Judge, 1920-03-27 · page 10 of 36
Judge — March 27, 1920 — page 10: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
# "The Mystery of Medicine" Page Analysis This page from *Judge* contains three satirical pieces: **"The Mystery of Medicine"** mocks doctors for deliberately obscuring their practices and finances. The Boston newspaper anecdote—"The doctor felt the patient's purse"—jokes that physicians diagnose based on ability to pay rather than actual illness. The essay satirizes medicine as inherently mysterious, comparing modern doctors to ancient Chinese practitioners who used dubious ingredients, arguing patients can't understand treatments anyway, so they should keep their finances equally opaque to protect themselves. **"His Adamantine Attitude"** ridicules an overzealous small-town constable (Slackputter in "Petunia") who declares two cars parked in a street "promiscuous" and refuses to listen to reason—illustrating foolish, inflexible authority. **"Judgment of a High-School Girl"** appears to reference President Wilson, praising his physical posture as representing his philosophical position—likely contemporary political commentary, though the specific context remains unclear. The page emphasizes satirizing institutional opacity and pompous authority figures.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
Drawn by R. B. Pouen “Henry, if you are planning to communicate with Mars, I wish you'd try your hand at call- ing Bobby’ to dinner.” The Mystery of Medicine By Yoo Cursevix HEN an erudite newspaper in the city of Boston says “The doctor felt the patient’s purse and declared there was no hope” the reader is non- plussed. What could be more cryptic than such a state- ment? Does it mean there was no hope of any fee at all? or does it mean a major operation with the usual consequences, both vital and financial? Any way you look a1 it, medicine appears determined to keep itself _ mysterious. There were the Chinese, hun- dreds of years ago, who brewed mixtures that comprised not only the hair of a dog, but multifarious ingredients of un- mentionable character sup- posed to possess extraordinary virtues, and whether the dis- eased survived them or pres- ently exhibited more disease was a matter wholly negligible in the circumstances. And so it is today. If you keep yourself in- formed of medical progress, you may select from the greatest variety of sure cures from many sources. Most of these cures live up to their birthright of mystery. Whether your medical adviser uses the hypodermic needle, New Thought, or any one of the hundred intermediates, it is all equally mysterious. All you can do to protect yourself is to make your financial con- dition correspondingly mysti- fying—just as it is necessary to do with one’s butcher and baker and iceman. In any case, beware of getting caught with a full purse unless you really would like to afford a modern sanitarium with all the luxuries of medical science that reinforce its mysterious advantages. His Adamantine Attitude “This ’ere promiscuous park ing of cars, anywhere and every- where, has got to stop!” sternly declared Constable Slackputter, the redoubtable sleuth of Pe- tunia. “Why, Chief, there ain’t but one other car besides mine in sight,” protested the owner of the offending Hootin’ “You can’t hardly call two cars in the whole length of the street promiscuous, can you?” “T can’t, hey?” thundered the when I say a thing’s promiscuous, it 1s officer. “By Godfre it is or not!” promiscuous, whethe A Dark-Room Whisper The friends of the photographer were putting up a tomb- stone over his grave. Under his name was the epitaph: “Taken from Life.” Judgment of a High-School Girl I think of Mr. Wilson as a man who's very good and great— Aman of whom it may be said his posture is his postulate, Drawn by W. K. Stammert + A.C. As it seems to the elopiny couple whose portraits were in the paper comicbooks.com