The Wasp, 1913 · page 100 of 364
The Wasp — 1913 — page 100: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This appears to be a literary excerpt rather than a cartoon page. It's prose fiction narrating a character named Burnham's strategic calculations about his precarious situation on an island. The passage describes Burnham as a disreputable Englishman with empty pockets, family estrangement, and a "shady reputation" who has ingratiated himself with a governor and his daughter. His plan is opportunistic: exploit their gratitude for three months before damaging information arrives from England. The satirical point targets social climbing and deception—Burnham treats relationships as "high trump cards" in a cynical game, banking on the slow communication across the Atlantic to maintain his fraudulent position. Without seeing accompanying illustrations, the specific political figures or historical references remain unclear, but the text suggests satire of fortune-hunters and social fraud in colonial or maritime settings.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
THE WASP 97 Chance had done well for him, he admitted, but he saw that he could not leave his future entirely in the swift yet fumbling hands of that hysterical goddess. He studied the situation coolly, weigh- ing and pondering in turn the adverse and the fa- vorable conditions. Against him were his empty pockets, his abso- lute lack of expectations, his hopeless estrangement from his family, and his shady reputation in Eng- land. For him, like high trump cards in an other- wise hopeless hand, were the governor and the gov- ernor’s daughter—the grateful and generous old sailor, the grateful and romantic young woman. ~ He had won their gratitude and respect. Very well, then.. He must make the most of this un- fortunate state of affairs while it lasted—in other words, before any communication concerning him could reach the governor from England. Burnham calculated that he would have three months, and perhaps more, of security and consid- eration in the island. Of course, he would not re- ceive any money in reply to his letter to his ficti- Comichooks.com