Judge — April 28, 1917 — page 7: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

This cartoon satirizes a **fashion trend for tortoise-shell-rimmed eyeglasses** that was apparently popular when this *Judge* magazine issue was published. The scene shows a wealthy household where nearly every person visible—from servants to family members to visitors—wears identical tortoise-shell-rimmed spectacles, regardless of whether they appear to need them. The joke is that the fashion has become so ubiquitous and absurd that it's ripe for ridicule. The caption expresses the cartoonist's view that this trend has been "overdone" and suggests it's time for public taste to shift away from it ("the reaction to set in"). The humor relies on visual exaggeration: the universal adoption of identical eyewear across all social classes suggests mindless conformity and herd mentality in fashion consumption—a recurring target of satirical magazines.