Judge, 1908-12-05 · page 19 of 44
Judge — December 5, 1908 — page 19: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page collects several interconnected Christmas-themed satirical pieces mocking the holiday's commercialism and social obligations. **"The Christmas Cynic"** (main poem): Bitterly catalogs forced Christmas traditions—paying bills, obligatory family dinners with tedious relatives, mandatory laughter at old jokes. The speaker fantasizes about silencing these bores (invoking Salome's beheading of John the Baptist as dark precedent). **"The Aftermath"**: Humorous comeuppance—the family suffers stomach pain from holiday candy and paint-flavored toys (children's toys were apparently toxic). **"She Was Tired"**: A weary toy-counter saleswoman endures an indecisive customer for the thousandth time, unable to help them choose a gift for their nephew. **"What He Hung Up"**: College students compare Christmas gifts—contrasting materialistic expectations (money, gold) with practical ones (a watch). **"Not Harmonious"**: A wife rejects fine imported cigars as a gift for her husband because their color would clash with the tacky necktie his mother is giving him—satirizing female consumer culture and poor taste. The overall message: Christmas reveals human selfishness, materialism, and exhaustion.
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Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
The Christmas Cynic. (A feeling that no on aliowed to betr: HRISTMAS is coming ! and won't stay away How to prepare for that horrible day— The bills by the score we'd rather not * we say, Or listen to, said by each bore and old Jay; The old obligat stu we have to about fat ployé""; The dinner to relatives toothless and gray; Their jokes that went, ages ago, Lodecay, But which they recount with ‘an air so au fait, And will till they're turned to dust or to clay While all must laugh loudly with voice like Or grinas the clowns i Thouyh really the * ing to flay circus ring may, pure long Or to plug up their mouths with a bundl Or to order their heads brought in As ancient Salome, in seanty Brought in the prophet’s she'd bribed them to slay, Such are the thoughts that make one distrait, In thinking of Noel. Merry? ay! THE AFTERMATH. Twas the night after Christmas, and all through the flat Not a creature was stirring, not even the cat. From father and mother and me and. the kid, Every one was knocked out with a pain in his mid. Because of the candies we ate for a lark, And kid from the paint that he chewed from his Ark. HORACE DODD GaSTIT. SHE WAS TIRED. HE saleslady at the toy counter had shown and reshown the toys to the undecided shopper. Rabbits, monkeys, jacks - in- the -box, jumping, jacks, trains, velocipedes had been dis J, oper- ated, and explained to the shopper, but still she could not make up her mind. “1 wanted to get some- thing suitable for my little rw," he reiterated for the thousand ainly a queer place fora cherry to grow WHAT HE HUNG UP AT CHRISTMAS. First college stu- ‘Old chap, how are you! Did you get anything. this Christ- mi dent nd college stu- Got a ten-dollar dent gold dent“ Hung up your stocking, eh?” Second college stu- dent“ No; 1 hung up my wateh.”” NOT HARMONIOUS. 66] AM sure your husband would like these cigars, madam," says the sales- man. ‘They are the finest Havana, hand made, and imported.” “Oh, mercy!” she replies. ‘They would never do at all, They are a color that would clash horribly with the necktie mother is going to give him.” comicbooks.com