Life, 1897-09-02 · page 12 of 20
Life — September 2, 1897 — page 12: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
# Analysis This page contains two distinct sections: a romantic letter to "My Dear Miss Summer Girl" on the left, and a medical cartoon on the right. The letter satirizes romantic idealization of women, praising the correspondent's constancy despite criticisms of her "fickleness" and "ephemeral nature." It's courtship-era satire. The cartoon below depicts a doctor and patient at a fence. The patient asks "What do you want?" The doctor replies: "Well, you better call in at the graveyard, down on the next lot." This is gallows humor about medicine—suggesting the patient is so ill that the doctor is essentially directing them toward death. It satirizes the limitations (or incompetence) of early medical practice, a common theme in satirical magazines of this era.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
192 Some Private Correspondence. Y DEAR MISS SUMMER GIRL: The time is not far distant when you will re- turn from your outing and when you will then be classified anew under titles more appropriate for other seasons, by apt professors of social distinc- tions, I have no doubt, how- ever, that you will still be the same dear girl that you are now, and that, although arrayed in other ha- biliments, your power over others will not be diminished by the chill winds of autumn. There are those who, in days not far distant, have sought to criticise you for your fickle- ness, and for the apparently ephem- eral nature of that necessary organ which has played such havoc among the swains of all ages. I myself, however, have always been too close an observer to become a party to these unjust charges. I have known too many of your sisters in the past, who have become gentle wives and loving mothers and the best of all housekeepers, to believe any part of what is said against you. And if it be true that during the past few weeks you have played at the game of love with not too serious a purpose, and have stricken with unerring aim the chance admirer who has come under your spell, I make no doubt that he well deserved it all, and that you have known instinctively that he was incapable of the sustained flight so necessary to a lifelong union. To me, your delightful and appar- ently hopeless frivolity is one of the greatest charms you possess, and to have your elusiveness diminished, in *LIFE: my humble opinion, would be to rob the world of its greatest happiness, for it is only through the mazes of uncertainty that base man is led up to the heights of love. To the right man you will aiways be the best and dearest of girls, and away with the rest! Before you slip back out of nature's framework into the artificial atmosphere of humanity, let me tell you that I understand you and appreciate you, and that, in She: WHAT DO YOU WaNT? “Rest!” spite of all that has been said against you, I respect you and admire you. Platonically yours, LiFe. More Regularity. OCTOR: Here is your medicine. Take one powder after each meal, ‘*Say, doctor, I can be more regu- lar about it if I take it before meals.” “WELL, YOU BETTER CALL IN AT THE GRAVEYARD, DOWN ON THE NEXT LOT."