Judge, 1914-05-30 · page 8 of 24
Judge — May 30, 1914 — page 8: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This is a humorous short story by William A. McGarry, not a political cartoon. The satire targets **nervous exhaustion and "atavism"** — late-Victorian anxieties about men's primitive impulses supposedly resurfacing despite modern civilization. The protagonist, Red Battersby, is a successful businessman plagued by violent urges he can't control. He consults a nerve specialist who prescribes an extreme "shock" as treatment. The joke concludes when Battersby accidentally picks up a "modern novel by a popular woman author" — implying this literary genre itself is shocking enough to cure his condition. The bottom cartoon titled "ONE METHOD" extends the satire: a caller asks why the hostess doesn't take up "the French language" as exercise, poking fun at faddish health remedies and linguistic pretension among the upper classes. The page satirizes contemporary medical pseudoscience, masculine anxiety, and literary snobbery typical of the early 1900s.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
The Shock By WILLIAM A, McOARRY RED BATTERSBY was at his desk, trying to force order from the cha- otic jumble of his thoughts, when the light step of the stenographer responding to his ring came to his ears. With a savage cry he was on his feet. The chair spun across the room and crashed through the door of abookcase, and Battersby gripped at the desk with fingers in which the veins showed purple. His lips were drawn back in a wolfish snarl. “‘Why—Mr. Battersby, what has happened?”’ The fright- ened girl dropped her books and backed toward the door. Other clerks came rushing in, attracted by the sound of break- ing glass; but to their surprised queries Battersby vouchsafed no reply until he had partially regained control of himself. Then, curtly, he dismissed them. When he was alone, he seized the telephone and instructed the operator to send for Dr. Ternal, the world-renowned nerve | specialist. Fifteen minutes later the specialist was shown in. | “Nerves again, I suppose,’’ he inquired. “Yes,"’ said Battersby; ‘and I'm heartily sick of it. Here I am, a strong, healthy, virile man, in the prime of life, clean living, hard working, successful—but a victim of atavism. Im- pulses to smash, to kill, get worse every day. It is making a wreck of me to contrul myself.’” i “You still exercise?’’ ee See ere “Bah! Last night I ran ten miles. This morning I CONSECUTIVELY i took a cold plunge, rode into the village and threw the . 4 i A 4 Gladys—Harry, when we are married | must have four servants. | blacksmith, a professional wrestler, swung clubs and punched Harep No fear, dest, poe ahall have lwenty—sbet bot all habe the bag for an hour and skipped the rope for another hour. same time. Then I stoked the yacht down i the river and walked to the office.’* The specialist shook his head. ‘‘A peculiar case— very,’’ he mused. ‘*‘Perhaps— yes, I think you need a shock, something sufficiently out of oj the ordinary to throw most men into nervous prostration. B It may act as a sedative. At 1 : least it can do no harm to try. fi Try to figure out something. B If I think of anything, I'll let you know."” T After the specialist had ¥ gone, Battersby paced back and forth, his face set, for an hour; but cudgel his brains as he would, he could think of al nothing legal that might pro- M | vide a shock for him. He | threw himself disgustedly in- a to a chair and dropped his hand on a desk. Uncon- sciously his fingers grasped a | book. A moment later, turn- | | ONE METHOD ing his head, he became aware | Caller —The doctor said I must take plenty of exercise. that it was a modern novel Pi Hostess—Why don't you take up the French language? by a popular woman author, tt comicbooks.com