Life, 1896-02-27 · page 3 of 20
Life — February 27, 1896 — page 3: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
# Analysis of Life Magazine Page (Volume XXVII, Number 687) This page contains several satirical pieces typical of early 20th-century Life magazine: **Main Cartoon ("To a Fickle Miss")**: A poetic rebuke to a woman who smiles sweetly while her "heart of steel" reveals her true nature—satirizing female duplicity or romantic manipulation. **"Setting a Price"**: Social commentary on how women's monetary value varies by circumstance. It references a real New York court case valuing a child at six cents in damages from a street-railway accident, using this absurdity to critique how society assigns monetary worth to females. **Fashion Illustrations**: "The Liberty Belle" and "Modest" show contemporary women's clothing, likely satirizing evolving fashion or women's increasing public visibility. The humor relies on period assumptions about women's nature and social roles.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
VOLUME XXVII. He: So You FIND THE TYPE- WRITER A HELP? Npeep! Why, I HAVE SIGNING CHECKS WITH TO A FICKLE MISS. OT worth your while That false, sweet smile Which o'er your features plays: Thy heart of steel I can reveal By my Cathodic rays. SETTING A PRICE. i the progress of a great nation, exact knowledge of any given object or pursuit is always welcome. Some women have been purchasable for a handful of diamonds; others have brought a fortune ; the Indian squaw was gained by a few strings of wampum or ablanket; others, strangely blind to their own worth, have been won simply through the exercise of a now almost obsolete custom which is termed love. These women, however, were adults. The matter under discussion, and which was settled not long ago by a court of law in New York city, is the exact value of a female child. The jury in the case—a fatal street-railway accident, the victim being a two-year-old girl—decided that the parents were entitled to six cents damages, Perhaps the quotation varies throughout the country. NUMBER 687 THE LIBERTY BELLE MODEST. ISS DE FLYTE: Bridget, if Mr. Simms calls while 1 am out, hold him un- til I return, BripGeT: Oh, Miss, sure and oi wodn't loike to do that. : [F the Roentgen method of seeing through things pans out anywhere near as well as its friends ex- pect, we are entitled to hope that it will almost putan end to vivisection. ‘There will be no need to put a knife into a live animal when a ray will make its inner workings visible. “WHEELS WITHIN WHEELS." comicbooks.com