The Wasp — 1914 — page 18: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

This page from *The Wasp* presents a biographical narrative about James Burnham, son of Sir Walter Burnham, rather than a political cartoon. The text satirizes James as an undisciplined member of the gentry who lacks the "nice sense of honor" expected of his class. The satire catalogs his scandalous behavior: striking a schoolmaster, misconduct at Oxford, a public affair, and shooting at a rival (a magistrate and his own uncle) without warning. The narrative culminates in his being robbed by a highwayman while fleeing to London. The piece mocks both James's recklessness and the contrast between aristocratic pretension and actual conduct—suggesting that despite his family's heraldic traditions (the griffin crest), he represents the moral decline of his social class.