The Wasp, 1918 · page 162 of 330
The Wasp — 1918 — page 162: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page contains **narrative fiction**, not a political cartoon. It's an excerpt from a sea adventure story featuring a character named Burnham, apparently a naval officer observing a distant naval battle in darkness. The passage describes Burnham detecting signs of combat at sea—distant sounds of gunfire ("small arms") and physical evidence suggesting two ships engaged in close combat ("fastened in the deathgrip"). The narrator speculates the combatants might be English and French vessels, though suspects they're "some craft of their" side instead. The text is pure adventure fiction employing vivid sensory language (sounds of sails, gunfire echoes, smell of pipe smoke). Without additional context about *The Wasp*'s publication date or the story's title, the specific historical naval conflict referenced remains unclear—it could reference various Anglo-French naval engagements from the 18th-19th centuries. This is **not satire**, but rather serialized dramatic fiction typical of period magazines.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
THE WASP 153 sea. He heard the indolent, hollow flap of an empty headsail, the whispering effort of the big mainsail trying to hold the elusive breeze, the patter of reef-points, and the spatter and sob of the little seas along the side. He heard the fellow at his shoulder breathing heavily and smelled the reek of his pipe. He strained ears and eyes against the dark and distance. _And then he caught it—the ghost of echoes ; and for a fraction of a second his eyes seemed to grasp a spot of red in the gloom. “There!” said the other. ‘Small arms ! Pll report it to the cap’n.” Burnham remained with his hands on the great teakwood rail and watched and listened for another sight or sound of the thing. He caught the muffled, rapping ghost of sound again. His blood quickened. Fighting was going on out there.in the sea gloom beyond a doubt. Perhaps two ships lay side to side, held by the gripping irons, with blood already spilling on deck and rail, with dead men in the scuppers and wounded men crawling to the shelter of mast and companionway. An English ship and a French ship might be - out there, fastened in the deathgrip; but he thought it more likely that some craft of. their comicibooks.com