Life, 1923-11-29 · page 27 of 38
Life — November 29, 1923 — page 27: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page contains multiple satirical pieces typical of early-20th-century Life magazine: **Top cartoon**: A schoolroom scene where Professor Owl teaches Willie Snake arithmetic. The joke plays on animal characteristics—snakes cannot multiply (reproduce), so Willie struggles with math multiplication. This is a visual pun combining literal and figurative meanings. **"Embarrassment of Riches"**: A sketch about a poor mountaineer family with so many children the mother can't get two daughters ready for school because they must care for the new baby. The irony is that their large family size—traditionally seen as wealth in agrarian communities—becomes a practical burden. **"Embarrassment of Riches" (lower)**: A humorous family dialogue where the father mentions Uncle Jack as "mother's only living relative" at a Thanksgiving party, implying the wife has outlived all her family members—a dark joke about mortality. **Poetry and "Laconics"**: Light philosophical observations including musings on symphony-going (where romantic thoughts about music are interrupted by practical taxi concerns) and witty one-liners about human nature, politics, and gender differences.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
aye Old Professor Owl: 'M GREATLY SURPRISED, WILLIE SNAKE; YOU HAVE BEEN THREE MONTHS AND YET YOU ., YOU KNOW, TEACHE! IN TH Willie: Embarrassment of Riches HE settlement teacher met Mrs. Day, who had the usual extensive mountaineer family, and inquired why the two sirls had not come to school. “Woman,” she replied, “hit don’t seem as if I could get hose girls ready to go. Yer see, the baby this year was Junior: BUT, DAD, YOU SAID THAT WE WERE GOING TO HAVE A LARGE FAMILY PARTY ON THANKSGIVING. Dad: sH!——THERE HE IS. UNCLE JACK MOTHER’S ONLY LIVING RELATIVE. Is YOUR | a) Sy ARRiSsen CADY ARE UNABLE TO MULTIPLY. , I AM ONLY A LITTLE ADDER. On Listening to a Symphony HAT ecstasy is this? What magic wings Beat low beneath those golden flights of Till men and women from the Wheel of Things Are, for one blessed interval, unbound? Life cannot be as bitter as it seems... Mortals are far, far more than earthen clods. The cellos waft me into noble dreams, I wander for a time among the gods. sound, And oh, the final movement! All the pain That seared the master’s soul and broke his heart Is mirrored in its musical despair... Great Scott! When I came in, it looked like rain. I sit up with a reminiscent start, And wonder if that taxi will be there. Laconics T takes two to make a quarrel and three to make it in- teresting. * * * A beaten candidate in politics never knows whether he has a defeat to live down or a moral victory to live up to. * ee A man’s prejudice is mental, a woman’s sentimental. * * * The most fascinating of all things is a secret—provided you don’t know it. comicbooks.com