Judge, 1914-07-04 · page 12 of 24
Judge — July 4, 1914 — page 12: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This is a humorous domestic dialogue by Arthur Chapman satirizing modern consumer excess disguised as simplicity. Colonel Beanfugle claims to value "simplicity," but Mrs. Beanfugle systematically catalogs how his actual vacation expenses have ballooned absurdly. The satire targets early 20th-century leisure culture: whereas his first fishing trip cost under $3 with a dollar rod, his current outfit totals $600-800, including $75 rods, $80 binoculars, electric searchlights, and elaborate aluminum accessories. He caught four trout in ten days—costing $200 per fish. The joke exposes the contradiction between professed values and actual behavior. Modern readers should note the era's emerging consumer goods marketed as "necessities" for genteel leisure activities. The cartoon (right side, shows a couple with luggage) and text together mock how vacationing had become an expensive status display, not genuine simplicity.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
‘ VACATIONING,” s id Colonel Be fugle, after having rendered val- Vacation Simplicity on the lids of four large nonsmashables, “is not the simple thing it used to L No, indeed," said Mrs. Beanfugle grimly. ‘Nothing is. In fact, I under- stand the word simplicity will be By ARTHUR CHAPMAN dropped out of the next vintage of dictionaries. “I remember your first outing trip after we were married,’? went on the colonel. ‘It calied for only one very small horsehair trunk and a rather pudgy valise, for that was long before the discovery that paper could be fashioned into suitcases and sold as genuine sole leather."’ “Why shouldn't outing demands change, as well as everything else?” “Well, I judge they have. I judge that two-thirds of the space in these four large trunks is taken up by your seven tango gowns and their accessories. I cannot help contrasting the expense of your first vacation outfit with the cost of the one I have just managed to compress for you into these four tomb-like compartments. “T remember, too, that you went ona fishing trip, just as you are going now, when I took that first outing,’ said Mrs. Beanfugle. The colonel writhed uneasily. “And lL remember,"’ went on Mrs. Beanfugle, ‘that your fishing outfit cost just dollars and sixty-nine cents, including a bottle of mosquito dope.’’ “Yes, yes, those were simple days.”’ ‘“‘Those were the days when you were content with a fishing rod that was es pensive at a dollar. Now I believe you have a seventy-five-dollar rod, and I hav just had curiosity enough in the last few days to go through the catalogue of your sporting-goods house and enumerate some of the things you count as necessary in fishing. Your imported flies, silk enameled lines, automatic reels, extra rod and stock of leaders, fly books, et cetera, run something like one hundred and seventy dollars. Your waders, slicker and other clothing run another hundred. You have a fancy sleeping bag, with air mattress and eiderdown quilt, that cost close to a hundred. n attack of rheumatism from sleeping on the damp ground would cost many times that,"’ interrupted the colonel. “You have an electric searchlight, a lunch outfit of aluminum, a reel box of fancy leather, a landing net, a lovely imported creel, a repair kit, head net for mosquitoes, line releaser for getting your flies out of trees, and even a cute little bottle of dry-fly dupe which fastens to your coat lapel with a nifty little leather strap. You have a very elaborate knife that contains a tape for measuring your fish and a scale for weighing. You have put something like eighty dollars into a pair of binoculars, and you have an alarm watch to rouse you in time to get the first minute of fishing in the morning. nu even h an individual sandwich box of aluminum, and a cunning little stool, collapsible and portable, on which you can sit while eating your lunch, Altogether, I estimate your outfit cost between six hundred and eight hundred dollars. The last time you went fishing you were gone ten days and caught four trout. Trout at two hundred dollars apiece, to make no computing of the value of your time, are rather extravagant eatin If 1 in- cluded liquor and cigars in my estimate, probably your fishing trip would explain why the mortgage on our house has not been taken up sooner "’ “T was just going to remark, my dear, id Colonel unfugle, **that in this age, when simplicity is such a rare bird and economy such a rare flower, your simple little vacation, jaunts fill me with satisfaction. I really think you'd better add another tango gown this collection before you start. You can get a special suitcase for it. You need it, and then—er—well, it might go to balance a trifling expense I went to to-day in adding a sixty-dollar fly rod to my collection ot for Him “George,’’ his fair young wife asked, ‘‘what is a fete champetre “As [ understand it,’’ he replied, ‘‘it's a blowout where they bathe in the cham- pagne after they've got so they can’t drink any more of it. If you've got an invitation to go to one, you may as well send regrets. I'm a temperance man from this time on."" comicbooks.com