Life, 1909-11-25 · page 8 of 32
Life — November 25, 1909 — page 8: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page contains two satirical pieces. "The Vocal Class at Jonesville" is a poem mocking women's singing groups, suggesting their voices were unpleasant and their ambitions misguided—a dig at amateur female performers. "A Standstill" discusses government inefficiency, specifically criticizing the Agricultural Department's expanding oversight of "plain people." The accompanying cartoon "Sweet Belles Out of Tune" depicts women voting or participating in civic activities (visible "votes" signs), satirizing women's political engagement as chaotic and unharmonious. The satire reflects early-20th-century anti-suffrage and anti-progressive sentiment—mocking both women's public participation and government expansion as ridiculous, excessive, and destabilizing to proper order.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
736 MAIDEN once voice Sang artlessly and clear She sang for friends, She caroled here and there, As if there were no trials, As if there were no care, mother, And then the maid “ took vocal,"? From some one just from France, That she might sing more charmingly And all the world entrance. They told her not to use her voice Till she had trained her lips, Could hold her breath, and stretch herself And balance from her hips. The wand’ring strains of joy were stilled ; The birds that would remain To catch their ecstasy from her Were silent in the lane. But faithfully she “did'’ the scales And shrieked to upper G, But if they asked her for a song She was mad as she could be. ‘Then the other girls “took vocal "’— ‘They learned it “just that way And none of them would deign to sing Without a hint of pay. When Mrs. Slater's baby died— ’Twas pitiful and wrong, The Vocal Class at Jonesville with silvery As happy birds who make so sweet The bloom-time of the year. father, SWEET BELLES OUT OF TUNE Rescucr: YOU'RE ALL RIGHT, OLD MAN; JUST KEEP CooL! They had to have the funeral Without a word of song. Because each girl was going to make A prima donna rare, They couldn't have a concert, Or sociable, or fair Then business it got so dull The young men went away And the girls that studied “ vocal "” Are plain old maids to-day. L. H. Bailey. A Standstill HE supervision of the Government over the plain people is gradually extending. It began apparently with the Agricultural Department, which now ex- erts a sort of motherly interest over every American citizen who has a gar- den. Recently there bas been organized a Forestry Commission, and before Presi- dent Roosevelt went out of office he au- thorized a meeting of delegates from all over the country to look after the in- terests of the helpless children in each community. These are only a few of the national movements—all good. In view of this prevailing fashion why not organize a bureau for of people whose than their ability? For example, Mr. Aldrich rose in the Senate recently and rebuked Senator, Beveridge, who be thought talked over- much. As for himself, he had been studying the tariff for thirty years and felt that he knew something about it Mr. Aldrich is mistaken. But he has become prominent of late because of his part in the so-called tariff revision. He is pointed out as a man of affairs, as a statesman, as one of the nation’s leading men, But he is not this any more than any other statesman—any more, for ex- ample, than Mr. Taft or Mr. Cannon. For it is a great mistake to suppose that the people who are engagea in run- ning the Government are necessarily the ablest men because their positions make them prominent. Voltaire nailed this misconception long ago. As a gen- eral rule our Presidents, our Senators, our Cabinet officers and our Congressmen are men of mediocre ability. A large part of them would not succeed very well at anything else. A business, if it is not run according to economic laws, soon winds up and is put in the hands of a receiver. This never happens to a government. It wor- ries along, the people who are running it sometimes being punished for their faults and sometimes not. suppression reputation is greater comicbooks.com