Life, 1917-08-09 · page 13 of 42
Life — August 9, 1917 — page 13: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
**Top Cartoon:** Six soldiers in identical military uniforms stand below, each imagining a different peaceful civilian profession (musician, businessman, blacksmith, waiter, office worker, fencer). The caption reads: "IT ISN'T WHAT YOU USED TO BE—IT'S WHAT YOU ARE TO-DAY." This satirizes WWI-era conscription, mocking how soldiers must abandon their peacetime identities and aspirations for military service. **Bottom Section:** "Close Escapes for Royalty" describes incidents involving Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany, the ex-Czar of Russia, and the King of Romania during WWI. The cartoon shows a book agent pitching to someone, captioned "NOTHING DOWN, AND THE REST OF YOUR LIFE TO PAY FOR IT"—likely satirizing how wartime experiences or memoirs might be monetized by royalty figures facing diminished power post-war.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
“OT ISN’T WHAT YOU USED TO BE—IT’S WHAT YOU ARE To-DAy.” THE BOOK AGENT “ NOTHING DOWN, AND THE REST OF YOUR LIFE TO PAY FoR IT” Close Escapes for Royalty AISER WILHELM of Germany, whose recklessness is well known in military circles, yesterday ordered his bomb-proof portable headquarters to be moved within ten miles of the actual firing. The Crown Prince himself, as hardly ever displayed such un- for all his impetuosity, paralleled dash and valor, The his own bravery that he decorated himself at once with the Iron Cro The ex-Cza was, with difficulty, restrained from seizing a pair of bin- oculars that would have brought the trenches into plain aiser was so thrilled at of Russia, during his last visit to the front, sight His Majesty wept bitterly at- being binoculars. “What is the use of being a C " he cried, “if one cannot watch one’s soldiers being killed?” It was this incident, rumor states, which led him to abdicate prived of the the throne. The King of Rumania is thinking seriously of a new Rumanian offensive. This has given him a furious head- which, however, he is bearing with stoical calm. “I .” he says, “that a king should be an example to his ache, comicbooks.com