Life, 1885-07-16 · page 12 of 16
Life — July 16, 1885 — page 12: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
# Life Magazine Page Analysis This page contains several satirical pieces typical of 19th-century American humor: **Main Cartoon:** "Doesn't Care If He Does" depicts a reformer earnestly asking a stranger about drinking. The stranger's response—asking *where* to go drink rather than *whether*—satirizes the ineffectiveness of temperance advocates. The joke is that moral persuasion fails when the target misses the point entirely. **Verse:** "Moon-Burnt" humorously invents a pseudo-scientific phenomenon worse than sunburn, mocking folk superstitions. **"Proof Sheet":** This satirizes pretentious art criticism. An overly elaborate, flowery review of a painting is rejected because the artwork hasn't arrived yet—it was replaced by error with a chromolithograph. The note mockingly exposes how art criticism often uses bombastic language regardless of actual quality. **Intercepted Letters:** Four humorous fake letters satirize various targets: politicians (the Tribune's "Fresh Hair Fund" reference), struggling poets submitting work, society figures, and ancient Roman plagiarism claims—all playing on contemporary concerns and absurdist humor.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
a fei DOES N’T CARE IF HE DOES. Reformer, earnestly : “MY FRIEND, DO YOU DRINK? Stranger : “YES, WHERE SHALL WE GO?” MOON-BURNT. NE moonlight night a happy boy Of cherries stole a pailful, The farmer quickly turned his joy Into a sorrow baleful. And while he roared, it came to pass, A settled fact the boy learned, That being ¢anned by moonlight was Far worse than being sun-burned. A PROOF SHEET. (From the Art Universe.) R. CLIFTON’S painting, “A Sea- Side Study, now on exhibition at the Art Hall, attracts much attention. The ¢echnigue is superb, and the tone and spirit masterly. A solemn, vague, and indefinable unrest broods with portentious heaviness on the troubled waves, while through the desolate drab mist of the low- hanging clouds fantastic shadows, em- bossed with dimness, float in ghostly and silent procession along the mutilated bosom of the innumerable sea. [Note from sick editor to assistant : kill paragraph about Clifton’s picture. It will not arrive till to-morrow. I got hold of a chromo by mistake.] Note in the Art Universe: Mr. Clif- ton’s picture, “A Sea-Side Study,” will arrive in a day or two, and will be duly noticed in these columns. INTERCEPTED LETTERS. I TRIBUNE OFFICE, N. Y. Hon. J. W. Husted: EAR SIR—Your request for an appropriation from the Tribune's Fresh Hair Fund is hereby not granted. No such bald contingency was ever expected to arise by its originators. Yours truly, W. REID, Ed. Trib. Il. AUBURN, N. Y. To the Editor of Bric-a-brac Century Magazine: S1r—I enclose a bit of vers de socéeté for your columns. IS LIFE REAL ? To quote from good old Dr. Watts Who wrote sweet hymns for us, This life we lead on this here earth, “ Aint worth a tinker’s cuss.” Ah me, I ’ve proved it to my grief Since on the day I fell, That life’s not real but naught beside A blim-blam-blinkish cell !* *No. 1924, Auburn, where cheque should be sent. Yours in haste and jail, J. D, FIs. Ill. U.S. SENATE, July 4th. L-dy Ran-olph Churchill: Please cable Mrs. Logan how you done it. Y’rs, Joun A. Locan. IV. SHEOL-ON-STYX, July 10, 1885. To the Editor of the Tribune: My Dear Sir—I must protest against your continual use without credit of my editorial and post-humorous paragraphs which appeared from time to time in the Roman Punch, published and edited by myself in the immortal city during the years from 102 to 56 B.C. I have no objec- tion to your clipping from the Castanea Vesca columns of my paper, but I must ask that you credit them to me. Thanks for your review of my book, which, though a trifle late, is thoroughly appreciated by Your constant admirer, Caius GRACCHUS JocuSTUS. P. S.—I don’t like Sheol as well as the old place, where, by the way, your paper is very popular. No gridiron or brimstone bath is considered complete without it. G GJ comicbooks.com