The Wasp, 1918 · page 36 of 330
The Wasp — 1918 — page 36: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page presents a serialized fictional narrative rather than a political cartoon. It depicts a plot of treachery involving characters named Peter Queery and James Burnham. **The Story**: Queery, apparently a hospitable island landowner, befriends Burnham and plies him with rum punch. Burnham awakes drugged and abandoned in an open boat at sea—apparently robbed and deliberately cast adrift as punishment or theft. **The Satire/Social Context**: The passage likely satirizes: - Deceptive hospitality and false friendship among men seeking inheritance or advantage - Colonial-era moral corruption and opportunism - The vulnerability of gentlemen travelers to scheming locals The drowsy, detailed description of Burnham's predicament and the ominous gull suggests melodramatic serial fiction—a format The Wasp may have used to entertain readers while embedding social commentary about dishonesty and betrayal in 19th-century society. Without seeing illustrations or knowing the series' broader arc, specific political targets remain unclear.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
THE WASP 27 longer. [ve found a friend in this young gentle- man—aye, and an heir, like as not. When I like a man, I like him without reservations. That’sme! You know my little place?” “| knows it, sir,” the shipmaster would reply. *¢ The finest estate in that island, ye may lay, to that, sir!” pany At midnight Queery brewed a rum punch of | great potency. James Burnham awoke at noon of the next day with a splitting head, a thick tongue, and a wavering, fainting stomach, and found himself drifting alone in an open: boat. His dazed and aching mind was not able to comprehend the situation immediately. Poisoned!” he muttered at last. “ Dre! Robbed! Cast off—adrift in an open boat!” There were oars, a square of sail-cloth, and a breaker of water in the boat. Burnham spread the piece of sail across the oars and lay down in the patch of shade, too sick to so much as curse Peter Queery. The little boat rode the moderate seas gallantly, smoothly. A snow-white gull appeared, with red eyes and a red beak and wings as sharp and — clean as curved knife-blades, and hung motionless high above the boat, preening the spotless feathers on its breast, riding the invisible tides comichooks.com