Life, 1892-11-24 · page 5 of 22
Life — November 24, 1892 — page 5: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
# Analysis The page presents "The Valedictory of a Meleagris Gallopavo" (a turkey's farewell speech). The top illustration shows a turkey addressing its offspring before slaughter, speaking to them about their family's place in American aristocracy and their impending fate at Thanksgiving. The lower cartoon, titled "Optimistic," depicts what appears to be a holiday shopping scene, with dialogue about being "thankful" for Thanksgiving—likely satirizing commercial materialism surrounding the holiday. The satire mocks both upper-class pretension (the turkey's grandiose speech about the family's social standing) and the gap between gratitude rhetoric and consumer behavior. It's dark humor about ritual slaughter reframed through aristocratic language, and commentary on how Americans commercialize Thanksgiving.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
VOLUME Xx. THE VALEDICTORY OF A MELEAGRIS GALLOPAVO. ATHER around me, my offspring. The time is close at hand when I shall follow in the feetsteps of all our illustrious line. Why our race above all OPTIMISTIC. GOING TO CHURCH THANKSGIVING ? 10, | AIN'T GOT NOTHIN’ TO BE THANKFUL FOR! WELL, YOU OUGHT TO BE THANKFUL FOR THAT. Clara : Tilly: Clara: others should have been chosen to grace the head of the festive board at Thanksgiving is a mystery shrouded in the darkness of the past. However, the fact remains, although we do not. Be proud that we come of a good stock. No vulgar lot is ours. Members of our family are sought by the best people of the land. Others of our race are sacrificed to the sordid needs of boarding-house keepers and linger along, day after day, running the descending scale from the glory of the roast to the vagueness of the croquette and thence to the mystery of the stew. To us is reserved a more distinguished fate. For genera- tions we have taken our places in the midst of the American aristocracy. They have admitted us to their inmost circles. We have touched the lips of their most beautiful women. We have furnished strength to their athletes and a material basis for their greatest intellects. Their gourmets have loved us and even their poets have extolled us in song. 1 go, butchered to make an American holiday. In our time we do not know much about Roman holidays, so we will have to let it go at that. An American turkey would probably have been an anachronism in Rome, and we have only to do with the era we live and die in. With these thoughts I bid you farewell. Fare—fare —well ! Farewell then, my offspring. Observe the grace and cour- age with which I go to the executioner. Let my example teach you to joy in your glorious fate. Take kindly to your nutriment. Let not melancholy or foreboding feed upon your damask cheeks, but be merry, grow fat, and your elegies shall be the grateful murmurs of the contented people who feast upon your remains. comicbooks.com