Captain Billy's Whiz Bang, August 1921 · page 35 of 68
Captain Billy's Whiz Bang #23 — page 35: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page from the satirical magazine presents a humorous essay on historical extravagance, specifically ancient Rome's obsession with roses at luxurious banquets. The author catalogs increasingly outrageous examples: Seneca's account of an insomniac so delicate a curled rose petal disturbed him; Romans reclining on rose-covered couches; Cleopatra's legendary banquet for Mark Antony featuring eighteen inches of roses retained by netting on the floor; and Nero's party where roses alone cost $100,000. The satire targets wealthy excess and decadence, implicitly comparing ancient Roman indulgence to contemporary (1920s) American wealth and frivolity. By presenting these historical examples with mock admiration ("Ah, my jeweled buddies"), the author ridicules both ancient and modern pretension—suggesting little has changed in humanity's wasteful pursuit of luxury.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
Captain Billy's Whiz Bang 33 tragic meaning. Seneca speaks of Smyndiride, who could not sleep if one of the rose petals with which his bed was spread, happened to be curled. Cicero alludes to the then prevailing custom among the Romans of reclining at the table on couches covered with roses. Ah, my jeweled buddies there were Adonises in those days! When Cleopatra, the perfumed serpent of the Nile, went into Cilicia to meet Mark Antony, she gave him for several successive days a festival such as the gods themselves would not blush to participate in. She had placed in the banqueting hall twelve couches large enough to hold three guests. Purple tapestry interwoven with gold covered the walls, golden vases admirably executed and enriched with precious stones, stood on a magnificent gold floor. On the fourth day the queen caused the floor of the hall to be covered with roses to the depth of eighteen inches. These flowers were retained in a very fine net to allow the guests to walk over them. Nero, the fiddler of burning Rome and the tyrant par excellence of his day, gave a fete on the gulf of Baiae when inns were established on the banks and ladies of noble blood played hostesses to the occasion, the roses alone costing more than four million of sesterces, or $100,000.