Judge, 1912-06-22 · page 8 of 24
Judge — June 22, 1912 — page 8: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
The cartoon satirizes **real estate agents' exaggerated sales pitches**. The illustration shows a surveyor with impossibly long, spindly legs measuring South Parkurst land, suggesting agents stretch the truth about property dimensions and value to absurd degrees—their claims are as physically implausible as those cartoon legs. The accompanying article, titled "Laughter," shifts to an essay on proper laughing etiquette. It's a humorous critique of social pretension, advising readers that different occasions require different laughs: a refined "pink-tea laugh" for literary gatherings, versus an "outdoors laugh" for genuine joy. The tone mocks how society demands artificial, context-appropriate behavior even for something as natural as laughing. Both elements mock American social conventions and commercial dishonesty of the era with satirical wit typical of *Judge* magazine's approach.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
THE KIND OF LEGS THOSE REAL ESTATE AGENTS THINK WE HAVE. T IS a wonder, now that the country is scoured for subjects on which to give advice, that there is not as yet bounteous instruction on how to laugh. And how few people know how to laugh! If 1 had a laugh like some peo- ple I know, I would never suffer myself to be amused at anything. Volumes could be written on the value of a har- monious laugh and how to acquire it. A good laugh is worth acquiring. It has a cash value to job and contract seekers, and a more than cash value to husband seekers. All men are come- dians and all women are wits. All they want is an appreciative audience. But advice on the art of laughing is neg- lected in favor of useless dribble as to how to be beautiful, how to make lyon- naise dressing without any lyon, and how to repel an Apache with the aid of an umbrella. I know of a contractor who lost a big contract because he did not have the right kind of a laugh. Just before the contract was signed, the patron told his favorite joke. Then the contractor turned loose that horrible wheeze of his that he circulates for a laugh. It so Laughter. mortified the patron that his joke should have provoked such a noise that he could not bring himself to have any dealings with the man at all. Tragedies of this sort happen every day because people have not learned to laugh right. Not only must a man be able to laugh, but he must have moré than one good laugh. He must have an assortment, in order to have them ap- propriate for various occasions. It would not do to turn loose a livery- stable laugh at an afternoon tea, nor ae IMPASSABLE. Jimmie—"' Say, mister, we live across de creek, an’ we haven't had dinner yet."” would it be advisable to release a pink- tea laugh at a boiler-makers’ convention, In order to learn the pink-tea laugh, observe a literary light surrounded by ladies and try to imitate the sound he makes; or get a copy of some bevel- edged magazinv and read the anecdotes, The sound you make after the perusal of them will be something like eh-heh at best. Practice this as a laugh. Ladies may throw ina little something in the way of a ripple. If there is in the reading a strong temptation to groan, suppress it. Groans are not tolerated in society, no matter what the joke may be. But when you have mastered the pink- tea laugh, do not emit it in the company of locomotive engineers, or you will make a serious mistake. No laugh at all is pardonable, but a pink-tea laugh would be fatal. To my mind the most beautiful laugh is the outdoors laugh—the laughter of a crowd of children out on a picnic or the laugh that comes from a canoe up the river and goes bounding across the water and resounding among the trees, Hamilton Pope Galt. comicbooks.com