also the drunk's self-delusional reform ("I'll reform, sh'elp me") immediately before catastrophe. The horse's reaction suggests alcohol's effects extend absurdly even to innocent animals, amplifying the message that drinking harms everyone around the drinker. This reflects late-19th-century American temperance advocacy through Judge magazine.