Judge, 1899-05-06 · page 10 of 17
Judge — May 6, 1899 — page 10: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page contains three separate comic pieces satirizing domestic life in early 20th-century America. **"His Only Stipulation"** mocks romantic expectations versus marital reality: a man professes eternal love to his fiancée Genevieve, but his sole condition is receiving a sofa pillow to sit on—suggesting comfort matters more than romance. **"A Quest in Spring"** is a humorous poem about a couple perpetually apartment hunting. The narrator romanticizes spring's renewal, but his wife obsesses over finding better housing each year. The satire targets both the housing market's constant upheaval and marital compromise: he seeks domestic peace; she seeks perpetual upgrades. The "dearest flat" punchline plays on the word "dear" (beloved/expensive). **"Often a Necessary Way"** is a brief joke: a mistress asks her maid Norah how she prevents pickpockets. Norah replies her purse is empty—dark humor about poverty or financial desperation among servants. These pieces reflect common anxieties: romantic disillusionment, housing instability, and class economics of the era.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
HIS ONLY STIPULATION. Genevirve— And will you love me thus forever, Reggy?” Rucoy—" Er—yes; if you will only bring me a sofa-pillow to sit on, ye know.” A QUEST IN SPRING. THE. badding boughs are all astir : ‘The young vines stretch their fingers out To grasp the sunshine, as it were ; Soft spring is dawning all about. But we've no time to think of that, We're hunting for another flat. The girl I loved, and wooed and eed: : Who brought me naught at first bat bliss— How could my soul foresee this dread, Or ever dream ‘twould come to this? ‘That we would spat and spat and spat While bunting for another flat. ‘Ab, sad the trath' It makes me weep. T could be happy and content In any place where I could sleep And eat and drink, and pay the rent. Bat she !—'tis this I'm raging at— Mast find, each year, another flat Yet—yet repining will not pay ; I must fare forth, again to seek— ‘What's this? In joyous tone, and gay. I hear her voice, and on my cheek T feel her hand in playful bat— “* Sweetheart, I've found the dear- est flat!” The dearest flat? Alas! tis true ; T feel it in each deepest sense. ‘Whatever place we more into Ts dearer than the last. And hence The fact I'm squarely gazing at— This surely is the dearest flat. + a 8, antoces. OFTEN A NECESSARY WAY. Mistress —* How do you carry your purse so as to frus- trate pickpockets, Norah ?” Norah — \mpty, mum.” GETTING RID OF A PARASITE. WHE The wor " And yor rf When y 1s And the f With a s The we E And the When t s And th f With a —Fra Take men, the con receive Roches comicbooks.com