The Wasp, 1918 · page 90 of 330
The Wasp — 1918 — page 90: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This appears to be a **text page from a serialized story** rather than a cartoon page. The passage describes a character named Burnham scheming on the island of Nevis. He's writing deceptive letters to his father and to fictional London business agents, planning to disappear within three months before his fraud is discovered. The text emphasizes Burnham's audacity and cunning—he writes his lies "with his tongue in his cheek," displaying the "sardonic squint" for which he becomes "later famous." The narrative notes he won't worry about eventual exposure because he intends to flee. This excerpt likely comes from a serialized satirical novel in *The Wasp* magazine, satirizing either a real colonial swindler or a type of 19th-century con artist common in British colonial territories. The social context involves Nevis (a Caribbean island with British colonial administration) and transatlantic deception schemes.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
THE WASP 81 sideration in the island. Of course, he would not receive any money in reply to his letter to his fictitious agents in London, and so would finally stand exposed before his new friends as a perverter of the truth, at least; but he had strength of mind enough not to let this thought worry him. : Three months are as useful as a year to a man of action. He was determined that whatever his fortune might be at the time, he would be gone from Nevis, before the end of three months. This being the case, he wrote to his father as well as to the non-existent men of business. Burnham’s letter to his father was a master- piece of impudence and fiction: He penned it with his tongue in his cheek and his eyes glinting with those impish and menacing cross-lights which gave him that expression of sardonic squint for which he was later famous. - Both letters departed for England two weeks later, aboard a square-bowed merchantman. The governor sent a whole packet of mail, both official and private, by the same ship. - The social life of Nevis lacked much in extent - but nothing in dash. Government House was _ the hub of it, the governor its head, and le comichooks.com