The Wasp, 1918 · page 165 of 330
The Wasp — 1918 — page 165: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This is a **narrative fiction excerpt**, not a political cartoon or satirical commentary—it's a serialized adventure story about a naval pursuit. The passage describes an encounter between two ships: a white schooner pursuing a damaged vessel (apparently called the "Black Polly," associated with someone named "Hellfire Hicks"). The white schooner's crew arms themselves with weapons and mocks the crippled ship's failed escape attempts. The focus shifts to **James Burnham**, a crew member characterized as morally unmoored—he arms himself with a cutlass he previously used to wound someone named Stanton on Nevis. The narrator emphasizes his lack of remorse or compassion, describing him as driven by bloodlust and believing "the world was against him." Without seeing the magazine's cover, publication date, or broader context, **we cannot identify this as satire of specific political figures or events**. It appears to be dramatic adventure fiction typical of late 19th-century periodicals, focusing on themes of naval conflict and ruthless ambition.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
156 THE WASP 4 Orders were shouted aboard the white schooner. Men raced along the deck with glowing faces and hair-raising jokes. It was said by some one that the crippled schooner was Hellfire Hicks’s Black Polly. Guns were uncovered and manned by their crews. Pistols and cutlasses and pikes were brought from below. The cripples showed feeble but anxious signs of life. Headsails were run up on the listed schooner, and the heavy-headed brig madea patch or two of sail and moved sluggishly before the wind. The men of the white schooner laughed at the brig’s efforts to escape, set their curved hands to their mouths, and bellowed words of ironic encouragement and advice across the brightening sea. “She'll sail to the bottom on that course,’ said one. ‘ Hope she don’t dive afore we a her bones ! ” James Burnham strapped a cutlass about his waist and brought from his berth in the fore- -castle the long, straight blade with which he had wounded Stanton on the sands of Nevis. He felt a lust for conflict and a thirst for blood untouched by any sense of remorse, pity, or compunction. The world was against him, his own people were against him, and fate itself —God Comicsooks.corn |