Life, 1907-04-04 · page 29 of 48
Life — April 4, 1907 — page 29: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page contains two distinct satirical pieces: **Top cartoon:** A domestic comedy about financial waste. A husband complains his wife won't stop spending money on their son Henry—demanding expensive clothes, paint, and improvements. The satire mocks upper-middle-class wives' frivolous spending habits and the tension between spouses over household finances. **"Wealth of Nations" essay:** A darkly cynical commentary on France's declining birth rate. The author argues sarcastically that France shouldn't worry—nations *need* masses of poor, unintelligent people to serve as cannon fodder in wars and cheap labor in peacetime. Quality population is actually *dangerous* because it makes the working classes "too brainy and prosperous and stuck up." This is social Darwinism presented as bitter satire. **"No, No!" joke:** A brief exchange where a man complains that paying alimony to his ex-wife costs him double—mocking divorce's financial burden on men. The page satirizes class attitudes, gender economics, and pseudo-scientific justifications for maintaining poverty.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
“ANOTHER FORTUNE FOR HIM! 1 BOARDED. I SAYS, ‘HENRY, THERE Al NER STAND WHIL HA AND KEEP HIM NICE WHILE I Wealth of Nations RANCE, having discovered, by her last census, that almost fewer people are being born. to her than are dying off, affects to console herself with the reflection that quality is more to be desired than quantity. Nothing could be more fatuous. A great nation has to have multitudes of people who are not much account to take the part of the submerged tenth (or as much larger fraction as may be needful) in times of peace, and in times of war to go forth and die as the fool dieth. The tendency of a dwindling birth-rate is*to make these masses altogether too brainy and prosperous and stuck up. Let us not forget that the survival of the fit is a continuous . YOU, DOLLY, IT AIN'T NO USE. YOU'RE AS BAD AS HENRY, HE WANTS THE BARN NEW- TIMBERS ENOUGH IN THE OLD BARN TO WARRANT IT. S OF PUTTING MORE CAPITAL INTO HIM, DOLLY, JUST KEEP HIM IN CLOTHES AND FEED HIM I CAN DO EVER SO MUCH BETTER FOR YOU WITH THE MONEY.” AP ON A COAT OF PAINT performance. It is written in the order of creation that the fit shall never get done surviving, lest they become rusty, and by that there need always be plenty of those who have no function but to stand round till somebody pushes them off the earth. No, No! BAKER: Do you think itis true that two can live as cheaply as one? Barker: Not much. Since I’ve been paying alimony to Mrs. Barker it has cost me double what it did when she was. my better-half. A REAL elephant does not need a certificate of size. comicbooks.com