Judge, 1917-09-08 · page 17 of 28
Judge — September 8, 1917 — page 17: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page contains three distinct satirical pieces: **"A Fable of a Fool"** mocks a husband who abandons all opinions to appease his argumentative wife. The irony: when he finally agrees with her about taking the trolley car, she becomes furious and divorces him for "cruel and inhuman treatment." The satire targets marital conflict and the impossibility of pleasing a querulous spouse through submission. **"His Natural Mistake"** presents a rural Arkansas joke: an elderly visitor thinks he's gone deaf when children stop yelling, but a neighbor explains the Presiding Elder (a religious authority) is arriving—implying the children fall silent out of respect or fear of the church official. **"The Pessimistic Sloth"** is a poetic moral about a lazy creature who complains about hypothetical future work despite doing nothing currently—satirizing chronic complainers and those who manufacture problems. **"Private O'Hara"** is a brief Irish-dialect joke about a soldier planning to send barbed wire home as clotheslines, eliminating the need for clothespins—absurdist military humor. All employ Judge's characteristic gentle, moralistic satire of everyday human folly.
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Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
A FABLE OF A FOOL NCE upon a time, there was a man who had a wife and an opinion. The man would sometimes assert the opinion, but the wife would assert herself. And, by some queer hap, the wife never agreed with the opinion nor the opinion with the wife. Then, in the upshot, was life miser- able to the man, and he did meditate, and spoke unto himself after this wise: “If IT assert the opinion that is mine, then is my wife mad and lays not out my clean linen, neither speaks to me any words of comfort. And, after that I have suffered in this torment, my opinion counts for naught and my wife pre Were it not better, then, that I have no opinion? Yea, veri! Then did he humble himself, and did blot out utterly his tendency to opinions And it came shortly to pass, upon an eventide, that they were going to behold a display of motion pictures. And it had chanced aforetime that they walked, or rode upon the trolley car, as the wife willed er the man had expressed his opinion that they should do the other. Upon this time, the wife spoke to him and sa well, my dear, that we ride upon the trolley “T think it wil rv a\ And the man made reply, “ Yes, my cherished one, I agree with you.” *Then did the wife speak no word, but was white with anger. And the next day she saw her lawyer and proceeded to divorce the man on the ground of cruel and inhuman treatment. —Dixon Merritt. HIS NATURAL MISTAKE “(XAP, I've shore had a stroke or something!” feebly said a certain prominent Arkansawyer’s venerable relative, who was visiting him. “I’m stone deef! A few minutes ago I was listening to the children out in the yard yelling as joyfully as if they were being murdered by inches, and all of a sudden I couldn’t hear a sound. I’ve lost my hearing, and——”” “Aw, no, Uncle Ricketts,” replied Mr. Gap Johnson, of Rumpus Ridge. ‘The children have stopped hollering; that’s all. I reckon the Presiding Elder is coming up the road or some- thing else intetesting that-a-way has took their attention.” The Pessimistic Sloth NE. DAY I found a large fat sloth a-sitting in the lane, His countenance contorted with grimaces of pain. T asked what ‘twas that hurt him so‘and made him look so blue. He whined, “I grieve because I have so much hard work to do!” Said I, ““Pish-tush! You do not toil, and neither do you spin.” “But, think,” said he, “how hard ‘twill be if ever I begin!” Tennyson J. Daft Private O'Hara—I'l have to write an’ tell me ould mother about gettin’ some barbed wire for dryin’ her clothes on. Shure she'll nade no clothespins at all!