Life, 1904-03-24 · page 16 of 20
Life — March 24, 1904 — page 16: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page contains **two distinct satirical pieces**: ## "The Norse Nightingale" (left column) A humorous poem in heavy Swedish-immigrant dialect mocking the famous Charge of the Light Brigade. The speaker adopts a Scandinavian accent ("Ay tenk," "ven skol") to recount a military disaster, making fun of both the original poem's romanticism and immigrant speech patterns. The repeated "sax hundred" (six hundred) references Tennyson's celebrated but tragic cavalry charge. ## "The Prosaic Age" (right column) A satirical poem imagining a world where romantic literary imagery becomes mundane or contradictory—if roses smelled like watercress, if ocean waves unionized, if lambs attacked violently. It mocks Victorian poetry's overwrought sentimentality by showing how absurd these tropes would be in reality. Both pieces ridicule the gap between **romantic literary conventions and actual life**—one through immigrant dialect comedy, the other through logical absurdism. The surrounding advertisements and brief humor vignettes are typical of Life's satirical magazine format from this era.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
THE PROSAIC AGE. If dairymatds wore diamonds, And shepherds evening dress; If “sweetly scented roses" Resembled_ watercress : If thrushes ceased to “warble,” THE NORSK NIGHTINGALE feed vondereal, And skies to “smile in blu ry von feeling blue— endows dlsco od ally YOrtully, dey ban brave old crew, TO etameliicis so Forfully-onyard, Yolly fallers, too, ; Andis bar walley of death Dis har sax bundred! m Rode the sax hundred! —AMilwaukee Sentin If “bounding ocean billows It ban a cinch, Ay tenk, Should Some geezer blu 1 the “moonlit evenings" “Hustle! Yu Light Brigade! Were in receivers’ hands; Yump!"* Maester Olson = / If larks grew pessimistic, Den in the walley of death And every “summer breeze” Go the sax hundred! . Should join a labor union, d rhyme no more with “tre sw no more the sands Cannon on right of dem, Cannon on left of dem, Cannon on top of dem, Wolleyed and t'undered; Smashed vith dis shot and sbal, Dey ant do wery val: Most of dem ketching hal— If all the “sturdy peasants” Had derby hats and canes, And every “lovely landscape” Were packed with railway trains; If “timid deer” the sidewalks Of Broadway should elect, And nightingales use language Which parrots now affect ; Nearly sax hundred! all dem sabres bare If “gentle lambs” attacked you ash purty gude in air; With murderous intent; Each faller feel bis bair If pigeons came and bit you, Standing—no vonder! As “through the land you went; das! It ant ban yob If “rosy dawns” grew arcer, any coward slob, a ib Flag And “blushing girls” extinct— ing dis Russian mol ee . . ifs Ah, me! poetic fancies Ay tenk Ay vudn't stand AUGE ACRITER: IE SEY SRE THe No longer would be inked Yeneral's blunder. SAID THIS IICNGRY YOUNG SPOTTED GIRAFFE “THIS IS NOT TIE WORST FODDER, BY HAPFE! AND THE CIRCASSIAN CHAP, FASTIOIOUS. Cannon on right of dem, WARING UP FROM TS Nar, non on top of dem, MUTTERED: “SURELY I NEARD SOME ONE LAFFE!"* Cannon bebind dem, tu Volleyed and t'undered. nally say Captain Grenk, Errie: Silly! Dolls don’t eat anything! “Ve got enuff, Ay tenk! Bertin: Don't, eh? Well, that old n Let's go and getting drenk.” yours that I cut open was stuffed chock full of "Bout tventy-sax com back breakfast food.—Woman’s Home Companion. —Harvard Lampoon “The front porch is dreadfully dirty, Maria.” “Yes, I know. But the new girl says she won’, — Wash it off until her trunk comes. “And what has her trunk to do with it?” of “Sb she always wears her best stocking when she wasbes porches.""—Cleveland Plain De Wat was it your husband wanted to see nie didn’t you scream when he put about?” inquired Mrs. Newliwed’s papa around you? I think he wanted to borrow a couple of hun- Ven sk deir glory : ted to, but couldn't, and when dred Jars from you,” she said. “He's so anxiou It ban gude cha a utte Inter-Mountain to get out of debt.”"—Philadelphia Ledger. Out of sax hundred! > Why all Newsdealers in Great Britain, The International News Company, Bream’s Ballding, Chancery Lane, London, E.C., England, AgENts, Established 1860 EvANS’ =a WHISKEY £ | Esterbrook’s Th 5 All ' If you want the best, Steel Pens at S you want Evans’. If you get Evans’) you get the best. aa ale The Best Pens Made CHICAGO’S THEATER TRAIN—11.30 P M.—NEW YORK CENTRAL. comicbooks.com