Judge — January 26, 1901 — page 5: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

This page shows two sequential cartoons from "Deacon Elderberry and His Times," a recurring Judge comic strip. The top panel depicts a father (Deacon Elderberry) and son attempting snowshoeing in winter. Both figures are comically failing—tangled with their equipment, skis askew, and clearly lacking proper technique. Their exaggerated expressions convey frustration and mishap. The bottom panel, labeled "A story without words," shows an indoor scene, likely depicting consequences or a related domestic moment, though details are harder to discern in this reproduction. The humor rests on the physical comedy of incompetence at a winter sport and the implication that snowshoeing requires skill ("a certain knack") that these characters lack. The strip appears to be gentle, family-friendly satire of everyday middle-class leisure activities and the gap between ambition and ability.