1931: You can fool some of the people some of the time
The snooty sales assistant is demonstrating one of the basic tenets of salesmanship. If you have a weak case just assert the opposite of the truth with utter conviction. It often works particularly if you are dealing with a customer lacking in confidence like the one pictured here.
The fountain pen argument is irrelevant. The owner of a fountain pen does not need an inkwell. The pen will be refilled when necessary straight out of the inkbottle. For the old-fashioned person who needs an inkwell the general popularity of fountain pens is totally irrelevant whereas the amount of ink that it can hold is the only issue.
There is no feeling of nostalgia in my mind when thinking about inkwells. Instead it brings back memories of the classroom with an inkwell fitted into each desk. It was the duty of the ink monitor to keep each inkwell replenished every day. We had those pens with wooden handles and steel nibs. The trick was to get exactly the right amount of ink onto the nib. Then I needed to place the nib onto the paper at exactly the right angle. After that it was important to press the pen down with the right amount of force. Too little and what you wrote wasn’t legible. Too hard and you got a blot and you could even ruin the nib when it became ‘crossed’. For a clumsy schoolboy like me these were all obstacles in the way of producing the neat handwriting that was desired.
All this changed for the better when I was given a fountain pen as a birthday present. This was the 1940s technological equivalent of the mobile phone for today’s youngsters. Refilling it was easy and involved no mess. Now at last I could concentrate on the words instead of the messy business of using the old technique.
H.M. Bateman’s cartoons are legendary. His trademark is that ‘the man’ outrages everyone in sight as in this example. The same basic idea is repeated time and time again in different settings. Often Bateman manages to find new twists to the theme and he obviously achieved great popularity.
Here he shows other lawyers reacting with utter astonishment at the barrister’s lapse. He himself can’t understand what made him do it. The judge’s face has turned so red that his wig has leapt into the air. Even the witness knows that a serious blunder has been committed. She tries to hide the smirk on her face since she knows she shouldn’t be doing it.
Thank you all for your kind remarks. I wonder if someone might like to comment on future postings. I must admit that is why I originally placed this thread in the Discussions section. Still, it is quite in order to make observations here. You might want to discuss issues raised by the current joke. This has been the case in another place. You might want to disagree with something that I have said. Honestly, I won’t mind.
1931: Snobbery Among the ‘Lower Orders’
The between maid (or tweeny) was a very lowly member of the household staff. She was ‘between’ in the sense that she could be called upon by both the butler and the cook.
In this cartoon Leighton indicates that being called ‘comrade’ by such a lowly servant is an insult to his self-important status, of which his body language speaks volumes. This is certainly plausible but it is also true that the upper classes found some comfort in the intense snobbery shown by their servants.
Both the old couple had formed their ideas during Queen Victoria’s lifetime. They are shocked at the sight of the tennis player’s arms. For our part we consider him quite elegantly turned out. However, the cigarette that he is lighting will have seemed quite normal to everyone in the picture but it startles us.
Smoking or not, I can’t help noticing how slim fit and happy everyone seems to be, the only ones with a bit of extra flesh seem to be the older and probably wealthier figures, jealous of the youth then as many still are today.
Children overhear many things and in play reveal how much or how little they have understood, as in this case. On other occasions they innocently give away things that their parents would prefer to remain within the family.
The term ‘literary lion’ has long since disappeared from English language usage. By 1931 it had already been in use for a considerable period of time. In the Pickwick Papers Dickens referred to it when naming the absurd Mrs Leo Hunter, thus pleasing those of his readers who knew that the Latin word for ‘lion’ was ‘leo’.
The cartoon is, of course, an exaggeration but not very far from reality. The slightest utterance from the ‘lion of the moment’ would be treated as both profound and original. This phenomenon is still with us today though the object of such admiration is not likely to be a mere writer of books.
They didn’t have muggers in the 1930s for the simple reason that they were called footpads. This is a term that goes back to the seventeenth century and was apparently used to distinguish them from their mounted fellow criminals, the highwaymen.
For the cartoon to appear I imagine that this crime was common enough at the time. The cartoonist has injected some humour into this scene. The footpad obviously doesn’t know the name of the victim who is making it clear that he is not going to resist.
Patronisingly the thief is giving ‘Horace’ the sort of advice that his Saville Row tailor might be giving him. Naturally real footpads didn’t talk like that any more than today’s muggers would. Hence the joke.
Evidently the fashion gurus had decreed that women should wear their hats at the back of their heads. And, of course, they all wore hats. It looks quite charming. The men are shown as copying and jolly silly they look, too. And, of course, they also all wore hats.
Obviously the men wouldn’t follow suit and the women would go on as they were until the next ‘latest thing’ was announced.
The cartoonist knows his stuff. The furniture, decorations, clothes and body language of the niece are all accurately observed. The aunt is trying to be polite. The uncle would be likely to express himself more directly.
There are two different ways of reading this cartoon.
The first is that the unselfish concern of the lady passenger is being snubbed by the sailor.
The second goes like this. The matelot’s task is seriously dangerous. He needs all his concentration to maintain his toehold on the ship’s side – and that is not a figure of speech. He does not need the distraction of dealing with the paying passenger’s silly question and he is in no position to give her the reassurance that she seeks. In truth she is not unselfishly caring about the man but rather more selfishly asking for permission not to have to worry thereby making him less safe than he was before her intervention. This makes the rather gentle reproof quite understandable
I can’t be certain but I suspect that we are intended to accept the first interpretation whereas I certainly prefer the second.
Re. Danger at Sea. I would agree with you Mr. Magoo and prefer the second explanation. Having someone come behind me and ask a silly question when I’m fully concentrating on what I’m doing is not only annoying but can be dangerous, especially when I have a blowtorch in one hand and a crucible of molten precious metal in the other.
1931: The need to display one’s wealth at all times
The bulk of Punch’s readers, although ‘comfortable’, would not have been anything like as rich as the woman being pilloried here. It annoys her that her money doesn’t entitle her to special treatment in the mere matter of sitting on a deck chair.
People in the 1930s were not ready for inclusivity and multi culturalism. This cartoon is typical of British attitudes at the time to foreigners.
I must confess that I don’t remember having met the word ‘dragoman’ before. Apparently it means ‘an interpreter chiefly of Arabic, Turkish, or Persian employed especially in the Near East.’ The background (such as it is) to the drawing suggests a Middle Eastern country. Egypt was a popular tourist destination at the time and is therefore a likely candidate.
I don’t suppose that the cartoonist meant us to believe that an actual dragoman would have said this. The point of the cartoon is to emphasise the irritating persistence of poor people trying to make some sort of a living out of rich foreigners.
This ne’er-do-well is accustomed to finding himself facing the forces of law and order. On this occasion he fancies that he has the opportunity to hit out by taunting the magistrate for having failed in his intention of becoming a judge. He could not be expected to know that magistrates almost always serve in a part- time capacity by virtue of being ‘distinguished’ members of the local community.
This is all true but the joke as far as readers of Punch concerned was the ignorance of the lower orders.
