Life — December 7, 1922 — page 16: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

NCE upon a time, there was a man who did his Christmas shopping early. “There,” quoth he, as he hid the last of his precious bundles in his closet, secure from prying eyes, “that’s over and I can have the whole of November and December to myself.” And so he sat him down each night thereafter in his study with his fa- vorite evening paper, stretched his legs in luxurious ease before a crackling :grate fire and bethought him it wasn’t a bad world after all. On the first night of his new- found freedom, he turned to the fashion page and there, sure enough, was what he sought. He nodded in satisfaction as he noted the lines of the correct sealskin coat depicted thereon, a model of which re- posed in his closet for his wife. He smiled gleefully as his eye strayed LIFE A Fable to the smart dinner frocks which so faithfully illustrated the lines of similar gowns that lay sequestered in their wrappings in his room, await- ing the delighted “Ohs” and “Ahs” of his growing daughters on Christ- mas morn. And then he turned contentedly to the sporting page. There was golf at Sunny Pinehurst, and farther South at Palm Beach the Northern invaders were indulging in their first dip, laved by the warm Gulf Stream. That too had its pleasures, to be sure, but where, he asked him- self, was the incomparable peace of his own home and fireside? His winter task completed, a good pipe and a friendly hearth to greet him and an accumulation of enthralling literature—what more could mortal man ask here below! And again he sighed in perfect contentment. But, lo, along about the second “Don’t you love Christmas, Bobby?” month, he allowed his eye again to stray to the fashion page idly, as one who, having nothing more to ask of life, dwells on its simplicity. And then, aghast, he stared the harder at the illustrations before him. “There is a marked tendency to- ward lengthier models for milady’s coat this Winter,” he read, “as directly opposed to the fashions of the Autumn, while the frocks of yestermonth in all their youthful shortness have given way to the greater dignity of full-grown skirts.” Sorrowfully he put away his pipe and paper, doffed his slippers for goloshes and hied him forth in the rain and sleet to do his shopping all over again. MORAL: The early bird catches the worm but who the dickens wants a worm, anyway? Christmas is fine. But this bein’ good for a week before- hand is the limit.” comicbooks.com