Puck, 1877-11-21 · page 10 of 16
Puck — November 21, 1877 — page 10: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This satirical comic strip depicts **Otto von Bismarck**, Prussia's Iron Chancellor, as a troubled farmer facing multiple agricultural crises. The captions reference specific contemporary problems: phylloxera destroying vineyards (panel 1), the Colorado beetle and Suez Canal issues (panel 2), cattle disease (panel 3), crop failure (panel 4), and grasshopper plagues (panel 6). The satire equates Bismarck's political/diplomatic challenges to farming disasters—suggesting his various policy failures and international entanglements are uncontrollable like natural calamities. By the final panel, he abandons farming for "diplomatic business again," implying he should return to politics rather than attempting agricultural management. The cartoon appears designed for American readers familiar with both Bismarck's prominence and agricultural concerns of the era.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
FARMER BISMARCK’S TROUBLES. 1. Donner und Blitzen! there's that Phylloxera Mac 2. Worse and worse! that Colorado-Beaconsfield 3. ‘Ten thousand devils! now my cattle have the | Mahoniensis still on those vines, Beetle will gobble up all the vegetation and Egypt, and rinderpest. I may thank Russia for this. the Suez Canal in the bargain, 4. Well, I'll be blowed, if my curn-crop isn't spoilt, 5, ‘This is really tou much—even my best land is uns” 6, “Ohf dear, ob! dear, there won't be a green thing | and has a Turk's head instead of cobis,: dermined by that black moleof a Pope. left now these “grasshopper Communists have” put in j ‘ an ppearance. 8. I think I've had enough of fa the diplomatic business