Life, 1898-12-08 · page 13 of 20
Life — December 8, 1898 — page 13: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page contains period humor targeting early 20th-century fashion and social conventions. **"The Ruffled Skirt"** (top) satirizes the return of ruffled skirts as fashionable, while implying women wearing them have "ruffled tempers"—a play on the double meaning suggesting the style doesn't actually improve feminine disposition. **Lower cartoons** employ crude domestic humor: A rooster has repeatedly gotten into a hen's nesting materials (misidentified as "alligator's egg" in the caption), suggesting sexual impropriety has become visible through microscopic inspection. The joke relies on the period's anxiety about hidden moral indecency being revealed by modern science. **"Ones/Brown"** presents a simple joke about trading a cigar for a match—wordplay on exchange. **"Johnny" scene** shows rejected romance, with the woman unable to develop affection despite the man's efforts. The humor reflects early-1900s concerns about fashion morality, animal behavior metaphors for human conduct, and emerging scientific scrutiny of private matters.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
AT LAST The Ruffled Skirt. H, Roffled Skirt, Once more wo seo You drapo yoursolt Orer lingerlo As soft and dainty As could bo. Oh, Ruffled Skirt, A fib wo'd tell It wo should say That on a bello A ruffled tempor Looked 80 well. ONES: I have a cigar but no match, Brown: Then give me the cigar. I have a match. HE _ microscope of | The Hen: xo, DEAR; IT'S ONLY THAT AN ALLIGATOR's Z0G GOT INTO Propriety has revealed MY Last aETTiNo. a world of indelicacy. Rooster: gap! i've oot ‘EM AGAIN! “IT ISN'T ER BIT OP USE, JOHNNY; ME HEART DON'T FEEL DRAWED TO YER.” comicbooks.com