Judge, 1911-12-09 · page 17 of 28
Judge — December 9, 1911 — page 17: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page contains two separate satirical pieces from Judge magazine: **Top cartoon ("Similis Simili Curantur")**: A domestic humor sketch about a girl preparing food while a student visitor arrives. The Latin title means "like cures like"—the joke being that the girl offers to handle the food with her bare hands, and the boy doesn't object because he's just arrived from a cattle boat where rough conditions meant eating poorly. **Main article**: A more pointed satire about a circus press agent who fabricates an wildly exaggerated account of a modest Sunday-school Christmas program. The agent never actually attended but writes absurdly inflated descriptions—calling a simple children's event a "Colossal, Multi-natured exhibition" with "Pomp and Glittering Splendor." The satire mocks both: 1. **Sensationalist journalism** of the era, where press agents and newspapers routinely embellished or invented details 2. **Circus publicity tactics**—known for outrageous hype—applied to mundane community events The humor lies in the gap between the humble reality (a local school program) and the overwrought theatrical language used to describe it.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
SIMILIS SIMILI CURANTUR. Girt (preparing little flat supper) —"* You won't mind if I use my hands on these cakes, because ""—— Student boy—"* Oh, go ahead, don't mind me. I'm just off a cattleboat where we ate like pigs !"” The Circus Press Agent Writes about the Sunday-school Christmas Entertainment. T WAS Christmas Eve and the Circus Press Agent called in to see his old friend, the Editor. Everybody around the office was hard at work, and the Editor handed the Agent a slip of paper and said, “That is the program of a Sunday-school entertainment that is being given to-night. I wish you would write a line about it and help us out.’’ ‘‘Sure!’’ said the Circus Man, and the following is his story of the Christmas ex- ercises he never saw: On Christmas Eve the Broadway Sunday School gave the Most Su- perb, Sumptuous, Sensational, Co- lossal, Multi-natured exhibition of unparalleled Christmas Features ever before seen, conceived, or at- tempted. Long before the hour for the performance to begin, the Enormous, New, Beautiful, rain- proof Church was filled to the doors with old and young, waiting with bated breath for the Bewilderingly Lavish Spectacle to begin. Prior to the Grand Triumphal Entry of the Children of the School, the re- nowned Mlle. Marie Murphie gave By MORRIS ANDERSON. a wonderfully adroit and Astonishing performance on that most beautifully toned and difficult of all instggments— the Sunday-school Or; At seven-thirty the fair musician RAMBLERS. He—'"'1 bet you a kiss I steal a kiss from you." She—"" And I bet you two kisses you can't."” swung into the galloping strains of & march, the rear doors were thrown open, and there entered the Elegant, Spec- tacular, Classically Bewildering, Tre- mendously Resplendent Inaugural Grand Entree of the scholars of the Enor- mous Combined and United Classes, each led by its trainers and teach- ers, carrying costly banners and singing songs of Christmas cheer. Truly reproducing in Fabulous Magnificence and Profusion the Pomp of Pageantry and Splendors of the Ancients, together with the Colossal, Massive, Processional Marvels of the Orient. The Acme and Idealization of Gorgeousness, without peer or parallel. The Most Supremely Attractive and Super- eminently Grand processional Ava- lanche that has ever moved in Pomp and Glittering Splendor through any Sunday School in the Universe. The first feature on this all- feature program was the first ap- pearance on any stage of Little Miss Smitho, in a very Clever, Dexterous, and Sensationally comicbooks.com