Life — August 15, 1889 — page 1: what you’re looking at

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# "The Uses of Words" - Life Magazine, August 15, 1889 This satirical cartoon illustrates a social clash between a Boston woman (identified as "Boston Girl") and a lawyer's clerk in what appears to be a legal office. The joke hinges on the phrase "take a chair." The clerk offers her a seat using standard language, but the Boston woman interprets or rejects it pedantically—insisting she wouldn't know what to "do with it" but will "sit down if I may." The humor targets pretentious Boston intellectual culture of the era, mocking how educated New Englanders were perceived as overly particular about language and social conventions. The cartoon suggests Bostonians were so concerned with precise terminology that they missed the obvious social meaning of common expressions, making them appear ridiculous and socially awkward.