Judge, 1910-05-21 · page 16 of 16
Judge — May 21, 1910 — page 16: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This appears to be a humorous tall tale from Judge magazine's "Captain Fibb" series. The comic strip illustrates an absurd fight scene told in sailor dialect. The joke centers on an encounter with a fantastical opponent who possesses multiple pairs of arms—depicted in the illustrations as an octopus-like creature with eight writhing tentacles functioning as boxing "mitts" or fists. The humor derives from the impossible mismatch: Captain Fibb has only two fists while his opponent has eight, resulting in complete defeat. The sailor's exaggerated explanation for his black eyes ("lamps") is that he was bested by this supernatural or mythological creature. This represents typical Judge magazine fare—combining crude comic illustrations with vernacular sailor speech for comedic effect, mocking both tall-tale traditions and the boastful stories sailors were stereotypically known to tell.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
JUDGE THE YARNS OF CAPTAIN FIBB. bit of a tale. I wuz appears in the por dodged me till now,’ sez he. ‘Now put up your dukes, and the best man sudden a strange-lookin a queer grin, and y y wins,’ sez he, and with that he drags me outer bed and makes me put on a al . the gloves. —— — Then he puts on the other eight pair hi r —— the cussed ¢ —— And arter he ‘d mashed me inter a mush be gathered up his mitts and heavy! I bad only two fists and be had at 2 gittin’ of his flippers and inter a pulp wi and departed the way he came. Yep, that 's the true story of how I came best of the mill when — honest, he did! —— by these black lamps."*