Life — May 21, 1885 — page 4: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

THE RUSSIAN GENERAL'S SONG. [Komaroff literally means the Son of a Mosquito,—New York Times.) OME join my humble ditty, From Vitzky I do come; I scare the dynamiter with His Czar-destroying bomb; I thrash the English general, Much better known as “ Pete,” For I'ma roaring Rush-i-an, The sonofa, sonofa skeet ! The Queen of England quakes to hear The greatness of my fame, And Gladstone breaks his lower jaw Pronouncing of my name; I raise a terrible hullabaloo, A gibbering Muscoveet, For ['m a roaring Rush-i-an, The sonofa, sonofa skeet ! The Czar sends me a telegram, Instructing this and that ; But I never care what Aleck says, I'm skipping to Herat. When I get there I'll run the place And govern most discreet, For I’m a roaring Rush-i-an, The sonofa, sonofa skeet ! Of England's prowess on the sea I do not care a cuss, And all the warlike talking there Is nothing more than fuss. I 've seen the way they “smash” their foes— I've heard about their fect, And that’s the only thing that scares This sonofa, sonofa skeet! . . * UNSET COX did not wait for Thanksgiving Day to make up his mind about Turkey. It is said the gentleman desires to become Collector of the Porte, which gives aclue to his reasons for accepting the Foreign Mission. * ° . AYS the Texas Siftings: “Never judge a person by the number of his shoe, Never judge a Christian by the rental of his pew.” To which LIFE begs to add: Never judge a dandy by the setting of his ‘‘ close,” Never judge a lady by the angle of her nose, Never judge a Paddy by the odor of his pipe, Never judge a printer by the pieing of his type. * * . N her second trial trial trip, Mr. John Roach’s Dolphin has been found unsatisfactory. The cause of the latest trouble, we are informed, was an overheated crank, but as to whether this overheated crank was identical with Mr. Roach we can only surmise. It is highly probable, however, that the ship-builder is the Jonah of his newly-made vessel—as the number of “ wails” in his immediate vicinity seems to attest. The vessel should be re- christened the DOLPHOUT. THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF AN UNSUCCESSFUL SLUGGER. I N order to command your undivided respect and attention, let me begin by stating that I am a Bostonian. My father before me was also a Bostonian, and, in addition, played first base for the Handel and Haydn Society, while my mother was (hush ! speak it softly) a Philadelphian. I therefore in myself am a combination of Mt. Olympus and New Jerusalem, and it is to be sincerely hoped that the above named cities will never again be allowed to intermarry, for the result is, judging from myself, almost certain to be discouraging to ordinary mortals and make their comparative insignificance painful to behold. I, like most young men brought up in the shadow of the Atlantic Monthly, married young ; for, to tell the truth, a bachelor has a rather troubled time of it in the “Back Bay” district. Our social position was such that I had the whole world to choose from, and could doubtless have married Queen Victoria if I had wished to; but, as my father said, she would have been a trifle too old for me, and in addition widows are a risky speculation, even the best of them. = I therefore ‘selected what would be called in an obituary “a most estimable young lady.” Her father was not only very wealthy, but had once been Sunday-school superinten- dent at Brighton Beach, so I therefore felt perfectly safe for this world, and that to a certain extent I had a mortgage on the next. The day after my marriage, however, my father-in-law failed—not an ordinary failure—but one in which he lost comicbooks.com