Life, 1897-11-04 · page 8 of 20
Life — November 4, 1897 — page 8: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
# Analysis This page from *Life* magazine contains an illustration and story excerpt by T. Chermayeff depicting a domestic drama. The sketch shows a well-dressed man confronting his wife, who reclines on a sofa in an elegant interior. The dialogue reveals the wife has sent a woman (implied romantic rival) an expensive gift—"fifty dollars' worth of knives and forks"—supposedly from the husband without his knowledge. The satire targets marital infidelity and deception. The wife's calculated act—framing her husband for sending costly gifts to another woman—appears designed to humiliate or manipulate him. The humor derives from the absurdity of the gift choice (kitchenware) and the wife's bold, sarcastic response to her husband's outrage, suggesting the fashionable upper-class marriage depicted is fraught with duplicity.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
place the day after to-morrow. There must have been some delay in for- warding it. I knew there was no time to lose in getting the present, so I stepped into Blacking’s to-day and ordered one of the most beautiful salad bowls you ever saw, sent at once. She can have it marked afterwards.” “*Did you send my card?" asked his wife. “Oh, yes," said the man, “1 stopped into the stationer’s and got one. “* What—did—you—send—her ?” His wife eyed him reproachfully. ‘You ought to have known,” she said, softly, ‘that I would have found that invitation in your pocket. Here it.is," and she brandished it in his face. The miserable man before turned deathly pale. ‘* What—did— you— send—her ?” he stammered, hoarsely. “Fifty dollars’ worth of knives and forks,” she answered, savagely. Tom Masson. her Alfred Austin. LFRED AUSTIN was not only born, but made, his appointment to the Laureateship of England being a license to write lines that rhyme. The fact that he does not write poetry means nothing, as it goes with the office. Mr, Austin's face shows that he has great self-control, never writing anything that could possibly be objected to by the party in power. As Laureate of England he has made a great success in this direction, and his receipt of £7,000 a year easily places him beyond the fear of his critics.