Life, 1885-07-23 · page 12 of 16
Life — July 23, 1885 — page 12: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
# What This Page Means The main cartoon depicts a mother cautioning her daughter Emma about spending too much time with boys. Emma's reply—that she likes older boys better as she gets older—is the joke: a cheeky double entendre suggesting romantic/physical interest rather than innocent friendship. Below are short satirical pieces: "The Fox and the Lion" mocks how familiarity breeds false confidence (the fox becomes bold through repeated encounters, leading to disaster). The moral warns that custom doesn't confer wisdom. The "SPORT" section contains brief jabs at contemporary figures: Baldwin hiring an expensive Black jockey while Blacks lack full social acceptance; Lorillard winning races through inherited advantage; and a dig at boxer Maxey Cobb's loss (the "Fenian cap" reference mocks Irish grievances as an excuse). "Foreign Flashes" satirizes international absurdities: Turkish financial collapse, Egyptian poverty, Czarist Russia, and the Mahdi's fanaticism—all presented as humorous oddities for American readers.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
Mamma: OLD TO BE PLAYING WITH THE BOYS SO MUCH? Emma: Do n't YOU THINK, EMMA, YOU ARE GETTING A LITTLE TOO I KNOW IT, BUT THE OLDER I GET THE BETTER I LIKE ‘EM. FABLES FOR THE TIMES. THE FOX AND THE LION, FOX met a Lion one day, and was so frightened that he ran into a house, sprang through a win- dow and escaped to the swamp, carry- ing with him a part of the sash, broken glass and other useless smpedi- menta, The next evening the Fox met the Lion, and ran off again, but not so rapidly, and without being encumbered with dismantled window-sash. When the two animals accidentally came to- gether the third time, the Fox boldly approached the big beast and accosted him as “ chappie,” “old chum" and “pard,” whereupon the Lion gathered him in with one paw and lunched on | his remains. Morac: This Fable teaches that custom makes us bold, but does not always magnify our wisdom or polish our manners, HERE was a young gambler named Coyle, So childlike and bland was his smoyle, He had a great knack Of stacking the pack, He did n't play ‘cording to Hoyle. H.R.E. SOFT PART OF A LOCOMOTIVE— The tender end. RATHER SET IN THEIR WAYS— Compositors. Bere: the California millionaire, has engaged Mur- phy the colored jockey for two years at $5,000 a season, yet some people insist that the merits of the negro are not duly appreciated in this country. . . . R. PIERRE LORILLARD'S victory with Wanda, in the Lorillard Stakes, reminds one forcibly of the man who gave himself a quarter for carrying his own valise upstairs. . . . AXEY COBB seems to have been badly overmatched by Phallas, but as his rider wore a Fenian cap, it may have been the wrongs of Ireland which proved too heavy a burden for him to bear. FOREIGN FLASHES. URKISH bonds have advanced three points, and are now quoted at three cents a hatful. THE editor of the Bosphore Egyptien has received the following articles in payment from delinquent subscribers: A string of fish, a celluloid elephant's tusk, a second-hand jack- plane, a night-cap, and a mummy’s thigh. Ir is rumored that the Czar gets ten dollars a week as special correspondent of a New York daily. Et MAHDI chops off the heads of all strangers who refuse to embrace the true faith, and is rivaling Sam Jones, of Georgia, as a successful evangelist. A FEW days ago a messenger bcj climbed a Swiss mount- ain, when a glacier got after tim and pursued him to the valley below. It was a clos race, and the boy just escaped with his life. -